Search
Off the Shelf
The Mindful Body: Thinking Our Way to Chronic Health, by Ellen J. Langer, professor of psychology (Ballantine, $28). The author (profiled in “The Mindfulness Chronicles,” September-October 2010), widely known for work on positive psychology, begins with …
Issue: September-October 2023
The “Scandalous Mansion”
Built between 1899 and 1902, the Ayer Mansion on Commonwealth Avenue is a rare surviving residence designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany. It was an outlier, commissioned by outliers. The textile magnate and marketing savant Frederick Ayer was a self-made man …
Issue: January-February 2017
Faculty Meeting Summary
In a remarkable meeting held on the Ides of March in the Loeb Drama Center, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) twice voted to register its lack of confidence in and concerns over the presidency of Lawrence H. Summers. The meeting followed highly …
Brevia
Scientific Ventures Albert J. Weatherhead Celia J. Weatherhead Justin Ide / Harvard News Office Justin Ide / Harvard News Office Flexible funding for innovative research in basic and applied sciences throughout the University is the goal of a …
Issue: March-April 2005
Theda Skocpol address to PBK
Working Together to Meet the Public Challenges of This Time Theda Skocpol Victor S. Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology Phi Beta Kappa Exercises, Harvard University May 24, 2022 Thank you to the Alpha-Iota Chapter of Phi Beta …
Off the Shelf
The Sentinel State: Surveillance and the Survival of Dictatorship in China, by Minxin Pei, Ph.D. ’91 (Harvard, $35). A professor of government at Claremont McKenna details the technology (cameras, AI facial recognition, and phone tracking) and enormous …
Issue: March-April 2024
Update: Harvard versus Yale
A 10-0 defeat of Yale, meted out under arctic conditions at the Stadium on November 22, gave Harvard a 9-1 football season and an Ivy League co-championship. Harvard shares the Ivy laurels with Brown, which won a 24-22 squeaker in the teams' first league …
Diabetes: A Looming Epidemic—and Solutions
In 1985 in the United States, there were only eight states where more than 10 percent of adults were obese. By 2001, not a single state had prevalence below 15 percent. The map below shows how obesity has increased in the United States from 1985 to 2007. …
Issue: November-December 2008
Philadelphia's Story
Philadelphia stands as the perfect prototype of the broken urban school system that federal regulators were trying to fix. For decades the school district, beset by powerful unions, rampant cronyism, and bureaucratic sclerosis, has shown little capacity …
Issue: September-October 2016
News Briefs
Police—and Student—Conduct The committee appointed by President Drew Faust last spring to review the April 13 off-campus arrest of a black undergraduate by Cambridge police—video evidence showed the physical force used to restrain him—completed its report …
Issue: January-February 2019
How Birds Lost Flight
How did emus , ostriches, and kiwis end up flightless? What chain of events resulted in these birds diverging from the species that soar through the air and moving to a wholly terrestrial, and very successful, existence? For a long time, scientists …
Issue: March-April 2024
Making a Case against the Courts
How will Americans know that their Supreme Court is truly dedicated to interpreting the Constitution as the Founding Fathers would wish? Attorney, activist, and author Phyllis Schlafly, A.M. ’45, offered some guidelines while discussing “The Culture War …
Issue: January-February 2008
Making Space
Just as I was sitting down to write this column before the Thanksgiving break, amidst grim reports of a rapidly spreading virus, welcome news about the work of a recent graduate crossed my desk. TIME had named Upsolve—a nonprofit co-founded by Rohan …
Issue: January-February 2021
21,000 Hours
Harvard College began holding a Freshman Convocation ceremony in 2009—a formal public greeting of new freshmen by the president and deans, and the only occasion when the students gather as a class before graduation. This year’s Convocation took place on …
Business School’s Guiding Light
Jay O. Light , an expert in finance and investment management, was named dean of Harvard Business School (HBS)—the ninth since its founding in 1908—by President Lawrence H. Summers on April 24. Light, D.B.A. ’70, had been acting dean since August 1, 2005, …
Issue: July-August 2006