The David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies has announced that David Kupferschmidt is the centers new executive director. Kupferschmidt brings to Harvard extensive experience in Latin America for nearly a decade, including work as a consultant for international organizations, NGOs, governments, and the private sector.
The subtitle of Mary Gordons reading, the final of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studys Deans Lecture Series (April 28), promised Swimming Between Fiction and Nonfiction. And Gordon delivered, with a stroke so effortless that the waters of memoir, essay, and fiction flowed into a smooth confluence, their borders barely distinguishable. Gordons swimming skills served her equally well in emotional waters, as the acclaimed author and Radcliffe Fellow masterfully delivered the audience from wry hilarity to shocking sadness to tender passion, and back again.
Afro-Brazilian politician and social activist Benedita da Silva spoke at Lamont Library last week. The former governor of Rio de Janeiro discussed the postcolonial challenges facing Brazil in its efforts to create a government and society that include traditionally disenfranchised groups such as blacks, women, and the poor. When I was a kid, said da Silva, and lived in Chapeu da Mangueira hill, a slum in Rio de Janeiros south zone, very close to Copacabana Beach, no black children had even the right to dream of a life different from the ones led by their mothers and grandmothers. The event was co-sponsored by the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research.
In remarks that opened a multidisciplinary conference called Bilingual Benefits Friday (April 30), Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers stated the truism that its always preferable to know more than to know less, and most of us wish we knew more languages than we do.
Researchers at Harvard University and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) have discovered that insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas that are attacked in type 1 diabetes are replenished through duplication of existing cells rather than through differentiation of adult stem cells.
Harvards Institute of Politics (IOP) recently announced the selection of 12 undergraduate students, chosen from a poll of 184 candidates, for prestigious paid summer political internships. These students will enjoy a unique opportunity to meet with and learn from leading academics, policymakers, and politicians at high-profile organizations to further their understanding of and interest in politics and public affairs.
James Earl Jones was a student at the University of Michigan when he first encountered racial prejudice aimed at him personally. A professor pointed out a misspelling in a paper Jones had written and said: Why are you trying to be something youre not? Youre just a dumb son of a bitch, and you dont belong at this university.
Art Libraries Society honors Stephan Wolohojian Lecturer on History of Art and Architecture Stephan Wolohojian recently received the 2003 George Wittenborn Memorial Book Award for “A Private Passion: 19th Century…
UIS to herald new product, repair center University Information Systems’ (UIS’s) Technology Services is holding an open house celebration today (May 6) and Friday (May 7) for the opening of…
Celebrating its 12th year, Arts First, Harvards annual celebration of students and faculty in the arts, lights up Harvard Square with performances, exhibits, and arts activities. Today, May 6, through Sunday, May 9, Harvard welcomes the public to over 225 music, theater, dance, film, and visual arts events (most free of charge). The festival is sponsored by the Universitys Board of Overseers.
Mortimer B. Zuckerman, LL.M. 62, is giving $10 million to establish a graduate fellowship program that will enable Harvard University to attract 25 exceptional students each year as Zuckerman Fellows. The program will be open to candidates who have earned or are pursuing a business, law, or medical graduate degree at Harvard or another U.S. university and who want to pursue an additional degree at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, John F. Kennedy School of Government, or Harvard School of Public Health.
Harvard Medical School (HMS) researchers have uncovered a missing link in our understanding of how human papillomaviruses gain their foothold in the rapidly dividing cells of the skin and mucous membranes. The discovery, reported in the April 30 Cell, could lead to new treatments for a host of human papillomavirus-related conditions, from the nuisance of plantar and genital warts to life-threatening precancerous cervical lesions.
The economics of biomedical research was at center stage at Harvard Medical School (HMS) April 28 during a conference convened to answer critics who say new treatments and devices drive up health-care costs while bringing few health benefits.
As the nation limps toward economic recovery, uneasy Americans – jobless or not – harbor understandable anxiety. Could my job be done by a computer? Will it go overseas to be done far more cheaply? Will there be enough jobs to go around?
Marking the end of the first phase of Harvard Colleges comprehensive review of undergraduate education, William C. Kirby, dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and Edith and Benjamin Geisinger Professor of History, announced the release of A Report on the Harvard College Curricular Review. The report affirms Harvards commitment to a liberal education in the arts and sciences and proposes significant changes in the structure and content of the undergraduate experience.
The textured stone of the Weeks Footbridge provides an almost-Mediterranean look to a spring day on the Charles. Framed by the stone are rowers taking part in last Saturdays crew competition, in which Harvard took every race. (Staff photo Lindsay Pierce/Harvard News Office)
At its 12th meeting of the year (April 28) the Faculty Council discussed with Deans Benedict Gross, William Kirby, and Jeffrey Wolcowitz the recently released Report on the Harvard College Curricular Review. Professors Goran Ekstrom (Earth and Planetary Science), Eric Jacobsen (Chemistry and Chemical Biology), Richard Losick (Molecular and Cellular Biology), and Diana Sorensen (Romance Languages and Literatures), Co-chairs of the reviews four Working Groups, were also present for this discussion. A discussion of the review has also been scheduled for the May 4 Faculty Meeting, with the possibility that this consideration will be continued at the May 18 Faculty Meeting.
Rebecca Wexler 05 plays electric violin with fellow Recklez band members during IsraelFest (Yom HaAtzmaut) in front of the Science Center on Tuesday. (Staff photo Jon Chase/Harvard News Office)
April 14, 1955 – Steeplejack Laurie Young ascends the spire of the Memorial Church to survey the weathervane to determine whether it can be regilded in place. He begins the…
Susan Okin service May 2 Friends and family of Susan Moller Okin, a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, will host a memorial service on Sunday, May 2,…
Following are some of the incidents reported to the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD) for the week ending April 24. The official log is located at 1033 Massachusetts Ave., sixth floor.
People who care about civil liberties in the United States should embrace rather than fight the USA Patriot Act, former Bush administration anti-terrorism coordinator Robert Clarke told a standing-room-only audience at the John F. Kennedy School of Government April 21.
When Hanna Holborn Gray, president emerita of the University of Chicago and Fellow of Harvard College, was pursuing a Ph.D. in history at Harvard in the 1950s, female role models in academia were scarce. At the time, Harvards Faculty of Arts and Sciences boasted exactly one female with tenure – Helen Maud Cam – and even she couldnt enter the Faculty Club by the front door or Lamont Library at all. Gray launched an impressive career in academia nonetheless, refusing to be hobbled by the factor that derailed many a budding female professors career: marriage.
In the April 26 special issue of Time magazine, Professor of Systems Biology Eric Lander, founder and director of the Eli and Edythe L. Broad Institute, is featured as one of the worlds 100 most influential people.
Harvard mens heavyweight crew further expanded its trophy collection this past Saturday (April 24) with a nine-second triumph over visiting Navy in the 69th rowing of the Adams Cup. Earlier this month, the defending national champion Crimson (ranked No. 1 in the national polls by USRowing) captured the Stein Trophy in Providence and the Compton Cup on the Charles en route to its 5-0 dual-meet record.
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