monday-mornings

With the reopening of JJ’s this semester, there has never been a better time to reconsider how diet affects our well-being.

Depending on how carnivorous your diet is, you might find yourself either hating or loving Mondays at Columbia. Even though your options aren’t completely meatless, your pickings are significantly limited. While vegans and vegetarians celebrate the abundance of plant-based food, carnivores despise the lack of meat in their meals.

To kick off our series of Monday Features, Spectator Opinion presents four articles that focus on religious life at Columbia. The spread features articles from members of Hillel, the MSA, the HSO, and the IVCF.

This Monday, Spectator Opinion presents four students' experiences with studying abroad and their decisions to leave New York for a semester. Fernanda Diaz calms down and finds space to breathe at the University of York. Lauri Feldman discovers Cape Town is a city with secrets of its own. Samuel Daly finds studying in Tanzania raises more questions than answers. Dov Friedman digs up new perspectives on Egypt during an archaeological dig program. Katherine Domash passes on studying in China and decides to stick around.

With concerns about the environment constantly growing, Spectator Opinion looks at four pieces of this world-wide puzzle. Becky Davies explains how everyone can participate in the sustainable food movement, while Acadia Roher examines a paradox created by environmental change. Professor Shahid Naeem looks at how human work should be more aligned with other organisms' sense of 'work,' and Julie DeVries encourages consumers to change their lifestyles instead of buying fashionably "green" products.

Almost every decision we make requires us to make ethical judgments, but rarely do we have the time to give every consideration the time it needs. This Monday, Spectator Opinion adresses some ethical issues that deserve a second look. Eric Nyman and Saryta Rodriguez argue that veganism is the only way to respect animal rights, Matt Balestrieri demonstrates that the competing needs of business and the environment are not so easy to resolve, and Christine Anderson compares the media's obligations to its sources and to the public.

This Monday, Spectator Opinion looks at the different roles of student activism from 1968 to 2008. Jonathan Backer considers a more effective form of activism, professor Todd Gitlin urges activists to find new forms of change instead of repeating old ones, and Karina Garcia explains why connecting with the "off-campus" community is important for activism. This is part one of three-part series on student activism. If you are interested in contributing to part two, e-mail us at opinion@columbiaspectator.com.

This Monday, Spectator Opinion continues to examine the role of student activism at Columbia. Gustin Reichbach contributes a new voice to the debate on how the values of the 1968 protests are relevant today, professor Dennis Dalton offers the success of Take Back the Night as a model, and Kristen Loveland envisions a different medium for student activism—the press. This is part two of a three-part series on student activism. If you are interested in contributing to part three, e-mail us at opinion@columbiaspectator.com.

This Monday, Spectator Opinion considers what defines a truly "global university." Nick Klagge wonders why Columbia is lagging behind the global efforts of other American universities, Rahel Aima argues that we can't hope to go global until we connect to our community at home, and Professor Saskia Sassen outlines what a global university could give the academic world.

Maybe you call yourself a carnivore. Perhaps you just can't live without a cheeseburger from JJ's Place every now and then. It's also possible that you grew up eating turkey every Thanksgiving, and that's just not a tradition you're willing to forgo.