Kaveri Pillai '23
As an Indian Hindu living overseas, I started Diwali with lighting a diya in front of the Lord Ganesha idol on my desk. Within seconds of putting in a silent prayer for the god of new beginnings, I received news of new beginnings being celebrated elsewhere — the United Kingdom had elected Rishi Sunak to be their new prime minister. At the age of 42, Sunak is the first person of color and the first person of South Asian descent to become prime minister of the U.K, according to Reuters.
Mount Holyoke College returned to a fully residential experience in Fall 2021 for the first time since the campus began remote learning in March 2020. In an email to students from March 2021, former College president Sonya Stephens addressed the Mount Holyoke community about plans for Fall 2021 and beyond. Stephens stated, “Faculty and students will be engaged in our campus learning environment together, and we will make any adjustments needed to continue to protect health and safety.”
As an Indian woman who lives to see a religiously-divided India today, it would be impossible for me to ignore that the origins of the religious strife can be traced back to the horrific British colonization and their heinous “divide and rule” land-conquering strategy. The list of harms done by the British Empire cannot possibly end at pitting religious communities against each other. The question for many of the once-colonized nations is not the scale of the offenses committed by the imperial power but what the monarchy can do next in mending the relationship between the United Kingdom and the rest of the Commonwealth.
On April 7, 2022, the U.S. Senate confirmed Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court, making her the first Black female to serve as justice. The 53-47 vote for Jackson highlighted the bipartisan support she received in the Senate. After two grueling days of intensive questioning regarding her judicial record and thoughts on controversial topics such as Critical Race Theory and abortion, Jackson’s appointment to the Supreme Court was celebrated by supporters as a groundbreaking win for Black women across the country.
Content warning: this article mentions racialized violence.
2022 is already a year of turbulence with global wars, a pandemic and the anxiety of upcoming midterm elections in the United States. This election cycle may challenge the Democratic party’s majority in the House and their 50-member stake in the Senate. It is also a year of state legislative elections in India, where the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party could potentially be overturned in crucial electoral states like Uttar Pradesh. What makes this year of legislative assembly elections so important is the fact that it can dictate India and the U.S.’ moves toward tolerance.
Content warning: this article discusses police brutality and racism.
Like many Indians across the world, I, too, was going to watch India’s first International Cricket Council T20 World Cup 2021 match against the team’s eons-old arch-rival, Pakistan.
Content warning: this article discusses rape and drugging.
While higher education seems to have student safety in mind as we readjust to the “new normal” pandemic world, the sexual assault case at the Theta Chi chapter at the University of Massachusetts Amherst on Sept. 18 compels us to question if these institutions are really monitoring student welfare.
In a world where the COVID-19 situation is constantly evolving, keeping up isn’t an easy task. It is essential to be on top of the facts and make way for conversations that address a simple yet crucial question: What’s next?
Mount Holyoke College President Sonya Stephens’ email in March 2021 was a breath of fresh air for many, bearing the news that Mount Holyoke would open its doors for all students in the fall semester. While many rejoiced at this decision, there were still questions and concerns littering students’ minds about masks, testing and overall safety about in-person school. Before the fall semester started, these initial questions regarding COVID-19 were answered.
For many, myself included, religion is deeply personal. What makes this type of faith so intimate is its promise for inclusivity and a sense of community. The history of religious faith can be traced back to the sacred texts we read today and the rituals and festivals we celebrate. Yet, this very faith has seemed to challenge its promise of longevity. The rapid decline in religious affiliation that started at the beginning of the last decade has sparked a conversation that addresses a simple question: What changed?
While around 250 million college students consider the four walls of the classroom their second home, the pandemic has resulted in a displacement of the regular learning process. The establishment of online schooling comes with a new set of rules and features, many of which consist of learning strategies for navigating remote learning. However, a number of students around the world, including myself, have found themselves questioning the efficacy and relevance of a lot of the in-person features being replicated online.
In January 2021, the global community completed one full year with COVID-19. After months of harsh lockdowns in India and New Zealand and days of rising cases in the United Kingdom and the United States, 2021 is, hopefully, the light at the end of the tunnel. With 11 vaccines having been authorized across several countries and a record of 205 million of these vaccines being administered globally, the pandemic is slowly becoming history.
The word “populism” is often synonymous with dictatorial regimes and authoritarian states. Adolf Hitler used the ideology of populism to carry out various anti-Semitic operations in the early 20th century. Joseph Stalin used his communist foundation and the ideology of populism as a way to justify his purges of and distrust in the bourgeois class. Despite this violent history and regardless of the increased number of democracies in the 21st century, populism has only increased in influence.
