Martha Baiye
Germany
BA in Economics, Politics, and Social Thought (2027)
Why did you choose to study at Bard College Berlin? BA in Economics, Politics, and Social Thought (2027)
I love how interdisciplinary the degree programs are.
How would you describe our community in a nutshell?
Diverse, engaged, and open.
Where is your favorite place to study on campus?
W16 Library Learning Commons
Favorite book you read in a class, and why?
I honestly can't say there's just one. Looking back, many of my favorite readings happen to be from the Global Citizenship course that I had with Dr. Nassim AbiGhanem in my first semester. One of them was Imagined Communities by Benedict Anderson. It was so striking to understand how this feeling and sense of national belonging emerged. So much is so psychological and has been constructed/fixed into systematic structures and conventional definitions.
Write briefly about one of your courses that left a lasting impression on you.
Pretty much all the courses I’ve taken so far have opened up new perspectives for me and have enriched my thought process around the theories and concepts that shape our world. I´m just going to take reference to the Forms of Love core class, because I feel like I learned so much about myself and it allowed me to put things into perspective I had not contemplated yet.
What surprised you the most about BCB?
Our campus and the BCB community are extremely safe spaces and contrast with the hectic and dramatic character of Berlin. "Safe" in the sense that I have not once witnessed or experienced any form of discrimination, whether it´s extremely subtle or very obvious.
Your favorite thing to do in Berlin on the weekends?
Go out with friends and have some food with hilarious conversations
What are your plans for after BCB?
After BCB I would love to pursue some of my longstanding socio-historic projects revolving around the two neighboring countries Nigeria and Cameroon.
What does a liberal arts education mean to you?
Liberal arts for me means having the opportunity to learn about the world from a very nuanced perspective, one that deviates from the faulty conventional narratives and perspectives.