“Wow! … You just listened to my whole anthem.” It was late at night, years ago, on North Broadway in Capitol Hill. “Miguel” had just recited his life story to me for a good 20 minutes…
When I was a child, I was terrified of the dark. I hated going to sleep, because, once the lights turned off, the sheer possibility of encountering a monster kept me awake…
When talking about religion, my father will sometimes talk about “the chosen people,” a title that Jewish people have historically adopted as a way to reference being descended from…
Throughout my life, I’ve lived by the belief that my success and achievements are not solely mine but are deeply connected to the generations of my family who came before me…
As a lazy September blows over, the otherwise slumberous city of Kolkata is set alight by the rhythm of dhols and the smell of Night-flowering Jasmine…
As we move towards the 21st session of the Conference of Parties (COP 21) in Paris, there are still a few people living in denial about climate change. The good news is that increasing numbers of people are now acknowledging climate change. But the bad news is that this increase is proportional to the climate-change impacts we are facing, and nature will continue to act.
“Art is the conversation … Art offers an opening for the heart ... Art is, at least, the knowledge of where we are standing … In this Wonderland … we are partners straddling the universe.’”
It’s been over a month since the armed assault on the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris, and the tragedy has been on my mind every day since. There are many issues deserving reflection, from free speech versus hate speech, rising xenophobia and violent extremism, or even avoiding the conflation of all Muslims with the violently radical, yet tiny network of heretics. Yet, my mind has been preoccupied with a more overarching theme of the core mission of terrorism – terror itself. The goal is more than a body count; it’s the arousal of our most instinctual response in evolutionary psychology: fear, and where that fear will likely lead us.