The Problem with Black History Month
On February 18th, three white students competed on College Jeopardy. In the second half of the show, which, thanks to the Internet, can be viewed on YouTube, the contestants sped through five of the six categories, which included obscure topics such as “Weather Verbs” and “International Cinema Showcase.” For 10 minutes, I waited for any of them to choose a question from the sixth category labeled “African-American History.”
by Lovia Gyarkye on
Dear Metta World Peace
Metta, you don’t know me, but I know you. And I’ve known you. You were an Indiana Pacer from the time I was 10 to 14 and children in Indiana grow up knowing the names of Pacers the way they know the Pledge of Allegiance. But then when I was in sixth grade you almost strangled a fan at a Detroit Pistons’ game and got yourself traded.
by Susannah Sharpless on
Canine Exceptionalism
Are you a dog person or a cat person? The question is laden with meaning. I have never had a pet, but the cat versus dog distinction is one I can understand. It is not about which animal’s wet fur you would prefer to clean up off your couch, but which traits you value the most.
by Emily Lever on
Nothing to Lose But a Leash
On October 5, 2013, The New York Times published an op-ed by Dr. Gregory Berns, a professor at Emory University who concluded from a neurological experiment on man’s best friend that “dogs are people, too.” To examine dogs’ brains and their responses to emotion and perception, Dr. Berns trained them to sit silently still in an MRI scanner.
by Joshua Leifer on
Online Games
According to the charter of the International Olympic Committee, the Olympic Games are held every four years to preserve the integrity of athletics, placing “sport at the service of humanity and thereby to promote peace.” Citizens of different nations come together and interact to strengthen the international community. The original Olympic Games of Athens served a similar function: to improve relations between the different city-states and create a common culture.
by Hadley Newton on
In Memory of Philip Seymour Hoffman
It happens more often than perhaps it should: a celebrity, be it rock star, movie icon, or stud athlete, is upheld on a pedestal for many years during his or her career, only to come crashing down at some shocking revelation that leaves fans disappointed and disenchanted. Sunday, February 4th left me with a similar feeling, when it was proclaimed over various social media outlets that Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman was found dead in his New York apartment with a needle in his arm and significant amounts of heroin in the vicinity.
by Tom Markham on
Girl Talk
Ever since the giddy, popcorn and T. Swift-fueled “Truth” games of seventh grade slumber parties, those two words have become a default response to countless puzzled male faces. From Sex and the City to Gossip Girl, generations of chick flicks and girl-power soap operas reinforce the idea that no crush, no kiss, and no hook up, no matter how “casual” or “on the D-L,” is to be withheld from a girl’s close circle.
by Kat Kulke on
Feeling a Spark
I spent my summer writing bad poetry and reading novels. Self-indulgent, I suppose, and I felt twinges of guilt for not following the ambitious career paths of my fellow classmates, who were off saving poor children in Kenya or studying philosophy in Greece. But after a rather stressful year, it was a relief to sit in my room, in my bed, with my books.
by Hyun Kim on
Reconciling Art and Artist
When I visited the Woody Allen papers before winter break, the allegations against Mr. Allen of sexual abuse had not yet resurfaced. Those accusations, presented by his daughter Dylan Farrow in the New York Times on February 1, have reignited an age-old debate about the relationship between an artist’s personal life and the content of his artwork.
by Alex Costin on
Kicking Upwards
Dads is a TV show on Fox about two young men who are forced through presumably wacky circumstances to live with their fathers, providing us with, if nothing else, some much-needed screen time for the middle class white man. Fifteen episodes of a nineteen episode season have been broadcast so far, and I have watched one, called “Funny Girl.”
by Sophie Parker-Rees on
Waiting for Woody
I entered Alexander Hall, heart pounding, clutching a small spiral notebook and an orange ticket. The narrow, rounded hallway bordering the theater was filled with a labyrinth of lines. I frantically weaved through and approached an usher to ask her where I could wait in order to sit in orchestra seats.
by Lily Offit on
The Plague: A Double Translation
The following passage is adapted from the opening of Albert Camus’ The Plague, which is a description of Oran, a city in French Algeria, in the 1940s. I have translated it into English and into the setting of Princeton in 2013 (office jobs become classwork, going to the movies is replaced by the more common pastime of the Internet and so on), but those are the only changes I believe I have made.
by Emily Lever on