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Your independent source for Harvard news since 1898

November-December 2019

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Letters

Letters on Angela Davis, the Bureau of Study Counsel, climate change, and more

President Bacow describes the potential for Harvard’s new Allston campus to benefit both gown and town.

Articulating a vision for Crimson athletes—and fellow students

The College Pump

Painting of Amos A. Lawrence, 1887, by Eastman Johnson.

Painting of Amos A. Lawrence, 1887, by Eastman Johnson. 

Courtesy of the Harvard University Portrait Collection, Gift of friends of Amos A. Lawrence to Harvard University. Photograph of painting ©President and Fellows of Harvard College

Expansive CVs, and extracurricular insights

Treasure

A colorful Byzantine funerary tunic fragment depicts faces and vegetal patterns with a border of gemstones.

Photograph courtesy of Dumbarton Oaks

Textile treasures from Dumbarton Oaks

In this Issue

Photograph of Sarah Richardson in her office

Sarah Richardson

Photograph by Stu Rosner

Historian and philosopher Sarah Richardson interrogates the science of sex and gender.

William Monroe Trotter (first row, fifth from right) with other leaders of the Liberty League, circa 1918

Click on arrow at right to see full image
At a gathering, circa 1918, of leaders of the Liberty League, Trotter sits in the first row (fifth from right).

Photograph courtesy of the Hubert Harrison Papers, Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University Library

Brief life of a black radical: 1872-1934

A spoof passport written in Spanglish for the fictional country El Spirit Republic of Puerto Rico, with a domino in place of a national seal on its cover

Click on arrow at right to see full image gallery
(1 of 12) Adál Maldonado’s The Passport, 1995, from the series The Spirit Republic of Puerto Rico.

Transfer from the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies, Harvard University, Gift of the artist, 2012.178. © ADзL. Image courtesy of Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum

The ubiquity of movement across man-made borders

Photograph of A.O. Scott at the Quad Cinema, New York City.

A.O. Scott at the Quad Cinema, New York City.

Photograph by Robert Adam Mayer

Special thanks to The Quad Cinema, 34 West 13th St. New York , New York

A.O. Scott on watching and reviewing a lot of movies

Letters

Letters on Angela Davis, the Bureau of Study Counsel, climate change, and more

President Bacow describes the potential for Harvard’s new Allston campus to benefit both gown and town.

Articulating a vision for Crimson athletes—and fellow students

Right Now

An illustration of an elementary school classroom with two teachers and an observer

Illustration by Jason Blower

Education policy should focus on schools as a whole, not individual teachers, argues Susan Moore Johnson.

Photograph of Professor Eric Nelson, seated, wearing a coat and tie

Eric Nelson

Photograph by Jim Harrison

Eric Nelson says John Rawls led modern philosophy astray.

A judge presides over an urban landscape from atop a tall building

Illustration by Pete Ryan

In combatting climate change, will courts hold that the general welfare trumps local sovereignty?

Harvard Squared

The Mad Monkfish's stage viewed from the back of a room

Click on the arrow at right to see the image gallery
(1 of 7) Sheila Jordan performs with the Yoko Miwa Trio at The Mad Monkfish, in Cambridge.

Photograph by Janice Tsai

A look at the live-music scene: traditional trios to experimental student performers

Click on arrow at right to see full image

Russian ballerina Lubov Tchernicheva, 1920 production of Cleopatra 
Russian ballerina Lubov Tchernicheva in Cleopatra, 1920. © E.O. Hoppé Estate Collection/Curatorial Assistance Inc.

Elegant photographs of dancing’s stars

A street crowd of black men and women, all dressed in white, either playing or responding to the playing of dozens of trombones

Click on arrow at right to see full image gallery

(1 of 3) “God’s Trombones, Harlem,” 2009

Photograph by Frank Stewart/Courtesy of the Cooper Gallery of African and African American Art

“The Sound of My Soul: Frank Stewart’s Life in Jazz,” at Harvard

A grinning woman in traditional Nigerian dress sits cross-legged on the floor surrounded by modern devices, including a power strip, a land-line telephone, and a desktop computer displaying on its screen a duplicate image of the entire montage.

Click on arrow at right to see image gallery

(1 of 3 ) Working Woman

Photograph by Fatimah Tuggar and BintaZarah Studios/Courtesy of the Davis Museum

Fatimah Tuggar explores artisanship and technology, at the Davis Museum

La Fábrica's nightclub in Central Square, Cambridge

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(1of 6) A vibrant nightclub scene at La Fábrica 

Photograph by Isabel Lopez/Courtesy of La Fábrica

La Fábrica’s Latin-Caribbean flair

Bow Street’s festive courtyard lit up at night.

Click on arrow at right to see full image gallery
(1 of 7) Bow Street’s festive courtyard lit up at night.

Photograph by Emily Tirella/Courtesy of Bow Market

Somerville’s Bow Market makes its mark.

Courtesy of followthehoney.com

Local artisans specializing in bespoke holiday treasures

John Harvard's Journal

Photograph of President Lawrence S. Bacow at Morning Prayers in Memorial Church

President Lawrence S. Bacow at Morning Prayers

Photograph by Rose Lincoln/Harvard Public Affairs and Communications

Opening-days messages focus on free speech and civil discourse within Harvard.

Photograph of Ryan Enos

Ryan Enos

Photograph by Stu Rosner

The political scientist explains “social geography.”

The College’s admissions office does not discriminate against Asian-Americans, a federal judge ruled on October 1.

A graph showing the performance of the Harvard endowment from fiscal year 2008 to fiscal year 2019

The endowment rises to $40.9 billion in a year of more modest investment returns.

Unhappy bell-ringer replaced by an automated bell switch sits high in the steeple looking out over part of the Harvard campus below

Illustration by Mark Steele

Headlines from Harvard’s history

The Harvard women’s lacrosse team takes the field.

A spirited moment for the women’s lacrosse players. Harvard athletics plays an important role in the lives of the nearly one-fifth of undergraduates participating in intercollegiate sports.

Photograph courtesy of Harvard Athletic Communications

Tackling harassment, athletics, and barriers to international scholars and students

Photograph of Giang T. Nguyen

Giang T. Nguyen
Photograph courtesy of Harvard University Health Services

New HUHS director, public-service pair, social-club-sanctions lawsuit, and more

Painting of a young Korean-American woman in a Harvard T-shirt walking beside a stream in a lush, hilly Hawaiian landscape

Illustration by Simona Mulazzani

The Undergraduate explores the ethics of gathering knowledge.

Two Harvard football players tackle a player from Brown.

Tag team: Harvard senior captain and defensive back Wes Ogsbury Jr. (1) and senior linebacker Joey Goodman (59) doubled up on Brown end Dan Gemmell.

Photograph by Tim O’Meara/The Harvard Crimson

In the early season, an infusion of new talent and a hot quarterback buoyed the Crimson football team.

Montage

A magician and comedian doing a card trick with an audience member

Click on arrow at right to see full image gallery
(1 of 4) Harrison Greenbaum’s What Just Happened? combines his two creative obsessions: comedy and magic.  

Photograph by Todd Seidenberg

For Harrison Greenbaum, it began with “Pick a card….”

Photograph of Jimmy Hoffa and Chuckie O’Brien near the federal courthouse, March 1, 1964

Close to home: Jimmy Hoffa (foreground) and Chuckie O’Brien near the federal courthouse, March 1, 1964, after Hoffa’s trial for jury-tampering

Photograph by Robert W. Kelley/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images

A new look at “one of the greatest unsolved crimes in American history”

Photograph of worker between two enormously high stacked bookshelves at the Harvard Depository

Where there are still plenty of real books: the Harvard Depository

Photograph by Stephanie Mitchell/ HPAC

A visit to the Harvard Depository

Singer Ali Sethi gestures toward the audience at Sanders Theatre, while students dance on stage behind him.

Ali Sethi brings the Sanders Theatre crowd to its feet during a concert last spring. His Harvard mentor, Ali Asani (right, in suit and tie), joined him on stage.

Photograph by Jake Belcher/Courtesy of the Office for the Arts at Harvard

Singer Ali Sethi finds his voice in classical Pakistani music.

An image of branching red seaweed against a dark-blue background

Sublime seaweed: nature photographer Josie Iselin’s cyanotype of Pikea californica

Photograph by Cyanotype by Josie Iselin

Recent books with Harvard connections

Photograph of President Donald Trump and Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio

President and supporter: Maricopa County sheriff Joe Arpaio, pardoned by President Trump

Photograph by Scott Olson/Getty Images

…and don’t always forgive

Correspondence on not-so-famous lost words

Alumni

Colin Cabot takes heart in the traditional skills, like woodworking, that are preserved at Sanborn Mills Farm.

Photograph by Jim Harrison

Promoting craftsmanship and agrarian skills in an idyllic New Hampshire setting

Honoring outstanding alumni interviewers for the College

Photo of Michelle Walsh and Benjamin Roy

Michelle Walsh and Benjamin Roy

Photograph courtesy of the Harvard Alumni Association

Honoring those who enrich the quality of life in their Houses

For outstanding service to the University

Paul Lee (left) holds the Little Red Flag replica in 2012. Also shown (clockwise from top left) are Spencer Ervin, Jeffrey Lee, and Stephen Goodhue.

Paul Lee ’46 holds the replica Little Red Flag in this 2012 photograph. Surrounding him (clockwise from upper left) are Spencer Ervin ’54, Jeffrey Lee ’74, and Stephen Goodhue ’51.

Photograph courtesy of Judy Goodhue

Who’ll carry the traditionalists’ Little Red Flag?

The College Pump

Painting of Amos A. Lawrence, 1887, by Eastman Johnson.

Painting of Amos A. Lawrence, 1887, by Eastman Johnson. 

Courtesy of the Harvard University Portrait Collection, Gift of friends of Amos A. Lawrence to Harvard University. Photograph of painting ©President and Fellows of Harvard College

Expansive CVs, and extracurricular insights

Treasure

A colorful Byzantine funerary tunic fragment depicts faces and vegetal patterns with a border of gemstones.

Photograph courtesy of Dumbarton Oaks

Textile treasures from Dumbarton Oaks