Conversations
Ned Friedman 15Q Arboretum Trees
"I’m gonna take you back a different way through the conifers, so we don’t repeat anything," Friedman says.
Fifteen Questions: Ned Friedman on the Arnold Arboretum, ‘Botanizing,’ and His Favorite Tree
The Organismic and Evolutionary Biology professor and Arboretum director took FM on a tour of the Arboretum, discussing botany, evolution, and his love of trees along the way. “Everything that is our reality has been shaped by plants,” he says.
Ned Friedman Tree Picture
"It’s kind of a magical tree, and it’s a mutant tree, too," Friedman says.
Hacking Harvard Bridge with Oliver R. Smoot
As a pledge, the fraternity made Smoot lay down on the bridge over 300 times, painting ticks at each smoot. Almost 70 years later, the Smoot markings remain, allowing pedestrians to measure their journey in “smoots.” According to a sign on the bridge, Cambridge and Boston are exactly 364.4 smoots apart.
Up Close with Lee Smith
Smith’s enduring attachment to his time is representative of his broader artistic philosophy, one of introspection and intimacy. Part of that philosophy emerged from an encounter with the groundbreaking photojournalist Gordon Parks during his visit to the yearbook staff.
Daniel Lieberman 15Q portrait
Daniel E. Lieberman is the chair of the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology and professor of biological sciences.
Fifteen Questions: Sarah S. Richardson on Gender Equity in Science, Interdisciplinary Research, and Purring as a Superpower
The historian of science sat down with Fifteen Minutes to talk about gender, science, and her ideal superpower. "Science is done by humans in context in cultural spaces, and is inflected by those contexts," she says.
Fifteen Questions: Jeannie Suk Gersen on Free Speech, Fast Fashion, and Getting Over Yourself
The Harvard Law School professor and New Yorker writer Jeannie Suk Gersen sat down with Fifteen Minutes to discuss her exploration of various aspects of the law. "For me, I can’t imagine in my career not having that sense of spontaneity and unpredictability about what it is I’m going to get super interested in next," she says.
Jeannie Suk Gersen Portrait
Jeannie Suk Gersen is a Harvard Law School professor and a writer for The New Yorker.
Fifteen Questions: Claudia D. Goldin on the Nobel Prize, Women in Economics, and the Barbie Movie
Henry Lee Professor of Economics Claudia D. Goldin speaks with Fifteen Minutes about her Nobel Prize, gender gaps in economics, and the Barbie movie.
Claudia D. Goldin Portrait
Claudia D. Goldin is the 2023 Nobel Laureate in Economics and the Henry Lee Professor of Economics.
Fifteen Questions: Yevgenia Albats on Journalism in the USSR, Freedom of the Press, and Her Bibliophilia
The journalist sat down with Fifteen Minutes to talk about her career, including being declared an enemy of the Russian state, investigative reporting on KGB officials, and her deep love of reading that was kindled in Widener Library’s basement. “In many countries, people are suffering because of their cruel leaders, because of injustice, because of poverty, because of absence of normal medical help,” she says. “Our job is to tell their stories.”
Unapologetic Selfhood with Matta Zheng
“When students come to me — many, if not all the times — they’re really suffering because they’re worried, they’re concerned, or maybe they even believe that their person is fundamentally wrong in some way,” Zheng says. “I am able, when it’s appropriate and when it works, to affirm to them in no uncertain language, in the fullest ways that I can, their full humanity, their full perfection, their full wholeness.”
Avi Schiffman
Having once turned down a multimillion-dollar offer to monetize a Covid-19 tracking website, Harvard dropout Avi Schiffmann now intends to “conquer” the world of wearable AI.
crespo portrait
Andrew Manuel Crespo ’05 is a professor of criminal law and procedure at Harvard Law school, the executive faculty director of the Institute to End Mass Incarceration, and a founding editor of Inquest, a forum for advancing decarceral ideas.
crespo football
A picture of Andrew Manuel Crespo ’05 in the huddle of his high school football team. He keeps this picture in his office.
Matta Zheng
Zheng’s firm belief in belonging that does not compromise the self has shaped their interests — drag performance, queer affirmation, spirituality, and palliative care, to name a few. This eclectic collection, like Zheng themself, refuses to be sorted into society’s traditional categories for personhood.
Harvard Dropout Avi Schiffmann is Making an AI-Powered ‘Wearable Mom’
Having once turned down a multimillion-dollar offer to monetize a Covid-19 tracking website, Avi Schiffmann now intends to “conquer” the world of wearable AI.
matta courtesy
Matta Zheng stands in San Francisco's Chinatown in a qipao and black heels with their face painted white and magenta.
Fifteen Questions: Andrew Manuel Crespo ’05 on Plea Bargaining, Playing Football in High School, and a Fateful Coop Dance Party
The law professor sat down with FM to talk about the potential of collective plea bargaining, meeting his wife on the dance floor of the Dudley Coop, and what’s kept him coming back to Harvard. “The Harvard degree does not confer on you a guarantee that you will use the privilege and power that you get by virtue of being here to make the world better. That’s a choice. It’s always a choice,” he says.
Jonathan L. Zittrain
Jonathan L. Zittrain is a professor at Harvard Law School and faculty director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society.
Fifteen Questions: Jonathan Zittrain on Social Media, AI Litigation, and CompuServe
The law professor sat down with Fifteen Minutes to discuss AI regulation, moderating online communities, and the Applied Social Media Lab. “I’m very interested in ways to see how people can gather with a sense of shared ownership rather than a corporate patron overseeing the conversation,” Zittrain says.
Brooks Lambert-Sluder, the Adviser’s Adviser
Brooks B. Lambert-Sluder ’05 is now the assistant director at the Advising Program Office and overseer of the Peer Advising Fellows program, but he recalls feeling a lack of support when he first arrived at Harvard — at the time, the PAF program did not yet exist.