Learning to listen
Ekene Agu ’13 got a bit of a shock during her freshman year at Harvard College. Agu, who grew up both in Nigeria and in the United States, was startled to read an article in the Harvard Salient — an undergraduate publication with a conservative take on politics and student life — that argued against undergraduate concentrations in women’s and ethnic studies. She says that the author’s opposition was less disturbing than his reasoning. “He didn’t believe that women or people of color had contributed enough to the societies of the world to warrant the formation of departments devoted to their study,” says Agu. “I was even more surprised at his boldness. Harvard is notorious for being a liberal hotbed, and though I expected a diversity of ideologies, I definitely was not prepared for such incendiary remarks. It made me realize the immense degree to which some people on campus see things...