The Prospect

DISPATCH | Getting used to the noise

It sounds strange when I explain it. Why Boston? Why these girls, who I barely knew before we signed the lease? I still have trouble picturing the series of events that led me here; the days after Princeton announced that fall semester would be online are a blur.

Beauty tips and tricks in the era of Zoom

Whether you’re a die-hard makeup enthusiast or just someone interested in experimenting with their look, Prospect senior writer Megan Pan shares her tips and tricks for makeup designed for Zoom.

Making Princeton at home

With all this rumbling in the back of my mind, throughout the past months I stumbled into a habit of trying to bring home the remaining things that make Princeton, well, Princeton.

Growing up, everywhere: In photos, Princetonians share what mattered to them as kids

We asked students to submit a picture of a place or person that was significant to them as a child and share what the subject's memory continues to mean to them.

What is ‘Princeton’ without Princeton?

Wendy Ho reflects on this unusual semester.

Going home to ‘Trump’s America’

This summer I was fortunate to be supported by the John C. Bogle ’51 Fellowship in Civic Service to return home and assist Dr. Erika Kitzmiller with her research project, “Youth Inequality, Mobility, and Opportunity in Red and Blue America.” I took this valuable experience as an opportunity to explore the dissonance I felt while reading Vance’s memoir and reflect on my own experience growing up in Appalachia.

Triangle’s ‘Old Folks’ Home’ and the future wished for

The future I see in front of me for the next couple months is the white wall that stands behind my desk as I write these words. It looks like my friends and classmates and professors confined to Zoom boxes. It looks like more time hundreds of miles away from the place I’d grown to love as my other home. This is all so different from the future I so wish lay ahead instead.

The psychology of reopening: Why we’re not taking the pandemic as seriously as before

Many of us have decided to behave as if the pandemic is over, or at least less dangerous than before. But why?

The Orange Bubble and the Elixir of Youth

Arriving home in March without a return date, I sought to reconnect with those I had lost touch with. In doing so, I learned what could have been and, more importantly, what Princeton has given me instead.

I thought I took every precaution. I still tested positive for COVID-19.

I thought I’d been careful, and indeed I had been — degrees more so than most, if not all, of my friends and family. Then came the email: my SARS-CoV-2 test, which I’d taken as a precaution before seeing my grandparents, and not at all because I was symptomatic, was positive. 

Last First Day — First First Day

Fall semester classes used to kick off on a Wednesday. A wake-up slap after the four-day fever dream known as Frosh Week.  Yet it's a Monday — which should usher in some sense of normalcy, since Monday is the start of the typical work week. But come on, it's Princeton. We fly in the face of everything “normal.”

Prospect Recipes: Granitas

Beat the summer heat and take a break from internships, jobs, or binge-watching Netflix to treat yourself with a fruity granita!

Magazine editor resigns over Dickman’s controversial poem, as U. community weighs in

Backlash over lecturer Michael Dickman’s use of offensive and violent language in a recently published poem led Poetry magazine’s editor to resign last month. We take a close look at the controversy, and how it fits into a broader University-wide grappling with free speech and offensive language.

Backlash over lecturer Michael Dickman’s use of offensive and violent language in a recently published poem led Poetry magazine’s editor to resign last month. We take a close look at the controversy, and how it fits into a broader University-wide grappling with free speech and offensive language.

A small quandary

This is a peek into my experience with dealing with medical and mental health issues in Princeton’s highly competitive environment. The biographical story form is used to represent my first-person perspective and is an attempt to convey the pressures, emotional struggles, and stresses the situation brought along with it.

An open letter to the first-years during your unprecedented transition to Princeton

Hannah Reynolds, a rising junior in the anthropology department, offers a few words of comfort and wisdom to incoming first-year students.

DISPATCH | Finding hope in a time of loss, mourning

Maintaining relationships, participating in activities with friends and family — even if they are virtual — and consciously making the effort to enjoy little bits of every day have become the cornerstone of my everyday life.

Prospect Recipes: Welsh Cookies

Today, we’re making Welsh cookies. I grew up eating Welsh cookies with Mam, and my parents and I have become somewhat addicted to them during this quarantine summer.

Authenticity, spirituality, and identity in art: an open conversation with Lauren Olson

In my conversation with Lauren, we discuss the motivations behind her work, which really means exploring confidence, authenticity, light-dark dichotomies, and spirituality — concepts essential to understanding the human experience.

‘Decolonizing your bookshelf’: students, alumni, and local businesses turn to books — and buying practices — to combat racism

As the pandemic keeps many from attending in-person protests, many in the University community are incorporating reading into their activism.

Anti-Racist Reading Review: Between the World and Me

In the first installment of The Prospect's Anti-Racist Reading Reviews, Alex Gjaja reads Ta-Nehisi Coates’s profound work Between the World and Me in the context of 2020, reflecting on the visceral violence of racism and the lessons Coates's text offers to universities and university students.