DAILY LOBO new mexico
September 30, 2010
Flood cleanup halts research
Just joking see page 11
thursday The Independent Voice of UNM since 1895
QUEEN OF ALL TRADES
by Chelsea Erven cerven@unm.edu
Graduate students and faculty in the Anthropology department have been in class-and-research limbo, while crews work to repair the basement after the Anthropology Annex flooded Sept. 1. Wirt Wills, an anthropology professor, said the repairs should be finished in two weeks, but faculty members still haven’t been able to use their basement offices. “Every week that goes by, we get further behind in our research,” he said. “Our projects all have time schedules, and we’re going to have to figure out how to make up for lost time.” A ceramics class that met in the basement has been moved to two different classrooms and is shuttling between the two rooms depending on the day of the week, Wills said, but neither classroom is set up for the lab the class requires. “It has been awkward and inefficient, but we’ll have to get through it,” he said. Custom Grading, Inc. made a mistake that caused the flood during construction of the new Sciences and Technologies building, said Mike Tuttle, manager of UNM’s Risk Management Department. Tuttle said the company took responsibility for the accident, and he has been in contact with an insurance adjustor from Keenan and Associates, the insurance company handling the claim. He said the claim is expected to be finalized in about a month. “It was very clear what happened, so the insurance company is not having any problems with the negotiations. We will get our money back in full from the company responsible,” Tuttle said. Repairs have so far included drying the building out, replacing four inches of moldy sheetrock along the bottomofthewallsandreplacingruined tile, Tuttle said. He said actual repair costs are still being calculated, but the numbers are confidential and will not be released. “The numbers belong to the state and are classified, but I can say for sure that it will not be nearly as expensive as the Logan Hall flood. This time no contents or furniture was damaged, so it was just repairs to the building that we have to pay for,” Tuttle said. James Boone, another anthropology professor who has a room in the basement, said contents weren’t damaged because faculty prepared for a flood. “This building has flooded so many times. This flood wasn’t any different,” he said. “We always keep things off the floor so that in the case of another flood, it’s not such a big inconvenience.”
Inside the
Daily Lobo volume 115
issue 29
Gabbi Campos / Daily Lobo Theresa Miller, a candidate for Homecoming queen, shows off her talent at Smith Plaza. Miller recited the first 450 digits of pi and solved a Rubik’s cube all while hula-hooping.
Weaving new traditions in with old by Andrew Lyman alyman@unm.edu
An exhibit at the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology will help visitors weave through Mayan community traditions. Mary Beth Hermans, Public Programs director, said the exhibit displays how clothing changed dramatically over the last two generations because of entrepreneurship and mass production. “There was a change in textiles,” she said. “They went from making clothes just for their families to more mass-produced clothes.” “Weaving Traditions Together” focuses on Mayan women’s weaving traditions in Zinacàntan, a city in the Mexican state of Chiapas. It’s based on a book by UCLA psychology professor Patricia Greenfield. The exhibit opens today at 7 p.m. and features a lecture by Greenfield. Greenfield traveled to Zinacantàn in 1969 and 1970 and studied how women learned to weave from prior generations. When she returned in 1991, she observed that next-generation weavers still used knowledge from the previous generation, but adapted their skills to match industrialized culture. “The material they were using had changed,” Greenfield said. “ Because of the available oil, they started using acrylic instead of
Gabbi Campos / Daily Lobo UNM staff member Cindy Mortensen looks at the Mayan weaving exhibit at the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology on Wednesday. The exhibit focuses on the differences in textile production in southern Mexico over the past two decades. wool.” Greenfield said she observed more trial and error in weaving, mainly because the materials were more accessible. She said mothers were less concerned with children making mistakes than before. There was also an abundance of colors to make clothing, something Greenfield attributes to the cost decrease of materials. “Before, they used wool and
Great bugs of fire
Gotcha!
See page 5
See page 2
color was more expensive, so you wouldn’t see children just playing around with the materials and making mistakes,” she said. Greenfield said television played a large role in the shift toward commerce-based economy rather than agricultural, but acknowledged other factors. “The two big drivers of change are urbanization expansion and more formal education,” Greenfield said.”
“WEAVING GENERATIONS TOGETHER”
Free, but donations accepted Opens tonight at 7 p.m. 277-4405 or e-mail Maxwell@ unm.edu to buy tickets
TODAY
85 | 62