The Ear

Welcome back to The Ear, Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, excavating, and investigating Columbia’s past and present. In this episode, Claire Burke and Claire Schnatterbeck investigate what makes a rural student. How do Columbia and Barnard define “rural”? Does the quintessential “rural student” actually exist? Schnatterbeck and Burke use their own rural backgrounds as a starting point...

In this episode of The Ear, Ellie Carver-Horner discusses the extensive archive of Indigenous audio recordings housed in the Columbia University Center for Ethnomusicology and the efforts the University is making to repatriate them. What is audio repatriation, and what does it look like to return something that isn’t physically tangible? Who owns these recordings, and why does their existence matt...

Twenty years after the death of Edward W. Said, a Columbia professor, renowned intellectual, and outspoken advocate of Palestine,reporter Lily Glaser seeks to understand his life, legacy, and impact on campus. In this episode of The Ear, Glaser  rifles  through his personal papers, speaking with former students, listening to exiled authors, and attending lectures. ​​Credits: • Script edited by Cla...

In this episode of The Ear, reporter Alicia Theologides Rodriguez speaks with Columbia students from many backgrounds to better understand how fear impacts the way that they navigate New York. This episode explores the underlying reasons for different students’ fears in an attempt to understand why there are discrepancies between the fears of students and New York Crime trends. ​​Credits: • Script...

From connections to horror stories, and from perks to unionizing. Resident Advisors, otherwise known as as RAs, navigate a complex role in a residential community. They are students like any other, and yet they are also responsible for ensuring the well-being of their peers, and even policing them when necessary. The complexities of the role are complicated even further by financial considerations...

Since the early 1950s, Columbia admissions has rapidly expanded its international student population, which currently totals 36.2 percent of the student body. But have the rest of Columbia’s academic expectations adapted to this change? Should international students be expected to have in-depth knowledge of Western culture? In this episode of The Ear, reporter Kelly Warner explores these questions...

In this episode, reporter Adrien Wheaton-Schopp investigates the issues surrounding Iran’s recent wave of uprisings. In speaking with both Columbia students and protesters in New York City, he finds that themes of civic responsibility and compassion are repeatedly evoked as motivating factors for the relentless activism. Whether it’s demanding accountability from their University or the administra...

Welcome back to The Ear, Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, excavating, and investigating Columbia’s past and present. In this week’s episode, reporter Cyra Paladini speaks with members of the Purple Gang, an unintentional activist group that came into its own in the wake of an attempted murder of Dean Henry Coleman in the 1970s. This episode was produced by Matthew Schwitzer with addit...

Welcome back to The Ear, Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, excavating, and investigating Columbia’s past and present. How can we look beyond the syllabus to change the way we educate about Black history? In this episode, reporters Natalie Goldberg, Claire Schnatterbeck, and Avery Reed explore the history and importance of contemporary curriculum at Columbia Teachers College and its imp...

Welcome back to The Ear, Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, excavating, and investigating Columbia’s past and present. In this week’s episode, reporter Andrew Kirdahy recounts the early formation of the Beat Generation on Columbia’s campus, detailing the murder in Riverside Park that shaped the trajectory of the Beats’ lives and literary careers. This episode was produced by Chase Cutar...

COVID-19 has totally changed students’ experience with higher education, and the difficulties faced by international students are especially challenging. Under global COVID-19 restrictions, international students are especially vulnerable to institutional decisions. Failing to receive financial support and assistance transitioning to life on campus from Barnard and Columbia, international students...

In this Ear episode, reporter Alan Chen outlines the history of Columbia’s dining halls. From the origins of the JJ’s Place pub to the bygone Wien Dining Hall, on-campus dining has changed over time. But how has the dining experience evolved? And how have the changes to Columbia Dining corresponded with the student body’s calls for change? Listen to find out!    Credits • Reported by Ala...

Columbia Health adamantly encourages students to reach out for care or guidance, however, students are struggling to get the medical help they need from the University. While finding the time to prioritize your personal health is difficult on top of a packed schedule, some students have found that navigating the bureaucracy of Barnard and Columbia health care services makes it all the more worse....

Content warning: This episode discusses issues of sexual abuse and assault.  Welcome back to The Ear, Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, excavating, and investigating Columbia’s past and present. In this week’s episode, reporter Annie Cheng traces the history of Columbia’s Navy ROTC program—from its establishment post-World War II to its discontinuation after the 1968 Vietnam War p...

Welcome back to The Ear, Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, excavating, and investigating Columbia’s past and present. In this week’s episode, reporter Natalie Goldberg investigates affirmative action initiatives specific to rural students. When financial strain, inadequate infrastructure, and cultural expectations discourage rural students from attending higher education institutions,...

Welcome back to The Ear ! In this episode written for the Eye's Arts and Entertainment issue, reporter Matthew Lucia interviews the composers from Columbia’s fall 2020 advanced composition seminar to talk about their pieces, their writing process, and their mental health during the pandemic, and reflects on his own experience in the seminar as well.

Welcome back to The Ear , Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, excavating, and investigating Columbia’s past and present. In this week’s episode, reporters Noah Sheidlower and Sam Hyman capture the voices and issues surrounding jazz at Columbia. How has the community’s perception and involvement in jazz progressed over the years? What are the concerns about the lack of racial and gender d...

Content warning: This episode discusses Columbia’s history with eugenics, sterilization, and the Nazi Party. Welcome back to The Ear , Spectator’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s past and present. In this week’s episode, reporters Miles Stephenson and Matthew Lucia investigate Columbia’s historical involvement in the study and promotion of eugenics in the ear...

Content Warning: This episode of The Ear discusses sexual violence and rape. Welcome back to The Ear, The Eye’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s history! In this week’s episode, reporter Teresa Lawlor examines Students for a Reformed Fraternity System, a student movement at Columbia in 1988 that tried to make the University’s all-male fraternities go coed. Thi...

Welcome back to The Ear, The Eye’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s history! In this week’s episode, reporter Claudia Gohn dives into the history of Columbia’s fall break and why it coincides with Election Day each year. The Ear dives into the proposal by student senators in 1970 to create a 10-day election break and the unique circumstances that informed thei...

Welcome back to The Ear, The Eye’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s history! In this week’s episode, reporter Briani Netzahuatl delves into the relationship between Columbia University and the surrounding neighborhoods of Morningside Heights and West Harlem by examining three key moments: the University’s move uptown to its current location in 1897, the propos...

Welcome back to The Ear, The Eye’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s history! In this week’s episode, The Ear delves into the murder of Columbia Law professor Wolfgang Friedmann in 1972 and Columbia’s complicated Public Safety response. Reporter Cole Cahill sheds light on the role that students play in shaping these policing decisions and considers how this cha...

Welcome back to The Ear, The Eye’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s history! In this week’s episode, reporters Teresa Lawlor and Sam Hyman examine three health crises from Columbia’s history—the 1832 cholera epidemic, the 1918 influenza, and the outbreak of polio on Columbia’s football team in the fall of 1951—in order to better understand how we as a communit...

Welcome back to The Ear , The Eye ’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s history! In this week’s episode, Mabel Ping-Hua Lee—a brilliant and determined leader—defies easy categorization. Reporter Victoria Li traces Lee’s life from Barnard student to first Chinese-American woman to receive a Columbia Ph. D. to suffragette to director of the First Chinese Baptist C...

Welcome back to The Ear, The Eye’s podcast dedicated to documenting, detailing, and excavating Columbia’s history! Our new season kicks off with a story about the historical relationship between Bard College and Columbia. The Hudson Valley college’s historical association with the University was one site of undergraduate coeducational debate decades before Columbia College opened its doors to wome...