Illinois Humanities 2022 Holiday Gift Guide

A BOOK FOR YOU, A BOOK FOR INCARCERATED YOUTH

Alyssa Bierce, Senior Manager of Marketing and Communications 
Pilsen Community Books in Chicago offers an easy way to give the gift of reading to a young person in your life, and to a young person incarcerated in Illinois. They’ve partnered with Liberation Library, an organization that provides books to youth in prison to “encourage imagination, self-determination, and connection to outside worlds of their choosing.” Browse their selection of young adult titles and find a book they’ll love. Check out books like A Snake Falls to Earth by Darcie Little Badger, a work of Indigenous futurism and Newbery Honor winner. Then, choose a Liberation Library gift amount here to help put books in the hands of young people experiencing the isolation of incarceration this holiday.

SALMON CROQUETTES

Tia K. Williams, Digital Communications and Technology Systems Manager 
One of my favorite books that I’ve read this year is a novel written by one of our frequent program attendees, Glodean Champion, titled Salmon Croquettes.

It’s a coming-of-age story about a young black girl set in 1965 Los Angeles who is struggling with her identity, family, and the world around her, set against the backdrop of the Watts Riots. I highly recommend this great read!

FOR YOUNG READERS

Morven Higgins, Director of Development and Communications 
Nora Brooks Blakely is an amazing partner of Illinois Humanities and the Gwendolyn Brooks Youth Poetry Awards as well as a playwright, author, and teacher. Nora’s new book, Moyenda and The Golden Heart, is a friendly original folktale that tells the story of Kwanzaa through the journey of a young boy on his way to making things better for his friends and family. Nora’s goal with this beautifully illustrated children’s book is to expand the visibility of Kwanzaa and promote its values and principles.

WATERSHED CAIRNS: THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER NORTH

Joanne Hsu, Grants Programs Manager 
Are you looking for a unique, thought-provoking gift for someone who appreciates art and the environment? Since 2011, artist Libby Reuter and photographer Joshua Rowan, Illinois Humanities grantee partners, have traveled to over 400 locations across the Mississippi-Missouri basin, placing Reuter’s glass cairns in watersheds and photographing them for the book Watershed Cairns: The Mississippi River North. Every glass cairn is strategically placed in a specifically scouted scene of some of the most beautiful and unexpected sites along the upper Mississippi, Missouri, Illinois, and Ohio Rivers. The large-scale, color photographs in this book vividly bring to life the locale and intimately reveal the connections of the people and communities to their local watershed.

GAMES AND MORE

Gabe Lyon, Executive Director
I’ve been giving Chronology as a gift. It is a new favorite board game in which players build timelines with historical event cards. The first person to build a timeline with 10 cards wins. What was invented first: mayonnaise or the invention of electricity? Which happened first: the Magna Carta or the painting of the Sistine Chapel?

MUSIC FROM INTERNATIONAL ANTHEM

Jane Beachy, Artistic Director
International Anthem is a Chicago-born recording company that produces and promotes progressive media. Albums by wildly talented Chicago-based musicians like Black Monument Ensemble and Angel Bat Dawid, both collaborators with Illinois Humanities, will make for meaningful gifts this holiday season! The International Anthem Record Company’s mission is to make positive contributions to the changing state of the music industry, and to vitalize the demand for boundary-defying music by presenting unique sounds in appealing packages to untapped audiences.