The Northern Arizona University Honors College will host Joy Harjo, the 23rd United States poet laureate, for a poetry reading and book signing on Wednesday, March 18 at 7 p.m. in Prochnow Auditorium. The ticketed event, part of the Nackard Family Honors Distinguished Speaker Series, is free and open to the public.
The internationally renowned writer and performer from the Muscogee Nation will read selections of her poetry and sign her books for audience members after the performance.
Harjo was the first Native American to ever be named U.S. poet laureate, serving three terms from 2019 to 2022. Harjo’s work has made a profound impact on the national literary landscape, blending poetry, music and storytelling to explore themes such as identity, history and resilience. She has authored 11 books of poetry, including her breakout book “She Had Some Horses,” released in 1983, and the highly acclaimed “Sundown in a Scarlet Light: Fifty Poems for Fifty Years.” In addition to poetry, Harjo has written two memoirs and a number of plays, children’s books and nonfiction works. Harjo is also a musician and has produced seven award-winning albums.
Among other honors, Harjo has been awarded a National Humanities Medal, the Poetry Society of America’s Frost Medal, the Bollingen Prize for American Poetry, the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Honors College Dean Kevin Gustafson said Harjo was a natural choice for NAU, where scholarship on Native American culture, heritage and history abounds. The university is home to more than 2,000 Native American students representing some 90 tribes throughout the U.S., a Department of Applied Indigenous Studies, a Center for Native American and Indigenous Futures, an Office of Native American and Indigenous Advancement and a plethora of Indigenous faculty and staff who support teaching and learning across NAU’s 20+ locations throughout Arizona.
“The NAU Honors College is grateful to our sponsors and numerous campus partners for making this event possible,” Gustafson said. “The Nackard Family Honors Distinguished Speaker Series is dedicated to bringing important voices to the NAU campus and greater Flagstaff community, and few voices are as important—or distinctive—as that of poet laureate Joy Harjo.”
Harjo will perform on Wednesday, March 18, at 7 p.m. in Prochnow Auditorium on the NAU campus. A book signing will follow the performance. The event is free and open to the public, but tickets are required and can be reserved on the NAU website.
Jill Kimball | NAU Communications
(928) 523-2282 | jill.kimball@nau.edu