NEA Big Read Massillon 2022

An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo

The 2022 NEA Big Read Massillon book selection is An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo. For fifteen consecutive years, the Massillon Museum has been honored to be awarded the NEA Big Read grant. NEA Big Read is a program of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest.

What is the NEA Big Read program?

The NEA Big Read is a community reading program focused on a single book. Massillon Museum and its amazing community partners create innovative and critical programs highlighting the book themes, exposing participants to new genres and ideas. The selected book is offered to the community for free so that many can participate. Since 2008, Massillon Museum has proudly distributed more than 28,000 books to Massillon and its surrounding communities.

Click here to learn more about this year's book selection from the National Endowment for the Arts and to access discussion questions.

Click here to visit the author's website.

Book Pick-Up Locations

Pick up your free copy of An American Sunrise at the NEA Big Read Massillon Kickoff eventat the Massillon Museum on Saturday, April 2, 2022, and at various locations throughout Stark County following the kickoff! This page will be updated as sites receive their copies of the book.

2022 NEA Big Read Massillon Programs

This page will be updated with additional programs in Massillon, Stark County, and beyond celebrating An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo as the 2022 NEA Big Read Massillon Kickoff approaches!

Saturday, April 2, 2022

2022 NEA Big Read Massillon Kickoff

Massillon Museum

Pick up your free copy of the 2022 NEA Big Read Massillon book selection, An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo.

More information will be available soon!

Thursday, May 5, 2022

Joy Harjo, © Matika Wilbur

2022 NEA Big Read Massillon Keynote with Joy Harjo

Massillon Museum

Join us at the Massillon Museum for the 2022 NEA Big Read Massillon Keynote with Joy Harjo, author of An American Sunrise. More information about this event and registration will become available in the coming months.

In 2019, Joy Harjo was appointed the 23rd United States Poet Laureate, the first Native American to hold the position and only the second person to serve three terms in the role. Harjo’s nine books of poetry include An American Sunrise, Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings, How We Became Human: New and Selected Poems, and She Had Some Horses. She is also the author of two memoirs, Crazy Brave and Poet Warrior, which invite us to travel along the heartaches, losses, and humble realizations of her "poet-warrior" road. She has edited several anthologies of Native American writing including When the Light of the World was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through — A Norton Anthology of Native Nations Poetry, and Living Nations, Living Words, the companion anthology to her signature poet laureate project. Her many writing awards include the 2019 Jackson Prize from the Poetry Society of America, the Ruth Lilly Prize from the Poetry Foundation, the 2015 Wallace Stevens Award from the Academy of American Poets, and the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America. She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, Board of Directors Chair of the Native Arts & Cultures Foundation, and holds a Tulsa Artist Fellowship. A renowned musician, Harjo performs with her saxophone nationally and internationally; her most recent album is I Pray For My Enemies. She lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma.