Although I have never taught at a big university, I imagine that a certain degree of anonymity is one of its advantages. Too much involvement with any school can be a bad thing, and sometimes we are all (faculty and students alike) too involved with the ins and outs of Wabash. Too much love for [...]

As I compose some final thoughts on race in relation to Wabash, it is necessary that I make it clear that I am by no means an expert or a scholar on the issue of race. The lack of expertise, however, should never keep one from expressing ones opinions and ideas on a topic. It [...]

“I created Kwanzaa,” laughed Ron Karenga like a teenager who’s just divulged a deeply held, precious secret. “People think it’s African. But it’s not. I wanted to give black people a holiday of their own. So I came up with Kwanzaa. I said it was African because you know black people in this country wouldn’t celebrate it if they knew it was American. Also, I put it around Christmas because I knew that’s when a lot of bloods (blacks) would be partying!”

It is not the creation of Kwanzaa, however, that is Karenga’s most controversial part of his history. In 1971, Karenga was convicted of kidnapping and torturing two women from his US Organization. He was sentenced to one to ten years in prison.

In the first edition of The Phoenix, in Spring 2007, Josh Bellis ’08 wrote an article about the problem created by the construction of the Malcolm X Institute. He suggested that if the College wanted a diversity center, they should have created something for all minority groups. In an apparent effort to prove him right, this fall a handful of minority student groups, with the aid of the Multicultural Concerns Committee, have been promoting the idea of a Minority Student Center. They have attempted to get in the long line of those petitioning to use the recently vacated Kendall House or the soon to be vacated Hovey Cottage.