Nina Davuluri facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Nina Davuluri
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Davuluri at the White House Forum on Minorities in Energy, November 2013
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| Born | April 20, 1989 |
| Education | University of Michigan (B.S. in Brain Behavior and Cognitive Science, 2011) |
| Occupation | Speaker and advocate |
| Title | Miss Southwest Michigan's Outstanding Teen 2005 Miss Michigan's Outstanding Teen 2006 Miss Greater Rochester 2012 Miss Syracuse 2013 Miss New York 2013 Miss America 2014 |
| Beauty pageant titleholder | |
| Major competition(s) |
Miss America's Outstanding Teen 2007 (first runner-up) Miss America 2014 (winner) |
Nina Davuluri (born April 20, 1989) is an American public speaker, advocate, and beauty queen who hosts the reality show Made in America on Zee TV America from Manhattan.
As Miss America 2014, she became the first Indian American contestant to win both the Miss New York followed by the Miss America Competition. She is also the second Asian American to be crowned Miss America.
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Early life and education
Davuluri was born on April 20, 1989, in Syracuse, New York, into a Telugu family from India. Her mother is an Information technology specialist, her father was a gynecologist, and her sister is a doctor. When she was six weeks old, Davuluri was brought to live with her grandmother and aunt in Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh. She stayed there until she was two-and-a-half years old, when her parents brought her back to the United States, returning to India each summer in order to study Indian dance. She is also fluent in Telugu.
Davuluri moved to Oklahoma when she was four years old. She lived there until she was 10, next moving to St. Joseph, Michigan. This period of her life would become the foundation for her future Miss American platform, "Celebrating Diversity Through Cultural Competency," as its goal is to confront bullying by actively learning to talk about diversity in an open and respectful way.
As a child, Davuluri studied ballet, tap, and jazz dance, and was later in the St. Joseph High School, where she participated in the marching band, played varsity tennis, and was on the Science Olympiad team. She graduated from St. Joseph in 2007, the same year that her parents moved to Fayetteville, New York. She chose to stay in Michigan, however, first beginning college at Michigan State University, and later transferring to the University of Michigan, where she was a Sigma Kappa/Alpha Mu, was on the Dean's List, and received Michigan Merit and National Honor Society Awards. She graduated in 2011 with a B.S. in brain behavior and cognitive science. She then moved back in with her family in New York, where she took nine pre-med courses at Le Moyne College. Halfway through her tenure as Miss America, however, she announced that she would not be applying to medical school.
Miss Michigan's Outstanding Teen and Miss New York
At the age of 16, Davuluri became interested in beauty pageants after her sister Meena won the title of Miss St. Joseph. As she was too young to enter local pageants, Davuluri became involved with Miss America's Teen division in Michigan, where she also learned that she could earn scholarship money for college. She won the Miss Southwest Michigan's Outstanding Teen 2005 pageant, followed by the Miss Michigan's Outstanding Teen 2006 pageant, and was first runner-up at the Miss America's Outstanding Teen 2007 pageant. After winning nearly $25,000 in scholarship money, she stopped competing for a few years and focused instead on her undergraduate education. After graduating from the University of Michigan, Davuluri returned to competing in pageants in order to fund graduate school. In 2012, as a New York resident, she won the title of Miss Greater Rochester 2012, and was named second runner-up in the Miss New York 2012 pageant.
Davuluri tried again the following year and won the title of Miss Syracuse 2013. She was then crowned Miss New York 2013. Davuluri has spoken publicly about her belief that "you don't need to be a certain size to be healthy".
Miss America
Davuluri, the first Indian American to win the Miss America pageant (and the second Miss New York in a row), held the title of Miss America 2014 from September 15, 2013, to September 14, 2014. In doing so, she followed in the footsteps of a previous Miss Syracuse/Miss New York, Vanessa Williams, who (as Miss America 1984) was the first African American winner of the pageant. She is also the second Asian American contestant to be crowned Miss America (the first was Filipino American Angela Perez Baraquio in 2001).
Drawing on her background in Kuchipudi and Bharatanatyam, Davuluri danced to the song "Dhoom Taana" from the film Om Shanti Om for her talent performance. Her routine, the first time Bollywood appeared on the Miss America stage, was developed in conjunction with Nakul Dev Mahajan as a fusion of Bollywood and Indian classical dance. After being crowned Miss America, she said that she was told that she was "never going to win with a Bollywood talent so just go back to singing if you are serious about [winning]."
During the final moments of the pageant, one of the hosts, Lara Spencer, approached the only contestants left on the stage, Davuluri and Miss California Crystal Lee and asked them how they were "feeling." Davuluri replied that both she and Lee were "so proud. We're making history right here, standing here as Asian-Americans." She later described that part of the pageant as "very surreal."
I really wanted to help effect a change in beauty standards . ... Miss America's branding is so associated with the girl next door, which has always meant blonde hair and blue eyes with only a few exceptions, but the girl next door must evolve as the country evolves. When I was younger I wanted to fit in, but I was aware growing up that I didn't fit that mould, and I really wanted to help make a change that meant young girls wouldn't feel like that.
Aftermath
Shortly after she was crowned Miss America 2014, Davuluri became the target of xenophobic and racist commentary in American social media. The news media compared this response to the backlash against Vanessa Williams after she became Miss America 1984. Congresswoman Grace Meng additionally linked Davuluri's experience to the antisemitism that Jewish American Bess Myerson faced as Miss America 1945. Davuluri later said that she was prepared for the social-media response because she faced a similar situation a few months earlier when she was crowned Miss New York.
Some responded to the backlash in a show of solidarity with Davuluri. Students at Duke University, and with Yale University's Asian American Cultural Center and the South Asian Society, created videos and ran photo campaigns denouncing the social media attacks, while Miss Kansas Theresa Vail blogged and gave interviews to discredit the comments about both herself and Davuluri. Actor and civil-rights activist George Takei (the original Hikaru Sulu in Star Trek) posted a comment on Facebook stating that while he normally doesn't "care about Miss America ... the uproar over an Indian-American winning (whom many decried for being 'Arab') has me shaking my head. Please tell me I'm not alone in wondering whether we've learned anything at all." University of Michigan student Munmun Khan also stated that while she doesn't like beauty pageants, she hates "racism and bigotry even more ... Not only was [Davuluri] the first Indian Miss New York, but she is now also the first Indian Miss America. All cause for celebration." Finally, Immediate Past President, Young Democrats of America, Atima Omara, argued that "a sexist, racist, xenophobic attack against one prominent woman of color is an attack against us all, and it shouldn't be tolerated just because we disdain that woman's choices. As an African-American woman with an ethnic name, I know the constant sting that comes from hearing how you are not American enough no matter how much you accomplish in the name of America."
Platform
During her year as Miss America, Davuluri promoted her platform "Celebrating Diversity Through Cultural Competency" and STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education to high-school and college students. She elaborated on her platform in a Yale University talk as one using social media as a form of activism. Describing it as "Circles of Unity", she encouraged students to view social media as a tool to spread cultural awareness and combat ignorance.
She also met with President Barack Obama for the Children's Miracle Network Hospital Champions at the White House.
Speaker and advocate
Since completing her year as Miss America in September 2014, Davuluri has worked as a public speaker and advocate for diversity, gender equality, and the promotion of STEM education. In this capacity, she has spoken in both political and diplomatic venues. In September 2014, she shared the stage with PBS' NewsHour Weekend anchor Hari Sreenivasan as hosts for a Madison Square Garden talk by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. She also participated in the 2015 Global Entrepreneurship Summit Youth and Women Day in Nairobi in July 2015. About a year later, Davuluri traveled to Mumbai, Hyderabad, and Vijayawada as part of an official March 2016 tour for the U.S. State Department to discuss women's education. Part of this tour focused on events connected with International Women's Day (including a talk for the Asia Society).
Davuluri continues to speak on the subjects of diversity and STEM at college campuses. In an October 2014 East Carolina University talk, she discussed the harassment she faced during her childhood." The following month, she spoke on women in STEM at Northeastern University. In March 2015, she spoke at Harvard's "Side by Side" gender-equality campaign. Later in the same month, she discussed the subject of diversity at Princeton.
Other accolades
- India Abroad Face of the Future Award 2014: India Abroad, June 19, 2015, M69-M82.
- Elected trustee to the Miss America Foundation Board in February 2015 (the first Miss America elected to the board).
- In August 2014 fashion designer Tony Bowls announced that he designed a shoe, "The Nina," in her honor.
See also
- Indians in the New York City metropolitan area
