May 2020 – Page 2 – Princeton Writes

Dispatches from Quarantine, Part 3: How to Look Good Zooming by Cate Mahoney

Cate Mahoney2020-05-06T17:06:52-04:00

Dispatches from Quarantine, Part 3 How to Look Good Zooming by Cate Mahoney Now that we’re all working at home, giving presentations at home, and trying to stay sane at home, users of Zoom, the suddenly ubiquitous video conferencing platform, will want some tips and tricks in their digital tool belt. I offer these suggestions as someone who recently (and successfully!) defended her dissertation virtually. (Thank you, thank you—you’re too kind.) (1) Find your light! And by this I mean placing your light source in the right position so that you are illuminated and don’t look like a cave dweller. To [...]

Dispatches from Quarantine, Part 3: How to Look Good Zooming by Cate MahoneyCate Mahoney2020-05-06T17:06:52-04:00

Prompt for the Week: 5/4/20

admin2020-05-05T15:52:48-04:00

Prompt for the Week: 5/4/20 “The writer’s obligation in the age of X is to pay attention,” writes Wayne Koestenbaum in a recent Paris Review essay. This phrase is repeated throughout the piece as Koestenbaum floats from one memory to another and suggests that a writer should “revisit books to which we have ceased paying sufficient attention, books we have failed adequately to love” and “play with words and to keep playing with them—not to deracinate or deplete them, but to use them as vehicles for discovering history, recovering wounds, reciting damage, and awakening conscience.” Write an essay about your personal perspective on [...]

Prompt for the Week: 5/4/20admin2020-05-05T15:52:48-04:00

To Zoom or Not to Zoom?

admin2020-05-07T11:11:50-04:00

To Zoom or Not to Zoom? As we try to stay connected to our families, friends, jobs, and communities while we social distance, we spend our days "Zooming" or "FaceTiming." Sometimes, this is a great way to come together, but it's not the only way. Email still works. Letters are wonderful for communication that is not urgent. Phone calls can have an intimacy and a connection that a video feed might not. And last but not least, you can host a book exchange, like the Pace Center's Bogle Fellows. However you do it, we hope you stay in touch with colleagues, friends, [...]

To Zoom or Not to Zoom?admin2020-05-07T11:11:50-04:00

Community of Writers: Pooja Makhijani

Elizabeth Durham2020-05-07T13:02:48-04:00

Community of Writers: Pooja Makhijani Pooja Makhijani is Communications Manager at the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies. She is the editor of Under Her Skin: How Girls Experience Race in America, an anthology of essays by women that explores the complex ways in which race shapes American lives and families. She is also the author of Mama’s Saris, a picture book. Her bylines have appeared in The New York Times, The Village Voice, The Washington Post, NPR, Real Simple, The Atlantic, WSJ.com, The Cut, Teen Vogue, Parents, VICE, Bon Appétit, Saveur, BuzzFeed, and espnW among others. She holds a [...]

Community of Writers: Pooja MakhijaniElizabeth Durham2020-05-07T13:02:48-04:00

Book of the Month: Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson (2019)

admin2020-04-14T13:39:22-04:00

Book of the Month: Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson (2019) Critical Evaluation "Temper tantrums and meltdowns. They're a bane of parenting. Often at the most inconvenient moment possible, your kid — tired, hungry, beyond reason — just loses it. And it's your job to keep your cool and calm them down. After all, you're the grownup. Well, here's cold comfort: It could be worse. In Kevin Wilson's third novel, Nothing to See Here, kids spontaneously combust — literally — when angered or upset. Their flareups don't cause injury to themselves, but they can be seriously damaging to people and property [...]

Book of the Month: Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson (2019)admin2020-04-14T13:39:22-04:00