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
This July I was standing in a dusty schoolyard in Nansana, Uganda listening to Icona Pop’s “I Don’t Care” at a party for the NGO where I worked for two months. My stomach was full of a mysterious barbecued meat and the Ugandan equivalent of PBR my boss had purchased for the occasion. I asked my friends who had been cooking what I had just eaten.
by Margaret Spencer on
It is October in Chicago and somewhere in the Susquehanna River a salmon is preparing to die. It has spent the last few years in perpetual transit, wandering the yawning expanse of the Atlantic and its arctic abyssal plains, upstream through currents and wave crests and darkness of unimaginable depth.
by Rachel Stone on
There’s nothing as acutely dissatisfying as the knowledge that somewhere, many people are having sex, and you are not one of them. That’s not the only reason why gay Ivy Leaguers flocked en masse to Princeton for IvyQ, the annual LGBT conference, but it was certainly one of them. IvyQ’s stated mission is to “create a pan-Ivy community of lgbt students and allies equipped with the skills to examine their identities” and “value those of others.” But it is better summed up in the conference’s keynote speech: “Have fun, make friends, and get frisky.”
by Elliott Eglash on
Remember this: it was 1 am and you stumbled through slush, which was stained red by the clay gravel of Prospect Avenue. Somehow you ended up alone, which I think happens to everyone at least once, and which meant you … Read More
by E. Mott on
It it is January 14th, Dean’s Date. You are hunched over a 500-page anthology of Russian Literature, writing your final paper. The deadline is in 2 hours and 18 minutes and every second counts. You ask yourself, why?! Why did you leave these hunks of textual meat in the oven until the last possible second? Why do you always wait until the deadline?!
by Lily Offit on
It is not often I get to encounter a fellow Dayton, so when I heard about a new documentary called Running Wild: The Life of Dayton O. Hyde, I was suitably intrigued. The film was to be screened on Saturday, February 8 at the Princeton Public Library, as part of the Princeton Environmental Film Festival (PEFF).
by Dayton Martindale on
Bicker changed everything. We can pretend it didn’t. Life might be the same in many ways. But it did. Hugs will be longer, looks will be warmer, and so many conversations will take place in self-conscious, hushed tones.
by Erin O'Brien on
Not Tri- as in triangle or tricycle, but Tri- as in Tree. Tree as in that family tree project I made in the third grade, still a novice to glue that came in sticks instead of bottles. The tree whose oldest branches spread far back to Spain, and in some cases, to Italy or France. The tree from which later branches grew in Argentina, a place where many branches still remain. Until, this newest, fledgling branch ended up on new American soil, taking up roots as it keeps trying to grow.
by Catalina Trigo on
My parents put in uncommon efforts to raise my brother and me completely bilingual. Our mother (a Frenchwoman from Normandy) spoke only French to us, ever, our father (a New Yorker by way of Romania and Tunisia) only English. To build a wall of separation within us between French and English, they pretended not to understand when we addressed them in the wrong language.
by Emily Lever on
As we approach the Sunrise Senior Living Home in Farmington Hills, Michigan, my grandmother explains that it houses two separate programs. The primary one is for the elderly who cannot fully care for themselves. The second, called “Reminiscence,” is for those who also have severe memory problems. That’s where my grandfather has lived for the past six months.
by Ben Jubas on
I have always thought that knowing how old you are is an important part of who you are. Your age lets you know what kinds of things you should be doing, and what is expected of you by wider society. My birthday has always been an unshakeable fact, as it is for most people I know.
by Akua Banful on