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NOVEMBER 3, 2021 SIXTH WEEK VOL. 134, ISSUE 6
Paul Alivisatos Inaugurated as 14th University President By BEN WIENER | News Reporter The University celebrated the inauguration of Paul Alivisatos on Friday in the Rockefeller Chapel with many others gathered at watch parties at Mandel Hall and Max Palevsky Cinema. Before he was appointed as the 14th president of the University of Chicago, Alivisatos (A.B.’81) was the executive vice chancellor and provost of the University of California, Berkeley. He previously held many faculty positions there, such as professor of chemistry and materials science & engineering, and served as the director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The 535th convocation began with “Crescat scientia; vita excolatur,” a carillon fanfare composed by University Professor of Composition Augusta Read Thomas. The piece was named after the University’s motto, which translates to “Let knowledge grow from more to more; and so be human life enriched.” Victoria Prince, marshal of the University, first welcomed those watching: “The many parts of our university, joined by our friends from other institutions and our city, come together to welcome Paul Alivisatos and listen to his vision for our university and the many opportunities to come.” Prince then introduced the speakers welcoming Alivisatos on behalf of the faculty, students, staff, alumni, and neighboring community. Speakers included assistant professor Eve L. Ewing; fifth-year doctoral student Vish Venkataraman; Student Centers Director Jennifer Kennedy; president of the University’s Alumni Board Margaret Mueller; and senior pastor at the University Church Reverend Julian DeShazier. A selection from Underworld Lit, read by author and professor Srikanth Reddy, preceded the two invited speakers: University of California, Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ
and Stanford professor Steven Chu. Violinists Janet Sung and Yuan-Qing Yu performed a musical interlude titled “Double Helix” to pay homage to Alivisatos’s work as a chemist at Berkeley. In his inaugural address, Alivisatos focused on the significance of realizing the University’s core values. He noted the inauguration is “far more than the welcoming of a new president, it reaffirms the values that shaped this university.” Alivisatos spoke of creating an engaged community, saying “it is imperative that we fully engage with the world around us.” He then praised the University as a place where “some of the world’s best thinkers, scholars, researchers, educators, analysts, advocates, artists, entrepreneurs, and creators are unified by a distinctive culture and a set of core values.” Alivisatos also acknowledged the University’s influence on the South Side. “As we deepen our engagement with our neighbors, we must examine, acknowledge and reflect upon our past actions with regards to development and housing on the South Side,” Alivisatos said. “These are essential steps to be better listeners and partners with our neighbors who bring enormous creativity and resilience toward the vision of a vibrant and thriving community.” He also supported the University’s commitment to diversity, affordability, and remaining an active partner with other institutions. The alma mater was then played by University Organist Thomas Weisflog, accompanied by members of the University of Chicago Motet Choir. The ceremony closed with a benediction given by dean of Rockefeller Memorial Chapel Maurice Charles, closing words by Prince, and a recessional by Weisflog.
VIEWPOINTS: The University must make accommodations for sick and struggling students.
ARTS: On the joys and hedonism of UChicago’s famous Fourth Meal.
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Rockefeller Chapel on the day of the inauguration. ANGELINA TORRE
GREY CITY: Reflecting on Timuel Black’s life and legacy as a Civil Rights leader.
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Students, Faculty, and Staff Can Now Access The New York Times and Other Newspapers Free of Charge By LAYNE FRIEDMAN | News Reporter Since mid-September, all University faculty, students, and staff have had free access to online editions of The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post through the University of Chicago Library. Individuals who wish to access these sites can follow the instructions on the library website to sign up for accounts through their CNET ID. The subscriptions cover the New York Times online and mobile app, the New York Times Book Review, the New York Times Magazine, the Wall Street Journal online and mobile app, and the Washington Post online. However, NYT Cooking, NYT Games, and the Washington Post mobile app are not included in the subscription. Prior to this change, access was available through ProQuest, Factiva, and other online databases. These databases will still provide access to newspaper texts and archives, but the new subscription service includes daily news coverage with articles in their intended web format. According to Jim Mouw, the associate university librarian for collections and access, there are other benefits of the new
subscriptions. “[The subscriptions] allow us to support numerous faculty who want to use interactive content from The New York Times in their classes. We have selected these three newspapers because they are major U.S. newspapers and because some departments have been licensing them [in] their individual populations, which led to spotty access across the University.” In addition to access to these three publications, the University library also announced the expansion of access to African American newspapers, such as the Michigan Chronicle and the Chicago Defender, on October 12. Archives from each paper are available from the early 1900s to 2010 for both reading and data mining. “[Both papers] contain vital historical coverage that is important to researchers, including advocacy work and social justice reporting as well as information about everyday life,” commented Mouw. For more information on accessing publications, students can visit the library guide.
Regenstein Library. COURTESY OF MEGHAN HENDRIX
First In-Person Family Weekend After COVID Sees Record Attendance; Parents Reflect on Their Experiences By ANUSHREE VASHIST | News Reporter This past weekend, the University welcomed families for three days of homecoming festivities and saw a record turnout. Director of College Programming and Orientation Preston Reilly said, “We are excited to share that this year’s Family Weekend had unprecedented attendance and included over 3,500 attendees.” Families had the opportunity to attend information sessions, participate in model classes, attend the Dean’s Brunch, and join neighborhood bus tours. Additionally, the Class of 2024 and
their families got to take part in the Presentation of the Class of 2024 Procession, a UChicago tradition delayed by COVID-19 in which new students walk through the Main Quadrangles and under Hull Gate. Similarly, a special ceremony in Rockefeller Chapel recognized the Class of 2020, whose graduation was virtual due to the pandemic. Guests over the age of 18 each paid a registration fee of $50 to attend the events, as they have in the past. Reilly explained, “The registration fees collected are used to help supplement the over-
all cost of the event. As you can imagine, reserving space, providing food and drinks throughout the event (including the Dean’s Brunch on Sunday), booking entertainment and neighborhood tours, and hosting large events like the Homecoming Block Party over a full weekend can be expensive.” Given the lack of family events last year, Homecoming had a special meaning for parents of the Class of 2024, who were finally able to see their children’s class procession. Rashmi Chandra, a parent of a second-year student (P’24), called the event “a nice touch,” explaining that it resulted in a “feeling of cama-
raderie of being a part of this community.” Model classes and information sessions allowed parents to become acclimated with the University’s academic programs. Lucia Panteja (P’25) enjoyed attending a model class called “Revolution!” with history professor Steven Pincus. “We loved the class. The professor was a really high caliber professor [and] a very interesting person because of his knowledge,” Panteja said. Equally exciting for Panteja was touring the University’s Oriental Institute, CONTINUED ON PG. 3
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which was open to families for self-guided tours featuring interactive kiosks and activity cards. Families could also attend the special exhibition, “Antoin Sevruguin: Past and Present,” which marked the first time the Oriental Institute had displayed its collection of Sevruguin’s photographs to the public. “It’s amazing. I was not expecting such a high quality museum [given that] it belongs to the University,” Panteja said. The bus tour allowed students and their families to learn about the University, Hyde Park, and surrounding neighborhoods like Washington Park, Bronzeville, and Jackson Park. The experience was filled with South Side trivia about a large swath of topics, including architecture and housing; the Obamas; the Chicago World’s Fair; and, as any UChicago publicity event would have it, the first man-made nuclear reactor created under Stagg Field. Diane Cyr (P’25) thoroughly enjoyed the bus tour. “What’s interesting about this college is [that] everything [is] of importance. The buildings are interesting. The people have a lot on their minds,” Cyr said. In addition to attending events, parents also had the chance to catch up with their children. First-year parents enjoyed seeing their children after their first few weeks on campus. “It’s nice seeing [my daughter] and [her] new habitat, especially now that
Parents’ walk through the north exit of the quad during Parents’ Weekend. MICHAEL MCCLURE [she] knows her way around,” Dana Roth (P’25) said. “We’re excited to see our daughter after a month and to have a chance to take her downtown to some nice restaurants,” Stuart Roth (P’25) added. Some students and parents felt frus-
trated by how busy students were while studying for upcoming midterms. Maisie Thompson ’25 said the timing was not ideal, as she had a paper due Sunday and a midterm later in the week. “[We] were almost going to leave the campus [on Friday] without meeting [our
son] because he was studying and he had to give an assignment,” Chandra said. Despite the timing, families enjoyed the variety of opportunities. Panteja said on Saturday, “It is difficult to say what is [our] favorite [event], but we have enjoyed [the weekend] so far!”
Two Students Hit by Paintballs in One Night By SOLANA ADEDOKUN | News Reporter Two UChicago students reported being hit in a drive-by paintball shooting by 55th Street on the evening of Saturday, October 16. Third-year Grey City writer Milutin Gjaja was hit with paintballs on Saturday at around 8:30 p.m. while riding home on his bike after studying at Harper Library. He was hit four times on his left leg and once on his ear. Another student reported being hit while biking back from the Point about 15 minutes
later. This is not the first time paintballers have struck students near campus. Last October, at least eight people in the University community were struck by paintballs shot from moving vehicles. Paintballing has historically been an issue in Hyde Park leading up to Halloween, with incidents reported in 2016 and at least as far back as 2003. “Everything kind of blurs together. At first, I thought I was being shot at for
real, but I think I realized they were just paintballs pretty quickly because I saw the paint on my pants,” Gjaja said. “It was fairly terrifying during the attack.” The second student was riding on their bike at about 8:45 p.m. when a black sedan pulled up next to them and began to shoot paintballs at them on 55th Street. “In the moment, it was a lot scarier… the paintball gun was really loud in my ear, and, suddenly, I felt like someone had hit me really hard in my back and in my leg. I didn’t know what was hap-
pening, just that I was in pain and that I was getting shot at,” the student said. The shooting continued until the student crashed into a pole near 54th and Kenwood. When they looked up, they saw a gun hanging out of the car window and heard the passengers laughing. “I…didn’t understand why this random car would shoot at me,” they said. The student sustained injuries to their leg and back, making it hard for them to walk. They later posted about the incident on social media.
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Fairgrounds Craft Coffee and Tea to Open at Campus North By YIWEN LU | News Editor Coffee drinkers on campus will soon have yet another place to get their caffeine fix. Fairgrounds Craft Coffee and Tea, a Chicago-based coffee house known for its diverse selection of roasts, will open a new location at the University in early 2022. The café will join Nella, Insomnia Cookies, and Te’amo Boba Bar on the ground floor of Campus North Residential Commons. The space previously held a branch of Dollop Coffee Company, another Chicago-based chain, for four years until the location went out of business during the COVID-19 pandemic. Hyde Park will be the tenth Fairgrounds location in the country. The chain also has cafés in Dallas, Milwaukee, and Minneapolis. Unlike other coffee shops that exclusively use coffee beans from a single roastery, Fairgrounds sources its coffee from a myriad of brands around the country. The Chicago location menu, for example, features blends from Colectivo Coffee in Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Verve Coffee Roasters in Santa Cruz, California; and Counter Culture Coffee in Durham, North Carolina. From a three-step espresso bar and matcha bar to diverse elixir offerings, Fairgrounds provides a wide selection of craft drinks. In addition, the café has pledged to bring all-day breakfast, lunch, and a kids’ food menu to the neighbor-
hood. Fairgrounds’s arrival will be the latest in a series of new restaurant open-
ings in the Hyde Park area despite the continued restrictions necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Earlier this year, popular salad chain Sweetgreen and Chicagoland staple Stan’s Donuts
opened their first South Side locations on East 53rd Street and in Harper Court, respectively. Fast food chains Wingstop and Taco Bell Cantina made their Hyde Park debuts on East 53rd Street one year ago.
Fairgrounds Coffee and Tea will open its tenth nationwide location in Hyde Park. COURTESY OF FAIRGROUNDS FULTON MARKET
Third-Year Students Launch Gig Work App Pocketask to Connect High School and College Students With Short-Term, Local Jobs By CLARK KOVACS | News Reporter Pocketask, a new app-based startup founded by third-year students Marie-Liesse Gouilliard and Nassouh Kabbani, launched in mid-August of this year. The app allows young people to find shortterm employment opportunities posted by trustworthy adults in their communities. Gouilliard said their mission is “to create a teenage-friendly platform to help you make good money in a safe, efficient
market.” As of October 14, Pocketask had a total of 220 active users spread across Hyde Park, Woodlawn, Kenwood, Grand Boulevard, and Bronzeville. It has accumulated these users primarily through word of mouth and several posters hung up around the Hyde Park area. According to Gouilliard, a primary investor is on track to take over financial support of the
company in the next three months as it continues to grow. In the near future, the company hopes to expand to the greater Chicago area and eventually out of state. Gouilliard created the prototype for Pocketask during her gap year before coming to UChicago, but it wasn’t until the second quarter of her first year that she began to turn her idea into a company. Gouilliard remembers pitching an idea for a different business to her sister, to which her sister responded, “This is an
awful idea. Why don’t you go back to that idea you had to help teenagers make pocket money? My friends and I are broke!” Gouilliard then sent out a survey to her sister’s friends to gauge the demand for such a service, and as a result of overwhelmingly positive responses, she set to work building Pocketask. In its current form, the app allows “creators” aged 23 or above to post offers for one-off jobs, such as dog-walking and CONTINUED ON PG. 5
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babysitting, that “taskers” aged 14 to 23 can take on. All users over the age of 18 must first go through an identity verification process, run externally by veriff. com, and a sex offender registry check, run externally by familywatchdog.us. Users over the age of 18 can also opt to have a criminal background check performed on them, the completion of which will be indicated on their profile should a negative result be returned. Taskers under
the age of 18 are required to get parental or guardian consent before they can use the app, and every time they accept jobs through the app, their parent or guardian will be notified through SMS or email. Once a job is successfully completed, money is transferred between individuals through the app, and a 10 percent commission goes to Pocketask. Using funding from the Jeff Metcalf Internship Program, Pocketask is able to employ one intern. It also receives
funding from Learning To Fly Ventures, a student-run venture capital group at UChicago, and supplementary financial support from the families and friends of current employees. It is also part of the Edge Entrepreneurship incubator program, which provides it with mentorship from Chicago Booth professor John McKinney. As many high schools across the country require students to spend a certain amount of time volunteering, Pocketask
is planning to incorporate a feature into its app that would allow local organizations to post volunteer opportunities for students to complete. Schools in partnership with Pocketask would then be able to track the number of hours each student has spent volunteering. Gouilliard explained that members of Pocketask are currently negotiating a partnership with North Shore Country Day School to roll out and test this feature.
39 New COVID-19 Cases This Week; Pfizer Vaccine Approved for Children Aged 5–11 By SOLANA ADEDOKUN | News Reporter From October 22 to 28, UChicago reported 39 new cases with 194 close contacts. During this time, fewer than five students were in on-campus isolation housing while 35 students were isolating off campus. The surveillance testing found three positive cases between October 21 and 27, making the campus positivity rate 0.43 percent.
The overall seven-day positivity rate for the city of Chicago is 1.6 percent, down from 1.9 percent the previous week. UChicago students and employees now have the option to get COVID-19 booster shots if they are 18 years or older and live or work in health-care and school settings. It is recommended that
students and employees consult with their primary care provider on whether they need a booster shot at this time. The University does not currently have a booster requirement. Additionally, the email linked the City of Chicago’s “Halloweek” guidelines for staying safe during Halloween weekend. The update also shared this week’s news that the Pfizer-BioNTech vac-
cine has been pending for approval for children aged five to eleven by a United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory committee. The vote on approval is set to happen as soon as next week. Final approval by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FDA would make the vaccine widely available to this age group through primary care providers and vaccine sites in Chicago.
Class of 2024 Reflects on Transition to In-Person Campus Life By CASEY KIM | News Reporter When second-year Leah Iosevich attended her first in-person rehearsal for her all-female a cappella group Medusa this year, she was not only singing alongside her peers for the first time but also connecting with them in a way that online rehearsals never allowed. “It was amazing how quickly we were able to learn songs and harmonize together compared to last year, because when we were on Zoom, [I] didn’t get to hear anybody else,” she said. “It was fun, but it was a hugely different experience, and we didn’t get to experience our voices combined with everybody else’s, which is what I love about a cappella. It’s great to sing with people, looking at their faces, and knowing that they’re also enjoying it.” Iosevich, along with the rest of the
Class of 2024, had a unique first-year experience due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the University regulations that came with it. Second-year Narvella Sefah expressed that the return of in-person opportunities has encouraged students to socialize with their classmates and become involved in the school community in a way that campus life last year did not. “I think my favorite part about being in-person is recognizing people in my classes outside, or just walking and doing things,” she said. “If I see someone in my class, I can just go up to them and ask them a question if I was confused, versus when things were remote, it was harder to communicate with other people and felt kind of weird to reach out to someone on CONTINUED ON PG. 6
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Zoom.” Second-year Brendan Kang said he feels much more motivated to learn and engaged in his classes this quarter. “I love walking to my classes where I can appreciate our amazing campus and seeing many of my friends,” Kang said. “Overall, the education and experience improved from the transition to in-person classes. I couldn’t be happier with how invested I am in the learning process and my responsibilities with work.” On the contrary, Iosevich said some aspects of online learning were helpful,
such as being able to re-listen to lectures before exams. “This year, if you miss class, and you don’t have a friend in that class, you’re SOL [shit out of luck].” Students who opted to stay home last year have had a more drastic shift to contend with. Second-year Isha Vasudev, who had two in-person classes last year during fall quarter, decided to return home in the winter after struggling to adjust to the fully remote on-campus environment. “It was definitely depressing being on campus and just having the big room to myself,” she said. “[I] also didn’t want to experience a Chicago winter without hav-
ing in-person classes. It didn’t seem like a good trade-off. And then spring quarter, I came back, but everything was online.” Now, Vasudev lives in an apartment in Woodlawn Residential Commons, where she is able to both interact with her suitemates in a common living space and enjoy time alone in her single room within the complex—a significant change from last year, where Vasudev had a room to herself. “It’s super nice to just be able to walk in, have a conversation with people, engage with people, and chat with them about their day,” Vasudev said. “It’s the normal stuff that I realize now I will not
take for granted.” The Class of 2024 has experienced one of the most drastically different first-year college experiences in recent history—and hopefully the foreseeable future. Despite the challenges they faced last year, Sefah believes that this shared experience has unified the class and inspired the now second-years to thrive at the University. “It’s kind of cliché, but it feels like we’re all in this together now,” Sefah said. “We’re all here and doing the same thing. And it’s nice to feel like there’s other people around you and that you’re not so alone.”
“Justice at Any Rate”: Remembering Chicago Civil Rights Leader Timuel D. Black Black died on October 13 at 102 years old. GABRIEL SANCHEZ AINSA | Grey City Reporter Timuel Dixon Black Jr. (A.M. ‘54) was living history from the moment he was born. His family moved from Birmingham, Alabama up to Chicago as part of the first Great Migration when Black was just a few months old. But as the family joke goes it was Black who instigated this change: he looked around at the oppression taking place in Birmingham, and said, “Shit, I’m leaving here.” All his parents could do was get on the train with him. I still remember the first time that I met Black, in my first week at UChicago, right before he turned 100. He was leading a tour of Bronzeville for incoming UChicago students organized by the
Civic Knowledge Project (CKP). As we drove around his Sacred Ground, he said to us, “A Change is Gonna Come,” quoting the lyrics of Sam Cooke—whom he knew personally—to which he added, “so where will you be when it does?” Black’s answer to this question was clear: on the front lines, fighting for justice and making history. He is remembered as a father, husband, friend, teacher, mentor, historian, war veteran, jazz enthusiast, labor organizer, activist, and one of the most important leaders of the civil rights movement in Chicago. He leaves behind a legacy of commitment to social, economic, and racial justice that has inspired generations of students and
activists in Chicago and beyond through his example, stories, and lessons that we could not learn in a classroom. Black was born in Birmingham, Alabama on December 7, 1918, to Mattie McConner Black and Timuel Dixon “Dixie” Black, a steel mill and stockyard worker. All four of Black’s grandparents were born enslaved. The Black family moved to Chicago in August 1919, a few weeks after the Chicago Race Riot. Their first house was on the 4900 block of St. Lawrence Avenue. The family moved frequently, but, as he says in his 2019 memoirs, Sacred Ground, “it was all in the same close community—Bronzeville, the Black Belt.” Black graduated from DuSable High School, 4934 South Wabash Avenue. This
school deeply shaped his intellectual trajectory. DuSable, he wrote, was “the first school that really felt ours. I felt at home there. I was able to excel and so were many others.” Built in the 1930s, the school’s construction was part of an effort by the school board to ensure that Black students did not transfer to schools in white Chicago. Carved over the auditorium stage were the famous words of abolitionist Wendell Phillips, “PEACE IF POSSIBLE, BUT JUSTICE AT ANY RATE.” This school motto would stay with Black for the rest of his life. The Great Depression hit Chicago when Black was a young boy. But alongside hardship came solidarity with his CONTINUED ON PG. 7
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“When his draft notice arrived, he sent it back saying, “‘I don’t have an Uncle named Sam. My uncles are named William and Walter.’”
Timuel Black at Notre Dame in 2010. COURTESY OF CULTUREEL GUNDERLAND / WIKIMEDIA COMMONS. CONTINUED FROM PG. 6
neighborhood community. As he writes in his memoirs and often recounted, “It was the Depression but we were not depressed. There was poverty, but we were not poverty-stricken. We took care of each other.” As a teenager, Black began working at a grocery store where his older brother used to work, on 51st Street between Indiana and Michigan Avenue. There, he met J. Levert “St. Louis” Kelly, who helped him and other workers organize to form the Colored Retail Clerks Union. Through this activism, the group
secured a raise from $12 to $18 per week. Black was already politically active in his teens and early twenties. In addition to labor organizing, he used to discuss politics in pool halls—including Dad’s Very Safe Pool Hall at 51st and Indiana, where Richard Wright also used to go—and frequented political forums at Washington Park, where Black used to listen to Communists Claude Lightfoot and Ishmael Flory speak. Black’s support of Flory would later cost him a spot in the Officer Candidate School while he was in the army.
He was working for the Metropolitan Funeral System, selling funeral insurance policies, and succeeding as a salesman when global events changed the course of his life. In 1940, Congress passed the Selective Service Act and, one year later, as Black was celebrating his twenty-third birthday, on December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor was bombed. When his draft notice arrived, he sent it back saying, “I don’t have an uncle named Sam. My uncles are named William and Walter.” Unlike many who have laughed upon hearing his stories, the US military
did not share Black’s brand of humor. He joined the army two years later, in August of 1943. The war years left Black with a sober recognition of the horrors of injustice. He served in Europe and marched down the Champs Élysées on August 26, 1944. Following the Battle of Bulge, he visited the German town of Buchenwald and went to a concentration camp, where he saw firsthand the atrocities of the Nazis. “I was so hurt, so angry, that I began to cry, and my first priority was to kill CONTINUED ON PG. 8
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all the Germans,” he remembers in his memoirs. “Then I began to realize that some of our soldiers were of German descent—even Eisenhower, Eichelberger, you can go on and name them. This got me reflecting, and I thought, this can happen anywhere to anyone.” All of this occurred while he served in a segregated army, where he faced and observed daily racism and hatred against soldiers of color from fellow white soldiers and officers. These experiences shaped how Black saw the racially segregated United States upon his return home. In his words, “it was the beginning of something new.” After serving in the army, Black enrolled in Roosevelt University followed by graduate school at the University of Chicago, where he earned a master’s degree in 1954. He studied sociology and history at UChicago under Allison Davis, the University’s first tenured Black faculty member. In 1955, Black had completed all the work required for the doctorate except for his dissertation, when he watched Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. give a speech on TV. King’s message spoke to him so deeply that he got on a plane to Montgomery that weekend. At the time, he was also working as a high school teacher at his alma mater, DuSable High School, after a stint teaching at Roosevelt High School in Gary, Indiana. In 1956, Black helped bring King to Chicago to speak at his church, the First Unitarian Church of Chicago, at 57th and Woodlawn. The space could not fit the crowd that came to hear King speak, so they had to move to Rockefeller Chapel—which still failed to fit the crowd. During the late ’50s and early ’60s, Black commuted between Alabama and Chicago frequently, supporting King’s movement. The two men would become close over the years—King called Black “TD” and Black called King “Doc.” Black embraced the shared ends and tactics of the Civil Rights and labor movements. Around 1960, A. Philip Randolph challenged the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) about segregation in unions. The organization’s racism at the time propelled Black and labor organizers to found the
Negro American Labor Council (NALC). Black became the local president of the NALC and stayed active in labor organizing during these years. It was Randolph who first proposed the 1963 March on Washington, but he asked King to take over its leadership because of his international reputation. However, the labor roots of the March remained greatly apparent in Chicago, especially after King and Bayard Rustin, the political strategist behind the March, tasked Black with mobilizing the Windy City. With the help of many volunteers, civil rights, and labor organizations, Black and other leaders, like Larry Landry and Charlie Hayes, saw to it that Chicago had a strong presence in Washington. They led 3,000 people by train, and a total of around 4,000 Chicagoans marched in DC in August 1963. Black also took a shot at running for office in 1963. He was part of a campaign against the “Silent Six,” a group of Black aldermen who were part of Mayor Richard J. Daley’s political machine. Black lost his race, but nevertheless remained a significant player in the struggle against the Chicago political establishment and its racist institutions. Later that year, he was involved in organizing a mass protest against Daley and Chicago Public Schools Superintendent Benjamins Willis, who was responsible for the infamous “Willis Wagons,” portable classrooms placed in the playgrounds of schools in the South Side to prevent Black students from transferring to white schools. It was then that Black coined his famous slogan, “end plantation politics.” He would also run for a seat in the Illinois House in 1966 but withdrew after a change in rules in the electoral procedure. Black’s fight against the Daley political machine continued into the early ’80s, when he played a central role in rallying voters, especially Black voters, to elect Harold Washington, Chicago’s first Black mayor. Black knew Washington personally and worked with him closely during his campaign. In 1992, Black witnessed yet another historic moment in the movement for racial and gender equality when Carol Moseley Braun won her seat as the first Black woman to serve in the US Senate.
She was also from the Sacred Ground of Bronzeville. In fact, Black’s wife Zenobia was close friends with Braun. And so, although they disagreed on some political matters, Black strongly supported her. Braun unsuccessfully ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2000 and in 2004. In his memoirs, Black wonders how things would have been different had the nomination turned out otherwise: “I cannot help thinking about just how historic it would have been if the first Black president of the United States had also been a woman, a woman from my Sacred Ground. Carol could have done it. Could have been, should have been.” Black was a celebrated teacher and beloved by his students. As an educator, he always worked for the advancement of young Black people, especially those whom others did not believe in. He taught at Roosevelt High School in Indiana before working at DuSable High School, his alma mater. He later taught at Hyde Park Academy High School, Wright Junior College, and Loop College, which is now Harold Washington College. Black officially retired in 1989, but, as he liked to say, “I am retired, but not tired.” He continued to be an educator and scholar for many years, mentoring young people and instilling lessons in generations of students to come. In fact, in his “retirement,” he produced two volumes of oral history, Bridges of Memory, detailing the stories of Black Americans who moved to Chicago during the first Great Migration and their children. In 2011, the Oral History Association gave him a special award and described Bridges of Memory as a “people’s history of Chicago.” Among Black’s many mentees was future president Barack Obama, who, having recently graduated law school, asked Black to meet him in 1992. They met at Medici on 57th Street. “He was a talented young man who was going to be ready when the doors of opportunity swung open,” Black recounts in his memoirs, “But he had a lot to learn. And I mean a lot.” Black attended Obama’s Presidential inauguration in 2008, which he remembers to be “as magical as the March on Washington.” Although he remained a supporter of his, Black did not stay quiet during Obama’s presiden-
cy and often sympathized with Obama’s left-wing critics. When Black passed away on October 13, the former President released a statement remembering him. “Today, the city of Chicago and the world lost an icon with the passing of Timuel Black.” Obama continues, “Over his 102 years, Tim was many things: a veteran, historian, author, educator, civil rights leader, and humanitarian. But above all, Tim was a testament to the power of place, and how the work we do to improve one community can end up reverberating through other neighborhoods and other cities, eventually changing the world.” Black called the South Side communities that make up the Black metropolis his “Sacred Ground.” He wanted others to know of it, and he recorded many of its stories in his memoirs and oral histories. For many years, Black collaborated with Dr. Bart Schultz and the University of Chicago’s Civic Knowledge Project (CKP) to share Black’s record of this Sacred Ground with others. In his memory, the CKP has established the Timuel D. Black Solidarity Scholarship Fund to support UChicago students committed to carrying on the legacy of Timuel D. Black. In a June 2020 interview with the Chicago Magazine discussing the wave of Black Lives Matter protests following the death of George Floyd, the interviewer asked, “How [do] you see the strife ending?” Black responds, “Let me put it this way: I’m glad I’m not a teenager, because they don’t feel as optimistic about the future as people of the earlier generations did.” Black, a man who came to Chicago during the 1919 Race Riot and saw firsthand the horrors of Nazi concentration camps, devoted his life to peace and justice. For those of us who had the opportunity to listen to him tell his stories—which he often recounted with humor—he radiated hope: a hope that taught us, like he used to say, how important it is for us young people to listen to our elders. A public memorial service will be held on December 5 at Rockefeller Chapel. He is survived by his daughter, Ermetria, and his wife of 40 years, Zenobia. He was 102.
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VIEWPOINTS We’re All in This Together: UChicago Needs to Be More Flexible With Sick Students Section attendance requirements punish students for illnesses beyond their control. By JENNIFER RIVERA This academic year, students found themselves welcomed by emerald green trees, the scent of freshly-ground coffee permeating the warm air, and swarms of their peers walking through the picturesque main quad. While walking through these swarms of students, I couldn’t help but think about how—after over a year and a half of isolation, uncertainty, and death—the liveliness of campus life felt jarring. Despite the collective excitement of being on campus, it feels strange to return in the middle
of a pandemic that’s far from over. Of course, it’s always pleasant to catch up with friends—and finally be able to meet classmates I’ve only seen on tiny, scattered Zoom screens—but despite the allure of an attempted return to normalcy, it’s reckless to ignore the reality of a pandemic that continues to tear through communities across the country. Whenwewereforcedonlinelast March, we assumed that it would be a temporary situation. A year later, it’s clear that COVID-19 is here to stay—a facet of life that forces us to constantly adapt to evolving STELLA BEVACQUA
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circumstances, restrictions, and regulations. Here’s the issue: professors, student organizations, and students on campus haven’t quite acclimated to that adaptation. In refusing to accommodate students experiencing symptoms of COVID-19—or, for that matter, any illness—professors and RSOs with attendance requirements create an environment that’s both unsustainable and hostile. In many classes, for example, attendance comprises a significant portion of a student’s grade, and we are only given a limited number of passes, as if we could plan how many times a quarter we get sick. Students shouldn’t be penalized or stigmatized for wishing to miss classes or meetings because they’re feeling physically unwell. We must all be more flexible with students who choose to miss school or events if they’re sick because—as the thousands of posters papered across campus would have you know—we’re all in this together
and have a responsibility to make our community feel safe and healthy for everyone. As much as students try to make the return to in-person classes feel normal, it feels anything but normal for those of us who’ve been afflicted by COVID-19 and have had the tragedy and senseless loss of the pandemic affect our own families. This side of the pandemic isn’t comprehensible for everyone, many of whom had the privilege of living normally while COVID-19 disproportionately impacted and devastated disadvantaged communities. Economically disadvantaged students, for instance, rely on UChicago’s Student Wellness Center for free comprehensive services, such as COVID-19 testing. Now, we’re at the mercy of Student Wellness’s often-crowded schedule and frequently expensive procedures because going outside of campus to seek healthcare is costly not only because of transportation
fees, but also because insurance may not always cover it. As a result, some of us may have to miss class or important meetings based on whenever the next available appointment arises. As a student who has experienced these difficulties firsthand, it worries me that there aren’t nearly enough professors willing to accommodate students who choose to miss class because they’re experiencing symptoms. I know that UChicago is a rigorous environment and that being a student here entails working long hours and late nights, often to the point of exhaustion. None of that discounts the fact that we’re in the middle of a pandemic in one of the largest, most populous cities in the world. An accessible, flexible approach to work helps us foster an environment that works for everyone because everyone deserves a community that they feel comfortable existing within. CONTINUED ON PG. 10
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“[P]rofessors and RSOs with attendance requirements create an environment that’s both unsustainable and hostile.” CONTINUED FROM PG. 9
Two weeks ago, I missed my first class of the quarter because I was experiencing symptoms and wanted to get tested for COVID; in typical UChicago manner, I felt dread, not relief. Although I’ve been fortunate enough to have some flexible professors and TAs—with one of my professors having a Zoom meeting option for students who are feeling unwell, and another electing to upload all recorded lectures from past classes—not all professors are as accommodating, and some go as far as to penalize students for missing class. Spanish 202 professors, for one, only allow students to miss two classes without a penalty—and anything beyond
that results in an immediate 3 percent drop in their class grade per absence. The class I was forced to miss, on the other hand, allows students a single absence per quarter, and I woke up violently ill that morning and knew that I’d have to use it. I get sick frequently, so I contemplated if it was even worth missing class that day because missing more than one would cause a deduction in my participation grade. As students, we’re all told to not miss a class unless we can’t bring ourselves to get out of bed; on top of having to suffer through classes while being sick, missing even a single session sets us back on what feels like several weeks’ worth of material. Consequently, we are constantly forcing ourselves to attend
in-person classes despite feeling physically unwell. There’s plenty of discourse surrounding whether sick students should attend classes, from UChicago Secrets posts to frustrated rants overheard from across the quad. This discourse, however, should be centered on how we can all work towards making campus, and our surrounding community, a safer and healthier environment. Because while it may appear to be completely harmless to attend classes while sick, you are putting others at risk for COVID-19 if you do not get tested beforehand (if you are experiencing symptoms, getting tested is part of the Student Attestation form we all
signed before coming back to campus). Students, of course, are not the only group that need to be wary of their actions; we also relies on a professor’s willingness to be more flexible. In order to make sure we’re all moving forward as a community, it’s vital that we all remain conscious of how our actions affect one another. As we all know by now, while the mandatory mask mandate provides some form of protection, it’s just one layer of insurance; the success of our COVID-19 program relies on student accountability and professor adaptability. Jennifer Rivera is a third-year in the College.
ARTS Red Velvet Bacchanalia: A Fourth Meal in Review By ADAM DIMASCIO | Arts Reporter A young man seated one table away, directly across from me, is having a passionate-yet-clamor-distorted discussion with his friend—an upbeat young woman with strikingly purple hair. The young man’s plate consists of a pseudo-Pisan tower of semi-trapezoidal onion rings accompanied by some indescribable substance slathered in what I hope is barbecue sauce. The young woman, observing, has a sole, mostly yellow banana, lying limply on the table. A knoll of Lucky Charms sits comfortably between them. Dry and seemingly untouched. Another person in a plaid shirt walks past me, wearing a Ushanka indoors and brandishing another mostly ripe banana in the same way that a prepubescent child might brandish a toy firearm. A friend of mine, grinning as he always does, approaches my table and greets me. We engage in approximately 45 seconds of mutually enjoyable banter before he ventures off to find his other companions. By my count, his plate holds four breadsticks arranged in the fashion of a collapsed teepee, along with a generous portion of
marinara sauce disproportionately distributed atop the highest layer. Speaking of breadsticks, the young man had briefly left the table but has since returned with two breadsticks of his own. The mostly ripe banana remains untouched. Such is the social condition of Fourth Meal at the Arley D. Cathey Dining Commons. At least in the region directly parallel to the chocolate milk station and perpendicular to the disappointingly not-ignited “Flame” Station, which should really be called the Dad’s Food at a Quintessential American Barbecue Station. Originally, I came to this Fourth Meal planning on writing a Sinclair-esque hit piece on the grotesque nature of Fourth Meal and the food that UChicago students eat after a long day of almost intentionally obtuse philosophy courses and downright Sisyphean problem sets. But as someone who has constructed his fair share of tater tot towers and eaten more bowls of Cosmic Cookie ice cream than I would dare to admit in a public forum, I came to the swift realization that this critique would be as out-of-touch as
it was unfair. Instead, in the spirit of rigorous inquiry, it seems pertinent to explore underlying factors that determine what and when the typical UChicago undergraduate chooses to eat. It is undeniable that the act of eating, at least to a moderate extent, is a social phenomenon. Humans have been congregating in feast-style gatherings for at least 12,000 years, and nearly every culture has its own customs, traditions, norms, and taboos associated with the preparation and consumption of food,
among other aspects of the overall dining experience. Unsurprisingly, Fourth Meal is as much of a social experience as it is a dining experience for all participants. This might seem like an exceedingly obvious characteristic to point out, but Fourth Meal seems much more explicitly social than its First, Second, and Third counterparts. Particularly, Fourth Meal is the social antithesis of breakfast. There are certainly groups that tend to congregate CONTINUED ON PG. 11
Eating has been a common subject of artists for centuries, but the Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci is probably the most famous eating scene in the history of art. I wonder what Jesus would have thought of the Woodlawn Panini Station?
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"It is undeniable that the act of eating, at least to a moderate extent, is a social phenomenon."
This is Sadak in Search of the Waters of Oblivion by John Martin. Definitely not as famous as something like the Last Supper but it’s still one of my favorite paintings. The enormity of Sadak’s struggle against the seemingly unconquerable mass of nature laid out before him in his Promethean quest, with the light of hope faintly beaming down from the precipice, reminds me of my good friend working on his physics problem set immediately to my right. It is decently late at night. He’s having a bit of trouble. He has not had his Fourth Meal. Everyone knows that you have to have Fourth Meal if you want to do physics. CONTINUED FROM PG. 10
This lovely little painting is Saturn Devouring his Son by Francisco Goya. Looking into the eyes of Saturn, it is clear that he feels some sort of regret, some remorse for what he has done and what he continues to do. To maintain the power structures of the universe, he has murdered his progeny on the presumption that they would challenge his throne, using the corpses to fuel his own schemes. Yet, despite his utter disgust and contempt for his actions, he simply cannot stop. Saturn is one of the most powerful beings in the universe, but he is powerless against the suggestions of his vices. Eat your burgers, eat your fries, eat your children. Succumb to hedonism, it’s good for you. Just look at that happy face.
in the wee hours of the morning and have a pre- (or, for some poor students, post-) lecture chat over healthy servings of scrambled eggs and whatever variety of American breakfast carbohydrate is available that day. However, I notice significantly more “islands” during conventional breakfast hours. That is to say, people sitting by themselves reading, doing some form of homework on a computer that is completely indecipherable to a layperson, or simply enjoying their own company. There is nothing inherently wrong with being a social island, of course, but the nine o’clock archipelago gives breakfast a bit more of a socially
depressed feel, comparatively speaking. Lunch and dinner are a slightly different story. There seems to be a direct correlation between time passed over the course of the day and the general willingness of the student body to socialize at meals. Lunch is usually the second most raucous meal of the day, serving the function of a refuel after the first class or two of the day along with a functional midpoint through which people can exchange ideas, gossip, or P-set answers (but you didn’t hear that from me!). But the social climate of lunch is more akin to a trough than a get-together. House tables are packed shoulder to shoulder CONTINUED ON PG. 12
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"Fourth Meal more closely resembles the pit of the Globe Theatre than any sort of conventional dining forum." CONTINUED FROM PG. 11
with people, many of whom do not, have not, and, with all likelihood, will not interact in a socially relevant capacity at the conclusion of lunch hour. Sure, there are discussions, hence the tumultuous nature of the thing, but they serve as marginally more socially intimate equivalents to those lame icebreaker discussions everyone had to endure throughout O-Week. Over the course of a typical 30-minute lunch at a UChicago dining hall, a privy observer can learn about Hegel, Hot Wheels, and who’s been sleeping with whom without much eavesdropping at all. These three topics could all be addressed by the same group of two to four people. There is approximately a 25 percent chance that none of them know each other. Dinner seems to be the most evenly distributed of the dining hours from a social sense. That is to say that the Group, the Trough, and the Island are all prominent fixtures at any UChicago dinner table. There are the Groups, of course, that congregate after a long day of classes to discuss the revelries of the day. As a consequence, there are the Troughs, those who merely wish to congregate with a group of people to voice their complaints or share their morsels of gossip. And as is the case with breakfast, there are the Islands, although far more dispersed than the early morning Archipelagos. However, there is one social group that almost exclusively exists in the dinner setting alone: the Dyad. As the name implies, a Dyad refers to any social gathering of exactly two people, the bare minimum prerequisite for an event to be considered a gathering. The reason I refer to this structure as a Dyad, as opposed to something like a Couple or a Pair or a Twosome, is because the inherently romantic connotations of these three terms do a disservice to the complexity of their nature. There are your fair share of couples, sure, but among the Dyads are prospective couples, confidants, friends, ex-couples, and a myriad of other dynamics. Because of this concentration of Dyads, I will make the contention that dinner is the most
socially intimate of the four meals, if you want it to be. Of course, there still remains the elephant in the room: Fourth Meal. Fourth Meal more closely resembles the pit of the Globe Theatre than any sort of conventional dining forum. Students from all across campus pour into the dining hall with reckless abandon, hands full and stomachs empty, ready to gorge themselves on pasta and the intellectual capital of their peer group. There is a sort of unquantifiable groupthink that governs the hedonism that seems so inherent to Fourth Meal. Grab a plate. Eat whatever. Live Now. Live Fast. Die Young. No earthly congregation comes closer to fulfilling the desires of Bacchus than the Arley D. Cathey Dining Hall at 11:30 p.m. on a Wednesday night. It is a personification of gastronomic pandemonium that would make any self-respecting dietician claw their eyes out. But why? What is the root cause for these desires? This collective caloric madness? “I fought wild beasts in Ephesus with no more than human hopes, what have I gained? If the dead are not raised, ‘Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.’” —1 Corinthians 15:32 Fourth Meal, more explicitly than any other undergraduate dining experience, encapsulates the social condition of the University of Chicago. It exists as a function of the need for students to pull off legendary study sessions or cram encyclopedias of information in order to stay on top of coursework. It is a time to release your inhibitions and eat as much as whatever you damn well please. It is a time to fill your body with “nutrients” to help keep the all-nighter going. I would also estimate that a nonzero quantity of the most major discoveries and contributions made by UChicago undergraduates were made under the influence of some combination of dining hall pizza and 5-hour Energy. It’s common knowledge Nobel Prizes are made out of talent, ambition, and more than a few slices of Macaroni and Cheese Pizza.
This is the slice of Red Velvet cake that will either spark paradigm-shifting discoveries or will serve as the catalyst for the hedonism-fueled downfall of modern academia. It’s 11:33 p.m. on a Monday, and I have just consumed a brick of sugar and cream cheese icing with a comically oversized fork in a clamorous hall populated by the ephemeral voices and ideas of some of the most brilliant young people in the world. It is at this moment that I am the lone Island in a sea of ingenuity. Whether they are Dyads or Groups or Troughs or among the legions of the Faceless Nameless shuffling back and forth between their respective seats at the table and the self-serve pasta station, these are people energized by the night and powered by some combination of carbohydrates and raw, unadulterated willpower. We are shoulder-to-shoulder with greatness, and we all know the same grind and love the same grain. I used to think there was no place for cake after sundown. He who feasts everyday, feasts no day, yet those who do not hope to reach the feast will live their lives without awe. To indulge in the Red Velvet is a microcosm of the human condition. Is it a risk worth taking, to reward yourself for your hard work? Or should the intrinsic value of your personal enrichment be sufficient compensation? My plate is clean. I know the answer.