Education
Saving a Language from Extinction
By Madeline Taub90-year-old Berkeley alumna Rebecca Contopoulou speaks Greek, Italian, French, English, Spanish, and another language that sounds a lot like Spanish but is actually Ladino, a Sephardic language that traces its origins to Medieval Spain.
Seamus Heaney in Berkeley
By Edward O’SheaMany Berkeleyans know that Nobel Prize-winning poet Czeslaw Milosz taught at Cal for many years. Fewer likely remember that his fellow laureate Seamus Heaney.
Awe is the Secret Ingredient to a Good Life
By Laura SmithWhat Dacher Keltner teaches isn’t likely to land you a job on Wall Street or even make you more hireable, but that’s not really the point.
How an Unusual Alaskan Town Inspired Iris Yamashita’s First Murder Mystery
By Margie CullenIris Yamashita has always loved fiction writing, but it was a winding road to her first novel, City Under One Roof (Berkley/Penguin, January 2023). As she explained, “I have Asian parents and they really expected me to be a doctor or engineer or something. Writing was okay as a hobby, but not okay as my main focus.”
Cheered Up: You Can Be a Dancer and a Lawyer
By Rachel Schuster ’17, J.D. ’23 as told to Margie Cullen, M.J. ’22When I was really young, I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease.
Discriminatory Bylaws and Free Speech
By Pat JosephOn September 28, 2022, an opinion piece ran in the Los Angeles–based Jewish Journal that carried the alarming headline, “Berkeley Develops Jewish-Free Zones.”
The Winter Issue’s Editor’s Note
By Pat Joseph“The University is not engaged in making ideas safe for students. It is engaged in making students safe for ideas.”
What to Read and Watch this Winter
The best from Berkeley’s writers and film makers
How Berkeley is Improving Equity and Inclusion
By Lizeth De La LuzFive Questions with Dania Matos, Vice Chancellor for Equity and Inclusion
Berkeley’s Partnership with Tuskegee
By Rob GunnisonIn July of this year, Berkeley announced a partnership with Tuskegee University for the study of data and community, a mission that aligns with the long tradition at Tuskegee of using academic rigor to advance its social agenda.
Editor’s Note from the Fall Issue of California Magazine
By Laura SmithI don’t know about you, but I’m growing weary of living in unprecedented times. Here I’m talking about our most recent national schism: the fall of Roe.
Our Editors’ Picks for Your Fall Reading and Viewing
New Yorker documentaries, Art and Race Matters, and more.
