Fall 2020 Big Read
October-November 2020 | Humboldt County, California
"The world is wrong. You can't put the past behind you. It's buried in you; it's turned your flesh into its own cupboard."
"because white men can't
police their imagination
black men are dying"
Claudia Rankine, Image Courtesy of Blue Flower Arts
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What Is the "Big Read"?
The National Endowment for the Arts Big Read is an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest. The main feature of the NEA Big Read is a grants program, managed by Arts Midwest, which annually supports community reading programs, each designed around a single NEA Big Read book. About the Book
Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric recounts mounting racial aggressions in ongoing encounters in twenty-first-century daily life and in the media. Some of these encounters are slights, seemingly slips of the tongue, and some are intentional offensives in the classroom, at the supermarket, at home, on the tennis court with Serena Williams and the soccer field with Zinedine Zidane, online, on TV—everywhere, all the time. The accumulative stresses come to bear on a person’s ability to speak, perform, and stay alive. Our addressability is tied to the state of our belonging, Rankine argues, as are our assumptions and expectations of citizenship. In essay, image, and poetry, Citizen is a powerful testament to the individual and collective effects of racism in our contemporary, often named “post-race” society. Read More. Finalist for the 2014 National Book Award in Poetry
Winner of the 2014 National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry Finalist for the 2014 National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism Winner of the 2015 PEN Open Book Award Winner of the 2015 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award in Poetry |
Thank you to the following community partners for the 2020 Big Read: Humboldt County
From Humboldt State University: University Library; Campus/Community Dialogue on Race; Multicultural Center; African American Center for Academic Excellence; College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; Department of Critical Race, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Department of English; El Leñador; Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; Office of Research & Sponsored Programs; Provost's Office / Academic Affairs; HSU Osher Lifelong Learning Institute.
Additional partners and sponsors include: College of the Redwoods (CR), CR Multicultural & Diversity Center, Humboldt County Public Library, City of Eureka, Humboldt County Office of Education Equity Summit, Equity Alliance of the North Coast, Humboldt Area Foundation, Redwood Curtain Theater, Arcata Playhouse Community Arts Center, KEET-TV.
From Humboldt State University: University Library; Campus/Community Dialogue on Race; Multicultural Center; African American Center for Academic Excellence; College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences; Department of Critical Race, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Department of English; El Leñador; Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; Office of Research & Sponsored Programs; Provost's Office / Academic Affairs; HSU Osher Lifelong Learning Institute.
Additional partners and sponsors include: College of the Redwoods (CR), CR Multicultural & Diversity Center, Humboldt County Public Library, City of Eureka, Humboldt County Office of Education Equity Summit, Equity Alliance of the North Coast, Humboldt Area Foundation, Redwood Curtain Theater, Arcata Playhouse Community Arts Center, KEET-TV.
