I’ve been a swiftie ever since I can remember. The Red stadium tour was my first concert, and you’ll see me in the Ticketmaster trenches so I can get my ticket to the Eras Tour. Here are some standout tracks from Midnight, including the 3 am releases I have been listening to on repeat.

You’re on Your Own Kid

This song reminds me of young Taylor with the youthfulness and fun she brings to the music while also delivering a punch with the lyrics. These lyrics make me think of my childhood and growing up while also realizing how much we have seen Taylor mature through her music career. I recommend checking out the Spiderman: No Way Home edits to this song if you weren’t already feeling emotional.

Anti-Hero

Let’s talk about the sexy baby line. The first time I listened to the song, I didn’t think much of the line. It sounded silly, but I thought I knew what she was trying to say, that she feels like a big monster compared to all of the small and cute women surrounding her. As someone who always tends to be on the taller side of women, I understand her strife. This line is also a call out to a joke from 30 Rock where a woman puts on a” sexy baby” act to impress a man. Either way, I think that my interpretation stands, and this bizarre phrase only adds to the theatrics of the song.

Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve

I am so excited to go home to scream this song while I drive with the windows down. It makes me feel like I had just gotten my heart broken and stepped on. Whether I’m sitting on the silent floor of Hillman, zoned out with my headphones on, or running through South Oakland so i can make it to morning classes on time, this song gives me enough righteous anger to get sh*t done.

Bejeweled

I like this song enough to listen to it, even with that one verse from TikTok engraved in my mind. This song is just fun. It’s the perfect song to play when you are getting ready, whether you are about to go out on the town or to a lecture. This usually isn’t the kind of Taylor Swift song that I prefer, as I’m sure you can tell by this point in the list that I like songs that make me feel like the love of my life has left me. This one is just irresistible and never fails to brighten my mood.

High Infidelity

It has come to my attention that this song is an uncommon pick off the album. I’m not surprised because when I think about why I am so obsessed with this song, I can’t focus on what exactly appeals to me. I think there is something about the beat that makes me feel like the most powerful person on campus when this song blasts through my headphones as I strut down Forbes Avenue. I will continue to dance around life, causing chaos wherever I go, but that’s just how things will be, and I appreciate Taylor for realizing that.

Written by Jameson Keebler

I conceal my face with layers of makeup hoping that half a bottle of BB cream will be enough to make me as flawless as Emma Chamberlain looks on the cover of Cosmopolitan magazine. I use innumerous acne medications, aspiring to be as unblemished as the girls in the Clean and Clear commercials. I reject bags of M&Ms and fudge brownies and pepperoni pizzas thinking that my sacrifices will make me “love my body” as much as the emaciated Victoria Secret models love theirs. I routinely shave my legs and armpits and pluck my eyebrows with fear of becoming the hairy woman the media deems horrendous. I do everything yet feel like I am nothing. Nothing compared to the beautiful women pictured in magazines and television.

I didn’t always feel so self-conscious. All my life I’ve been considered a “normal” healthy kid. I didn’t know that there was anything “wrong” with my body until I was in 10th grade and a friend felt the need to make it known to me. We were laying on my bed watching a YouTube video about grilled cheese sandwiches when she said, “You’ve got stretch marks on your legs!” and proceeded to take her pointer finger and identify the four or five tiny lines that were starting to form. “Only fat people have stretch marks.” The onset of my confidence issues came soon after that.

Whereas the world saw a young teenage girl who was happy in her skin, laughed a lot, and didn’t care what anyone thought about her, I felt like I was worth nothing on the inside. The truth of the matter was I wasn’t happy in my skin; I laughed to hide my pain and cared deeply what my peers thought of my appearance. I can’t remember a moment when I’d look in the mirror and think, I look good. I’d lose it when a photo of me at a bad angle was posted, or when I was a bigger size at one store than I was somewhere else. Every day, I’d scroll through Instagram with envy, looking at the girls with perfect bodies and be so angry that I couldn’t look like that.

For far too long, I abused my body. I talked down to her, writing down every part of myself that I hated and reading it back to myself over and over. I would look at myself in the mirror for hours, poking the extra fat and pointing out the flaws. I fought with her. I created good and bad food lists for her to live by, obsessively tracking calories taken in and calories burned. I punished her, exercising for hours at a time, secretly enjoying the pain I felt. I refused to nourish her. Mealtime felt like a battle—one that I was consistently losing. I chose to hide her away because I was ashamed of her, wearing oversized sweatshirts every day and making up excuses to not go to the beach with my friends.

Coming out of this toxic mindset has not been easy. Some days I feel like I am on top of the world and other days I feel as if I had made no progress towards recovery at all. I’ve sought help online by reading inspiring stories from women who have somehow found a way beyond this thinking. “I have learned to love my body and accept it and cherish it and worship it,” they’ll write. But I haven’t gotten to that point yet, and it doesn’t seem like I will anytime soon. So, when I read about all these women coming to love their bodies, it all seems like a giant lie because how can I learn to love something I’ve hated all my life?

But maybe it is okay to accept that I am not happy with my body just yet. Maybe it’s okay to hate how I look in the mirror some days because that means that there are days that I am happy with how I look. When I catch myself comparing my body to those I see on social media, I remind myself that my body does so much for me, and I should appreciate it for all the good it brings. Loving who we are is not easy because there can be so many things to hate but focusing on the good—great friends, beautiful art, calming music, a wonderful support system—has helped me make small pushes forward.

Written by Anonymous

Growing up as a pastor’s daughter, I felt pressure coming from all directions dictating what I should wear. Dressing for church, shopping with my mother, and picking out clothes for a night out all involved complicated decisions as I tried to find an outfit that would look good, be comfortable, and not reveal too much. Or reveal just enough? I stood in front of a mirror countless times, wondering if I was dressing for myself or for others.

To work out some of these questions, I called up some friends with different religious and cultural backgrounds than mine. We had a long conversation, ate way too many sour patch kids, and learned some things about each other. Keep in mind these are our own thoughts and not a reflection of Studio 412 as a whole, and buckle in for a *spicy* conversation about religion, clothing, and the patriarchy.

A brief introduction: Our names, religions, and backgrounds.

HARSHENI: Freshman, Hindu, and one of my roommates. A public health major with a knack for discovering high lead levels in my favorite foods.

FIZZA & TASBEEH: Freshman, Muslim, New Jersey natives. Identical twins and microbiology and molecular biology majors, respectively.

LIZZIE: Freshman, Christian, political science major and narrator of this piece.

Was modesty something that you thought about growing up? Was it tied to religion in any way? Were the adults in your life impressing it on you in any way? 

LIZZIE: My mom was the enforcer of the dress code—she would check me before I went out the door every day, and sometimes she would say “Turn around! Different outfit!” There were things I could wear to school but not to church. I also went to a Christian camp where I couldn’t wear two-piece bathing suits. Which makes sense on one hand, because two-pieces aren’t very practical if you’re being flung off of the Blob. But on the other hand, there was this element of the girls needing to be modest.

TASBEEH: Were the guys expected to wear shirts?

LIZZIE: No.

FIZZA: In Islam, there’s a point where you become “wajib”, which is like a coming of age. For women, it’s 9, and for men it’s 15. That’s when you’re supposed to start wearing hijab. For us, we stopped wearing shorts. I wore short sleeves until I was twelve, which technically you’re not supposed to do, and then I switched into long sleeves, long pants. I didn’t start the scarf until this summer. It’s been a kind of leaning into modesty—never anything our parents forced on us, although they obviously had an influence. My mom wears a scarf. 

TASBEEH: Something I didn’t know until I started hijab is that not only are you not supposed to show your hair but you also shouldn’t show your neck and collarbones. That’s to protect your “aura”. Men have an aura too, which they would protect by covering their chest and their knees. I don’t know any man in my life who covers their aura, but I know lots of women who do it.

HARSHENI: As I got older, there was some pressure to be modest to “protect myself”, but my mom is pretty chill about it. But even now, I don’t wear short-shorts, and dresses and skirts I wear just above my knee. 

LIZZIE: Was that decision a religious thing?

HARSHENI: More of a cultural thing. The way my parents grew up in India had a big influence on me—my dad grew up in a village where there’s unspoken rules about modesty. But if I’m going to a temple, I’m fully covered, out of respect. Even if I was going to church or another religious place, I would cover up.

Besides religion and culture, what influences the way you dress?

FIZZA: I feel like I wouldn’t be dressing this way if I wasn’t Muslim. There’s so many other things I would rather be wearing, but I have to set a limit for myself. I used to wear a lot of v-necks, because I love my collarbones. Finding cute clothing that’s modest, especially for the summer, is so hard. That’s why I’m much more of a fall/winter girl.

TASBEEH: I used to think that I was modest enough as long as I wasn’t showing skin, but my perspective on that has changed since I started wearing the scarf. But if I try to switch too much too quickly, I start hating the way I look.

LIZZIE: I feel like in my life there’s a tension between wanting to be modest and wanting to look attractive—and with that, wondering if I’m dressing for myself or for guys.

TASBEEH: As a pastor’s daughter, did people have a higher expectation for the way you dressed?

LIZZIE: I was very lucky in that my church didn’t put that much scrutiny on me. Maybe there was a little more attention, because everyone knew who I was. 

HARSHENI: I’m realizing now I didn’t have much of a say in my wardrobe until high school...my mom often picked out my clothes for me, and I just went along with it. But I got closer to my mom during quarantine, and we had more conversations about clothes then. Now I dress in a way that’s comfortable to me, where I feel cute but comfortable in terms of modesty.

Do you think guys should think about modesty more?

TASBEEH: One hundred percent. I don’t know what side of Instagram you guys are on, but I’m on this religious, Muslim side…

FIZZA: It’s fake religious.

TASBEEH: There’s people saying “women shouldn’t wear this, this, and this, because you’ll attract men”, and it’s the wackiest stuff I swear I’ve never heard before in my life. And they don’t say anything about men. 

FIZZA: There’s an idea—I’m sure this is in the Bible as well—that people shouldn’t judge others because they themselves aren’t perfect. If a man isn’t trying to be modest, he shouldn’t be saying anything about women. 

HARSHENI: I am going to bring this back to the patriarchy. *Laughter* The way that guys can just walk around shirtless…and if you see a guy walking around in a Speedo at the pool, no one asks any questions. In most religions, modesty is pushed more on women.

FIZZA: I will say…the one place that had modesty rules for men was our Saturday school. They couldn’t wear shorts.

HARSHENI: That’s the same for temples. There’s this one temple in New Jersey where I’ve been handed a dhoti for modesty, and the last time we were there they gave one to my brother! In terms of Indian culture, I’m going to blame the British for everything.

LIZZIE: As you should.

HARSHENI: In Hindu scriptures, there’s lots of stories about equality between men and women. There’s even a god that’s half man, half woman. The British came in and ruined everything. The blouse worn under the sari only came about because of the British…the entire point of the sari is that it’s a giant piece of cloth tied in a way that can fully cover you.

How would you define modesty, and why is it important?

TASBEEH: I feel like modesty really does not have a definition. It’s what you make of it. For me, it’s important and helpful because it lets me know who’s on the same track as me in Islam. Also, you can be a bad Muslim and wear hijab. Don’t get me wrong—hijab is important. But it’s your version of your utmost modesty, and that looks different for different people.

FIZZA: Modesty can also look different based on the culture you’re living in.

HARSHENI: For me, modesty is important as a sign of respect when I’m in temple, or if I’m praying.

LIZZIE: That’s a very valid point, but something that drives me crazy is when I’m around other Christians, and they start slut-shaming women behind their backs. 

FIZZA: That is so annoying. It just pushes people away. Biggest pet peeve.

From here, the conversation meandered away from clothes and onto all sorts of other religious topics. Following our general theme of religion and the patriarchy, we discussed marriage, fasting, and periods. Although we weren’t able to wrap things up neatly, we learned a lot about each other and ourselves. 

I love conversations like this. I can’t speak for Harsheni, Tasbeeh, and Fizza, but growing in my understanding of other cultures and religions helps me grow in my own faith and respect women who come from other practices.

Written by lizzie dickerson

I always joke with my friends that I’ve never dated anyone.

 Not really, anyways. 

They then proceed to chime in to clarify that I have—which is technically true. So then why do I feel like I haven’t had that experience? 

From a fairly young age, relationships are shoved down our throats. Not even just by others in our lives, but by the media. Cinderella finds her Prince Charming and he saves her from a life of being enslaved by her evil stepmother, Aurora can only come out of her coma with true love's kiss, etc. And especially as we age, everyone in teen programming has significant others and on-screen kisses. So I feel as though it’s fair that the rose-colored glasses we wear when we freshly enter high school are valid. 

I had my first and only boyfriend when I was a freshman/sophomore in high school. He was super sweet and was one of my best friends at the time, but he liked me a lot more than I liked him. Famously, he had been asking through a friend of mine if I would say yes to going on a date. For a long time I said no since I wasn’t sure of my feelings and I knew that wasn’t fair for him. Eventually though, those rose-colored glasses were slid back on my face by those around me, saying how cute we would be together. He asked me out after the Spring Dance at his school.

To say the relationship didn’t go well would be an understatement. It’s not like we fought or anything, because that wouldn’t have physically been possible. We barely saw each other all summer. This was my fault of course, as I had a lot of stuff going on, and my pseudo-boyfriend always got pushed to the side. 

Once we got back to school, we started getting back into the swing of things, but even then the relationship moved at snail speed. After eight months of dating and many talks with friends about how the relationship just wasn’t working, I broke up with him on my sixteenth birthday. 

I know you’re wondering, how in the world did you not see it sooner? How did he stay with you that whole time? And honestly, I don’t know. I think that I just wanted to be in a relationship so bad and have that coming-of-age moment I so desperately longed for that I was willing to turn a blind eye to all of the faults. 

So where does this put me now almost four years later? Not much further. I have done a lot of reflection since then, trying to understand what went wrong. I’ve made sure to not jump into things with others too fast so I can fully comprehend my feelings before I commit. This, however, has completely stunted my dating life. 

To this day I still really struggle to navigate relationships, both romantic and platonic. I also feel that, since I haven’t had much experience I haven’t been able to figure it out. And now that I’m in college I feel like it’s too late to figure it out. But I know this isn’t true.

Feeling lonely and left behind since you have no experience to show for yourself is not necessarily a bad thing. Trust me, I had to learn the hard way. It just means that you are better at prioritizing yourself and your desires. It’s ok to have high expectations! I know I do.There is, and always has been, this idea that you have to start dating young and that the later you wait the weirder you are. But I’m here to tell you that, even though I know it doesn’t feel like it, you will get there. Everyone has a different story, otherwise what would they make movies and write songs about?

Written by Leighton Curless

“Why don’t you have a boyfriend?”

I can’t count the number of times the question has been thrown at me. 

Often I’m caught off guard and try to laugh it off, usually mumbling something about focusing on school. And while that is somewhat true—it isn’t the full story.

When I was younger I thought something was wrong with me because I wasn’t in a relationship. I must be too ugly, or annoying, or my body wasn’t good enough, etc, etc… On and on I’d go, finding reasons why someone couldn’t love me, all while being constantly surrounded by messages telling me I needed to be in a relationship. 

It was in the Disney movies I watched as a child and the books I read as a teenager. It was there every time I opened social media and in almost every song. It felt like a cuckoo clock going off at the beginning of every hour, reminding me I was unlovable. 

Frustrated doesn’t begin to describe how I felt watching the world continue to push this narrative down, not only my, but every other young person’s throat. From the minute we can understand what a romantic relationship is, we are told that our goal in life is to find one. 

But I don’t believe that’s true. 

I hope I don’t come off as cynical or that I hate love and think everyone should avoid it at all costs—that couldn’t be further from the truth. Ironically, I’m a hopeless romantic. 

I still believe love is a beautiful, unifying force in our world, and hope that everyone who wishes to find romantic love, will. There are few things that make me as happy as seeing my friends in happy, healthy relationships. I even believe in soulmates! 

But over the past year, as I have put myself out there, gone on “dates”, and thought more about the idea of being in a relationship, I have realized something crucial,

I want to be alone. 

At least for now. 

I do hope to find a romantic partner someday (I think, only time will tell), but currently, I am perfectly fulfilled with my own presence and the presence of my friends and family, that I feel no need for one. Honestly, when I think of dating someone right now, it feels like I’m suffocating—like I’m a little patch of grass that’s in the shade of a skyscraper and can’t feel the sun.

I brought my feelings up to my therapist, who stared at me and said point blank, “Then why are you trying to contort yourself to meet expectations you don’t even agree with? It seems to me that being in a relationship right now would make you miserable. There’s nothing wrong with being alone.” 

It may sound stupid, but that conversation was a breakthrough for me. Of course, I knew people could be happily single; I was even happily single, but I always assumed I would be happier with a partner, and I should constantly be on the lookout for my soulmate. I didn’t understand that it was ok to crave solitude.  

Realizing I wanted to dedicate this period of my life to focusing on myself—I don’t mean my studies or my career—but the things that make me truly happy, the hobbies and interests that light up my soul, and the people that make me feel at peace, has been the most restoring change I have made in years. 

It has made me much more gentle and kind to myself. I get to enjoy all of the things I thought were “cringe”, “silly” or “childish” because I no longer feel the need to impress anyone.

Looking back, I feel sad for that young girl who wanted nothing more than to be loved. She should have been focusing on building friendships and being a kid, rather than feeling like a failure because she didn’t get asked to prom. I wish I could go back and tell her how differently she would feel about relationships in a few years. She’d probably be terrified that she’d be twenty years old and still had never been in a romantic relationship, but truly, I couldn’t be happier. 

 At the end of the day, as cliché as it is, you only have yourself, so do whatever the f*ck makes you happy. Be in a relationship, don’t be in a relationship, date around, be with the same person for ten years—it doesn’t matter. But don’t let the world persuade you into thinking you can’t be a whole person if you are alone. 

Embrace your aloneness. 

Happy Valentine’s Day, kate xo

Written by Kate Castello

I never considered myself to be the “relationship type”. 

I had all the dating apps, I met up with the guys, and then I always left those meetups with no desire to see them again. I used to think it was me—I simply wasn’t someone who was made to date. I was always ghosting or friend zoning these guys that I simply had no motivation for, I was starting to get exhausted. 

Over the summer I expressed these concerns to my mom while we were driving into Oakland. I gazed at the Monongahela river and felt the warm summer air on my face. “I just think I have commitment issues, that’s why I will never be in a relationship.” I mentioned off-handedly. 

I think if my mom could have slammed on the brakes she would have, and what she said has stuck with me since, “Isabelle, don’t even manifest that to yourself, the more you say it the more you convince yourself it is true. You do not have commitment issues, you just haven’t found the person you want to be committed to.” 

I think that this is such an important thing for all of us to keep in mind. I didn’t have commitment issues, I had high expectations for myself and knew my worth when it came to finding someone I wanted to be committed to. There’s nothing wrong with you if you want to be alone, you are an independent person who is comfortable enough with themselves to recognize you don’t need a partner. 

There is no guidebook when it comes to dating, no timeline. We find our person when the time is right, and it usually comes when you least expect it. 

Rewind to February 22, 2022 I was distractedly swiping through tinder and came across a man with a cute smile and good music taste. A rare but easy swipe right from me. We matched, and a week later we met outside of Pizza Romano at 1 am (how romantic). We stayed in touch for the two weeks following, and I got welcomed back to campus from spring break with a “Hey Belle, I think we should just be friends” text. 

Humbled is an understatement of how I felt at that moment. 

I managed to keep my disappointment at bay, and we truly did stay friends. We were a little shy of each other at first, but by the summer he was truly one of my best friends. Those feelings for him never went away, but my ego and heart refused to admit defeat to him again, so I kept it to myself. But, whenever my mom told me I would be committed when I found the right person, he was the first face I thought of. 

By the end of the summer going into O-Week, I was starting to get frustrated. I never have been the hopeless romantic type, and I was embarrassed with myself of how just flat out obsessed I was with him. I just had this gut feeling we would work, and as each day went by it seemed as though the universe was trying to prove me wrong. 

Being single but wanting to date is a confusing and exhausting process. You have so many strike outs and receive so much blatant disrespect that when someone holds the door for you it is easy to imagine getting married to them. The bar is literally in hell. All I would say is don’t silence that little voice in your heart. You know what you deserve, and you know when those needs are not being met, and when they are. It's easy to convince yourself you are overreacting or being dramatic, but you know you best, and you deserve the best. 

For the longest time I tried to convince myself I was crazy, because every time I looked at this man I had this terrifying, amazing gut feeling that he was my person. I still feel crazy for saying that. But it’s Valentine's Day, so I am embracing my hopeless romantic side and I encourage you all to do the same. Love is a scary and intimidating feeling, but once you let yourself be vulnerable and find that person, you will be so appreciative of all of the stages you went through to get there. Whether you want to be alone, don’t understand dating, or are in a relationship, embrace the feelings you have now. 

Focusing back to the present day, I have now been with this silly little tinder man turned best friend turned boyfriend for over five months. The wait was worth it, my gut was right, and my heart can finally say, 

“Ah, Finally”

Happy Valentine's Day. 

I love you all, but especially you, Andrew Clarke. 

Xoxo belle

Written by Belle O'Hara

I’ve never been skilled at change. Notice my word choice — skilled. For “normal” people, is changing a skill? Or is it a natural innate thing; a piece of humanity that I was born without? After all, change is built into our biological clocks. Every day, we get a little older, and every year, the Earth does too, with its changing of the seasons. Right now, we merge from the days of sandy toes and sun that seeps through to your core, to the snow-piled winters, where somehow my body, even in its constant state of tension and agitation, is warmer than the air itself.

I’ve spent the last two or so months sorely attempting to adapt to my college surroundings. I grew up about twenty-minutes east of campus, and I purposefully stayed close to home — something that I know would disappoint my younger self. She ached, not only to leave her town, but to go as far away from it as possible. I think I had convinced myself that I wasn’t the problem, I wasn’t the reason I was so lonely, so unfulfilled, and so glued to that classic state of eighth-grade depression — it was the city. It was Pittsburgh, and its steel mills, and its dirty rivers, and its stupid little black-and-gold towels that angry men wave around in the air — no matter if our sports teams lose or win.

High school was also a hard change for me — I went to three different schools in a four-year time-span. Finally, I settled on a place where I managed to find a handful of good friends. Friendship is part of what makes change so hard. At the risk of sounding cliche, it’s like searching for a needle in a haystack. But sometimes the needles will poke you until your hands are speckled red. Or, your slippery fingers will drop them into the abyss, never to be seen again.

By my senior year, I finally became semi-confident in myself. I grew out of my hatred for my hometown. I decided to stop resenting my parents, and my mom became one of my best friends. I adopted a cat named Houdini, who I love more than life itself. I was comfortable, by most definitions of the term. But it was time to venture off again to a brand-new start. Never did I ever think I’d be nostalgic for rubbing my hands together in a cold gym, or for wasting time in study halls. But, here I am, exhausted with reinventing myself.

Some nights, when I lay in my Tower A dorm room, I stare at the ceiling and a wave of melancholy washes over me, like I’m laying in a shallow sea. The sand is prickling at my spine, and the tide is growing lower, and lower, and lower. When I’m feeling brave, I’ll try to close-read this feeling like it’s an assignment. At its core, it’s a feeling of lost time and what-ifs. I want my lips to be stained with freshly-picked strawberries. I want to drink hot cocoa on a snowy day. I want to cook peanut butter fudge with my Grandma. I even want to re-play the taunts of my bullies, because this time, I’ll know what to do.

I worry that Pittsburgh is a curse, or some sort of never-ending time loop.

But for as many wants of the past, I have wants of the future. I want to live in another state someday. One with mountains and lots of trees, like Oregon or Washington. I want to study abroad in London just for the sake of saying I did it.

I have a backstory and a load of possibilities, both just out of reach. I am not fond of this middle, limbo space. Why can’t I view myself as an individual instead of an extension of a city or a family? And is it really a curse to have a home that it hurts to leave?

For my own sanity, I hope those answers come soon. I don’t know where I belong, but I do know that everything is a process. At one point, I was born, and I’m sure that infant-Wendy wasn’t a big fan of things like light or sound. But now those things are at my core. One day, maybe I won’t just be a part of a family, or a Pittsburgh-native — I’ll be a tree in Oregon, a big book with complicated words, or a little grain of sand on a big beach. Or, dare I say, a past and a future consecutively: both knowing pain, and strife, but also the joy that can come after disaster.

Written by Wendy Moore

Prior to my visit to Andy Warhol’s Social Network exhibition, I knew very little about Andy Warhol and the exhibition itself. I chose to analyze this particular exhibition because, despite being a Pittsburgh native, I have never been to The Andy Warhol Museum. Although I lacked knowledge of the exhibition, I knew about the existence of Interview Magazine before visiting. I did not, however, know that the magazine had any relation to Andy Warhol. After learning that Warhol founded Interview Magazine with journalist John Wilcock, I was intrigued by the idea of an artist, known for his work with screen printing, co-founding a pop culture magazine.

I had a few preconceived notions before attending the exhibition. I expected the museum to feel very modern and industrial because of the work and style of art for which Andy Warhol is famous. I went on a Thursday morning, mid-October, so I did not expect to see many people there. My biggest hopes were that all articles of Interview Magazine were on display and labels describing the process behind and the formation of the magazine were available. In terms of diversity in gender, race, and in color, I did not expect very much. With little to no evidence, I predicted that the museum would predominantly be filled with white males in their twenties and thirties. I made many of these assumptions because I do not find Andy Warhol to be a particularly relatable artist or person. He was, in fact, a white male with a college education. He lived in New York for a portion of his life, and there he made art, went to parties, and spent time with his friends and regular muses, Liza Minnelli, Mick and Bianca Jagger, and Jane Fonda. Despite Warhol being born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, I have always thought of him as a mysterious, distant individual. Andy Warhol has been a consistent inspiration to me, and he was one of the few names I knew in the art world for some time. Although I do not find him to be relatable, he has continued to be influential with his revolutionary art style.

The Andy Warhol Museum is quite unassuming from the outside. It is a gray stone building with minimal advertisement of the museum and its exhibitions. The ground level of the floor has display windows filled with merchandise and the wallpaper that fills the walls of the museum inside. The lobby of the museum felt like that of a high-end hotel or lounge space. There was a cafe with seating and many comfortable couches, and even a coat-check room to leave my jacket in while walking around the museum. I made my way up to the second floor of the building via elevator, and when the elevator doors opened, I was welcomed to the Social Network exhibition by a wall text that read, “Andy Warhol’s Social Network: Interview, Television, & Portraits”. The floor was filled with display cases full of Interview Magazine articles, and there were pictures hung up that were taken on Warhol’s 35 mm camera. Many of the walls and all of the display cases and labels were a dull, light pink color. Despite the color pink typically being associated with femininity, the exhibition did not feel particularly feminine. The room felt very industrial because of its exposed lighting, high ceilings, and open concrete structures, but the floor felt softer when juxtaposed with the light pink color. The curator of this exhibition, Jessica Beck, succeeded in producing a space that felt diverse in gender, age, color, and race.Andy Warhol’s Social Network exhibition was a peaceful and informative experience. I enjoyed the aesthetic of the space and the pools of information I digested. I found the common theme between the works in the exhibition to revolve around Warhol’s social life. I was impressed by the neutral feeling of the museum in terms of feeling comfortable. As a nineteen-year-old college girl, I tend to feel out of place in spaces in which I am not familiar, however, at the Andy Warhol Museum, I felt accepted and relaxed throughout the duration of my visit. I was not overwhelmed by the amount of information being thrown at me, and I did not feel rushed to move through the exhibit. I was impressed by the pacing and spacing of the exhibition. The architectural and interior design elements of the exhibition strengthen the idea of inclusivity and peace. The labels and wall text provide the viewer with ample information pertaining to the artist and his extravagant life. Curator, Jessica Beck, did a spectacular job explaining such a broad portion of Warhol’s life while encouraging the viewer to continue to read, learn, and take in the artwork.

Written by Maggie Knox

Dark Academia is a popular aesthetic known for emphasizing higher education, the arts, and gothic literature. It embraces dark clothing, rainy landscapes, and a hunger for knowledge that goes beyond what we see into the world of the unknown.

Personally, I love the clothing and the overall vibe of the aesthetic, however, my favorite part has got to be the books. They’re mysterious and melancholy with deeply flawed characters who aren’t trying to be fixed. And even though I love following these twisted stories, they can often weigh heavily on me even after I set them down.

So whether you’ve already read these books or are looking to get into Dark Academia literature, I have compiled my definitive ranking for how badly these books fucked me up emotionally (ordered from least to most).

Of course, please read at your own risk and check out trigger warnings before starting 🙂

Ranking: 1 - Happy to read this on a rainy day in the library

Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke

While this book is not in the traditional cohort of DA book suggestions, I read this during my peak dark academia phase, and therefore in my heart, it feels like it belongs on this list. 

It isn’t a novel, but rather a collection of letters between Rilke and a young poet named Franz Kappus.

Letters to a Young Poets has some of the most beautiful lines of prose I have ever read and the letters overall give me the same vibe as the happy scenes from Dead Poets Society.

The letters contain advice on writing, love, and life. Overall, I think it's a great read for anyone in this uncertain period of life.

Ranking: 2 - Read by candlelight for extra spookiness

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

To be honest, classics scare me. However, this one is not only highly accessible but also really good! 

We follow a young Victorian socialite as he turns from sweet and caring to twisted and reckless. There’s also a spooky magical realism aspect of this book, so if you’re looking for something to read around Halloween I highly recommend this one!

Ranking: 3 - Some of the scenes freaked me out (if you hate ghosts, stay away), but in a fun way

Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

If you’re more of a fantasy reader (like myself), but looking to give a Dark Academia book a try, I suggest Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo. It surrounds a murder that takes place at Yale University and a girl with the ability to talk to ghosts.

I’ll admit that I didn’t really get into this book until the second half. There is a lot of information thrown at you in the beginning—one of Leigh Bardugo’s specialties— and it can be hard to keep it all straight. However, the atmosphere this book creates is spectacular, and by the end, I had difficulty letting go of the characters.

Ranking: 4 - touch some grass after this one

Bunny by Mona Awad

If you like a book where you don’t know what the hell is going on the entire time, Bunny is for you! 

We follow a group of deranged grad students as they perform interesting rituals in the name of writing.

Reading this book is what I imagine the world would be like if I were on my sixth day of drinking only coffee. But at the same time, it's fun and for the girls! It has in fact been deemed a “hot girl” book, so do you really need another reason to read it?

Ranking: 5 - sat in the dark sobbing for a good 45 mins after 

 Dead Poets Society by N. H. Kleinbaum

I will accept zero slander against this movie, and since I am such a big fan of the movie; I knew I had to read the book. 

The main focus of the book is a teacher with a passion for poetry trying to teach a class of young boys how to properly experience life.

Spoiler Alert: it’s pretty much the exact same thing as the movie.

Now, this book would be much higher up on the list if it wasn’t for the ending. 

The ending literally knocks all the air from my body and leaves me in tears every single time I experience it.

Ranking: 6 - Probably took a few years off my life

These Violent Delights by Micah Nemerever

These Violent Delights is a Dark Academia book that takes place in Pittsburgh!

It’s about two boys who fall in love, but as their lives entangle, their morals and decisions become grayer and grayer until they’re covering up a murder they never planned to commit.

As a native Pittsburgher, the location was really the main reason I wanted to read this book. However, it also ended up being super creepy and disturbing (but in a thrilling, i-can’t-put-this-book-down kind of way) so if you’re into that, have at it!

Ranking: 7 - haha I'm totally not emotionally scared from this book

If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio

If I could give this book ten stars, I would. And if you’re still unsure about this genre, this is the book to start with. 

We’re introduced to the main character, Oliver Marks, on the day he’s released from jail after serving a ten-year sentence for a crime he may or may not have committed. The story unfolds as Oliver recounts his days as a student when he and six other young actors studied and performed exclusively Shakespearean plays. One member of the group is murdered, but the murderer and motive are a complete mystery. 

If you’ve been unfortunate enough to ask me for a book recommendation since October 2021, I’ve probably babbled on to you about this book. But seriously, so worth the read. 

Ranking: 8 - have support on hand cause this will f*ck you up

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

There’s a reason this book is the classic Dark Academia book recommendation.

It’s incredible.

We follow a group of six Classics students at a private New England college as they discover a new way of thinking—and perhaps take it too far. Their love of learning quickly turns dark when one of the students is murdered, and the others are left to pick up the pieces.

Now, I obviously love this book, but it does get really dark and definitely sent me spiraling.

Written by Kate Castello

Abby is in eighth grade, she is fifteen years old, and just like any other teenager. She has smooth, blemish free skin that everyone envies, along with a healthy lifestyle of working out regularly and eating well. But privately, Abby felt something was wrong. She could relate with her peers on everything relating to music, sports, and academics, but whenever her friends would talk about their periods—Abby would go silent, nervously waiting for her own to finally arrive.

When Abby decided to go to the doctor about her absent menstrual cycle, the doctors insisted that she go on birth control. She went on the pill on January 1, 2021, and for the first two to three months everything was perfect. Her period had finally arrived, and she was beginning to feeling like a “normal” girl. Her reproductive processes were working efficiently and properly, making her feel like birth control was truly the answer to all of her problems.

She then started breaking out, bad. To her dismay, acne began to cover her cheeks: an issue she never had to deal with prior. She also noticed a weight gain—her face and midsection seemed to become fluffier and fuller. Nothing had changed in Abby’s lifestyle…except her prescription to birth control.

Then the heart palpitations began.

Lily is at work. It is the summer of 2019, she is eighteen and serves in a banquet hall. While standing off to the side of the event space waiting for a task, she feels a strange twitch in her right leg. Uncomfortable, she sits down, which makes the pain pulsate and shoot up to her thigh. She has never known a pain like this before, and struggles to find words to explain the feeling to her mother later that night. She does not go to the doctor, assuming it was just a fluke and a one time thing, so she continues on in her daily routine.

Then, it struck again. She was sitting in class and she felt the paralyzing pain shooting up her leg. She knows something is wrong and goes to the emergency room in an attempt to get some answers. After waiting for hours in the hospital, she gets taken back to the doctor only to be told she is having period cramps and will feel better with some water and Ibuprofen. Lily knows what period cramps feel like: this was not a period cramp.

It’s August 2016, Samantha starts high school tomorrow, she's fourteen and excited and anxious about the first day. She wakes up in the middle of the night to intense stomach pains. She goes to tell her mother and her mom tells her to try and go back to sleep with the promise that they will go to the doctors in the morning at 8 am.

They arrive at the doctor the next morning to which Samantha is told by the doctors she is experiencing period cramps. Samantha has only had her period for one month at this time, so she figured maybe this was what period cramps felt like. The doctors suggest birth control, to help with the intense period cramps she seemed to have.

Her mother knew this was an incorrect diagnosis and that something truly was wrong with her daughter. She continued to advocate for Samantha and push the doctor to do more research into her condition.

Three hours later Samantha went into emergency surgery.

Each of these women have unique stories and conditions, but there is one constant in all of them. All three of them were told that they were experiencing period cramps by doctors and encouraged to go on birth control, when in reality there was a much more serious diagnosis waiting to be uncovered. Why is it that periods are the automatic scapegoat when it comes to women’s health? This is not new in the healthcare industry, women have been and continue to be underrepresented in research, resulting in misdiagnosis and the prescription of birth control working as a bandaid on a bullet wound (Mitchell).

In a research article by Kate Young from the Feminism and Psychology Journals she states, “The institution of medicine is predominantly the product of privileged men who have thus produced androcentric knowledge and practice”. For the vast history of medical research men were used as the standard, specifically, white straight men. This leaves people of color and women largely under represented, and by effect largely misdiagnosed as well. “Any aspect of the female body that differs from the male or that cannot be given a male comparative (exemplified by the uterus) is viewed as evidence of deviation or ‘fault.’” (Young). Male and female bodies have different anatomy and different symptoms for certain disorders and diseases. Therefore, when men’s research is applied to women’s bodies the answers are askew and inaccurate which could lead to possibly fatal circumstances.

For example, heart attacks are commonly assumed to be the number one killer of men, with the main symptom being the intense and dramatic chest pains. Breast cancer is then the disease that is assumed to be the number one killer of women. In reality, 1 in 3 women die of heart diseases each year, while only 1 in 30 die of breast cancer (Sadick). Women’s symptoms for heart disease include shortness of breath, cramps, tightness in chest, and lightheadedness. These symptoms are very similar to period symptoms, so women are either taught to ignore them, or get ignored by health care professionals.

The heart palpitations were the last straw for Abby. Though there was no way to determine if they really were caused by the birth control pill or if they were caused by extraneous circumstances, such as stress or anxiety, but Abby knew she needed to get off of it. Once done with the pill she went to a professional physician as a last resort, and in her senior year of high school she was diagnosed with PCOS, poly cystic ovarian syndrome.

“PCOS isn’t very understood, because there isn’t much research about it. Birth control is a very lazy way to address it.” Abby describes. She knew she needed to go off of birth control and after doing more research found that by addressing the problem at the root cause, she could overcome this diagnosis. Doing low intensity workouts such as walking and Pilates and eating more greens she found were the best holistic and successful ways to live with this syndrome. However her doctor still continued to push birth control, suggesting different brands and doses, ignoring Abby’s pleas to stay away from it, “Birth control is a bandaid, it does not address the root cause.”

“Birth control is a bandaid, it does not address the root cause“

Lily goes to an OBGYN in an attempt to get more answers, they recommend a trans-vaginal ultrasound to get a closer look at her ovaries. She sits on the chair and stares at the large metal prongs that she will place her feet on to expose herself. The doctor puts a large ultrasound probe in her vagina in a way that any young woman at the time would consider the thief of her virginity. Uncomfortably, as her mom sat across from her in the small beige examination room and she choked back tears, Lily worried she knew what diagnosis was to come from this.

Lily did some research of her own after the unhelpful trip to the emergency room. She explored studies and other forums of women’s personal experiences with similar symptoms to her own. In the end she found endometriosis, and she knew that was what she was battling against. When brought to her doctors attention, they quickly denied the possibility of it ever happening.

“They told me, ‘You can’t have endometriosis, you are too young, this usually only affects women in their twenties.’” Lily explains about the doctors reaction to her hypothesis that she was in fact struggling with this disorder. In an attempt to prove to Lily that she did not have endo, the doctors gave her the ultrasound. Lily loves to be right, but in this situation she did not boast when she found out that she was in fact diagnosed with endometriosis.

For treatment plans, she was very limited. Lily explains, “Endo is so under researched, the only main ways for ‘treatment’ are to either go on birth control and cross your fingers, or go under an extremely invasive surgery in an attempt to get it out of your ovaries”. She decided to go on the birth control route, she recalls with a disappointing sigh. While on birth control she gained weight in her stomach and chest area, began breaking out with acne, and found her emotions and hormones completely out of control. The leg pains didn’t stop, and she knew in her gut that birth control was what was making her situation worse. She gave it the benefit of the doubt, but after six months she got herself off of the pill, and once she did she found that all of her symptoms had silenced.

Samantha is in emergency surgery. After her mother continued to fight for her to get further examination, the doctors were able to find her appendix moments away from exploding acid all throughout her body. The doctors were convinced that she only was experiencing period cramps, and if their attempts at dismissing her were successful, Samantha’s story would be much different.

“If my mom didn’t advocate for me and tell the doctors that there really was something wrong, I would’ve died.” Samantha, even at a young age experienced the effects of women’s health being under researched, and the quick blame of period cramps anytime a young woman expresses concern for her own health.

When women approach a doctor with pains similar to those that come with having a period, doctors tend to point the finger at the uterus before discussing other options. Nowadays, simply having a period is all it takes to either get doctors approval for birth control, or order yourself birth control in the mail. Many women are encouraged to take it or influenced to take it by peers or partners, “However, in recent years continuous oral contraceptives have been marketed to women as a way to avoid menstruation altogether” (Johnston-Robledo I). Periods have the stigma of something that hold women back and limits them in the workforce, and big pharmaceutical companies target and take advantage of this assumption to sway more young women into taking birth control. There are even online dispensers of birth control that only require you to fill out a survey, put in your address, and credit card number to have the pill sent to your front door monthly. This does not take into account prior health issues or concerns such as breast cancer or heart problems that could be activated if birth control is ingested. When the communication between patient and professional is cut off for the sake of “convenience” to get the pill, it could result in many women prescribing themselves an unsafe brand or dosage of birth control.

Birth control started as a contraceptive, a method in which women could take the pill and lower their chances of becoming pregnant. It now is used as a multipurpose medicine for an assortment of disorders in women, but it does not solve the core issue. Birth control is used as a bandaid due to the insufficient research in women’s health and the negative stigma that is attached to menstrual cycles. The only way to prevent further misdiagnosis and unnecessary birth control prescriptions is to continue to educate and push for research in women’s health in the same expectation research is carried out for men.

Works Cited

Johnston-Robledo I, Chrisler JC. The Menstrual Mark: Menstruation as Social Stigma. 2020 Jul 25. In: Bobel C, Winkler IT, Fahs B, et al., editors. The Palgrave Handbook of Critical Menstruation Studies [Internet]. Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan; 2020. Chapter 17. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK565611/ doi: 10.1007/978-981-15-0614-7_17

Mitchell, Madeline, et al. “Opposition to Pharmacist Contraception Services: Evidence for Rebuttal.” Pharmacy, vol. 8, no. 4, 2020, p. 176., https://doi.org/10.3390/pharmacy8040176.

Sadick, Barbara. “Women Die from Heart Attacks More Often than Men. Here's Why.” Time, Time, 1 Apr. 2019, https://time.com/5499872/women-heart-disease/.

Young, Kate, et al. “‘Do Mad People Get Endo or Does Endo Make You Mad?’: Clinicians’ Discursive Constructions of Medicine and Women with Endometriosis.” Feminism & Psychology, vol. 29, no. 3, 2018, pp. 337–356., https://doi.org/10.1177/0959353518815704.

Written by Belle O'Hara