What if the Vikings were not the furious marauders we thought they were?

Happening Off-Campus: What if Vikings were not the perpetually furious marauders we always thought them to be? Neil Price, the London-born archeology professor at Uppsala University, has long worked to rewrite the narrative of helmeted brute through his research. In his 2020 book, “Children of Ash and Elm: A History of Vikings,” Dr. Price reveals how the Vikings were perhaps never an ethnicity at all, but more of a job description. According to Dr. Price, the terrifying armies that descended upon Europe were not a monolith; they were migrating communities, driven from their homelands from social, political, and economic upheavals. Dr. Price’s latest book, “The Sea King and Sorceress: Life and Death in the Viking Age,” humanizes this world by diving into the histories of 21 people from ancient Norse burial sites. (New York Times)

Happening Near Campus: Last August, Most Holy Redeemer was closed with little explanation from the Archdiocese of New York other than a priest shortage and structural damage to the ceiling. Its weekly Mass was cut to two services a year for its feast day and consecration anniversary, though according to its members the church has not opened for either of those two services, and its ceiling has not been fixed. Since it stopped holding weekly mass, some of its most devoted parishioners have continued to pray in front of its locked gates nearly every Friday morning and Sunday evening. Many Catholic churches, once an essential part of neighborhoods like the Lower East Side, have become endangered. At the heart of the fight of the Most Holy Redeemers parishioners, lie questions of identity in a changing New York neighborhood. (New York Times)

Happening On-Campus: Are you interested in taking part in an immersive learning environment spanning the mountains, rivers, and coastlines of rural Japan? Join Columbia’s Summer in Itoshima Information Session this Monday at the International Affairs Building in room 918 from 4:30-6:00. For more information, click here. 

Song of the Day: Baby Steps by Olivia Dean