LENA CHEN is a Boston-based freelance writer and the author of the blog Sex and the Ivy. Currently completing a sociology degree at Harvard University, she writes about sex, dating, lifestyle, and food for a variety of online and print publications, including The Boston Globe Magazine, Hustler, Beauty Launchpad, CollegeHumor, and luxury e-zine Juli B. This fall, she pens a regular column in Fifteen Minutes, The Harvard Crimson’s weekend magazine, blogs for Sex Really, a project of the National Campaign To Prevent Teen & Unplanned Pregnancy, and co-authors an educational series about sex products in The Harvard Voice with MIT sex columnist Christine Yu.
In August 2006, she started writing Sex and the Ivy as a college sophomore. Her first-person accounts of sexual experiences, alienation, and the true state of undergraduate life at the world’s premier academic institution spurred campus discussion, prompted media attention, and garnered a loyal following. Quickly becoming a controversial figure, she has been criticized by some as “morally reprehensible” and praised by others for encouraging frank sexual dialogue. With a daily readership of 2,000, Lena has been featured in local and national media outlets, including The New York Times, Newsweek, The Boston Globe, and Salon.
Lena currently manages online editorial content for a college admissions non-profit (and previously served as founding editor of College OTR, a news and entertainment blog network). She has written sex and relationship columns for CollegeCandy, covered the Boston dining scene as a Grub Street party reporter, and shared culinary adventures on Citysearch’s 3 Buck Bites and Sugar Bomber. Her new blog, The Chicktionary, is a chronicle of her daily life and likes, as well as all things feminist, queer, or otherwise radical. She lives in the Back Bay.
In August 2006, she started writing Sex and the Ivy as a college sophomore. Her first-person accounts of sexual experiences, alienation, and the true state of undergraduate life at the world’s premier academic institution spurred campus discussion, prompted media attention, and garnered a loyal following. Quickly becoming a controversial figure, she has been criticized by some as “morally reprehensible” and praised by others for encouraging frank sexual dialogue. With a daily readership of 2,000, Lena has been featured in local and national media outlets, including The New York Times, Newsweek, The Boston Globe, and Salon.
Lena currently manages online editorial content for a college admissions non-profit (and previously served as founding editor of College OTR, a news and entertainment blog network). She has written sex and relationship columns for CollegeCandy, covered the Boston dining scene as a Grub Street party reporter, and shared culinary adventures on Citysearch’s 3 Buck Bites and Sugar Bomber. Her new blog, The Chicktionary, is a chronicle of her daily life and likes, as well as all things feminist, queer, or otherwise radical. She lives in the Back Bay.