July 1st, 2015 marks an event that many students of color at predominantly white institutions could imagine only in their wildest dreams: a black feminist scholar will become the president of Swarthmore College. Valerie Smith, who has served as Princeton University’s Dean of College for the past three years, was announced president-elect of the private…
Author: Contributing Writers
Beyond Recognition: A Case for Asian American Studies
“The impossible is the least that one can demand.” – James Baldwin I have never felt more intellectually and spiritually affirmed than I have at the Asian American Studies Conference last month – an unprecedented event in Yale history. Over the course of the conference, I had the pleasure of listening to academics and graduate…
Claudia Rankine’s Yale Visit
Claudia Rankine did not win the National Book Award. She told us so at her talk on Wednesday, March 4th, when someone asked her if she thought black artists were sufficiently recognized by elite literary circles. She laughed and raised her eyebrows, and mentioned that she had, however, won something at the NAACP Recognition Awards:…