Institutional News

Silver on Building Community

In the wake of the election this November, The Chronicle of Higher Education published an opinion piece by Mariko Silver called "Learning How to Be Together." 

Chronicle of Higher Education

For Silver, the biggest lesson from this year's tumultuous campaign is that "we [as a country] have forgotten, or perhaps never knew, how to see one another."

She sees the way forward through building intentional communities, ones that make space for diversity, difference, and debate, emphasizing that "being a community does not mean we must agree. In fact, being able to live with disagreement, give it space, and analyze it is crucial."

She concludes:

The need for discourse and critical analysis has never been greater, the need to know and understand never more crucial. And so we make space, we make art, we ask questions, we examine the evidence, and we generate solutions. We listen to our fellow human beings. We get to work.