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Decolonize the future: Defending Indigenous rights and lands
Maya activist Cristina Coc speaks into a microphone on the Perry World House stage

Cristina Coc, a Q’eqchi’ Maya community leader who founded and is program director of the Julian Cho Society, was one of three activists from Belize at the Perry World House event. (Image: Courtesy of Perry World House).

Decolonize the future: Defending Indigenous rights and lands

Three Maya activists from Belize spoke with Richard M. Leventhal about the challenges and progress they’ve made on land rights in recent years.

Kristen de Groot

Mask and Wig makes history with its first gender-inclusive show
six students dancing in a rehearsal room

The Mask and Wig Club will make history when they take the stage Oct. 12-15 in the fall show, “Better Call Y’all,” the first gender-inclusive production since its founding as an all-male comedy group in 1889. The cast rehearsed at the Platt House for the Performing Arts.

Mask and Wig makes history with its first gender-inclusive show

The 133-year-old comedy troupe becomes gender-inclusive, opening auditions to all undergraduates this fall, recruiting 20 new members, 14 of them female-identifying.

Louisa Shepard

Poet Wes Matthews combines writing, music, research, and service
Wes Matthews leaning in a doorway at the Kelly Writers House

Matthews says he plans to write poetry throughout his life, and hopes someday to collaborate on a poem or book with his mother. 

Poet Wes Matthews combines writing, music, research, and service

College fourth-year Wes Matthews is combining writing, music, research, and service during his Penn experience. A former Youth Poet Laureate of Philadelphia, the anthropology major and religious studies minor works at the Kelly Writers House and is a Wolf Humanities Center fellow.

Louisa Shepard

The significance of Indigenous People’s Day
Two woman in a garden.

Ryly Ziese (left) and Nyair Locklear (right) outside the Greenfield Intercultural Center.

The significance of Indigenous People’s Day

Two Penn students, Nyair Locklear, of the Tuscarora Nation and a member of the Lumbee Tribe, and Ryly Ziese, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, offer their points of view on the significance of Indigenous People’s Day

Kristina Linnea García

Finding community in the Jewish High Holy Days
A cut apple and pomegranate surround a honey jar with a wooden honey stick on top. An uncut apple and pomegranate are in the background.

Finding community in the Jewish High Holy Days

Three cultural and academic leaders at Penn consider how a return to experiencing Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur in person offered physical and spiritual healing.

Kristina Linnea García , Michele W. Berger

‘Citizenship on the Edge’
A book cover depicting a woman wearing a striped top and face and body paint. She is holding a rainbow flag. The book cover reads: Citizenship on the Edge: Sex/Gender/Race

A new book by anthropologist Deborah A. Thomas and political scientist Nancy J. Hirschmann compiles a series of essays examining citizenship from an interdisciplinary lens. 

  • Q&A

    • ‘Citizenship on the Edge’

    In a new book, anthropologist Deborah A. Thomas and political scientist Nancy J. Hirschmann look at who’s kept out of social governance and belonging.

    Kristina Linnea García

    ModPo celebrates its first decade
    Al Filreis holds up the Book "The Difference is Spreading" while seated at a long table with four other people to his left and a television screen with the faces of several other people to his right in front of an audience

    English Professor Al Filreis holds up a copy of the just-published book “The Difference is Spreading: Fifty Contemporary Poets on Fifty Poems,” during the ModPo webcast to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the free massive online open course Modern and Contemporary Poetry. 

    ModPo celebrates its first decade

    Modern and Contemporary Poetry was founded by Al Filreis of the School of Arts & Sciences at Kelly Writers House in 2012, and now has 69,000 people enrolled globally. Poets and participants came to campus to celebrate the 10th anniversary.

    Louisa Shepard

    Zero tolerance: Family separation and U.S. immigration policy
    Efrén Olivares speaks to a crowd of people holding signs that say "end zero tolerance," "no human is illegal," and "not one more deportation."

    Olivares speaks to a group of people about immigration in McAllen, Texas during a rally to demand an end to the zero-tolerance policy in June 2019. (Image credit: Texas Civil Rights Project)

    Zero tolerance: Family separation and U.S. immigration policy

    In the 2022 Dolores Huerta keynote lecture, lawyer Efrén C. Olivares, Class of 2005, spoke on his personal and professional experience with immigration.

    Kristina Linnea García

    A hub for scholarship on ethnicity, race, and immigration
    Chenoa Flippen addresses an audience before a panel on Latino voting history.

    Chenoa Flippen (left) introduces a panel featuring author Geraldo Cadava and political scientist Michael Jones-Correa, an event sponsored by the Center for the Study of Ethnicity, Race and Immigration.

    A hub for scholarship on ethnicity, race, and immigration

    The Center for the Study of Ethnicity, Race, and Immigration brings together undergraduates, graduates, and faculty across the University to build connections and enhance and fund research. 

    Kristen de Groot

    What it’s like to be stationed at a particle accelerator
    Inside the particle accelerator.

    A photo from the installation of the detector. The large silver and orange striped tubes are the solenoid magnet, which is the largest toroidal magnet ever constructed. It provides a magnetic field of up to 3.5 Tesla. Now that Run 3 has started, the magnet is on even when we researchers are working underground, so they are required to use non-magnetic tools. (Image: Courtesy of Gwen Gardner and Lauren Osojnak)

    What it’s like to be stationed at a particle accelerator

    Gwen Gardner and Lauren Osojnak, Ph.D. candidates in physics, describe their work as part of the Penn ATLAS team at the Large Hadron Collider.

    Blake Cole