Who’s Got The Power?

Unlike the Harvard-student relationship, Harvard-faculty couples are a never-ending source of interest. Whether they rule the economics department, add to Eliot House life, or combine various interests to promote human rights, these Harvard “Power Couples” are the apples of our eyes. So, in honor of Valentine’s Day, FM brings you an inside look at the lives of these faculty celebs.

Homi Bhaba & Jacqueline Bhaba

“I never really thought of myself as being part of a power couple,” says Jacqueline Bhabha, executive director of the University Committee on Human Rights Studies. “It probably applies more to the Clintons or something.”

While Jacqueline and her husband, Humanities Center Director Homi K. Bhabha, may not be getting as much press as Hillary and Bill, the two have established a presence both on—and off—campus as a couple dedicated to the study and safeguarding of human rights.

After meeting as undergrads at the University of Oxford, raising a family in England, and working at the University of Chicago, the couple arrived in Cambridge in 2001. In addition to running their respective organizations, the couple brings their enthusiasm to the classroom, teaching courses ranging from Homi’s class on postcolonial literature and cultural citizenship to Jacqueline’s classes in human rights and refugee law. Though they tackle the issue from different angles, it’s this shared passion for rights that makes the duo tick.

“[Jacqueline] is less interested in my literary pursuits,” says Homi.

“[Homi’s] much more theoretical than I am, and I tend to be much more on the ground,” adds Jacqueline.

The overlap of their interests and engagements, as well as their son’s enrollment at Harvard Law School, can often send dinner conversations into a Crimson overload. In fact, the couple has instated a “Two-Minute Harvard Rule,” requiring non-university topics to take precedence after the unavoidable two minutes of Ivory Tower chatter.

“Your perspective can narrow because both of you work in the same institution and maybe spend too much time thinking about it,” says Homi. “Then the two-minute rule goes into operation.”

The couple enjoys the benefits of working together in academia, whether it comes in the form of their increased understanding and involvement in each others’ work, or their long summers abroad. Both agree that only here can this co-working environment be possible. Had they stayed in Europe, the lack of “resources and flexibility would have made [the current situation] much harder,” says Jacqueline.

But Jacqueline also notes the high stress and inconsistent daily routine as downsides of their academic lifestyles—cons that were particularly evident when raising their three children.

After hours, the couple loves to entertain, holding dinner parties for colleagues in their Cambridge home. “There’s nothing nicer than friends around a table, sitting in the glow of candles, their cheeks turning ruddy after several glasses of wine, their temperaments turning mellow after a good duck…” muses Homi.

Inside Harvard’s ivy-covered gates, the couple is on the same high-up rang of the academic ladder, but it’s a different story in the kitchen: “[Homi’s] the cook,” Jacqueline insists. “I’m basically the sous chef.”

Lino Pertile & Anna Bensted

As Eliot House Masters for the past eight years, Lino Pertile and his wife Anna Bensted have certainly made their presence known on Harvard’s campus. Pertile, the Carl A. Pescosolido Professor of Romance Languages and Literatures, is a renowned Dante scholar, and Bensted works at the National Public Radio affiliate in Boston. However, they refrain from dubbing themselves a “power couple.”

“I do find that expression rather loaded,” says Pertile. “We are very, very involved as a couple in the life of the undergraduates. But I do consider it a form of service that we give to the community.”

A legacy is already emerging from this service. A few years ago, Pertile and Bensted commissioned an Eliot House song to be written and an American Idol-esque competition emerged. Ever since residents voted and chose the winning lyrics in the dining hall, singing the song at dinner has become a classic Eliot tradition.

“It really got into the DNA of the student population,” says Bensted. “When it was sung outside down by the River in the courtyard, we could hear the waft of the lyrics of the Eliot House song.”

Though they have 400 binge-drinking students as neighbors, the couple feels that their experience as masters has been overwhelmingly positive, even if there are a few drawbacks.

“Maybe the fire alarms at 4 a.m.,” Bensted cites as one of the cons. “And everyone sees you in your pajamas. You wouldn’t wish that.”

Predictably, the couple’s arrangements for Valentine’s Day involve Eliot House. “Love poetry” has graced the tables of the dining hall and the two will be watching a performance of Shakespeare in Love—in Eliot.

According to Pertile, if you want love, you needn’t look further than Eliot House. Need proof? Couples “go up the tower to pop the question,” says Pertile. “We’ve already seen babies that have come out of Eliot House marriages.”

Guido W. Imbens & Susan Athey

The prospect of living in the same house as someone is daunting to some. But for Professors of Economics Guido W. Imbens and Susan Athey, the home-life proximity was so rewarding that when they transferred to Harvard from professorial positions at Berkeley and Stanford, respectively, they chose offices right next door to one another.

And it’s this proximity that has defined the Ec power couple’s relationship—starting with their meeting at University of California, Los Angeles, where Athey was giving a talk, which Imbens drove across the traffic-laden city to attend.

“[Imbens] drove all the way across Los Angeles to hear me speak at UCLA, which made me a little suspicious because it was outside his area,” says Athey. “He still hasn’t confessed whether it was academic or other interests that drew him across the city.”

These two academics spent time together in California, Athey working at Stanford and Imbens at Berkeley, until the commute for Imbens became too much to handle with a young family at home—thus the move across the country to a home in Cambridge and side-by-side Littauer mezzanine offices.

However, the physical proximity is not the only perk of the Harvard workplace that the couple cites.

“The flexibility and similarity of scheduling helps a lot,” maintains Imbens. “If one of the spouses is a lawyer or some executive type, then it would be much harder to accommodate an academic schedule.”

“That’s the only possible way that I could continue to have my career continue at the level it currently is at and giving my kids their fair shake,” adds Athey. And her career certainly is at a high level—she became the first woman to win the prestigious John Bates Clark Medal in 2007.

But the twosome’s life is not just academic. One of Imbens’ favorite memories is of standing in Rome on vacation in 2000 where “Susan particularly impressed me because she could recite the entire lines of Mark Antony from [Julius] Caesar standing next to the Ceaser Temple,” muses Imbens.

A memory which fueled the idea for his Valentine’s gift to her—tickets for two to see a American Repertory Theatre showing of… “Julius Ceasar.”