In March, my college’s director of student life, Momo Wolapaye, told me by phone that another student felt “distressed” by me and had “requested a no-communication order.” In a letter that served as official notice of the NCO, he declared that “neither you nor Harshini Abbaraju ’22 may have any communication with each other in person or through another party, by telephone, letter, e-mail, or other electronic media, or by any other means, including via social media.”
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The first time we knew there was something seriously afoul in the Princeton Department of Classics was when, in January 2018, the then-chair circulated to the faculty a draft of a mission statement emphasizing the historical complicity of classics in perpetuating race-, class-, and gender-based inequality and promising a new era of inclusivity.
The draft itself was not especially interesting—such things rarely are—but one of us (Joshua, then a professor in the department) was bothered by the absence of “academic excellence” from its stated goals. When he pointed this out to his colleagues in a mild email, his words were met with incredulity and derision.