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With the opposition claiming victory in the recent Zimbabwe election and contesting the president's re-election, FRANCE 24's Nadia Massih is joined by Dr. Chipo Dendere, Assistant Professor of Africana Studies & Political Science at Wellesley College.

Jennifer Chudy, a professor of political science at Wellesley College and author of the forthcoming book "With Sympathy: Rethinking American Racial Politics", notes in her op-ed that even Republicans reported strong support for Black Lives Matter after Floyd’s murder: “For a party often characterized by its racial insensitivity and antagonism toward racial minorities, this increase in support was striking. But perhaps even more striking is its rapid decline.” After Black linguistic innovations armed the country with terms and ideas that situated Floyd’s death within a wider, structural plight, Republicans swiftly entered negrophobic revulsion, becoming locked into the “wokeness” obsession they claimed to despise.

The presidential election in Zimbabwe last week that kept the governing party in power and was widely criticized as dubious is likely to isolate the country further from the United States and other Western nations. But it has also exposed Zimbabwe to increased scrutiny and pressure from a surprising place: its neighbors in southern Africa... Chipo Dendere, a political science professor at Wellesley College in Massachusetts, said she saw a broader shift among regional bodies across the continent that want to promote stability. They are acknowledging that “the impact of colonialism is there, but we also have to look inward and think, ‘What are we doing as African governments to move the continent forward?’” said Ms. Dendere, who has researched Zimbabwe extensively.

In a era marked by rapid technological advancement, we are seeing everything from artificial intelligence to robots slowly seep into our everyday lives. But now, this technology is increasingly making inroads into a realm that has long been uniquely human: religion...  It’s a concept referred to as orthopraxy, according to Wellesley College anthropology lecturer Holly Walters. “In short, the robot can do your religion better than you can because robots, unlike people, are spiritually incorruptible,” she explained. “Modern robotics might then feel like a particular kind of cultural paradox, where the best kind of religion is the one that eventually involves no humans at all.”

Assistant professor of Africana studies Chipo Dendere writes for The Conversation about the Zimbabwe election: Can Nelson Chamisa win? He appeals to young voters but the odds are stacked against him.

Ifeanyi Menkiti, poet, philosopher, and longtime professor at Wellesley College, bought the Grolier Poetry Bookshop in Harvard Square in 2006, saving the storied spot from closure, and he ran it until his death in 2019. His family keeps the place running now, with its high shelves lined with poetry collections, and the ghosts of poets past hovering in the air. On Thursday, Aug. 24, the Grolier is hosting the third annual Ifeanyi Menkiti Memorial Reading, taking place on what would’ve been Menkiti’s 83rd birthday.

Wellesley police took a boat out into Lake Waban at Wellesley College to rescue a disoriented dog that ran into trouble during a swim. The dog was scooped from the water by the Wellesley Fire Department boat and returned safely to its family.

For some families, particularly those with incomes and assets between $75,000 and $200,000, the impact of removing the sibling discount could be large. Their eligibility for financial aid could be cut by thousands of dollars, explained Phillip Levine, an economics professor at Wellesley College.