Ashley Branch

Senior Columnist

Class of 2013 English

abranch1@binghamton.edu

37 Articles


Opinions

Choosing your major — it’s all about you

Friends and family often make us lose focus on what really matters. We should be looking for the things that make us passionate. ...


Opinions

Rielle Hunter is not a hero

I really want to like Rielle Hunter, but she makes it so difficult for me. While promoting her tell-all book, “What Really Happened: John Edwards, Our Daughter, and Me,” on shows including...


Opinions

Reflections across the pond

LONDON — This week marks the end of my stay in London. As I begin to pack and study for exams, I’m reflecting on what I’ve done this semester and how living...


Opinions

When true citizenship doesn’t require a test

LONDON — How does one define citizenship? I contemplated this over the weekend as I gave my Britain-born friend a tour of Central London. As I walked her through New Oxford Street,...


Opinions

Armchair activism in digital age isn’t a sign of true heroism

LONDON — Unfortunately, superheroes don’t exist. On the upside, real heroes do. They live just as you and I do, but with a twist. Between lunch breaks and long talks with friends...


Opinions

Whatever, I’ll pray where I want

LONDON — I’ve been a member of the Roman Catholic Church since birth. Am I a Catholic now? Depends on who you ask. Since I graduated high school, I’ve questioned the strength...


Opinions

Put Shakespeare in his historical place

LONDON — Shakespeare has been one of the major aspects my of semester-in-London experience. I’ve visited his grave site at Stratford-upon-Avon as well as the home of his wife, Anne Hathaway. I...


Opinions

Speak softly, carry a small stomach in UK

Greetings from London! I hope all of you in Binghamton are having a more productive and hopefully warmer start to the spring semester than I am. Not to imply that I haven’t...


Opinions

Developing nations beware: This is not a post-colonial world

Imagine a country where the people and the government view themselves in such high regard that they felt morally obligated to impose their culture on other nations. Imagine that this country produced...


Opinions

Can you read this? Don't take that for granted.

I wasn’t sure what to be grateful for this Thanksgiving — besides eating a home-cooked meal — until I read about James Arruda Henry. Henry was illiterate for most of his life...