Culture
Our List of Women Who Rock
By Pat JosephMarié Digby, who studied philosophy at Cal in the mid-2000s, scored a viral hit on YouTube with her cover of Rihanna’s “Umbrella,” which she plays solo on acoustic guitar while sitting on the floor of her living room. It currently has more than 22 million views. It wasn’t pure chance; by the time she released […]
The Edge Episode 18: Into the Ishi Wilderness
Today, we’re featuring the audio version of California magazine’s recent cover story, “Into the Ishi Wilderness.”
She Thought She Would Change Her Community as a Lawyer. Instead, She Did it with Mac and Cheese.
By Margie CullenErin Wade got a law degree from Berkeley in 2008, but quickly realized that she hated being a lawyer. Instead, she turned to her childhood love: mac and cheese.
This Land is Their Land
By Hayden RoysterTo Phenocia Bauerle, the words “land-grant college” carry a particular weight. A member of the Apsáalooke tribe, she grew up in Montana, a state where, as she puts it, “it’s understood what a land-grant institution means: It means Native land was taken.”
Into the Ishi Wilderness
By Laura SmithTo get to the Ishi Wilderness you’ll want a full tank of gas and four-wheel-drive. Even then, you should be willing to ditch the car and walk. The approximately 41,000-acre wilderness area is located in the Lassen National Forest in a remote part of the southern Cascade foothills northeast of Chico, within sight of Mount Lassen.
First Person
By Alexa Zahlada '23, as told to Anabel SosaBack in 2009, I moved from Ukraine to the U.S. to live with my mom, who was studying to become a doctor. Years later, I remember her sitting me down in the car and saying, “I cannot afford to raise you here and I don’t know what to do.”
High Fidelity
By Coby McDonald, M.J. ’17Each afternoon when the lunch bell rang at Maybeck High School, 16-year-old Gabriel Lautaro, aspiring DJ, would walk the two blocks to Telegraph Avenue and hit the record stores. The year was 1990, back when DJing meant two turntables and a crate of vinyl.
What Began as Family Trauma Becomes Celebrated Art
By Emily WilsonA few years ago, artist Cynthia Brannvall spent the summer experimenting with creating a floor to ceiling cyclone of clothes, trying to push her textile work to sculpture. She didn’t really like the results—she had meant to convey female power with the cyclone, but instead it looked ghostly and fragile — and she worried she’d wasted the summer.
Spotlight
By Anabel SosaBlind thinkers, scientists, and artists showing us the way.
Losing Joan Didion
By Pat JosephWriter Joan Didion, who graduated from Berkeley in 1956, died on December 23, 2021, at age 87. She will be remembered as one of the most distinctive voices not only of her generation but in all of American letters.
What to Read, Watch, and Listen to This Spring
Here are a few of our favorite books, shows, and films by people from Berkeley.
Gospel is the Foundation of American Music
By Dhoha BarecheA Q&A with documentarian Matt Durning.
