Editors' Choice
Do We Have the Right To Read?
“Do we, as a society, have an ethical obligation to create safe spaces and boundaries for particular groups of people?” asks Jocelyn Kennedy, one of the curators of the Harvard Law School library exhibit, “Challenging Our Right to Read.”
Acid and Cake at the Death Cafe
Death Cafe provides an opening, if imperfect, for inquiry about finding meaning with or without religiosity.
How Not to Be a Big Sister
Looking back, I realized that because I had tried to be the perfect long-distance sibling, I had turned myself into someone unrelatable and distant. I thought that because they looked up to me, I should only show the parts of myself that were worth admiring. Instead, I wondered if the best thing I could do for them was to be totally honest.
The Early Days of YouTube
YouTube wasn’t a public part of my personality — it was more of a shameful love affair.
Exploring Neurospirituality with Michael Ferguson
To Michael Ferguson, contemplating spirituality in both the chapel and the laboratory makes his experience of religion more rich.
For Linguistics Influencer Adam V. Aleksic ’23, Language is Political
One of the Internet’s first and only “linguistics influencers,” Aleksic, who works under the handle @etymologynerd, spends his time post-graduation traveling the world and creating videos about etymology for an audience of over 1.3 million across TikTok and Instagram.
Daye: A Woman Who Untangles Roots
To this day, hearing her switch between languages — her mother tongue, Sorani Kurdish, and Arabic — reminds me of the melding of cultures I’ve always hoped to embody. Yet I find myself replying to her in Arabic. Mama longed for me to learn Kurdish, but I was pressured to embrace my Arab half at the expense of my mother’s tongue.
Jazz Jennings is in Her Self-Care Era
Jazz Jennings’s reality TV show “I Am Jazz” aimed to increase trans visibility by showing she “was just a normal girl going through life, who just happened to be trans.” Now, Jazz is just a normal Harvard student, who also happens to make mermaid tails.
The Editorial Board's Guide to The 2024 Board of Overseers Election
A Guide to the 2024 Harvard Board of Overseers Election
Venn Diagram: My Spring Break Trip to Cordoba, The Four Shops in the Square That Sell Boba
I felt more cultured after going the first time.
Good Grief
Some people honor their deceased loved ones with beautiful poetry, speeches of somber remembrance, or quiet moments of reflection. I honored my grandmother with a three minute stand up set.
Maia Ramsden on Pro-Running, Pacific Poetry, and Y2K fashion
When Ramsden leaves Harvard for the real world, she’s planning to be a professional runner. I ask her what she’ll miss most. “I think I’ll miss being super busy, even though it’s hard to imagine right now,” she says. “That’s what everyone’s telling me anyway.”
Through Oral History, Students Listen to the Silences
“Memory changes because life experience has changed, but so does the language and ideas available for someone through which to understand that experience,” says Professor Katie Holmes. “Meaning is always individual and cultural, therefore, it is historically located.”
Getting to Know Sungjoo Yoon, the Datamatch Leaker
Sungjoo Yoon ’27 became a campus celebrity when he leaked a list of Rice Purity Test scores from freshmen’s private Datamatch profiles. But despite his newfound celebrity status, Yoon doesn’t see himself as the infamous “Datamatch Leaker.”
Entrepreneurial Academia with Gary King
Professor and serial entrepreneur Gary King argues that his frequent traversal of the boundaries between academia and industry is “not a double life.” Rather, they’re just different facets of the same job — and, if anything, that back-and-forth “helps both.”
Allston Is Gentrifying, but Harvard Isn’t To Blame
Harvard owns 360 acres of land in gentrifying Allston, but is it actually shaking up the economic landscape?
‘Going Viral’ with Wesley Wang
Wang’s last film gained 3.7 million views on YouTube in the span of a few months. “You never expect anything to go viral,” he says, “although I did know for a fact this one was going to do better than my other ones.”
At Vilna Shul, Shabbat is a Big Dill
With national attention trained on Harvard the past few months, engaging in Jewish spaces on campus has felt like more of a political endeavor. Pickle-making, gimmicky in all the right ways, was enough to get us out the door.
Harvard Must Learn Its Lesson. Institutional Neutrality Is Step One.
As an editorial board that has criticized the University for failing to make these statements more than perhaps any other entity, we mean it when we now say: It is time for Harvard to turn off the megaphone.
Fifteen Questions: Arthur M. Kleinman on Caregiving, Field Research in China, and His Love Story
A professor of anthropology of over 40 years, Kleinman studies patient-caregiver relationships in Asia. “I had the personal experience of taking care of my late wife, Joan, for 10 and a half years while she suffered from early onset Alzheimer’s disease and died from it,” he says. “That experience was transformative for me. I thought I knew everything about illness and care. I realized that I had a hell of a lot to learn. What is it to take care of someone who you love with a terrible disease?”
Pedal to the Metal at Cabot’s Quad Bikes
“Having someone walk in with a broken bike and walk out with a fixed bike — there are few things I've done at this university that have made people so instantly happy,” says Quad Bikes manager Julian K. Li ’25.
Other People’s Pups
At the end of the day, I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking to pet his dog.
Hacking Harvard Bridge with Oliver R. Smoot
As a pledge, the fraternity made Smoot lay down on the bridge over 300 times, painting ticks at each smoot. Almost 70 years later, the Smoot markings remain, allowing pedestrians to measure their journey in “smoots.” According to a sign on the bridge, Cambridge and Boston are exactly 364.4 smoots apart.
To Pay Attention
I never thought I loved Chico. But that December day as I lay curled up in my childhood bed watching the interaction between Christine and Sister Joan on my iPad, I realized that I had paid attention to it. And if I really hated it, why did I spend so much time telling other people about it?