by David Rico No longer able to defend Christopher Columbus’s moral character, students at Yale and our peer institutions have challenged the idea of Indigenous Peoples’ Day by pointing to the positive aspects of the Columbian Exchange: corn for beef, squash for wheat, etc. As if any technological advancement or new crop were worth the…
by Katie McCleary Where I grew up on the Crow Reservation in Montana our closest neighbors are the Northern Cheyenne. As is common for many neighbors, especially those competing for resources, Crows and Northern Cheyenne were enemies. The U.S. Government assumed this was a minor issue when they forced the communities into reservations next to…
by Alexis Payne This past Monday, Deray McKesson, a leader in the Black Lives Matter movement (BLM), took over Yale’s Afro-American Cultural Center with an idea: “You are enough to start a movement. That is the story of Ferguson.” His audience was 200 potential movement-builders: Yale undergraduates, grad students, professors, and community members. McKesson’s organizing…
by Ashia Ajani and Nicole Chavez This past Wednesday, Jenn Fang, an Asian-American post-doctoral student, spoke to a diverse crowd of Yale students regarding the myth of the “Model Minority.” As explained by Fang, The idea of “successful” minorities and “problem” minorities came as a direct response to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s…
by Arianna B. Neal “This is not a trickle. This is a hemorrhage,” stated Professor Jafari Allen. Within his office, the floating scents of green mint tea and burning incense intermingled with the soft tones of classical piano and clinking glass dishes. He explained the crisis. Over the past few months, three renowned faculty of color…