Kimia Nikseresht

April 01, 2020

Since my second week of undergraduate classes at the University of Virginia in 2013, I have found a companion in my planner. My beautiful, color-coordinated, perfectly designed planner. I mean, I vividly remember breaking down in ugly tears the day I spilled my coffee on it during my Fourth year, and thinking “how will I survive without my plans?” My social life, my academic needs, my career trajectory and everything else that mattered, including “free time”, was scheduled inside those pages. It was my confidant and my sense of control: I always had a plan.
I think it’s safe to say...
October 24, 2017

Art by Kirsten Hemrich
Here’s a name you might not know: Nancy Gibbs.
Nancy Gibbs started her career in 1985 as a part-time fact checker for Time Magazine. Educated at Oxford, she has spent her entire three-decade career at the magazine, working her way carefully and meticulously up the ranks of a world that was, at the time, white-male-dominated. Gibbs became the first female editor-in-chief of the nationally recognized magazine in 2013, calling herself “the first managing editor to wear pumps – so far as...
April 17, 2017

If you’re anything like us, you love to read (and you love to read Iris, am I right?). We read because literature, regardless of content or style, is a gateway to thought and passion. Language tells stories, and stories are powerful little entities that can shape and reshape mentalities, take us to faraway lands, allow us to fall in love and hate, and force us to feel. And I mean, force, because you...
January 24, 2017
20 January, 2017.
Normal day.
21 January, 2017.
8 AM: Standing on the crowded Metro, heading into Washington D.C. One woman walking up and down the Metro with her “MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN” hat. It’s too damn early for this shit.
10 AM: An air of empowerment has taken over. Excitement. Inspiration. How are people so freaking creative? These signs are mind-blowing....
December 28, 2016

December is always the month of reflection, as we attempt to make sense of the last 12 months and, feminist or not, come to terms with that fact that we are one year older and don’t feel that much wiser. In fact, this January, we may actually feel dumber – think about it… We don’t have a female president. We don’t have peace in the Middle East. We don’t even have decent wifi at UVa. 2016 isn’t looking too good.
2016 was unique, though, in that it was also the year of the hashtag. We #PrayforParis (and some of us #PrayforIstanbul too), we recognize that #BlackLivesMatter (...
December 28, 2016

You know that feeling when your heart drops, your hands start shaking, and the whole world seems to disappear as you try to read that blurry “we need to talk” text through your uncontrollable tears? It might be due to the lack of oxygen, because you’re already crying so hard you physically can’t breathe through your runny snotty nose, or it might be that your body knows what your brain doesn’t want to accept yet – you’re about to get dumped.
At this point it doesn’t matter if you met this guy a week ago, or if you’ve been in love with him for an eternity. It’s a shitty feeling. Now...
March 01, 2016
Just a few weeks after its official release, Rihanna’s newest reggae-inspired collaboration with Drake off of her new album “Anti” has already made its presence in pop-culture as one of this year’s assured radio hits and club anthems, currently holding down the number 1 spot on the Billboard’s Hot 100 list. But this song and the music video that accompanies it are more than a catchy melody and an unoriginal narrative of two...
November 10, 2015
April 20, 2015
