Issue 16

THE AMHERST

THE INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER OF AMHERST COLLEGE SINCE 1868

STUDENT VOLUME CXLV, ISSUE 16 l WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2016

Women’s Basketball Dominates Bates by 53 Points See Sports, Page 10 AMHERSTSTUDENT.AMHERST.EDU

College Council Proposes Shortened Spring Semester Jingwen Zhang ’18 Managing News Editor

Photo courtesy of Sunna Juhn ‘18

Next year, French House will move to the second floor of King Dormitory, and La Casa will live alongside Spanish House in Newport. Other than the changes in location, both theme houses will remain largely unchanged.

Newport Sees Theme House Changes

Dan Ahn ’17 Managing News Editor

French House will move from Newport House to the second floor of King Dormitory next year, and La Casa will move into Newport from the third floor of Moore.

According to associate director of residential life Corry Colonna, members of French House had been suggesting a move for a long time. Colonna said the Greenway dorms will increase the college’s total count of non-suite singles next year, which made it possible to allocate the singles in King Dormitory to a theme house. The Office of Student Affairs made the final decision to move the theme houses.

French professor and director of French House Rosalina de la Carrera said she supports the change for several reasons, one of which is the need for residents to speak French more consistently to each other in the house.

“One of the reasons to have French House is in order to provide an immersive experience,” de la Carrera said. “You’re not immersed when you go to the common spaces [of the dormitory] and speak English, because it’s the only common language you have.”

According to de la Carrera, room selection is challenging in Newport and can be simplified by putting French House on a single floor. Each year the house alternates floors between French and Spanish House residents. The house policies require that both theme houses have residents live in the annex, a section of Newport that branches out from the main building, and de la Carrera said that this places theme house members far away from each other. She also said that it was important to ensure that the three French teaching assistants can live next to the students.

La Casa co-presidents Irma Zamora ’17 and Elizabeth Gonzalez ’17 said that there will be benefits to moving into Newport, which will still

hold the Spanish House.

“Because there is so much overlap between the houses, even just in the language, [they are] naturally going to flow together,” Zamora said.

“The Spanish House concentrates on culture, and we’re mainly focused on culture, so that interaction will be beneficial. I think the move will also help strengthen our relationship with the Spanish department.”

Zamora said Newport can be an effective place to host cultural events because it has a kitchen and provides more than one floor of space than La Casa’s current home in Moore. La Casa, which is currently working on an event with Spanish House for this March, will continue to work on collaborative cultural events in Newport.

“It’s difficult to express what the theme house is meant to represent in a dorm where other students can also be randomly placed,” Gonzalez said.

Chair of the college council and professor Nicola Courtright introduced the proposal to shorten the college’s spring semester during the Association of Amherst Students meeting on Monday, Feb. 22.

The new proposed calendar would decrease the length of future spring semesters from 14 to 13 weeks, which would match the length of fall semester. The proposal includes an extension of reading period in the spring to a minimum of four days, three potential make-up days for weather emergencies or campus-wide events such as the day of dialogue and a full three-week interterm session.

The senators voted in a straw poll on the proposal. 14 members voted in favor of shortening the spring semester to 13 weeks, with none opposed and four undecided by the time of poll.

Courtright, a professor of art history, said that many faculty members and particularly science professors have been unsatisfied with the short duration of interterm in the last several years. Some professors felt that they did not have enough time for themselves or for students to finish laboratory or other researchbased projects. Around a year ago, professors proposed that interterm always remain three weeks long, with the semester starting on the following Monday.

“What this meant, however, was new pressure on the spring semester,” Courtright said, adding that the academic year could not extend later into May because commencement dates could not be rescheduled. “With a late interterm and a 14-week semester, [there would be] probably two days of reading period, which was the way [it was] last year.”

Courtright cited examples of other institutions with 13-week semesters, such as Yale University, to explain the prevalence of this calendar system. She also said that as a result of having a short spring semester reading pe-

Continued on Page 3

Donna Brazile Speaks on Race and Electoral Politics Jacob Pagano ’18 Staff Writer Donna Brazile, political strategist and the Vice Chair of Voter Registration and Participation of the Democratic National Committee, gave a talk titled “Race and Politics in America: The Past and 2016” in Stirn Auditorium on Feb. 18.

The event was funded by the Croxton Lecture Fund, which was established to bring renowned speakers to campus. The lecture was part of a series of events hosted by the college in honor of Black History Month.

Brazile worked for every Democratic presidential campaign from 1976 to 2000 and became the first African-American manager of a presidential campaign in 2000, when she worked for Al Gore.

“She has the ability to present a concise viewpoint and distill complex issues in ways

that are very accessible to viewers,” said Maximos Nikitas ’17, who attended the event. “Her insights are valued by people on both sides of the spectrum, which is extremely rare in politics today.”

Brazile began the talk by discussing the importance of Black History Month. “When I accepted this event, I had no idea that the first black president would be holding his last Black History Month at the White House,” Brazile said. “So I am celebrating Black History Month with all of you. It is a month when we observe the historic achievement and contributions of African-Americans — not just to Black history, but to American history.”

Brazile, who has guest-starred in both “House of Cards” and “The Good Wife,” offered funny commentary on the presidential race before delving into race in politics. “Factchecking Donald Trump is like fact checking the moisture content of the ocean,” she said.

“I’m not sure the other candidates can stop being crazy even if they try, and I don’t think they are going to try.”

She continued: “There’s only one candidate who can bring both parties together … And that’s Ted Cruz: Neither side likes him.”

During this election cycle, she has frequently attended the debates of both parties.

“I’ve been out in New Hampshire and Iowa, so I’ve doubled the black population in both states — there’s no such thing as diversity, what you saw as diversity was all flown in,” Brazile said. She suggested that “Martin O’Malley is still driving back from Des Moines.”

Brazile encouraged the students to pay attention to the ongoing congressional elections. “Every four years we state that this is the most important election in our lifetime, but of course this time we actually mean it,” Brazile said. “At least 12 of the 34 seats are up for grabs. If you get tired of going to some of the

other more important channels like ESPN, just know that there’s a senate race going on.”

Brazile turned towards race in the final portion of her talk and suggested that efforts toward social justice must aim to impact all levels of society.

“I’m aware that this state has elected a black governor, but it’s not just about putting people in office, we also have to make sure that we use every tool of justice to ensure that there’s no one in our society living on the outskirts of hope,” she said.

Brazile stressed that race can adversely affect voter registration and that race will influence both this coming election and beyond.

She also spoke about the Black Lives Matter movement.

“You never see me on the scene of a killing,” she said. “I have to tell CNN I have to stay

Continued on Page 3

News

Yael Rice Fresh Faculty

Feb. 15, 2016 - Feb. 21, 2016

>>Feb. 15, 2016 1:48 p.m., Off-Campus Location A student reported being involved in an accident with a college-owned vehicle. Report was filed. >>Feb. 16, 2016 11:03 p.m., Morris Pratt Room Officers responded to a complaint of loud music and issued a warning to a fourth-floor resident. >>Feb. 17, 2016 1:08 p.m., James Dormitory An officer received a report that a statement was written on a basement wall. The person reporting the incident removed it from the wall. >>Feb 18, 2016 12:38 a.m., King Dormitory An officer discovered unattended alcohol in the first-floor common room. It was disposed of.

6:20 p.m., University of Massachusetts Police Information was issued via AC Alert regarding an incident at UMass. >>Feb. 19, 2016 2:16 a.m., Coolidge Dormitory A caller reported hearing a possible fight in a second-floor room. The responding officers discovered two students were boxing and there was no issue.

2:43 a.m., The Lord Jeffrey Inn An officer assisted the town police with a medical call involving a student at the Lord Jeffery Inn. 9:55 a.m., Off-Campus Location A Hitchcock Road resident reported her garage was entered overnight and a window on her car was smashed out.

11:35 a.m., Newport House A student reported the theft of a red bicycle, manufactured

by Hard Rock, stolen from the front porch. It is valued at $260 and was unlocked at the time.

9:57 p.m., Stearns Dormitory An officer encountered a resident with several bottles of alcohol in his room. It was confiscated and the matter was referred to Student Affairs.

11:47 p.m., Off-Campus Location A caller reported an intoxicated female having difficulty walking in the center of town. The town police were notified. >>Feb. 20, 2016 1:13 a.m., Mayo-Smith House A caller reported several males yelling and swearing outside the building. No one was lo-

cated outside the building or in the area when an officer investigated.

1:37 p.m., Social Quad An officer encountered a group of students in the quad playing drinking games. The activity was stopped.

2:19 p.m., Social Quad Alcohol was confiscated from a group of underage students gathered in the quad.

3:43 p.m., Bike Path Officer responded to assist an person injured on the bike path. The person was taken by ambulance.

8:25 p.m., James Dormitory Officers investigated a smoke detector sounding in a thirdfloor room and discovered a resident had smoked marijuana in his room. He was fined $100 for the smoking violation.

8:34 p.m., James Dormitory While in a third-floor room, officers discovered alcohol. It was confiscated as the residents are underage.

8:59 p.m., Campus Grounds An officer investigated a car parked on a sidewalk outside of Jenkins and discovered the operator was in possession of an amount of alcohol that exceeded state law governing the transportation of alcohol.

A portion of the alcohol was confiscated.

9:25 p.m., Service Building Lots An officer observed two women smash a glass bottle outside the Powerhouse where an event was in progress. They were identified as five-college students and were directed to clean up the glass, which they did.

9:29 p.m., Valentine Dining Hall Officers responded to a report of two men having an argument inside the dining facility.

After speaking with the two, they calmed down and no further intervention was necessary.

9:58 p.m., Beneski Earth Science & Natural History Museum Officers investigated an intrusion alarm but no cause could be identified.

10:31 p.m., Crossett Dormitory Officers encountered an event in the basement with alcohol.

The alcohol was disposed of.

The event was ended. >>Feb. 21, 2016 11:13 a.m., Wilson Admissions Officers investigated an intrusion alarm and found it was

Art and the History of Art and Asian Languages and Civilizations

Yael Rice is an assistant professor of art and the history of art and of Asian languages and civilizations. She received her Ph.D. in the history of art from the University of Pennsylvania in 2012.

Q: What did you do before coming to Amherst?

A: I was the assistant curator of Indian and Himalayan art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Q: Can you talk about why you decided to come to Amherst?

A: I was drawn to the interdisciplinary nature of learning and scholarship at Amherst College. I like having students from a variety of disciplines in my classes — art history and the other fields of the humanities, but also neuroscience and math — and I enjoy the many opportunities for team-teaching and collaboration that are available.

Q: What is your primary research area, and why do you find it interesting?

A: I work on manuscripts and other portable arts that were produced in Iran and South Asia during the medieval and early modern periods (c. 1200-1800). I’m interested in how these relatively small objects, many of which bear complex images and ornamentation, have the capacity to actively shape the ways people think, act and function in the world.

To this end, while I’m interested in what images mean or symbolize, I’m equally interested in what images, objects and materials are perceived to do. Another facet of my research agenda takes up the role of artists in generating — rather than merely reflecting — new forms of knowledge and ways of seeing. According to this framework, images, artifacts and architectural spaces are as constitutive and historically meaningful as texts, and sometimes more so.

Q: Can you tell me about the classes you’re teaching right now?

A: I’m teaching an introductory course on the art and architecture of South Asia. While this course proceeds according to a historical trajectory — from around 2500 BC to the present — I emphasize the role of the recent past, from the colonial period to the present, in shaping our perception of these complicated, distant histories. My other course, an upperlevel seminar, investigates the major debates that have shaped and continue to shape the field of art history. These include questions about the construction of chronologies, and the place of art and architecture in marking the flows of time; the myth of the artist as a genius individual unaffected by outside influences and networked knowledge; the formulation of communities of taste and judgment; and the contributions of feminist, queer, postcolonial and critical race perspectives to the study of art history.

Q: How does Amherst compare, as a community, to the other places where you’ve worked?

A: Before coming to Amherst, I worked at a research university and an encyclopedic museum. In comparison to these large institutions, Amherst’s community is close-knit.

Even more, I’m struck by the acute sense of moral and ethical responsibility that pervades the campus. The community’s commitment to social and political activism is inspiring.

Q: How do you hope to contribute to the Amherst community?

A: I’d like to foster conversations about the fundamental place of artifacts, images and architecture in our lives. As a scholar who teaches the art and architectural histories of South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East, I also hope to contribute to the greater understanding of the diverse cultures and practices of these regions.

Q: What do you do in your spare time?

A: I like to hike, snowshoe, cycle and forage for mushrooms and other wild edibles. When the weather’s less forgiving, I hang out in museums, libraries and used bookstores.

Q: Can you tell me about how you first became interested in the art and artifacts of Iran and South Asia?

A: My interests in South Asia stem from a college semester I spent in Nepal. I was then a cultural anthropology major, though, and only decided to pursue the study of art history several years later, in part spurred by my experiences making art and spending time in museums. By that point, my interests had expanded to include the diverse historical, artistic and cultural connections between Iran, Central Asia and South Asia.

Q: Can you tell me about your experiences at the research university you mentioned?

A: I co-taught a mixed graduate and undergraduate seminar at the University of Pennsylvania that focused on a single 12th century Qur’an manuscript from Iran, which had been repaired and augmented in Cairo in the 18th century, and was later purchased by Penn’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, where it is now held. We spent the semester examining the manuscript inside and out, from the multiple papers (Iranian and European), inks and pigments to the Qur’anic text, interlinear commentary, colophon and dedication notice. We also worked with conservators to analyze the metal content of the manuscript’s “gold” illumination and consulted with other manuscript specialists. This collaborative venture has since morphed into a publication project that will document the complex “life” of this peregrinating manuscript.

Q: What was it like to work at a museum, and how does that compares to work at a college or university?

A: There was never a dull moment at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. I spent a lot of my time researching and cataloguing the phenomenal collection of South Asian art, planning gallery rotations and exhibitions, collaborating with colleagues in conservation and other curatorial departments, giving gallery talks, supervising interns, interacting with donors and collectors and liaising with dealers and auction houses. I also traveled for research and once even couriered two paintings to the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain. I’m just as busy working at Amherst, but have much more time to devote to teaching and to developing research projects that are not necessarily collections-based.

— Ryan Cenek ’18

The Amherst Student • February 24, 2016

News

3

College Holds Third Annual Wellness Challenge Kiana Herold ’17 Managing News Editor The Wellness Challenge is a four-week program aiming to promote mental health on campus from Feb. 1 to March 1. This is the program’s third year, with 465 students and 144 staff and faculty participating.

The challenge is composed of a pre-assessment survey with questions assessing health and emotional and mental wellness, followed by weekly surveys evaluating individual participation in each week’s practices. Following the survey, each student receives an email with suggestions for six-seven possible activities associated with a different theme every week. The four week-long themes for the Wellness Challenge are emotional, physical, spiritual and social wellness. Participants commit to practicing each activity at least three times, which amounts to a time commitment of approximately one hour each week.

Mental Health Educator Jessica Gifford devised the challenge three years ago after attending a conference where health educators spoke about similar programs, and then created the list of activities for each week based on extensive research and experience. She said that the flexibility and limited time commitment of the Wellness Challenge were aspects designed to engage Amherst students.

“There [are] a lot of different ways you can work on improving your mental health, and it doesn’t have to be what you normally think of,” Gifford said. “In theory everybody could find at least a few activities … to incorporate into their lives.”

Last year, 110 students and 39 staff and fac-

Students took part in the Grit and Resiliancy training offered as part of the Wellness Challenge on Thursday, Feb. 18. Participants shared experiences of personal difficulties and how they overcame them. ulty participated, an increase from the total of 55 participants in the challenge’s first year.

Results from last year’s assessment data indicated that participants experienced reduced levels of stress and loneliness at the conclusion of the challenge and at the end of the semester, compared to a control group of non-participants.

Participants also showed significant positive improvements in levels of depression and anxiety.

“I really think that since I’ve been here there has been a lot more talk about mental health and wellness on campus,” Gifford said. “People really want to shift the culture. So I hope having this large of a number of people participate is a start to the tipping point of being like, OK, let’s not have such a stress-producing culture.”

This March the college will administer the bi-annual National College Health Assessment,

which collects campus health data. On the 2014 survey, students indicated that a higher percentage of the student body had experienced feelings of loneliness than the national average, setting off campus-wide discussions about the college’s social climate.

Gifford hopes to see improvements in student wellness compared to what the 2014 survey results indicated.

Gun Alert Prompts UMass Campus Lockdown Dan Ahn ’17 Managing News Editor

The University of Massachusetts Amherst went into lockdown after a reported sighting of a handgun on Thursday, Feb 18. All students, staff and faculty at UMass were instructed to keep indoors for the duration of the incident.

Around 5:17 p.m. Thursday, two men assaulted a student near Pierpont Hall, in UMass’s southwest residential area. The student suffered a minor head wound and was

later hospitalized.

The two suspects were found to be unaffiliated with the university. A warrant for the arrest of one suspect, William McKeown, was issued Friday morning. That afternoon, McKeown turned himself in to the police station in Framingham, Massachusetts. He faces charges of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, assault and battery, and armed robbery.

During the incident, Amherst College police maintained communications with both the UMass and Amherst town police de-

partments and stationed uniformed officers around campus.

“The Amherst College Alert was sent out in recognition that our students and faculty travel extensively among the Five Colleges,” said John Carter, the college’s chief of public safety. “In consultation with the Chief of Campus Operations and the Chief Communications Officer, we felt the warnings from UMass police warranted advising our students, staff and faculty to stay away from the UMass campus.”

According to Carter, there were no indica-

tions that Amherst College was under threat and the suspects did not show signs of heading toward the college.

There have been no gun-related incidents at the college in at least the past ten years.

“The Amherst College Police Department has confiscated prohibited weapons on campus over the years, but none that were used in a scenario that required an alert,” Carter said.

Carter encouraged members of the community to sign up for the AC Alert system and to have a plan ready for similar lockdown situations.

Brazile Talks Courtright and Senate Discuss Shortened On Elections Spring Semester Proposal Continued from Page 1 home — I have 19 nieces and nephews, so I first call them, and cry. As the videos of police brutality pile up, the slogan ‘Black Lives Matter’ continues to take on a sense of urgency. But we must remember, that it is more than a slogan, there’s pain behind that.”

Liam Fine ’17, co-president of Amherst Political Union, said Brazile’s visit had an important resonance after the events of Amherst Uprising last fall.

“In light of the events and racial dialogue sparked as a result of Amherst Uprising, I believe Ms. Brazile’s talk highlighted the best aspects of civic engagement and retail politics,” Fine said “I think everyone [was] impressed by her sense of humor, but more importantly, excited and optimistic about confronting the status quo.”

Brazile concluded her talk with her hopes for the future. “Dr. King believed that faith was taking the first step even when it was impossible to see the entire staircase,” she said. “If we decide to go at it together, to reach out and find the common ground, I think we can take that first step of finally solving our racial problems.”

Continued from Page 1 riod, students and faculty have suffered higher stress around finals period at the end of the semester.

According to Courtright, any plan to extend reading period would not be for students to return home early, but rather to take advantage of resources at the college to finish their work and to meet with professors during the extra time. Professors would be expected to hold additional office hours or review sessions during the extended reading period.

“We thought of it as a period of review, reflection and academic production,” Courtright said. “It would allow people to make the most of what had happened during all their courses.”

Senator Tasha Kim ’18, the sole member of the college council who voted against the proposal during the council meeting, raised the concerns that she had during the initial council vote.

“We come to school, we pay to come to Amherst for classroom instruction and I felt like self-reflection was something that I could be doing on my own time,” Kim said, emphasiz-

ing the high cost of lost classroom instruction time. “Also, if we take away a week of school, we’re probably never going to get that back.

It’ll be a lot harder to bring back more school once professors have adjusted to teaching less … It’s just really important to understand that this is going to be a very permanent change.”

Courtright previously confirmed that such a change to the spring semester schedule would not alter tuition costs for students.

“I really think that, done well, this extra week of reflection or reading period … really gets more at the goals of the college than just an extra week of class,” senator Sam Keaser ’17E said in response. “College is both a place to learn and also a place to reflect upon what we’ve learned and actually interiorize it.”

While most senators favored the proposal, a majority of their feedback for Courtright concerned the details of having a longer reading period.

“I’m having a hard time believing that professors are going to compromise all of the schoolwork,” senator Maeve McNamara ’19 said. “Especially for science or math courses, where curriculum carries over, and you need prerequisite knowledge for the course.” She

said that professors would try to cover the same load of material in the shortened time, rather than to eliminate a week of material.

Another topic of discussion was the idea of adding programming to the extra days of reading period, whether through organized events or through music and theater and dance department performances, to ensure that students stay on campus for reading period. AAS communications director Bonnie Drake ’17 said that extra programming adds stress to students facing finals period and suggested providing additional study or relaxation spaces stocked with food instead.

The college council is in charge of handling the academic calendar, but the idea of a 13week spring semester has not yet reached a faculty vote because it has not been approved by the Committee on Educational Policy, which is discussing the idea of spring semester being 13 and a half weeks long instead.

“Essentially, there are disagreements between the CEP and the college council on how to proceed,” Keaser, also a member of the Committee on Educational Policy, said.

“People really just want more time to discuss the question.”

Opinion

THE AMHERST

STUDENT

Housing, Loneliness and Social Division Editorial The perpetual problems of loneliness and social division among Amherst students have been discussed extensively in recent years. As administrators seek new ways to resolve these critical issues, it seems that housing is the first aspect of Amherst life that they turn to. They’ve proposed Neighborhoods. They’re tearing down the social dorms.

And now, they are overhauling the room draw process. Some of the changes are undoubtedly positive: We appreciate that Res Life has decided to streamline the process and minimize errors by moving room draw online. But other changes, which seem to be aimed at overcoming existing social divisions, may hurt students more than they help us.

First, the new room draw process caps room groups at six people.

Sure, this seems to make sense, since the college will no longer have eight-person suites. But capping room groups at eight limits students’ options in the room draw process and may cause rifts in existing social groups. Additionally, since many suites have four-person occupancies, it makes sense to keep keep room groups at a multiple of four.

Finally, Res Life should keep in mind that students were not always forming eight-person groups solely because they wanted eight-person suites. Some students simply want to form a room group that can accommodate a large group of friends: for instance, some first-years would form groups of eight because they hoped to get four doubles close to each other. Capping room groups at six limits options for students like these, creating unnecessary stress in the room draw process.

Second, there is a chance that Res Life enforce a cap on the number of people allowed to choose the new dorms each night of room draw — a change that would help split the new Greenway dormitories evenly among sophomores, juniors and seniors. They have rationalized this decision by explaining that the dorms will contain a mix of singles, doubles and suites, and juniors and seniors would

not likely want to live in doubles anyway. But why not let juniors and seniors decide for themselves whether they’d like to live in doubles? Sophomores will have two more chances to live in the Greenway dorms; seniors will have none. There seems to be no explanation for these quotas other than a half-hearted attempt to break up pre-existing social groups and to promote integration among varying class years. And while this is a worthy goal, we are not sure that a few superficial changes to the room draw process will accomplish it. Instead, we fear these tweaks to room draw will cause increased stress for students without accomplishing anything meaningful.

Attempting to combat these deeply rooted social issues simply through procedural changes merely scratches the surface. Firstyear dormitories provide a pretty good atmosphere for friendships to be formed, but the fact that loneliness persists even among firstyears suggests that the issue is that Amherst’s housing system is often used as a scapegoat, so the administration is motivated to work harder to overhaul it with the ultimate goal of fixing our segmented community. However, we can’t rely on Residential Life to create solutions to the divisions on campus. Divisions naturally arise even within first-year dorms. It’s hard to hold housing arrangements entirely accountable for the social climate across campus. It’s important, but it should not be the sole focus of administrative efforts.

Attempts to redesign the housing system sadly amount to wasted energy. The unfortunate reality is that forced interaction is an imperfect solution to Amherst’s social divisions. Instead of trying to achieve some social engineering through housing changes, the administration should shift its attention toward bottom-up, student-led approaches to mend our fragmented community, instead of restricting the students’ choices through clumsy top-down methods.

On Irony and Hipster Leftism Siraj Sindhu ’17 Contributing Writer There is a disappointing, scathing and toxic mix of ironic leftism permeating discourse at Amherst College.

The discourse of our age is a pessimistic one, demoralizingly saturated with irony and preemptive disavowal of Serious Ideas. But irony is employed most fervently in reference to leftist ideas of workers’ revolution, racial justice and gender justice. Jokes about “false consciousness” mix with declarations that the “revolutionary Marxist college students are going to end up as attorneys.” Amherst students love to escape discomfort by taking a heavy dose of irony: Sure, capitalism causes all sorts of problems, but we’re not going to take down Wall Street anytime soon.

Besides, anyone who thinks they found the divine solution to inequality and exploitation in Volume 1 of “Capital” is a fool. Right?

In the three years since Meghna Sridhar ’14 published an essay in the Student decrying the dearth of public leftists on campus, the frequency with which Amherst students discuss Marx or critique liberalism and capitalism has certainly jumped. Perhaps this is due to movements like Black Lives Matter and Amherst Uprising, which pulled discourse sharply to the left. Perhaps it is due to curricular changes: courses on critical theory, postcolonial theory, indigenous peoples and neoliberal critiques have changed the tone of campus discourse. Perhaps Bernie Sanders’ marketing of himself as a “democratic socialist” — whatever that might mean — is responsible for the shifting awareness. None of these changes to the intellectual situation have made a dent in the self-aware and smug postures adopted by Amherst students toward leftism.

This new awareness of leftist alternatives to liberalism has led to a worrisome dissatisfaction. I hear Amherst students say, “No one really

thinks socialist society is a workable solution.”

I hear Amherst students discuss how learning about race and American capitalism is intellectually interesting but useless because there’s simply nothing to be done. I’ve heard well-read and intellectual Amherst students argue that anti-capitalism is just a fleeting fashion of the 21st century academy that will soon pass.

We are, in general, a college of timidity and uncertainty, the precursors to irony and cynicism. Our peer institutions — schools like Wesleyan, Swarthmore, Reed and Williams — have definite identities, whether activist, brainy, alternative or superior. Amherst has an empty center where an identity should go, and I don’t mean the open curriculum. I am referring to the culture of irony, cynicism and sarcasm that has distanced Amherst students from any discernible shared conviction or value. The students who led the Uprising should be credited with creating possibilities for the articulation of new and sincere community values around racial justice. But even with their hard work and bravery, I notice even greater degrees of racial segregation among underclassmen this semester than I have in previous years. The formation and growth of the Amherst United Left over the course of the past couple years provided hope for serious treatment of leftist ideas, and the publication of the Disorientation Guide introduced students to cultural and institutional criticism. But the energy to build durable leftist consciousness faltered in the face of irony and hipster leftism. These are easier and more convenient postures to strike, especially at a college with a history of graduating future politicians, financiers, lawyers and other members of the American liberal-capitalist oligarchy.

I don’t claim to have empirical proof of Amherst’s cynicism and irony, but I do think that what I am identifying runs both deeply and diffusely through the culture of our college. Irony is the safe alternative to taking a stand: Why espouse a conviction when you could instead

smirk at the very idea of convictions? Irony is there wherever students acknowledge the Uprising but say that it was “too emotional.” Irony is there wherever students pursuing lucrative careers argue that those committed to activism or social justice “just don’t seem capable of having any fun.”

Here, I have to make a distinction. Activist fatigue is a legitimate concern. Leftists need to make time for fun. The irony I am talking about is not the reparative kind of joking in which leftist activists engage as therapy. The irony I want to discuss is the irony that takes place when leftism is reduced to stereotypes and caricatures. Both kinds of irony exist in the behavior of thoughtful Amherst students who take critical courses in various departments. Regardless, there is a distinction to be drawn between the act of complementing political action with fun and the act of replacing political action with disparaging humor.

In any case, ironic leftism’s hold is still evident on this campus. Amherst students could not extend the spirit of the Uprising further. I see and hear every day signs that students of color on this campus are still not at home here. Amherst students could not bring the institution to divest from fossil fuels. Amherst students could not even maintain a respectful and prolonged discourse about the tragedy of gun laws in this country when an armed person threatened the University of Massachusetts, Amherst campus. Only on a campus that outwardly espouses criticality while maintaining a studied ironic stance toward critical ideas could such anti-leftism prosper. Amherst College continues to be a bastion for the neoliberal arts, preparing us for careers in the capitalist social machinery. But in the age of irony, Amherst also teaches us how to stomach our own complicity in the damaging of our world with a big gulp of irony each day to wash down the difficult political convictions that stick in our throats.

E X E C U T I V E B OA R D Editors-in-Chief Elaine Jeon, Lauren Tuiskula Executive Adviser Sophie Murguia Managing News Dan Ahn, Kiana Herold, Jingwen Zhang Managing Opinion Diane Lee, Julia Pretsfelder Managing Arts and Living Gabby Edzie, Paola Garcia-Prieto, Alida Mitau Managing Sports Jason Darell, Drew Kiley, Julia Turner Managing Design Gabby Bishop S TA F F Head Publisher Emily Ratte Design Editors Justin Barry, Megan Do, Sunna Juhn, Adele Loomis, Monica Nimmagadda, Zavi Sheldon, Chloe Tausk, Yrenly Yuan Assistant News Editors Ryan Cenek, Carlos Rivero Photography Editor Kyra Gardner

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The Amherst Student • February 24, 2016

Opinion

5

Don’t Settle for ‘Amherst College Average’

Johnny Van Siclen ’13 Contributing Writer

In the spring of 2013 I shook Biddy’s hand and received my diploma and cane. I had graduated in four years, I had made lifelong friends and I would join an investment bank later that summer. I was “Amherst College Average.”

Clearly being average at Amherst is not remotely a bad position to be in. If you’re an Amherst College student, you are almost certainly talented, creative and intelligent. You’ve forged meaningful friendships and you’ll have no trouble securing a lucrative and/or fulfilling job. But I believe all Amherst College students have the capacity to achieve more.

Whether your focus is social, environmental or economic, your Amherst education gives you the tools to make a dramatic, disruptive impact on people’s lives. While at Amherst, you’re consistently pressed to think critically, to solve problems and to absorb new concepts and ideas. You’ve cultivated the ability to synthesize concepts and ideas into creative and innovative solutions. You have the perfect skillset to affect change and to break free from average.

Passion and Entrepreneurial Pursuit

Utility? = Liberal Arts?

Samuel Rosenblum ’16 Contributing Writer In a letter to The Student last week, Shruthi Badri ’16 rightfully lamented the lack of tenure lines and the dearth of elective courses in the mathematics department. As the department, along with others, needs to cater to skyrocketing course enrollments, professors are increasingly employed to teach introductory level courses to meet the high demand. And this has forced, as Badri argues, the department to reduce offerings for students who want to wander into mathematics because they find it mostly elegant or interesting, rather than useful or necessary for other purposes. Needless to say, this is probably not only a problem that mathematics has to cope with — economics and computer science probably also have to as well.

Badri accurately diagnoses the source of burgeoning enrollments: the utility of mathematics both for the study of other disciplines (e.g. economics, chemistry and physics) and for the stable employment in an economy in which more and more jobs require quantitative literacy. (Tied up in all of this is the way mathematics is taught in middle schools and high schools.) As students increasingly experience the pressures of and obstacles to finding stable employment and to achieving financial security in today’s market economy, it is not surprising, but rather expected that increasing numbers of students major in disciplines which happen to teach skills useful to be successful economically.

Two points are worth pausing over here.

One is that it was not always quantitative disciplines like mathematics which provided students with the best shot after Amherst. In an earlier time and in another historical moment, rhetoric and classics were the popular fields of study. If the popularity of fields of study, insofar as they happen to provide students with human capital and transferable skills, varies, it does not necessarily make sense for the college to invest in more tenure-track lines in disciplines which happen to be gaining popularity because of the present needs of the market economy. What will happen if and/or when venture capital in Silicon Valley dries up or when the next disastrous financial crisis hits or when anthropogenic climate change restructures ecosystems and

The word “passion” comes from the Latin word “pati,” which means to suffer or endure.

We have all experienced passion. It is irresistible, forcing us to look, to do, to create and to focus. Passion can become an all-consuming, driving action that we may not otherwise have considered.

An entrepreneur is one who organizes and manages an enterprise, often with considerable risk, with the goal of creating something new.

Ask any entrepreneur why they chose their path and they’ll tell you the same thing: they had no choice. An entrepreneurial pursuit is one that starts as an idea and evolves into an obsession.

Sound familiar?

Entrepreneurialism and passion are categorically linked. If you have a passion, whether it is to promote social change, to save the environment or to ease an economic burden, you should entertain the prospect that you may be an entrepreneur at heart. By embracing your passion and entrepreneurial spirit, you’re taking the first step toward making a meaningful impact. You’ll eventually find that the straight and narrow career path you had envisioned will grow stale, and you’ll have no choice but to diverge to something new.

The Road Ahead

You’ve embraced your passion and entrepreneurial spirit — now all you need is an idea.

Don’t panic if a furious brainstorming session yields nothing but a couple of broken pencils and some scribbles on a page. Ideas aren’t born overnight and even the best ones evolve before they are ever implemented. Your brilliant, transformative idea is on its way. You just have to be prepared when it arrives.

Make a point to learn all aspects of the solution you are trying to solve. Think and dream about the problem in your spare time. You’ll evaluate and discard countless concepts and solutions before stumbling across an idea that could work. Put your fledgling idea to the test.

Ask your friends to poke holes in it. Understand it from all angles and obsess over why it might not work. If your idea holds up against the pressures applied, then congratulations are in order. You’ve successfully combined your passion with an idea, and you’re ready to make it happen.

Once you have an idea, it’s time to take the entrepreneurial leap. It’s a difficult road ahead, filled with equal parts optimism, hope, risk and uncertainty. But you’re prepared. You have the education, drive, determination and passion to succeed, along with a secret weapon: the alumni network. A quick search in the alumni da-

tabase returns nearly 350 people, who identify themselves as entrepreneurs. I can tell you from firsthand experience that the vast majority of these alums are willing to help you in your pursuit in any way they can. Take your shot, use your resources and lean on your skillset, and I am confident you have what it takes to succeed.

My Escape from Average Story After accepting my diploma three years ago with a degree in economics and environmental studies, I was well on my way to safe and lucrative career. But when I couldn’t silence the entrepreneurial call any longer. My career was put on hold and I made the decision to follow a passion. Two months ago, after turning down a promotion and a handful of post-banking job offers, I quit my job and founded a start-up.

I’ll happily admit that being an entrepreneur is not the easiest path to take. It is filled with risk and can be lonely at times. When asked what I do, I typically tell people that I’m somewhere between a CEO and unemployed. Between us, given that 8 out of 10 start-ups fail, I am far closer to unemployed than a chief executive of anything. But despite all the odds and the adversity, I could not be happier with my choice.

Life is too short to be boring, and I’m following my passion in an effort to make an impact.

Questioning Exhaustion, Part 1 Andrew Lindsay ’16 Contributing Writer This is the first of a two-part series that asks, “What does it mean to be exhausted at Amherst College?” There is a tendency for students at elite institutions to scapegoat the heavy academic workload for campus exhaustion. The problem, I insist, is much more complicated.

For many of us, exhaustion is the primary condition of the Amherst experience. It is a feeling that can consume everything, whether eventful or mundane. For many, merely navigating spaces on campus — the dining hall, Frost library, the gym — means exerting herculean mental effort.

“Who did I wave to?” becomes “How many times did I wave?” The question “Should I even be in the back room?” changes to assessments of number of times smiles were shared on the way there.

At the curricular level, the excessive discipline necessary to pull off a satisfactory result often causes exhaustion. In fact, the banal acts of completing problem sets, Moodle responses and paper prompts often obscures the matter that they intend to illuminate, and work here can often feel so distant. I remember sitting in an introductory chemistry course during my first year and not fully understanding why I was there. What did Schrodinger’s cat have to do with me? I would never need it for personal growth. At these moments, school felt more concerned with the production of unknown intellectual ends as opposed to the passion associated with the learning process. However, this feeling didn’t matter because I needed the grade. I had to suck it up.

economies? Where will jobs be then and what will popular majors be?

The second point is this: the world students are entering is unpredictable and precarious.

Jobs are changing with increased rapidity, labor is becoming increasingly mobile, social safety nets have been decimated and employees work longer hours for less pay. To begin figuring out Amherst’s institutional response to this reality, I would say this: for students to formulate their education here at least primarily on the terms of trying to win in the competition for jobs, money and status in a market society (where winners are increasingly few and far between) is to fail at the project of the liberal arts. Why? Be-

For Amherst’s “diverse” individuals to “survive” in the community, they must internalize everything. We must achieve at all costs for the parents, for the family, for the race. We internalize everything like the cell whose self-regulating mechanisms cease to function. We must do the most.

When these cells-now-tumors cannot handle the overconsumption — the overstimulation — they metastasize and exhaust. For this reason, neurological diseases are common here: attention deficit hyperactivity, depression, PTSD and burnout syndrome are widespread.

To do homework I must stay up tonight. I can’t call mom this Saturday because I have a mixer. I can’t hang out with X tomorrow because there is too much work. The conditions for a flourishing “life” at Amherst College — good grades and an active social life — often conflict with the necessities for a wholesome life outside it: physical and mental health, family life and meaningful friendships.

Exhaustion, as noted in its Latin root exhaurire, means to draw out. At the level of the individual, this process breeds alienation. This phenomenon changes the common maxim “Yes we can” to “I can’t breathe.” “I can’t draw out anymore,” we say. “There is literally not enough time in the day.

There is never enough.” Breath is extracted; life is extracted for the schedule.

Ta-Nehisi Coates notes in “Between the World and Me”: “I sensed the schools were hiding something, drugging us with false morality so that we would not see.” But what is the subject of this morality? I say that it is excessive discipline. When the workload, the combination of academic and

cause conforming our educational decisions here to the demands of the market and whatever social expectations are imposed on us pushes aside the question of how the liberal arts relates to freedom, the intellectual, political and perhaps economic freedom you, me or anyone else can and should gain coming here. It is to make liberal arts education illiberal.

After all, the term “liberal arts” signifies a relation between education and freedom. The Latin liberalis, from which the liberal in liberal arts is derived, means liberty. If we maintain fidelity to the broadest roots of the term “liberal arts,” we must reflect both about what the “liberal arts” mean and how we experience it and its relation to the increasingly unfree

extracurricular commitments (parties included), consumes everything — trapping unmediated thought and leisure in the way that a black hole traps light and stunting curiosity and pursuits outside the predetermined categories of varsity athletics, clubs and club sports, academics and career opportunities — an exhaustion takes root that loosens instead of affirming our connection to the world. The community’s obsession with discipline reveals the secret of Amherst’s collective condition: that our mission statement’s “principled life of consequence” and the “life of exhaustion” are the same.

With that revelation I, again, ask, what is the specific condition of this type of dual exhaustion-alienation? It is hyper-passivity after hyper-activity, unresponsiveness after overstimulation. It is akin to having an open cut that numbs after being exposed to the elements for too long.

It is the kind of fatigue that compels us to lash out and then forces us to retreat into silence. At its worst, the condition takes control of the body, possessing any expression of individual will. For many of us at these moments, life can be reduced to the robotic pace of attending class, engaging in small conversations at Val, completing assignments, going to the gym, partying — rinse and repeat. Here, the exhausted life reveals itself as an automated life, absent of narration.

The exhausted life is a sleepless one. Grogginess is the human condition. Reality and dream are indistinguishable. So we cry, “Shut up! I’m very tired and I just want to sleep!” However, for the most troubled this cry becomes the quiet whimper, “I don’t want to wake up.”

and utility-based market society we will enter.

If it is the case that enrollments in some departments are increasing, perhaps for reasons unrelated, or even worse, antithetical to the liberal arts project, the college must ask: Do we tacitly or explicitly support the intellectual desires shaped by the economic and social realities, which our students express in their course selection or major, by adding more tenure-track lines in mathematics and other disciplines that happen to be more useful in market economy jobs? Do we advise, recommend, incentivize, authorize and encourage — in short, educate — students to think about and experience their education in the liberal arts not merely or pri-

marily in terms of human capital acquired in order to be financially well-off, but rather because of critical questions they feel have gone unanswered or fields of study about which they are curious? Should the college think of new policies — through advising, admissions, departmental offerings and major or curricular requirements — to ensure that students choose fields of study because of intellectual commitment to both the field and the liberal arts project as a whole? In short, do we make students think about the relationship of their education to freedom? The answers to those questions are not mutually-exclusive nor obvious, but surely demand our utmost critical scrutiny.

Arts&Living

Photo courtesy of Elena Marione ‘16

Elena Marione ‘16’s thesis production “Twine” features performances by Emily Willick ‘18, Mahalia Banton ‘19, Alina Burke ‘17 and Darienne Madlala ‘16.

“Twine” : Marione’s Thesis Production is Interactive and Dynamic DivineAsia Miller ‘19 Staff Writer Between Feb. 18 and Feb. 20, Elena Marione ’16’s thesis production “Twine: After Troy” ran in Kirby Theater for a full house.

The two words that best describe the production are “interactive” and “dynamic.”

Right away the interactive nature of the production was apparent to the audience: the play came to us, hushing the idle conversations in the lobby of Kirby in the form of a clear voice suddenly piercing through the crowd with emotive singing. The voice belonged to Philomela (Emily Willick ’18), who led a captivated audience into the main auditorium of Kirby to their seats, all the while still crooning her mournful song. Following behind her, surrounded by solemnly huddled people marching forward, I felt like a member of a funeral procession. Philomela led us onto the stage itself to a seating arrangement that blended into the decrepit aesthetic of the stage itself. Tree branches and debris littered the stage, the offstage seats and the floor. The

audience was intimately brought into the disrepair that the lives of the four protagonists have fallen into.

The interactive element the play started out with wasn’t a cheap gimmick to draw us in; Marione committed to including the audience throughout the entire play. Actresses pinned audience members with intense eye contact while speaking, handed them artifacts to hold and shined lights onto them during the production to directly engage with them. The interaction itself was dynamic and so varied in intensity. At one point, an audience member had to move their leg to make room for an actress fishing beneath their chair for something. During another scene, in which the actresses drew the storyline of prerecorded audio that played during the show, Philomela settled in front of me and drew a picture that I could see clearly, while I could only see Hecuba’s (Mahalia Banton ’19) back as she drew for other members of the audience.

The interactivity of some parts of the play and not others was one of the many ways that

the play was extremely dynamic. The primary evidence of this dynamism lied in the structure of the piece: it was broken up into several styles and different methods of storytelling. In the beginning of the show, Hecuba launched into a soliloquy, but the show contained everything from a delightful use of stage lighting and bodies for shadow play on the back wall of the stage to a short period of silence from the women, preoccupied by their props.

The emotions and themes of the show were elaborated on by the variation in the content of the show, but there was not a “storyline” in a traditional sense, and the show’s structure changed every two minutes or so.

Dynamism abounded in many other aspects of the show as well. Speech was sometimes sustained for extended periods of time and came in quick, choppy bits. The women onstage screamed in fits of passion, but other times left the stage tense and silent. Characters shifted position often and took advantage of all the space available onstage; at some points they clustered together and occupied small areas, while in other moments

Photo courtesy of Elena Marione ‘16

“Twine” invites the audience to partake in the production, strengthening the look at the collective suffering of women.

they spread out so far from each other that they seemed self-contained. Furthermore, the characters themselves seemed to be different parts of a whole — Hecuba, a maternal figure focused wistfully on the past; Cassandra (Alina Burke ’17), an eccentric toeing the line of mental illness; Andromache (Darienne Madlala ’16), a romantic prone to fantasy and hope; and Philomela, an impassioned woman full of anger. Despite being very distinct individuals, they all seem to exemplify women who emerge out of strife.

The process behind writing the story sheds some light on the masterpiece that is “Twine.”

Rather than approaching actresses with a readymade script, Marione opted for a collaborative process known as “devised theater” — Marione, Banton, Burke, Madlala and Willick collaborated on the final product during rehearsals. Marione led the process with text, myths and images that the four actresses and herself used as prompts for improvisational scenes, games and movement exercises. At the end of the process, Marione selected the ideas that worked best and polished them before situating them in the final product.

Marione said she is “lucky to discover such dedicated and enthusiastic performers.” She began by searching for a cast that all identified as female and unearthed a team that was willing to participate in the creation of the production through trial, error and play. Dynamism is part of the very fabric of the play; it was only through the interaction of four women from very different backgrounds that “Twine” was finally born (notably, the women were all cisgendered and present, thus a limited view of womanhood).

The time and thoughts Marione invested in the show paid off, as all of the actresses in the play gave evocative performances that conveyed raw emotion that goes beyond what simple language can say. In writing “Twine,” Marione set out to convey a story about “womanhood, grief, strength and survival.”

And besides the special electric feeling one gets when being interacted with by an actor and the excitement of a dynamic stage, Marione gave her audience something extremely powerful with her thesis project: an unadulterated, unrestrainedly emotional look into the collective suffering of women.

Arts & Living 7

The Amherst Student • February 24, 2016

Lenny Abrahamson’s “Room” is Deemed a Somewhat Unsatisfying Success Youngkwang Shin ’19 Staff Writer There is a certain aesthetic that defines the seasonal outpour of movies that more cynical moviegoers scorn as “Oscar-bait”. The camerawork in such films travels the middle road between subtlety and officiousness, and it is just subdued enough to be impressive. The script is usually open to a range of interpretation and emotion on the part of the main actors, often tinged with sentimentality easily understood by an equally accommodating range of audience members.

Most importantly, these movies do their best to differentiate themselves from the blockbuster. The pace and action are dialed back, and they opt for a calm self-confidence in their own resonance and message that ironically homogenizes with the tens of other maverick productions released around the same time. The worst of these movies ring with self-importance, flattening any interest in the actual happenings of the plot and offering more than enough reason to dread stepping into the local indie theater before the snow has stopped. Most of them, however, offer happy repose from the more explosive impudence of summer films and a chance for the average Joe to appreciate the medium of film. “Room” is one of those movies.

The movie features a woman who was kidnapped and forced to bear the criminal’s child as a teenager. The child and she have lived in a one-room shack ever since, and their isolation from the rest of the world is only broken by the criminal’s periodic visits to check on their well-beings. The room is all that the young boy has ever known. The sole window built into the house and the television are his only gateways to the outside, and what he sees in the former may just as well be as fictional as what he sees in the latter. His mother, unsurprisingly, is deeply troubled by this and decides

to formulate a plan to escape and to raise her child in the outside world.

The room is the key thematic pivot of the entire film. It represents the extent of what we view as reality, or what we ultimately believe matters. While its walls protect us, they also limit us when we refuse to see what lies beyond them.

“Room” is ultimately a movie about perception and how growing up transforms our perceptions by forcing us to abandon our rooms.

The struggle the mother faces when escaping the room, then, is reflective of the pains that accompany maturation. The movie’s greatest strength is its ability to crystallize and develop this theme using accessible symbols such as the mother, the boy, the criminal and most importantly, the room. That development takes a rather interesting turn halfway into the film, and many may begin to question to where the plot will go next. But the film confidently strides to interesting places (literally and metaphorically), cleverly playing with the idea that children are not the only ones subject to the imprisonment of the mind’s eye.

There is not much to fault the film. The actors turn in performances proportional to the quality of the writing. A particular stand-out performance is Jacob Tremblay as the son: it is one that will go a long way to dismantle unfavorable stereotypes about child actors. The film does start to drag by its last third, but the final scene manages to tie most of the character arcs in an extremely tidy knot that leaves little room for dissatisfaction. To conclude, the film’s ambition stretches no farther than the ability of the filmmakers. From another perspective, though, that may be this film’s “room.” Because its aims are so laser-focused, there comes a point where its movements become predictable. Because the characters are necessarily tied to the development of the central theme, the plot can become far too easy to track. Aside from the event that starkly di-

Photo courtesy of manticbingers.files.wordpress.com

Though “Room” is extremely captivating and well done, its plot is predictable at times and it contains many features of other “Oscar-bait” films. vides the film in two halves, there is very little here to offer intrigue; every scene of the film rides on the momentum and in the direction of the last. By the time the credits roll, what

remains is an extremely competent film, well worthy of filling the screen, but there is no guarantee that it will do the same to the moviegoer’s heart for the entirety of the film.

Mead Museum Unveils Two Unprecedented Contemporary Art Exhibits

Photo courtesy of Mead Art Museum

Mead’s latest exhibits include Tom Friedman’s reimagining of paintings, sculptures and photographs from the Mead’s permanent collection.

Sophia Salazar ’18 Staff Writer The Mead Art Museum opened two new stunning exhibitions on Feb. 16: “Tom Friedman: Untitled (Foundation)” and “SecondHand Reading: William Kentridge and Zanele Muholi.” Both exhibits are unique not only to the Mead, but also to the art world. Friedman’s contemporary art exhibit is directly inspired by various artworks from the Mead’s own holdings, making it the first time the art-

ist has based his work on a single museum’s collection.

“Tom Friedman: Untitled (Foundation)” features Friedman’s contemporaneous reimagining of notable paintings, sculptures and photographs from the Mead’s permanent collection. Such works in the permanent collection that served as muses for Friedman’s artwork include Joshua Reynolds’ infamous portrait of Lord Jeffrey Amherst (1765) and Claude Monet’s “Morning on the Seine” (1897).

Other works from which he draws influence range from second century Greek sculpture and eighth century Japanese woodworking. Friedman uses a range of media to restructure and/or repurpose the preexisting artwork, such as glitter, Styrofoam and Plexiglas, which introduces a fresh take on great art pieces, allowing them to transcend time and space.

In some of his pieces, Friedman engages the artistic emblems of the past to poignantly deliver ironic and politically charged messages on modern issues. For example, in his piece “Untitled (Lord Jeffrey)” (2016), Friedman horizontally elongates Reynolds’ original portrait of Lord Jeffrey Amherst and places multicolored bars over the stretched image.

Friedman metaphorically places Lord Jeffrey behind bars on the inkjet image, alluding to the application of our current legal definition of war crimes on historical accounts of despicable violence. Another one of Friedman’s works “Snowflakes” (2016) takes on the now infamous Starbucks red holiday cup controversy. White snowflakes cover the image of Dutch Golden Age painter Bartholomeus van Bassen’s painting, “Interior of a Church” (1624). On the artwork’s description, Friedman states that the image is a response to Starbucks removing the snowflakes on their holiday cups. The juxtaposition of festive snowflakes on a 15th century painting of a hallowed, sanctified church speaks volumes about the artist’s perspective of the Christian right’s recent movement against Starbucks’ sans-snowflake red holiday cups. Ultimately, Friedman’s new works feature his creative interplay with the past, introducing spectators to new conversations and ideas about pieces from the Mead’s art collection.

“Second-Hand Reading: William Kentridge and Zanele Muholi” feature the works of the two renowned contemporary South African artists, who stem from two different

generations. Zanele Muholi, born in Umlazi, Durban, South Africa in 1972, uses the photographic medium to display aspects of the complex history of race, sexuality and gender in her home country. The majority of Muholi’s photographs that are currently on display at the Mead are selections from her “Faces and Phases” series.

The series praises members of South Africa’s LGBT community through stunning black-and-white portraits. The remaining works contributed by Muholi include recent self-portraits, which are vividly gorgeous in black-and-white form. In a quote on a wall of the exhibit, Muholi, who is an activist in addition to an artist, states that she aims to “re-write a black queer and trans visual history of South Africa for the world.”

William Kentridge, born in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1955, uses text, drawing, collage and stop-motion animation to portray the nature of recording and articulating history. On display in the exhibit is Kentridge’s stop-motion film “Second-Hand Reading,” which is set to a revised version of an old Sesotho church hymn performed by Neo Muyanga. Kentridge’s works draw on themes, of memory, tragedy and hope, markedly influenced by his life experience growing up during apartheid, and his life’s work dedicated to investigating apartheid’s consequences on South Africa’s historical memory. By observing the display of Kentridge’s art on display at this exhibit, one can grasp his beautiful take on difficult questions that arise from historically accounting for South Africa’s apartheid.

Overall, these two new exhibits work actively to engage with history in a contemporary context. Moreover, they represent the beautifully creative ways in which humanity interprets and engages with the past. “Second-Hand Reading: William Kentridge and Zaneli Muholi” is on view until April 3 while “Tom Friedman: Untitled (Foundation).”

Arts & Living 8

The Amherst Student • February 24, 2016

Photo courtesy of wikimedia

Chris Carter revives “X-Files” series after a 15-year hiatus. The show’s original actors appear in this new season which aired from Jan. 24 to Feb. 22 on Fox.

“The X-Files” Revival Falls Short of Reclaiming Cult Classic Status William Harvey ’18 Contributing Writer In recent years, “The X-Files” has become a paranormal figure in the world of television; the nine-season series pioneered the modern science fiction show and proved that intellectual, cinematic television could be produced for a mainstream audience. Amateur and professional screenwriters for the past 15 years have been vying to get a glimpse of the cult show’s surprising success. And like most supernatural mysteries, those attempts have yielded only fake and rubber-limbed reproductions. So with the newly released revival season, can “X-Files” creator Chris Carter capture his mythical beast on film once again?

It seems the answer is a middling “maybe.”

The rather paltry selection of only six episodes manages to offer the Whitman Sampler variety of “X-Files” well, but struggles to consistently offer the highs that the show held in its heydays. That’s not to say the new episodes are unfaithful to the spirit of the show. If anything, they are just like the “X-Files” that went off air in 2002: uneventful, emotionally distant and far too hit and miss.

Two of the episodes are focused on the show’s greater lore, while the remaining episodes are “monsters of the week” — individual cases that have little connection to “The XFiles” background conspiracy. The standalone episodes are the real stars here; each is a solid foray into a topic that feels both modern and relevant to the show’s roots. Viewers may not be completely satisfied with the episodes, which mostly end without resolution, but they’re more than competent and quite enjoyable.

Unfortunately, the 14-year break between seasons has been unkind to both actors David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, who struggle to rekindle the charisma and chemistry of their younger selves. Anderson finds her footing as agent Dana Scully by the second episode, but Duchovny’s performance as Fox Mulder struggles to meet even the baseline minimum of believability. It’s disheartening to see Anderson try so hard and have her foil contribute so little. Mitch Pileggi’s performance as FBI Director Walter Skinner is so flawless viewers will wonder if the man is immortal due to how easily he returns to this role.

“The X-Files” seems like the perfect show for the era of CGI television, but instead, it chooses to balance traditional effects with computer-generated graphics. The level of gore and horror is especially worth mentioning. The 90s risqué violence has been suitably updated to still be shocking in the modern day.

Post-processing has taken a hit with modern techniques; the shots are overwhelmingly blue

and blend into the ubiquity of other Fox crime dramas. It’s disappointing to see the show lose its iconic, foggy noir appearance; however it’s not a complete deal breaker. The show’s cinematic quality is still evident, although the artistic shots the show pushed in the 90s have since become the norm, leaving it attractive but not particularly notable.

Ironically, it is Carter who struggles to recapture the occult and alien on film. The strength of his former writers and cast harkens back to the glory days of UFOs, Conspiracy and episodes recorded on VHS tapes. A fullfledged new season, composed almost entirely of individual monster episodes, could reignite the passion for Fox’s hit. Yes, there is a seam on the rubber suit and the monster is looking pretty shrimpy, but most “X-Files” fans will be glad they have anything new at all.

Individual episode reviews: My Struggle — Skip It As the show began to decline in its later seasons, its writers seemed to become desperate to earn back its broad viewership. The massive twists and turns that defined the show’s early success became the biggest roadblock to its coherency and entertainment in the end.

Constantly flip flopping on whether aliens were real, the overarching storyline became so bloated that even Anderson and Duchovny did not understand their lines. Unfortunately, the only aspect of the show that the premiere episode captures is this confusion.

The typical reunion-style episode, “My Struggle” rounds up Scully and Mulder, now teamed up with right-wing political pundit Tad O’Malley (Joel McHale). The show hastily recaps its nine seasons of shaky lore with moderate success. The “shocking revelation” that comes after might have been more effective had it never been used before. Any chance of redemption is ruined by McHale’s irritating performance, which distracts from what most fans really want, which is more Mulder and Scully.

Founder’s Mutation — Recommend Watching Right from the brutal opener, viewers are assured that X-Files is back and that the prior episode was just a fluke. The FBI sends Mulder and Scully to investigate a scientist whose home remedy for intense tinnitus is a screwdriver to the head. In doing so, Mulder and Scully explore the future they never shared with their orphaned alien hybrid son William.

Penned by James Wong, a veteran of the original series known for his gruesome cases, Founder’s Mutation does enough right to seem like a classic X-File. While not an instant classic, the episode’s use of body horror and real

life medical conditions perfectly encapsulates the fictional use of cutting edge science that the 90s version of the show did so well. The attempts to garner sympathy for William fall flat, not necessarily due to Wong’s writing but because of how irrelevant the character was in the classic series.

Mulder and Scully Meet the WereCreature — Must Watch A comedy tour de force, the agents search for a werewolf in Oregon. The creature they find, however, is not exactly what they expect Of all the classic “X-Files” writers, Darin Morgan may be the most talented and also least recognizable. He only wrote four episodes for the series, yet all four are heralded as classics. His writing style is itself the antithesis of “The X-Files” — Morgan always uses his paranormal element to explore the nature of humanity rather than the monster itself. His “were-creature” is no exception, an absurdist hour of laughs, phenomenally written dialogue and clever set pieces. Viewers will walk away entertained and possibly with a better understanding of what it means to be human.

Morgan’s episode is reason enough for the revival alone. Not only is it the best episode of season 10, but arguably one of the greatest pieces in the series’ run.

Home Again — Recommend Watching A series of brutal deaths call Mulder and Scully to Chicago, where a creature made of trash is terrorizing major players involved in local politics. In the middle of investigating, Scully rushes to her comatose mother, who has mysteries of her own.

Glen Morgan, another writer known for former X-Files’ fame, wrote a solid but ultimately rushed episode that harkens back well to the classic series. “The X-Files” already did a golem twice and a Tulpa once, the latter having already been made out of trash. Fortunately, Morgan distinguishes his graffiti-gone-wrong creature from prior attempts and creates a genuinely horrifying monster. The monster’s signature somber into a trash compactor is an image that viewers won’t forget, and a home invasion scene set to the tune of Petula Clark’s “Downtown” is nothing less than iconic. Sadly, Scully’s dying mother distracts from the ultimate plot. It would have been better split into two separate episodes, in which each thread could have its own satisfying ending.

Babylon — Skip It An Islamic suicide bombing in a Texan art gallery attracts the attention of the federal government, who sends two up-and-coming agents, Miller (Robbie Amell) and Einstein (Lauren Ambrose), to do field work. It also

catches the eye of Mulder, who reads reports that trumpet from the heavens hailed the coming explosion. Mulder, Scully and the greenhorns travel to the lone star state to interview a surviving bomber. Things get trippy along the way.

The show’s opener itself is an indicator of the wavering quality of this episode, which tries to explore Islamophobia without the delicate approach needed. The situation is made worse by a truly indescribably mushroom trip in the middle of the episode, which is both intensely fun and incredibly cheesy. The episode’s tone is wildly inconsistent, jumping from terrorism to racism to “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle” to reverent in a matter of minutes. The new characters, clearly set up as material for a reboot, fail to offer anything new to the plot. Agent Miller is a bland, emotionless copy of Mulder’s character, and Einstein is an almost comical personification of Scully’s skepticism. It’s a confusing episode and a disappointment as the final monster of the week.

My Struggle II — Skip It A (mostly) direct sequel to the season’s opener, the shadowy syndicate conspiracy group finally makes their move. Citizens are succumbing to every 20th-century disease thought to be extinct, a plot half a century in the making. Mulder and Scully race against the time, both in their world and the 42 minutes of the episode, to overturn a global conspiracy.

Start with a whimper, end with silence. Like the season’s opener, Carter’s new turn for the series attempts to make the “X-Files” relevant, tapping into the fears of the modern day: conservative propaganda, anti-vaccination and chemical trails. In today’s political climate, these topics are not stable enough to serve as inspirational material; they’re jokes and ruin the believability of the series’ premise. The show’s former conspiracy theory rooted itself in the reality of the past; viewers can believe the government is experimenting on citizens because there is historical evidence that it has.

The updated end goal of the ominous “Syndicate” is dissatisfying, uninteresting and far too obvious for 10 seasons of development.

Pouring salt on the wound, Carter writes former agent Monica Reyes (Annabeth Gish) back into the plot, a character universally hated by the fandom and the icon of show’s declining quality in the 2000s. The saving grace is William B. Davis’ returning role as the Smoking Man, a fun, love-to-hate performance that, while incoherently written, is expertly delivered. “My Struggle” and “My Struggle II” are terrible bookends for an otherwise enjoyable revival.

The Amherst Student • February 24, 2016

Sports 9

Men’s Swim & Dive Places Fourth in NESCAC Championship Meet

Photo courtesy of Rob Mattson

Jeff Anderson ’16 earned a first place victory in the 200-yard butterfly and third place in the 400-yard individual medley, earning him all-NESCAC honors.

Hayes Honea ’19 Staff Writer The men’s swimming and diving team took fourth place at the 2016 NESCAC championships, held at Williams.

At the end of day one, the men held third place, behind Williams and Connecticut College, with a score of 501. Senior Asher Lichtig earned first place on the 1-meter diving board with an impressive score of 511.50. Connor Haley ’17 also had a stand out performance with a first-place finish in the 500-yard freestyle with a mark of 4:33.75. Elijah Spiro ’18 and Josh Chen ’19 seized second (25.38) and third place (25.65), respectively, in the 50yard breaststroke event. Reed Patterson ’17 and Sam Spurrell ’18 also earned second and fourth place, respectively, in the 50-yard but-

terfly with times of 22.42 and 22.59.

Additionally, Amherst finished second in the 400-yard medley relay with a combined effort from Matt Heise ’16, Spiro, Spurrell and Alex Dreisbach ’17 (3:21.29). The group set a pool record in the preliminary event with a mark of 3:21.10.

With day two coming to a close, Amherst stood in fourth place with 957 points. Spiro earned second place in the 100-yard breaststroke with a mark of 56.06. Jeff Anderson ’16 and Patterson each earned third place in the 400-yard individual medley (4:02.36) and 100-yard butterfly (49.46), respectively. Chen and Spurrell added fifth-place finishes in the 100-yard breaststroke (56.58) and 100-yard butterfly (49.92) as well.

The relay teams also stood out on day two with third-place finishes for Heise, Patterson,

Spiro and Dreisbach in the 200-yard medley (1:31.41) and Anderson, Haley, Dreisbach and Charlie Seltzer ’19 the 800-yard freestyle (6:50.79).

After the final day of the meet, Amherst finished in fourth place with 1315 points. Lichtig performed well again, earning second place in the 3-meter event with a score of 494.60. Greg Han ’17 earned a solid first-place finish in the 200-yard breaststroke with a mark of 2:04.01.

Anderson also earned first place in the 200yard butterfly, breaking a pool record with a time of 1:49.68.

“It was very bittersweet being at my last NESCACs,” Lichtig said. “I have been diving for 15 years and can’t image my life without diving, but at the same time, I’m excited about moving on and seeing what life is like without it. I couldn’t have asked for a better ending to my career being at that meet with the best teammates in the world. This team has been amazing and I wouldn’t have wanted to finish up with any other group of guys with me out there.”

11 Amherst swimmers were also named to the 2016 All-NESCAC team, given to the top three finishers in each event over the weekend. Lichtig highlighted the group by taking both the NESCAC diver of the year and fouryear high point diver awards. He was awarded the four-year high point award because of his consistently excellent performances over the entirety of his collegiate career. In addition, Lichtig will finish his senior season having been named to All-NESCAC teams twice in the 1-meter board event and three times in the 3-meter board event. He is only the third Amherst diver in history to be awarded the diver of the year award, and the fourth to earn the four-year high point for divers.

Joining Lichtig on the All-NESCAC team were Heise, Anderson, Patterson, Haley, Dreisbach, Han, Spiro, Spurrell, Chen and first-year Charles Seltzer. The combination of

upperclassmen and underclassmen on this list ensures that the team will continue to succeed in years to come. It is particularly notable that two first-years made the All-NESCAC teams, as they will have three more years to improve upon their already stellar performances. While the senior leadership will be missed, the team is in good hands in terms of individual talent, and will continue to succeed.

The men will return to the pool for the final time this season this March in Greensboro, North Carolina, to compete at the NCAA Division III tournament. They will look to continue their excellent individual and team performances in their final competition of the year.

Photo courtesy of Rob Mattson

Asher Lichtig ‘16 earned the fouryear high point diver, only the third Amherst diver to recieve the award.

Men’s Hockey Secures Sixth Seed in NESCAC Tournament

Women’s Basketball Overpowers Bates, Doswell Sisters Impress

Sarah Wagner ’19 Staff Writer

Kelly Karczewski ’18 Staff Writer

The Amherst men’s ice hockey team encountered two NESCAC rivals on the road this weekend. Williams and Middlebury proved to be tough competition for the purple and white, who went 0-2 with only a single goal between the two games.

Up against Williams, the top-ranked team in the NESCAC, Amherst faced a tough challenge on Friday. While the 0-2 result was not ideal, the purple and white made the talented Ephs work for the win, nearly matching them in shots with a 35-32 tally and keeping the game close throughout. In addition, each team went 0/3 on power plays.

Even though there were a total of 23 shots between the two teams in the first period, neither was able to break through and record a score. Almost halfway through the second period, Williams’ Joe Welch broke through the Amherst defense. The assist on this gamewinning goal came from Colby Cretella.

Williams widened the lead halfway through the back-and-forth third period when Tyler Young sent a pass to linemate Roberto Cellini, who put the puck in the back of the net. Amherst was ultimately unable to break through their opponents’ strong defense, even with an extra skater at the end of the game. Senior goalie David Cunningham put in a strong performance, finishing with a total of 32 saves in the tough 0-2 loss.

Two of Middlebury’s three goals in their decisive 3-1 win over Amherst the next night occurred within a minute of each other. Other than this short breakdown, however, Amherst goaltender Connor Girard ’18 played well; he made 24 saves throughout the game, including one from point-blank range during the opening minutes of the contest.

At the end of the first period, Zach Taggerty and Max Greenwald opened the scoring by executing a textbook 2 vs. 1 to put the Panthers ahead. The flurry of goals occurred at the beginning of the second period: first, Ronald Fishman scored a fluke goal when he chanced a tight-angle shot from the corner. A minute later, Spencer Cage slid a pass to Jake Charles, who beat Girard over the shoulder.

Amherst’s lone goal of the weekend came with four minutes left in the second period.

During the second Middlebury penalty of the period, Theo Hannah ’16 received a pass from Patrick Arena ’16 and sent a shot flying from the point through the five-hole of Panthers goaltender Liam Moorfield-Yee. The Panthers, on the other hand, were unable to capitalize on their sole man-advantage opportunity of the evening.

Unfortunately, the purple and white’s comeback attempt was short-lived, as they failed to record another score for the rest of the game. In fact, the third period went entirely scoreless, even though Amherst pulled Girard for two minutes in a fruitless attempt to break down the Panthers’ defense.

This weekend brought the regular season to a close. Amherst is currently ranked sixth in the NESCAC and will face Bowdoin in the quarterfinal round. The purple and white will look to bounce back from their recent struggles and regain their early season form in an attempt to make a run in the postseason The Polar Bears should prove to be a tough matchup for the purple and white — the teams’ first contest ended in a scoreless tie and their more recent game at the beginning of this month resulted in a 1-3 loss for the Amherst squad. The quartefinal playoff game will be played at Bowdoin this coming Saturday with the time of puck drop to be determined.

It was an impressive weekend for the Doswell sisters and the rest of the Amherst women’s basketball team in the first round of NESCAC tournament last Saturday in LeFrak. The purple and white trampled over Bates in a decisive 8229 victory in the quarterfinal game, in which Ali Doswell ’17 achieved her 1000th career point and sister Meredith Doswell ’17 put away 22 points to lead the team to the next round.

At a home game in front of an excited and sizeable crowd, Ali Doswell’s 1000th career point came in the form of a 3-point swish just two minutes into the game. Now with 1,013 points as only a junior, Doswell is only the 16th player in the program history to surpass the 1,000-point milestone.

After 10 minutes of play, purple and white had kept the momentum in their favor and held the advantage at 31-9. The lead extended to 50-16 by the halftime whistle, ending a first half characterized by phenomenal Amherst shooting percentages and domination of both offensive and defensive boards. The fantastic Amherst rebounding was led primarily by Meredith Doswell and sophomore Jackie Nagle, who ended the match with 12 and 11 rebounds, respectively.

In the second half, purple and white continued to put up significant points as well as to further shut down the Bates offense, outscoring the Wildcats 23-8 coming out of the locker room for the third quarter. Cheyenne Pritchard ’16 had a standout second half, hitting important deep shots early in the third quarter to extend the lead. The final 14 points of the contest went to the purple and white, and the score ended at an impressive 82-29 for Amherst.

Sophomore Hannah Hackley finished with 11 points, Ali Doswell with 14 and Jaimie Renner

’17 added eight.

Their notable 53-point victory over Bates marks the second time in three games that this dominant purple and white squad has posted a 50+ point win as Amherst rolled over Middlebury on Feb. 12, finishing with a final score of 77-24.

Amherst now advances to the NESCAC semifinals, where the purple and white will match up against No. 3 Bowdoin at Tufts on Saturday in hopes of finishing a successful season with a NESCAC championship before NCAA tournament action.

Photo courtesy of Clarus Studios, Inc.

Ali Doswell ’17 scored her 1,000th point this weekend against Bates.

10

Sports

The Amherst Student • February 24, 2016

Men’s Basketball Wins Quarterfinal, Green Named Co-NESCAC Player of the Week Julia Turner ’19 Managing Sports Editor The number two seeded Amherst men’s basketball team matched up against seventhseed Bowdoin in last weekend’s NESCAC quarterfinal action. The purple and white pulled a win out of a closely contested game against the 12-11 Polar Bears with the help of a spectacular performance by senior Connor Green, named co-NESCAC player of the week after his 29-point effort.

Amherst came out strong in the beginning of the first half with flexible offensive play, driving consistently into the key while still showing off their phenomenal outside shooting. And as always, the outside shooting didn’t disappoint. The purple and white scored 36 of their 83 points from behind the arc, shooting 40 percent from distance and 46.6 percent from the field. With ten minutes left in the first half, Amherst held their largest lead of the game after Jeff Racy ’17 hit two free throws to put the team up by 14 points.

Eleven Amherst fouls, coupled with timely shooting, allowed the Polar Bears to tie up the game at 30 with six minutes left in the first

half, but the purple and white managed to hang on to their lead, heading into the locker room at halftime with a six-point advantage.

A strong start by Bowdoin coming into the second half propelled the Polar Bears to another tie score at 48 before Johnny McCarthy ’18 came up big with a made jumper followed by a strong drive into the key for a contested layup.

From there, the two teams battled through three more tie scores, Bowdoin never managing to pull ahead. A three-point play by McCarthy and timely free throw shooting by Eric Conklin ’17 put momentum back in the hands of the purple and white, who went on a run to go up by nine with less than two minutes left to play. Two made free throws by Racy sealed the game for Amherst as they wrapped up play at a score of 83-76.

This win allows Amherst to advance to the NESCAC semifinals against number three seed Tufts at 4 p.m. at Trinity this Saturday, Feb. 27. This will be a huge test for the purple and white. The Jumbos handed them one of their only two conference losses this season two weekends ago when the purple and white traveled to Medford.

ATHLETE SPOTLIGHT

Jeff Anderson ’16 Favorite Team Memory: Beating Williams at home sophomore year and this year Favorite Pro Athlete: I’m a Jets fan, but I’ve got to admit my teammates have worn me down and I love Gronk Dream Job: Working as a doctor for NASA Pet Peeve: People talking or using their phones during movies. Even when you’re not in a theater. Can’t stand it Favorite Vacation Spot: The Coqui Inn in San Juan, Puerto Rico Something on Your Bucket List: Go to a Jets game and watch them win. Both games I’ve been to they’ve gotten blown out and it was not too fun to sit through Guilty Pleasure: Binge watching TV shows.

I go through some like wildfire Favorite Food: A Five Guys cheeseburger Favorite Thing About Amherst: Burger day at Val How He Earned It: Anderson finished in first place in the 200-yard butterfly with a time of 1:49.68, and third in the individual medley with a time of 4:02.94. In recognition of these efforts, Anderson made NCAA ‘B’ cut marks and earned All-NESCAC honors.

Taryn Clary ’16 Favorite Team Memory: Every moment of it!

Favorite Pro Athlete: Derek Jeter Dream Job: Curator Pet Peeve: When people hold the King vacuum hostage Favorite Vacation Spot: Paris Something on Your Bucket List: Finally hiking the Notch Guilty Pleasure: Disney Channel original movies Favorite Food: Cheese ravioli Favorite Thing About Amherst: The people How She Earned It: At the Walker Cup semifinal this past weekend, Clary won in straight sets against No. 21 Colby College en route to a resounding 8-1 team victory.

The next day, Clary gave Amherst a chance to win the final by grinding out a tough fiveset victory (11-4, 13-15, 11-7, 8-11, 11-3) on the fifth court. Unfortunately, Amherst was unable to pull out the victory, and suffered a heartbreaking 5-4 loss. Her individual performance improved her record to an excellent 15-2 on the season.

Women’s Squash Falls 5-4 in Finals of the Walker Cup to NESCAC Rival Bates Photo courtesy of Amherst Athletics

Connor Green ’16 was named co-NESCAC player of the week after his 29 points on 9 for 18 shooting led Amherst to a quarterfinal win over Bowdoin.

Women’s Track and Field Competes at Division III New England Champs Nate Tyrell ’19 Staff Writer The Amherst women’s track and field team put on an impressive performance in the twoday DIII New England Championship at Middlebury this past weekend, finishing 24th out of the talented 31-team pool.

The squad continued to impress in the middle-distance events, with first-year Julia Asin placing 12th overall in the 400-meter dash with a time of 1:00.69. With marks of 1:38.18 and 1:38.70, Victoria Hensley ’16 and Leonie Rauls ’18 finished back to back in the 600-meter run to finish seventh and eighth, respectively. Rounding out the strong showing was Kaeili Mathias ’18, who claimed 19th in the 800-meter run with a time of 2:29.01.

Heading into the distance events, the purple and white enjoyed several more strong showings, with senior Keelin Moehl finishing 10th overall in the 1,000-meter run with a mark of 3:11.14. Adding a 13th-place finish to the Amherst scorecard, senior Betsy Black crossed the finish line in the 5,000-meter run with a time of 18:43.64.

In the relays — one of Amherst’s strong suits this season — the quartet of Hensley, Rauls, Moehl and Asin placed seventh in an extremely competitive 4x400 relay pool with a time of 4:07.05.

In the field events, sophomore Becki Golia took eighth in the high jump event with a height of 1.58 meters.

“I thought we were very energetic, yet focused,” Golia said. “With the best athletes in

New England competing, the meet was challenging, but I thought we did well.”

Next up, Amherst will travel to Boston University for the NEICAAA Championship on Friday, Feb. 26.

Photo courtesy of Amherst Athletics

Women’s track placed 24th in a talented 31-team field last weekend.

Mary Grace Cronin ’18 Staff Writer An exciting weekend of competition at Yale ended in heartbreak last Sunday morning for the Amherst women’s squash team. The purple and white were dethroned as two-time Walker Cup Champions in the final match against their NESCAC opponent, Bates. The contest was a close one, with Amherst falling 5-4. Amherst had previously bested the Bobcats at the Pioneer Valley Invitational in January, a match that ended in a resounding 7-2 victory for the purple and white.

In their first couple matches of the Walker Cup, Amherst coasted past their opponents, and showcased just how much depth they had. In the first round, Amherst prevailed 8-1 against Tufts, with six different Amherst players posting sweeps against their opponents.

They built on their momentum from this decisive opener, and continued their dominance in the second round.

This time against Colby, all but two players swept their competition en route to a perfect record on the day. This victory improved their record to 11-5 on the year before their final match against Bates.

And what a final match it was. Amherst women’s squash battled it out against a Bobcat roster fueled by redemption. Haley McAtee ’18 exemplified the fighting spirit of the purple and white despite her narrow loss a match against Emma Dunn of the Bobcats.

Senior captains Taryn Clary and Khushy Aggarwal ended their careers on high notes with key wins. The other wins of the matchup came as a result of strong performances from Mae Cromwell ’18 and Priya Sunha ’19.

“I think today we lost some of that focus that really helped us on the first two days,” Kim Krayacich ’18 said. “Bates was definitely a determined team, and even though the loss was upsetting we know we gave it our all.”

As their season comes to a close, the Amherst women have shown tremendous grit and talent. Graduating seniors Clary, Aggarwal, Corri Johnson, Rebecca Pol and Ericka Robertson have each made a significant impact in their time donning the purple and white, and were integral to the success and leadership that has thus far characterized the 2016 season.

The underclassmen will get their chance to represent the program as they move on to the individual post-season stage. So far, McAtee and Krayacich have secured their spots, but the possibility remains for several other women to continue their seasons. They will contend for postseason glory at Chelsea Piers in Stamford, Connecticut on March 4, 5 and 6.

Photo courtesy of Amherst Athletics

Kimberly Krayacich ’18 went 2-1 while Amherst reached the final.

The Amherst Student • February 24, 2016

Sports

Women’s Hockey Concludes Regular Season with Sweep of Wesleyan Devin O’Connor ’16 Staff Writer The Amherst women’s ice hockey team finished their regular season on a high note, sweeping Wesleyan in a two-game series over the weekend. The purple and white defeated the Cardinals 6-0 on Friday at Wesleyan before beating them again, 6-0, at home on Saturday evening. The home game Saturday marked the senior class’ 100th career game and was senior day for the class of 2016.

Sophomore Bailey Plaman tallied the win in net, making 18 saves between the pipes, while six different skaters added the six goals for Amherst at Spurrier-Snyder Rink. The purple and white put the first goal on the board just under six minutes into the first period. Emma Griese ’18 received a pass from classmate Brenna Sullivan and sent the puck around Wesleyan goaltender Corinne Rivard.

Kristen Molina ’18 added a second Amherst goal at the 9:05 mark to extend the visitor’s lead to 2-0. In the second period, Eileen Harris ’16, Katelyn Pantera ’19 and Erin Martin ’16 added a goal each to make it a five-goal game before entering the third quarter. Sophomore Alex Toupal notched the sixth and final goal of the game with just minutes to play in regulation.

The senior day finale was quite a day for Amherst. Orr Rink was packed with excited fans to celebrate the class of 2016, and the energy was felt in the stands and on the ice. Seniors Erin Martin, Caroline Bomstein and Eileen Harris have

amassed a 61-24-13 record over their careers, and appeared in two NESCAC semifinal games.

The purple and white had another 6-0 finish on Saturday, going 3-for-6 on the power play opportunities. Goaltender Sabrina Dobbins ’18 registered 11 saves in net for the home team.

Toupal added the first and game-winning goal for Amherst around the halfway mark of the first stanza. The forward delivered a wrist shot over the glove of Rivard. Martin notched the next goal for the purple and white, sending one in from the offensive blueline. Toupal added her second goal of the game with under 20 seconds to play in the first period. After 20 minutes, Amherst led the Cardinals 3-0.

At the 9:32 mark of the second period, Sara Culhane ’17 scored the fourth Amherst goal. Culhane sent the puck between the legs of Rivard.

Though the Cardinals netminder made some stellar saves to follow in the second stanza, Amherst continued its offensive efforts in the third period. First-year Jocelyn Hunyadi scored twice on power-play situations in the final twenty minutes of play. Hunyadi knocked a loose puck in front of the net into the back of the goal at the 14:31 mark. She added her second and final Amherst goal from the left zone with under eight minutes to play in the game.

“Last weekend was a great way to end the regular season and set us up for playoffs,” Bomstein said. “It would have been great to get the number one seed, but I think we are all really exited to get another shot at Bowdoin, especially on our home ice.”

Photo courtesy of Amherst Athletics

Through 24 games played this season, senior captain Erin Martin leads Amherst with 22 goals. She is also second on the team with 12 assists.

Chris Boyko Coach’s Corner Strength and Conditioning Coach

Chris Roll ’17 sat down with head strength and conditioning coach Chris Boyko to talk about his background in fitness and his thoughts on staying healthy at Amherst.

Q: How and at what age did you become involved and passionate about athletics and fitness?

A: I was always playing sports as a kid growing up. There was not a time when I was not involved in at least one or two sports at a time.

When I wasn’t playing sports, I was watching sports on television. When I got to college I wanted to be a physical therapist, but I realized that it would be more fun to work with healthy individuals than with those who are injured. I also heard a few speakers during college that were in the strength and conditioning field and they were very motivating.

Q: How did you end up as the strength and conditioning coach at Amherst?

A: I am from the area actually so I went to University of Massachusetts Lowell for exercise physiology when I still wanted to be a physical therapist. Once I got hooked on strength and conditioning, I applied to Springfield College’s graduate program on exercise science and strength and conditioning, which was the first program of that kind in the country. I worked part-time at University of Massachusetts Amherst while I got my graduate degree and ended up staying there full-time after I finished up at Springfield. I was at University of Massachusetts Amherst for nine years as an assistant strength coach and when the opportunity opened up here, I jumped on it.

Q: What aspects of Amherst College and the athletic department have impressed you the most?

A: The students here at Amherst have really made me a better coach. Due to the academic rigors of our college, time is precious here at Amherst and our athletes and students sacrifice their time to come down and work on their fitness. It is up to me to provide them with an efficient, beneficial program that is worth their time. The students here are extremely motivated in all aspects of life and their dedication to fitness has made me a better coach.

Q: What is the most rewarding part of your position? And the most challenging?

A: The most rewarding part by far is when someone, verbally or written, expresses to me that I have made an impact on their life or have kept them healthier than they would have otherwise been. Working with the students and then knowing you had a positive impact and that they believe their time was well spent is certainly the most rewarding. The most challenging part is probably the sheer volume of students that come in and are looking for help.

We have a very active population here. Whether you play varsity sports or not, there are a lot of people cognizant of their health and they want to stay active. We have a ton of students who play club sports and intramural sports or participate in wellness classes and I try to help out with everyone as much as I can.

Q: What does your ideal fitness center look like?

A: Our fitness center runs pretty smoothly.

Since we do have such an active and athletic population, we could use some more space, especially for cardio equipment. Since our students are so academic, the late afternoon is the ideal time for students to work out and the aerobic machines get pretty crowded. With more space students would never have to wait and therefore spend their time in the fitness center more efficiently.

Q: Can you speak to the importance of exercise and good nutrition?

A: I actually just had my physical and the doctor reminded me how important it was to stay active in preventing disease and keeping a healthy lifestyle. Being able to enjoy your retirement and grandkids is something people have an easier time doing when they stay active. Keeping active and maintaining a healthy diet will improve your quality of life later on.

Finding your niche or something you enjoy, in terms of staying active, will keep you coming back and maintain a high quality of life.

Men’s Track and Field Places 12th at Division III New England Champs Caleb Winfrey ’19 Staff Writer The Amherst College men’s track and field team placed 12th overall in the 26-team, twoday Division III New England Championships hosted by MIT last Friday and Saturday, Feb. 19 and 20.

In the middle distance events, the purple and white put on an impressive performance, with first-year Kristian Sogaard claiming ninth place overall in the 600-meter run with a time of 1:23.36. Jesse Fajnzylber ’17 placed tenth overall in the 800-meter run (1:58.96).

Finally, crossing the line in 2:39.33, Steven Lucey ’17 placed 14th place in the 1,000-meter run.

In an exciting performance by Kevin Connors ’17, the junior took third place in the 1-mile run with a time of 4:25.65. Clocking in at 8:33.90, standout cross-country runner Mohamed Hussein ’18 finished fifth in the 3,000-meter run to add to the purple and whites’ total score. Rounding out the distance events, senior captain Dan Crowley used a mark of 15:22.14 to claim tenth place in the 5,000-meter event.

The highlight of the day was the team’s success in the 4x800-meter relay, in which

the team of Chris Butko ’18, Vernon Espinoza ’18, Sogaard and Brent Harrison ’17 claimed a first-place victory overall with a lightningfast time of 7:48.46. Not only did the group win the race, but they also took down the DIII New England Championships meet record from 1984.

In the field events, senior Khalil Flemming took 39th overall in the long jump with a distance of 5.79 meters and 29th overall in the triple jump (12.70 meters). Finally, with a distance of 12.51 meters, Thomas Matthew ’16 placed 24th in the shot put event, and firstyear Sam Amaka finished in 34th place (11.42 meters).

“Overall, the team did not perform as well as we would have wanted, but there were a few highlights,” Sogaard said. “Kevin Connors getting third in the mile was a good result from him, and there were a few personal bests from people like Jesse Fajnzylber in the 800-meter.

We ended the day with a win in the 4x800meter, which will hopefully help increase our confidence going into Open New England’s this coming Saturday. We should hopefully have some strong performances there.”

Amherst will travel to Boston University to compete in the NEICAAA Championship this Friday, Feb. 26.

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Competing from the No. 4 position, Cameron Bahadori ’18 compiled a 2-1 record for the purple and white at last weekend’s CSA Team Championships.

Men’s Squash Competes at CSA Team Championships, Michael Groot Goes 3-0 Cole Steiger ’19 Staff Writer Men’s squash participated in its final team competition of the year on Friday at Yale. The team entered the Collegiate Squash Association (CSA) team championships, primarily hosted at Yale, sporting a 6-8-season record and the No. 22 spot in the CSA’s national rankings. That ranking placed Amherst in the Summers Cup (C Division) of the CSA Championships: an eight-team bracket featuring the squads ranked between No. 17 and No. 24 nationally.

There were plenty of familiar faces in the bracket this year, where the purple and white joined No. 17 Bates, No. 18 Williams, No. 19 Wesleyan, No. 21 Colby and No. 23 Bowdoin to make it six NESCAC teams in the Summers Cup. Coming off of a strong seventh-place finish at the highly competitive NESCAC championships two weekends ago, the team earned a first-round matchup against a talented Wesleyan team that had narrowly won over Amherst at the Little III Championships in January.

Seeking revenge in a much-anticipated re-

match, Amherst took the courts on Friday with a slightly different lineup than the one that nearly pulled the upset against Wesleyan a month ago.

A spot in the semifinals up for grabs, both teams fought hard but it was not long before the purple and white found themselves in an uphill battle.

Amherst No. 1 Noah Browne ’16, despite his strong season, fell to Wesleyan’s Guy Davidson (117, 11-9, 14-12). After dropping the first set, David Merkel ’19 evened the match at 1-1 on court three, but the first-year eventually fell, 11-7, 8-11, 11-9, 11-6.

In the end, Cameron Bahadori ’18 (default) and Michael Groot ’17 (11-6, 2-11, 12-10, 11-8) scored Amherst’s only victories, coming on courts four and seven, respectively. With the loss, Amherst fell into the consolation bracket.

Following the 7-2 setback, Amherst faced off with No. 23 Bowdoin for the second time this tournament season. History favored Amherst in this one, since it was over the very same Bowdoin team that Amherst had triumphed, 6-3, in the seventhplace match at the NESCAC Championships in early February.

Saturday’s matchup, again close, saw a similar

GAME SCHE DULE

result. Browne got the festivities started for Amherst with a 3-0 win (12-10, 11-6, 11-6).

Harith Khawaja ’19 dropped his match on court two, but a four-set victory Merkel victory and a five-set Bahadori win on the third and fourth courts put the purple and white up 3-1 with five matches to play. Amherst needed just two more wins to take the victory and advance to the consolation finals.

Bowdoin’s George Cooley defeated Darian Ehsani ’17 on court five (11-7, 7-11, 11-7, 11-3), but Jeremy Van ’17 provided a win at the No. 6 position with his sweep of Bowdoin’s Satya Butler. Groot then earned his second victory of the weekend (115, 11-8, 11-4) on court seven to clinch the match.

Bowdoin eventually carried courts eight and nine but Jojo might as well have been singing from the crowd, because it was just too little too late for the Polar Bears. Amherst triumphed 5-4 and moved on to the finals of the Summers Cup consolation bracket.

There, the purple and white faced No. 21 Colby College for the second time this season, with the chance to avenge a 6-3 loss to the Mules at the Pioneer Valley Invitational in Jan. Unfortunately,

FRI

SAT

Men’s Track & Field NEICAAA Championship, TBD

Men’s Track & Field NEICAAA Championship, TBD

Women’s Track & Field NEICAAA Championship, TBD

Women’s Track & Field NEICAAA Championship, TBD

Amherst was unable to overcome their tough opponent, falling on the wrong end of a 7-2 score line.

Browne lost a tough five-set match in the first position. The senior captain fought back after falling behind twice to knot the match at 2-2 heading into the final set. However, Browne then fell in the fifth, 12-10.

Merkel finished his strong weekend from the third position with a come-from-behind victory.

The first-year dropped his first set but grabbed the critical second set 11-9 and went on to win in four sets.

Groot then grabbed the purple and white’s other victory of the matchup with a sweep of Colby’s Andrew Swapp on court seven.

The junior impressed in particular with an undefeated tournament.

After this weekend’s results, Amherst’s record stands at 6-10 for the season, while Browne leads the purple and white with a 13-3 individual record.

Amherst has this weekend off before they return to the court for their final matches of the season from Friday to Sunday, March 4-6. They will compete at Chelsea Piers in Stamford, where the team hopes to finish the season off on a strong note.

Women’s Ice Hockey vs Bowdoin, 3 p.m.

Men’s Ice Hockey @ Bowdoin, 3 p.m.

Men’s Basketball vs Tufts @ Trinity, 4 p.m.

Women’s Basketball vs Bowdoin @ Tufts, 4 p.m.