VOICE The Georgetown
November 17, 2017
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NOVEMBER 17, 2017
staff
THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
editor-in-chief Caitlyn cobb Managing editor alex boyd
Volume 50 • Issue 8
news
executive editor lilah burke Features editor jonny amon assistant features editor caitlin mannering news editor jake maher assistant news editors michael coyne, noah telerski
culture
executive editor mike bergin Leisure editor devon o’dwyer assistant leisure editors brynn furey, ryan mazalatis, mary mei Sports editor tyler pearre Assistant sports editor beth cunniff, jorge deneve
opinion
“ready set go-go” by Aicha nzie
contents
Editorials
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Keep Dreaming Emily Jaster
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Life Infiltrating Art Mica Bernhard
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Home is Hard to Define Julia Pinney
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The Beat that Goes and Goes: The Sound of D.C. Devon O’Dwyer
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How Jewish Communities Made Their Home in the Capital City Alex Boyd
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Women’s Soccer Meets Lofty Expectations in 2017 Season Jorge DeNeve
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La Dolce Estate: Call Me by Your Name Captures Fleeting Love Caitlin Mannering
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Pickett’s Charge Brings History to Light at the Hirshorn Musem Ryan Mazalatis
Executive editor graham piro voices editor cassidy jensen Assistant Voices editors sienna Brancato, rebecca zaritsky Editorial Board Chair chris dunn Editorial Board jon block, caitlyn cobb, Nick Gavio, Alli Kaufman, Caitlin Mannering, GRAHAM PIRO, Isaiah seibert, PHillip Steuber, Jack Townsend
halftime
Leisure editor emily Jaster assistant leisure editors claire goldberg, julia pinney, eman rahman Sports editor jon block Assistant sports editor phillip steuber
design
Executive editor alli kaufman Spread editor jack townsend Photo Editor Isabel lord cover Editor aicha nzie assistant design editors jake glass, keeho kang, lizz pankova, rachel zeide Staff designers Egan Barnitt, Delaney Corcoran, abhichana Naiyapatana
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copy chief audrey bischoff assistant Copy editors Leanne Almeida, Isabel Paret editors Mya Allen, Mica Bernhard, Sienna Brancato, Kate Clark, Nancy Garrett, Caroline Geithner, Anna Gloor, Claire Goldberg, Emily Jaster, Isabel Lord, Julia Pinney, Cade SHore, Hannah Song, maya Tenzer, Jack Townsend
online
website editor Anne Freeman Podcast editor nick gavio assistant podcast editor Gustav Honl-stuenkel social media editor mica bernhard
business
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general manager naiara parker assistant manager of alumni outreach anna gloor assistant manager of accounts & sales karis hawkins
support
The opinions expressed in The Georgetown Voice do not necessarily represent the views of the administration, faculty or students of Georgetown University, unless specifically stated. Columns, advertisements, cartoons and opinion pieces do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editorial Board or the General Board of The Georgetown Voice. The university subscribes to the principle of responsible freedom of expression of its student editors. All materials copyright The Georgeton Voice, unless otherwise indicated.
editor@georgetownvoice.com Leavey 424 Box 571066 Georgetown University Washington, DC 20057
contributing editors emma francois, danielle hewitt, kaei li, isaiah seibert associate editors margaret Gach, amy guay, parker houston, alex lewontin, anne paglia, lindsay reilly
Staff writers
Umar asif, Teddy Carey, MOnica Cho, Rachel Cohen, Austin Corona, DamiAn Garcia, jake gilstrap, jayan hanson, tristan lee, Brynne Long, Shadia Milon, Santul nerkar, Brice russo, Katya Schwenk, Will Shanahan, cam smith, aaron wolf
THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
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READ & Listen ON GEORGETOWNVOICE.COM Podcasts Stripped In this episode of Stripped, Isabel Lord and Emma Francois tackle some fashion and tabloid news, discuss the end of Teen Vogue in print, and mix in some serious social commentary.
The Sports Sermon: NFL Debrief This week on The Sports Sermon, the Voice‘s global sports podcast, host Nick Gavio is joined by staffers Jon Block and Jorge Deneve to discuss the NFL season so far heading into week nine.
news H*yas for Choice Demands Transparency in Birth Control Coverage Decision News editor Jake Maher covered members of unrecognized student group H*yas for Choice as they delivered a letter to University President John DeGioia’s office on Monday. The letter detailed what they see as a lack of transparency in the university’s decision-making process around birth control coverage in its health insurance plans. Read more for full coverage and quotes.
halftime Logan: Death of the Superhero Halftime Leisure assistant editor Eman Rahman analyzes Hugh Jackman’s final portrayal of Wolverine in Logan. As the comic book genre declines from its recent peak, Rahman explains how Logan both deconstructs and reuses classic tropes.
World Cup Qualifiers: Despair for Italy and Joy For Sweden Halftime Sports staff writer Tristan Lee reflects on the Italian men’s national team’s heartbreaking failure to qualify for the World Cup. While the Swedes celebrate their return to the tournament, several legendary Italian players announced their retirement from international soccer.
NOVEMBER 17, 2017
EDITORIALS
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State Department Cuts Draw Concern In the 11 months since his inauguration, President Donald Trump and his administration have weakened and eroded a number of top federal agencies. From the Department of Agriculture to the Department of Energy, the agencies and bureaucracies tasked with carrying out American governance are understaffed, undermined, and ignored. Political positions go unfilled, those who receive appointments are overwhelmingly white men, and career civil servants face increasingly worse working environments. Nowhere is this problem more apparent—or more dangerous—than in the State Department. Since he attained his post in February, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has made it his mission to decrease the personnel in his agency, and the State Department’s role in American foreign policy has been diminished in the current administration. Last week, the head of the American Foreign Service Administration (AFSA), a union for the nation’s Foreign Service Officers, warned of the dwindling number in America’s diplomatic corps. Since Trump took office in January, 15 percent of minister counselors, 42 percent of career ministers, and 60 percent of career ambassadors have left the department. The department is continuing its push to reduce staff, offering $25,000 buyouts for staff to quit or retire by next April. Given the precarious nature of political developments around the globe and the essential role that the State Department should play in conducting diplomacy abroad, this editorial board finds the developments in Foggy Bottom to be extremely unsettling and detrimental to the safety of American citizens.
Now more than ever, the United States needs clear foreign policy and talented diplomats to carry it out. There is no lack of serious geopolitical threats that require the hand of diplomacy today. On the Korean Peninsula, Trump carries out American foreign policy over Twitter. In the Middle East, tensions are rising in the cold war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, and the humanitarian consequences of the Saudi war in Yemen continue to be devastating. Last month, American troops died in West Africa in a deployment that was generally unknown to the American public before the incident. These are just some of many clear examples of the need for an increase in the role of American diplomacy, an increase that seems impossible as the diplomatic corps is being depleted. On the campaign trail, Trump surrounded himself with advisors who promoted a more hawkish foreign policy, and that has carried over into his presidency. Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn threatened Iran with military action, and Trump recently decertified Iran’s compliance with the 2015 JCPOA, commonly known as the “Iran Nuclear Deal,” threatening to end the deal between the United States and Iran. Earlier this year, we wrote about the troubling increase in civilian casualties caused by American military actions. American foreign policy must be carried out in tandem by the military and the civilians in the State Department. As it stands, the current administration has limited the ability of the latter organization to operate, doing a disservice to American strategy abroad. At the very least, any military presence abroad should be matched by the presence of the State Department,
and the country should explore any and all diplomatic options available before the use of military force. When the agency is as understaffed and undervalued as it has been this past year, this is all but impossible. Reports of dysfunction at the State Department should trouble all Americans, but Georgetown students specifically should find them problematic. Georgetown is home to the School of Foreign Service, where students—graduate and undergraduate alike—are trained in the skills necessary for a career in diplomacy. While the vast majority of SFS graduates are not employed by the State Department, the fact that so many of the jobs that make up the namesake of one of the university’s four undergraduate schools are disappearing should be troubling to all Georgetown students. The State Department was founded in 1789, and in the years since then it has served as the face of our country abroad. While we do not endorse all of the actions that the agency has made in the past, nor can we assume it will be perfect in the future, we find it to be an essential part of the United States government. While such a statement may seem obvious, the weakened role that the department plays in the decision making of the current administration and attempts to decrease its staff show that the government itself suggest otherwise. The repercussions of the past year will be felt for years to come. The Trump Administration must reverse its current course regarding the State Department. The diplomats who have dedicated their lives to the agency, and the American people, deserve better.
Tax Plan Shifts Burden Unfairly In the past two weeks, Republicans in both the House of Representatives and the Senate released their respective proposals to overhaul the United States’ tax code. The versions have minor differences but are similar in advocating for the same goal: lowering tax rates for corporations and the wealthiest Americans. In their current forms, the bills would cut the corporate tax rate by 15 percent and give individuals making between $400,000 and $1 million a large tax reduction as well. Gary Cohn, an economic adviser to the administration of President Donald Trump, said that “big CEOs” are the group most excited for the Republican tax plan. Each plan is also similar in that it shifts the tax burden from businesses and wealthy individuals to higher education, with graduate students and university endowments facing tax increases. This editorial board finds the tax proposals to be unfair and misplaced and believes that they show just how far their creators are willing to go in order to lower taxes on the wealthiest in our society. The endowment tax and elimination of the graduate student exemption are symptoms of the overarching issues with the tax plan, which shifts the tax burden unnecessarily while lowering it on those who need it least. The Republicans’ efforts to keep the bill deficit neutral in order to pass through reconciliation—and therefore only need 51 votes in the Senate—include two policy changes that would specifically affect universities across the country and their students. Both the House and Senate proposals as currently written plan to tax the investment income of endowments at some
private universities. If implemented, the House’s tax reform bill would also repeal an exemption that currently prevents graduate students from paying taxes on educational stipends used to fund their educations. These two provisions would have far-reaching and detrimental effects on higher education and are extremely unreasonable, given that they are being used simply to facilitate tax breaks for the wealthy. The bills would levy a 1.4 percent tax on the investment gains of private universities with endowments worth at least $250,000 per full time student, which would mean that roughly 60 to 70 universities would be required to pay the tax. While taxing investment gains on endowments may be a proposal to consider in the future, it is not the right decision within the circumstances of the Republicans’ tax reform effort. Changing policy on endowments to ease financial responsibility for the wealthy is exceptionally ill-advised. In addition to proposing the endowment tax, suggesting the elimination of graduate student tax exemptions is another misguided attempt by Republicans to balance their corporate tax cuts by placing burdens on more vulnerable members of society. Counting aid money for graduate students as taxable income is not only nonsensical on the surface level, but also would have widespread effects on educational access and quality. Removing the tax exemption on scholarships for graduate students would make these degrees more expensive overall, as the cost of entering graduate school compared to the workforce
would rise with the heightened tax burden of advanced degrees. The changes in affordability would limit access for low-income students who are qualified to attain these degrees and make them available only to those who are able to afford the increase in taxes. Given the usually small stipends that graduate students receive, this would almost certainly mean that the already wealthy would still be able to receive these degrees, while some of their peers would not. For students at Georgetown, two major repercussions of eliminating the graduate student tax exemption are clear. First, the change would obviously have massive effects on graduate students currently enrolled and any undergraduates who plan on pursuing advanced degrees in the future, limiting access to advanced degrees for students with less financial flexibility. Second, many undergraduate students enroll in classes either taught by graduate students or with graduate students working as teaching assistants. If accessing graduate degrees is more difficult for talented people with less financial means, the quality of teachers will fall, adversely affecting undergraduates taking these courses. The Republican tax plan is a blatant attempt to balance a tax deduction for the wealthy by removing benefits from members of the middle and lower classes. The impact of the two plans on academia is dangerous to our student body, as both undergraduate and graduate students would be impacted if the proposal were to become law. Policymakers in Congress must reconsider their bills immediately and work towards a tax plan in which all members of society pay their fair share.
THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
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Carring on: Voice Staffers Speak
VOICES
Keep Dreaming
Lizz Pankova
I’ve developed a set of strategies so that staying awake is no longer just a matter of endurance. Rationing caffeine intake is an artform. Personally, I tend to start with a black eye—a coffee with a double shot of espresso—and buy another red eye—a coffee with a single shot—every few hours. I’ve found that no matter how addicted to caffeine you are, you can still maximize the benefits of coffee by drinking it at the proper intervals. Toward the end of the night, tea or regular cold brew will suffice, as long as you have a steady supply. (The exception is when you work until morning and still have to go to class, which calls for a sigh and a 5-Hour Energy.) Over time, sleeplessness becomes so familiar that you almost stop thinking about it. To carry on in this way over an extended duration—that is, more than a week or two—takes a completely altered mindset. You surrender any expectation you once had of aligning to a circadian rhythm. You stop caring what the clock says. You accept the incessant body aches. You habitually specify “a.m.” or “p.m.” to refer to single-digit times. You come to accept this strange new reality. But this reality doesn’t seem so strange in the context of Georgetown. Just walk into Lau some night, and listen closely. The most prevalent sarcasm here revolves around sleeplessness. We repeat “I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” we tell stories of “back when I used to sleep,” we joke about how many Awakenings to buy before Midnight Mug closes at 2 a.m. But it’s nothing to worry about, according to the number of “this is fine,” dog-in-the-fire meme printouts that I’ve seen adorning dorm rooms around campus. Everything is fine, right? That’s exactly the self-deception I’ve engaged in for the past few semesters. I had thought I deceived myself in the same way in high school, but as it turns out, quick access to a 24-hour library has brought it to a new level. There was a time in the spring semester of my freshman year when I only fell asleep by accident and only woke up in panic. The panic probably emerged after I slept through 10 a.m.
lab a couple times, or when an 8 a.m. exam appeared on my finals schedule. It’s a damn good thing that my watch displays the date. This year, the closest I’ve come to a solution is to stay up for morning classes rather than to try and wake up for them. Once, this meant staying awake for 40 consecutive hours— and I hate to admit it, but I’m still a bit proud.
But the truth is, I decided that I would stay up for all of tonight before I sat down to write this. I don’t feel any sort of hesitation, disappointment, regret, or drive to do otherwise. I wish I could tell the story of how I finally hit a breaking point that inspired me to turn my life around, to push beyond the cultural expectations of an over-achieving school, and then describe the process by which I reclaimed my circadian rhythm and found time to sleep. But the truth is, I decided that I would stay up for all of tonight before I sat down to write this. I don’t feel any sort of hesitation, disappointment, regret, or drive to do otherwise. I’m not trying to complain, either—I couldn’t, when over half the people reading this are probably feeling the same way.
I’m tired of hearing “you’re not alone” as a way to close the conversation. Sure, we may be here to look out for each other, but that doesn’t justify such a large portion of the school being burdened beyond the possibility of sleep. We need to stop telling ourselves that sleep deprivation is normal, or necessary, or even acceptable. Ideally, I’d like to see a Georgetown where students respond to a friend’s sleeplessness in the way one might respond to a friend’s drug addiction—this isn’t healthy, you need to stop, I see how it’s affecting you, and I’m not okay with it. Quite frankly, the strained “LOL, same!” response only perpetuates the behavior. Realistically, I’m not sure such a world is possible. The generations before us—parents, professors, even siblings—suffered in the same way that we do now. It’s meshed into society’s core as one of the most famous aspects of the college experience, up there with drinking too much and learning to live on your own. The intense competition for class rank and careers will always favor more hours, more work. I’d be lying if I said I enjoy staying up so late so often, but I can’t say that I hate it, either. I’ve found a thrill in it, and it feels like a part of me. I love seeing Lau 2 empty out, and I find peace in working through the night without caring whether I sleep or not. I love stepping out at 4 a.m. and seeing how the stars have moved since the last time I sought fresh air. I love hearing the birds start to sing over Healy lawn, and I even love being the first to arrive at Sellinger in the morning. But maybe I’ve just fallen too deeply into our sleepless culture.
Emily Jaster is a Sophomore in the College. She is the Halftime Leisure editor of the Voice.
VOICES
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NOVEMBER 17, 2017
Life Infiltrating Art I read reports of Louis C.K.’s alleged sexual misconduct, now confirmed by Louis himself, on the same laptop that boasted a “Louis C.K. is my spirit animal” sticker. Before I began to peel it off, not wanting to force the face of sexual harassment onto my fellow students, I was struck by the age-old question that plagues modern audiences: How do we separate art from the artist? My earliest memory of attempting to distinguish between the two dates back to my introduction into the world of Woody Allen. As a young adult, I was carefully warned by my parents of his problematic relationships and allegations of sexual abuse. Nonetheless, I continued to give my full attention to much of his work, from Annie Hall to the more recent Midnight in Paris. I found myself empathizing with his autobiographical treatment of neurotic existentialism and overlooking his questionable past. Few could deny his indelible legacy within the history of cinema. Neither could I. Years later, I still overlook the misdeeds of artists when enjoying their art. If Good Will Hunting were to come on my TV, I would not change the channel despite the handful of people involved in the film who have been accused of sexual harassment: actors Ben Affleck and his brother Casey Affleck, along with the now infamous producer Harvey Weinstein. As with Woody Allen’s films, I would maintain some emotional distance but take away the same moral truths as I had before. Beyond Hollywood and the heinous politics of sex it fosters, I somehow manage to reconcile my Jewish identity with the art I admire from anti-Semitic artists. Richard Wagner’s revolutionary contributions to musical drama do not require me to agree with the racism he espoused in his time. When I listen to “Ride of the Valkyries,” I think not of the composer’s association with Nazism but instead of the piece’s grandeur and atmospheric qualities. Similarly, I can appreciate painter and sculptor Edgar Degas for the impressionist trailblazer he was, without thinking about how he exposed his own latent anti-Semitism when he falsely accused Alfred Dreyfus in the French political scandal of the late 19th century. Yet something was different about Louis C.K. I stared at the sticker for some time, looking deep into his furrowed brow, familiar grimace, and eyes that could have belonged to your neighbor or professor or, dare I say it, dad. He had really been my “spirit animal,” making me uncomfortable in the best way possible with his crude jokes and human sensitivities. This same pleasant discomfort has now soured as I think of all the times I listened to clips from his standup on the way to school or watched his Netflix specials with my family. Throughout the years I felt as if we had somehow defied the laws of the comedic cyber world to become friends. He gave details into his private life, allowing me
insight into his relationship with his daughters, his awkward sexual escapades, and even his unrestrained thoughts on masturbation. I gave him the privilege of entering my thoughts, influencing my humor, and coming up in dinner table conversation. But before I go so far as to say that I feel personally betrayed by my “friend,” I want to point something out that should make us all a little less surprised by his misconduct: Louis has been dropping hints all along. In his 2005 special on the HBO series One Night Stand, he joked, “These days my problem is very simple: it’s trying to find a place in my house where I can masturbate without somebody bothering me.” In his 2008 special Chewed Up, he joked, “I jerk off way too much and it upsets me and I don’t know why.” And in a 2011 show at the Beacon Theater, he joked, “You’re a tourist in sexual perversion. I’m a prisoner there.” Why then, should I feel betrayed by someone who has been so obviously in control of writing his own perverted script? As a loyal audience member, I should’ve paid closer attention. What I feel truly betrayed by is our culture of hierarchizing actors, artists, politicians, and everyone else in the public spotlight at the top. Too often we forget about the fallibility of celebrities, or rather, of humans. Louis C.K. is no cautionary tale—we have been warned of the prevalence of this kind of behavior in Hollywood long before him. He should be reminding us that what separates our total veneration and disgust for perpetrators like Louis C.K. is the truth. How many other artists out there have committed the same, if not worse, acts of sexual va anko p misconduct? Why should it take a band z Liz of brave and vulnerable women—and some men—coming together each time to inform the world that these offenses occur on and off screen? Why are we pretending like sexual harassment is news when it burdens women everywhere every day, especially women with significantly less economic power than actresses? In trying to answer the question of how to separate art from the artist, Randy Cohen of the New York Times wrote, “It’s hard to be a good person; it’s hard to produce great work. Most of us accomplish neither. To demand both might be asking more than human beings are capable of.” I don’t think it’s too much to ask that a man be able to make jokes and keep it in his pants at the same time. So I peeled off my sticker.
Mica Bernhard is a Sophomore in the College. She is the Social Media editor of the Voice.
THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
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VOICES
When Home Is Hard to Define Keeho kang
Up until I left for Georgetown, it was simple to define “home.” Home was the house in Los Angeles where I grew up. It was the place where I learned to swim with my twin sister Katharine and my preschool best friends Charlie and Evren, endlessly doing mermaid kicks as we clutched the side of our pool for dear life. Home was the place where every Sunday morning throughout high school I would crawl into my parents’ bed and read the New York Times, my mom and I racing to grab the Style section. She would look at Bill Cunningham’s photos in his weekly “On the Street” column. I would flip straight back to the “Vows” section. Home was my bedroom at the back of the house where my best friend Scarlet and I would sprawl out on the scratchy carpet and talk about every nuance of teenage life.
As I grew up, my parents created a home for me, and now I’m creating my own—the first of many. When I’m at school, and I’m cold, or I can’t possibly look at another page of history reading, or I feel lonely as we all inevitably do sometimes, I yearn to go home. Because home is comfort. My dog is at home. There aren’t Spanish presentations at home. My mom will make me a turkey sandwich if I ask nicely. I spend time with my high school friends who I have known for years. I get to sleep in my bed with its ridiculously comfy mattress topper that is indented from my habit
of sleeping exclusively on the right side. At home I find comfort in the predictability of being in a place I have known my whole life. But the reality I’ve had to wrap my head around is that home is harder to define than it used to be. I haven’t slept in my bed in Los Angeles for more than eight consecutive nights this year. I’m not going home for Thanksgiving; my family is instead meeting me in New York. Home has become less of a place and more of a feeling. Home now comes in small doses of comfort. I feel home when I’m on the phone with Katharine trying to describe our new, separate lives. I feel home when my parents come to visit and we recreate an adapted version of the routines I know so well. Quiet-time reading and puttering around our house before dinner becomes relaxing, squished together on the queen bed in my parents’ hotel room before getting ready to go out to dinner. Daily recaps during the car ride home from school have become efforts to catch each other up on the important developments in our lives in the few faceto-face moments we have together. Further complicating my definition of home is my realization that I now have two of them. I was once quick to deny that Georgetown was one. So I surprised myself when I was having coffee with my high school English teacher this summer and the phrase, “when I go home” slipped out of my mouth as I talked about flying back to D.C. the next week. I had believed that Los Angeles would be the only place that ever felt like home to me. It was only when I opened the door of my Village A apartment for the first time this year that I felt differently. As I grew up, my parents created a home for me, and now I’m creating my own—the first of many. This home is different. It takes some trial and error. I have to build it by figuring out who the people are who make me feel good, how to spend my time, and what
I need to do to take care of myself. This home is not as comfortable, and at times, it’s scarier. But it’s mine. And that excites me. I feel home when I cook bolognese sauce with my mom’s recipe, but I experiment each time, adding some rosemary one day, cumin another, to make it my own. I feel home when I invite friends over for dinner. I feel home when I wake up early to go for a run because I discovered I love the stillness of the morning, something I never got the chance to find in my first home.
This home is not as comfortable, and at times, it’s scarier. But it’s mine. And that excites me. “Home” is now a word I can’t solely define by the house where I grew up. It carries more nuance now. My childhood house will always be my home. But I’ve had to accept it is a place I only visit now. Now, my home is my apartment, with the table where I sit and watch people walking by as I eat my dinner, and the bed where I read before falling asleep as I’ve done since kindergarten. Home is the ever-expanding list of places where I am building my own life.
Julia Pinney is a Sophomore in the College. She is an assistant Halftime Leisure editor of the Voice.
NOVEMBER 17, 2017
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The Beat That Goes and Goes
The Sound of D.C.
Left to Right: Back Yard Band, Rare Essence: TurN it up, Rare Essence: Hey Now, Chuck Brown: Beautiful Life
By Devon O’Dwyer At most go-go shows, when the music starts, it doesn’t stop for hours. The ten musicians onstage have instruments ranging from keyboards to cowbells, conga drums, and roto toms. A blend of funk, blues, soul, and Latin rhythms, go-go music first became popularized in D.C. in the 1970s by the late Chuck Brown, the original creator of the powerful sound. Brown started out playing funk music, but experimented with other rhythms that eventually formed the genre around 1976. Known for its infectious energy, heavy percussion, and call and response between the lead singer and the crowd, go-go was quick to spread throughout the city. It thrived in dance halls, night clubs, churches, and neighborhood recreational centers where many of D.C.’s youth were first exposed to the genre. According to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, the resulting competition between dozens of new go-go bands included many teenagers who received their formal music training in high school marching band programs. During go-go’s rise, the city was divided among tourists, government officials, and a largely invisible working-class black population. The genre gave the black community in D.C., the first city in the country to have a majority black population, a platform to express their experiences and have a recognizable voice.
Chuck Brown performs in 2011.
Wikimedia
“Go-go is something that came out of extreme segregation and you can even trace it back to debates over slavery, so the music is reflecting the conditions of black people in this country, especially in urban areas,” said Natalie Hopkinson, a Howard University professor and author of Go-Go Live: The Musical Life and Death of a Chocolate City. Hopkinson explained that while hip-hop began to rise in the 1980s, go-go did not gain the same national audience—
but it continued to grow and flourish in D.C., solidifying its position as the distinct sound of the nation’s capital. “Generations of musicians have been organizing go-go bands in different communities and playing at proms and playing at local community centers, recreational centers, clubs, junior high schools, high schools,” Hopkinson said. “So, it’s something that was a really big part of D.C. youth culture for many generations.” Quentin Ivy, a go-go musician, first experienced go-go at a recreational center in 1979, just a few years after the genre’s inception. Rare Essence, one of the most prominent and longstanding go-go bands, was playing and immediately intrigued Ivy with its eclectic beats. “I was a drummer, always a drummer. But in 1979, I was introduced to go-go. And from there, everything just changed,” Ivy said. “Once I heard go-go, I just hunted it down, that was my everything.” After learning how to play the unique percussive rhythms of go-go, his career in the genre took off as a member of the Mighty Peacemakers. Now, Ivy plays for the very band that introduced him to the genre. Last November, Ivy found himself onstage at Georgetown University’s Gonda Theatre as part of the live go-go band that performed during Wind Me Up, Maria!: A Go-Go Musical. He was surprised to find out just how unfamiliar gogo was to many Georgetown students, even after living in D.C. for up to four years. “It’s good for exposure because people need to know what’s going on, and when the kids living in Georgetown don’t know what’s going on on the other side of the city, that’s crazy to me.” The musical marked a unique collaboration between Georgetown and the greater D.C. community. Wind Me Up, Maria! pulled together Georgetown students, a live go-go band, and D.C. middle school students from The Capital Kidds, a local music program founded by Charles “Shorty Corleone” Garris, an acclaimed go-go musician and a current member of Rare Essence. Every show sold out, including an additional show that was added to the original schedule. It marked the first time in the Gonda Theatre’s history that a show had a completely sold-out run. At first glance, go-go music and theater may not be the most obvious match. But for the show’s writer, Natsu Onoda Power, an associate professor in Georgetown’s Program in Theater and Performance studies and an avid go-go fan, it seemed like a natural pairing. “Chuck [Brown]’s shows really embodied everything I wanted to do in my work in the theater,” Power said. “It’s
nonstop energy, every new thing is more exciting than the one before, there’s no transition and it just goes and goes. Everyone is participating in it and there’s full energy.” But for a long time, Power didn’t feel qualified to write and produce a go-go musical—until she met Garris. The musical tells the story of Georgetown graduate Maria, played by then-freshman Myiah Smith (SFS ’20) who finds employment as a live-in tutor for a family of six adopted children. As their tutor, Maria introduces the children to the world of go-go music for the first time. “We had the Georgetown community and the greater D.C. community sitting together,” Power said. “People who had never come to Georgetown before came because of gogo, so it was a really exciting experience. There were students who had never heard of go-go sitting next to people who have known go-go their whole lives.” For Smith, go-go has been part of her life since she was a child. Smith has lived in D.C. since she was three, and both her father and grandfather were members of go-go bands.
The cast of Wind Me Up, Maria! performs. Shannon Finney Photography “Go-go is a very live, performative music,” Smith said. “It is best understood when you are there, in the audience, call and response, dancing, bumping to the music. And that is what makes go-go so fun. That it happened on Georgetown’s campus, it was such an amazing thing.” In the past 20 years, go-go’s original sound has evolved as a new form of the genre has risen: bounce beat. The new sound, which gained popularity in the early 2000s, is a more aggressive and explosive version of its predecessor, one that draws in younger audiences who are ready to party to go-go’s original rhythms, intensified. According to Jason Lewis, a co-host for Bounce Beat Radio, the rise of bounce beat music has created cutting divisions between newer, younger artists and their older counterparts who claim bounce beat isn’t real go-go because it strays too far from the original sound.
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THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
“go-go turntables” by Jake Glass
But to Garris, the two sounds may have more in common than some may think. “It’s like history repeats itself. The original bands were teenagers when they created the music, so the image they had was an up-tempo dance style groove, and that’s what’s going on with the new generation. The beats per minutes are pretty much the same, maybe one or two beats off, and the call and response is still there from both,” Garris said. As new go-go artists emerge, however, they need a platform to be heard and to spread their music. Bounce Beat radio provides that space, serving as a place where Lewis can mentor upand-coming go-go bands and give them an outlet to share their music. He stresses professionalism and encourages them to be meticulous in their work in order to elevate their music. Behind every go-go band, there is a dedicated team concerned with the logistics and success of the performance. “A lot of go-go is a self-driven, entrepreneurial music concept from a manager to a promoter,” Garris said. “They’ve been able to sustain by locking down a venue, going out and promoting the shows, and having great concerts. This happens weekend after weekend, weekday after weekday, and it survives.” Despite Garris’ optimism, there is concern in the community about the future of the genre as go-go gets pushed outside of the city limits. The reason for the displacement is multifaceted, with rapid gentrification and law enforcement crackdowns on go-go venues both contributing to the genre’s decline as more and more venues move into Maryland. “Because of the influx of new people into the city, because of the moving out of Washingtonians and black native
Washingtonians, we can see go-go struggling in today’s context of the city,” Smith said. Despite being the nation’s first majority black city, the black population slipped below 50 percent in 2011. As neighborhoods gentrify, the city’s native people are often forced to move. “Just as black people have been displaced from D.C. through gentrification, the music has as well,” Hopkinson said. “And the music is an early warning sign that that is happening, starting with the schools. As D.C. public schools have been dismantled and the neighborhood system has dismantled, so has the neighborhood culture that helped go-go grow.” In addition to increasingly gentrified D.C. neighborhoods, go-go has also faced resistance from local law enforcement. “When go-go was at its height, some of the issues of violence around the drug trade in D.C., they were also at their height,” Hopkinson said. “So, people connected the two.” Hopkinson acknowledges the challenges of tracking go-go venues—a go-go band playing at a prom or church may not always officially register their show. But to those who are familiar with the genre, it’s clear that a significant decline in the presence of go-go has occurred as venues are shut down and pushed out of the city. Hopkinson warned that owners of new music venues may even be pressured to sign “no go-go” pledges, particularly due to tensions between loud go-go venues and neighborhoods who do not want the music there. “And then you have a lot of pressure on venues, as well, and some of it’s from the police to not host go-go because they
see go-go fans and the people who support it as undesirable,” Hopkinson said. Go-go also faces the difficulty of being located in a city where politics precedes the arts. “There’s something going on every single night of the week in D.C. and the DMV surrounding areas, but we’re overshadowed entertainment and music-wise because of the demand of the news and politics,” Garris said. “When all those acts are in NYC, it’s easier to get to those buildings and constantly bang on the door to get heard, whereas you’re four hours away and hopefully able to keep your appointment, so it’s just an interesting constant battle.” Despite the problems go-go has faced, it continues to find ways to survive due to its loyal fan base and strong community. “The role and importance of go-go and the reason why people celebrate it is because it’s the soundtrack of their lives,” Garris said. “It’s that beat that they can call their own. It’s exciting, and it’s underground, it’s unique, it’s party, it’s a great time, it’s like escape your troubles and whatever you’re going through.” And beyond go-go and D.C.’s inseparable link, the genre is also representative of a much broader and larger conversation. “It’s a bigger thing than the music even,” Hopkinson said. “You’re talking about erasure of people or erasure of a culture, so I think about go-go as a good way to get into that bigger conversation about race and public policy and what are the decisions that we’re doing, whether we’re including people or we’re marginalizing them, erasing them or trying to push them away.”
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NOVEMBER 17, 2017
Judaism in D.C.
EGan Barnitt
How Jewish Communities Made Their Home in the Capital City Illustration of Adas Israel Synagogue, located in Cleavland Park, D. C.
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s Georgetown students reached the center of the stage to receive their degrees at the 1869 commencement, they were greeted by Catholic chaplains, university administrators, and the 18th president of the United States. President Ulysses S. Grant stood front and center, congratulating the students and personally handing them their degrees. The last of the students left the stage and the first-year commander-in-chief sat back down as Fr. Bernard Maguire, SJ., president of the college, addressed the crowd. John Gilmary Shea includes Maguire’s speech in his 1891 book History of Georgetown College: “Cicero said a man could confer no greater favor than to educate the youth. This is our mission. We teach them to be true to religion and liberty, and from whatever section they come, to love each other.” Four months later, across the city, 38 members of D.C.’s first Jewish congregation, Washington Hebrew, embraced a similar goal. They officially split off to form their own congregation, Adas Israel, to preserve a traditional form of their faith and build the first permanent synagogue in the city. They opened their building seven years later in 1876, and Grant, in the final year of his second term, sat in the front row at the dedication. His presence that day has allowed the original synagogue to endure municipal threats of demolition over 140 years later. However, as a Civil War general just 14 years earlier, Grant ordered the expulsion of all Jewish residents from his territory of control.
For Jewish Student Alliance (JSA) member Madeline Cunnings (COL ’18), when most people think about Jewish people in the DMV, their minds instinctively drift to the prominent communities in Baltimore and Silver Spring, often overlooking the nation’s capital. “Contrary to popular belief, D.C. has a thriving Jewish community,” Cunnings said.
“Detroit has cars, we have politics, and a lot of really active politics,” said Samuel Aronson, assistant dean in the SFS and a docent at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. “That overshadows everything.” Today, Georgetown’s Jewish students have access to religious resources both on and off campus. In addition to weekly Shabbat services on campus, the District has at least 15 congregations ranging across denominations, four Jewish preschools, and a Jewish Community Center. The center sponsors Theater J, the largest professional Jewish theater company, which performs in the Aaron and Cecile Goldman Theater in Dupont Circle. There is no single Jewish community in D.C. Within the religion, there are not only subsets in terms of religious orthodoxy, including reform, conservative, and orthodox sects, but also divisions that exist between ethnic groups, with descendants ranging from Eastern European Ashkenazim to Iberian, North African, and the Middle Eastern Sephardim. Even within these ethnic groups, each nationality features its own distinct religious and cultural traditions. Cunnings believes that resources on campus are mostly geared toward reform Jewish students. However, she explains that there are still communal events that bring a more diverse group together. For example, a wide variety of Jewish students often coordinate to visit senior citizens at Georgetown MedStar Hospital and offer comfort and companionship. “The Jewish community isn’t monolithic,” Aronson said. “The Jewish community is many, many, many things. For some people, it has a lot to do with religion. For some people, it has almost nothing to do with religion. For some people, it has a lot to do with history. For some, it has a lot to do with the contemporary and the present.” University founder John Carroll planned for Georgetown to welcome people of all faiths as early as his original proposal document in 1787. “Agreeably to the liberal principle of our constitution, the seminary will be open to students of every religious profession,” he wrote. “They, who in this respect differ from the superintendents of the academy, will be at liberty to frequent the places of worship and instruction appointed by their parents.”
Still, it took almost 40 years after the university’s founding in 1789 for Carroll’s interreligious proposal to be put into practice. Georgetown’s first Jewish student, Marx Edgeworth Lazarus, enrolled on Sept. 19, 1834, according to Fr. Robert Emmett Curran, S.J. in 1993’s The Bicentennial History of Georgetown University. He was the heir to two distinguished Wilmington, North Carolina families. His mother Rachel was a member of the influential Mordecai family and his father was a successful slave-holding merchant. Lazarus was a fierce and outspoken abolitionist, though he fought for the Confederacy during the Civil War.
“The Jewish community is many, many, many things. For some people, it has a lot to do with religion. For some people, it has almost nothing to do with religion. For some people, it has a lot to do with history. For some, it has a lot to do with the contemporary and the present.” He attended Georgetown at a time when he, along with all other non-Catholic students, were required to participate in daily Mass, public prayers, and recitations of the rosary, though they were not obligated to give confession or receive communion. However, there was no synagogue in D. C. for Lazarus to
THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
practice his own religion. Dr. Jonathan Sarna, a professor of American Jewish history and the chair of the Hornstein Jewish Professional Leadership Program at Brandeis University, explained that Washington Hebrew first organized in 1852 and began to petition Congress for permission to build a synagogue. According to Robert Shosteck in Jewish Life in Mr. Lincoln’s City, they convened in churches and temporary locations as their congregation grew while the Civil War raged around them. Jews accounted for fewer than 200 of 75,000 D.C. residents in 1860, working mostly as merchants, Shosteck wrote. It wasn’t until the Reconstruction period that a flood of Eastern European Jews journeyed to America in search of economic opportunity and refuge from violent persecution. These immigrants settled in the mostly German neighborhoods in Foggy Bottom, and a more visible Jewish presence in D.C. began to take shape. “We’re a pretty small minority,” Aronson said. “We’re a small group of people, one of the smallest minorities in the world. So, we’re just going to be outnumbered. I don’t mean that in a negative way, it’s just arithmetically true.” Jews counted for less than 0.2 percent of the world population last year, and less than two percent of the U.S. population. In D.C., Jewish residents constitute between three and four percent of the city’s population. Despite its small size, the Jewish minority on Georgetown’s campus has successfully organized together. A 1963 Hoya article reported on the first Jewish club on campus, B’nai Sholom, a group that set up debates, lectures, forums, discussion groups, and social events for Jewish students to explore their faith and their shared challenges at Georgetown. In 1967, 125 students on campus created their own chapter of Hillel, the largest Jewish university organization in the world. Georgetown also welcomed Rabbi Saul Kraft as their first Jewish chaplain in 1967. Rabbi Harold White, who became the first full-time Jewish chaplain in 1976, worked until 2010. This kind of formal community would have been foreign to Lazarus. He left campus in 1835, 41 years before the capital’s first permanent synagogue would weave itself into the tapestry of the city.
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for a larger space. The congregation moved to 6th and I Streets NW in 1908 and then to Cleveland Park in 1951, according to the Jewish historical society. Though the District marked the original building for demolition, the historical society managed to save it by tearing the historic structure from its foundation and driving it by truck to a new location at 3rd Street NW in 1969, where it became the Lillian and Albert Small Jewish Museum. In 2016, the landmark fell into a District construction zone once again, this time for the Capitol Crossing Project, and moved down the street on a truck for a second time. Next year the museum will move again, this time to F Street NW. In Sarna’s opinion, the building would surely have been destroyed if not for Grant. “The fact that Grant was there saved the synagogue,” Sarna said. “Meaning, had it not been for that connection to Grant, they certainly would have knocked it down, rather than moving it now twice.” Back in Adas’ current home in Cleveland Park, the congregation has boomed. Long past the days when Jews had to petition Congress to build a synagogue, over 5,000 Adas members across D.C., Maryland, and Virginia now enjoy a recently renovated, state-of-the-art development for both religious and community purposes. The grounds include the Charles E. Smith Sanctuary, which seats 1,200, a more intimate sanctuary for traditional services, a pre-school, a playground, a coffee bar, a study room, and social rooms. Community events include adult classes, mindfulness yoga, programming for young professionals, and happy hours. President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, and the Dalai Lama have all spoken in Adas sanctuaries to address the international Jewish community, catapulting the congregation into the political sphere. Adas congregation president Ricki Gerger and her staff have embraced Adas’ intersection with politics, organizing interfaith social action groups including food pantry collections, drives for the homeless, and climate projects to engage with the wider Washington community.
“I think, at least in recent memory, we have thought of ourselves as a change leader and a thought leader, not only in Judaism, but in the city,” Gerger said.
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aj. Gen. Grant’s orders flew across his area of command via telegraph on Dec. 17, 1862. According to the historical society, Union officers throughout the Department of Tennessee, the area of Grant’s command including parts of southern Illinois, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Mississippi, went door-to-door to distribute General Order No. 11: “The Jews, as a class violating every regulation of trade established by the Treasury Department and also department orders, are hereby expelled from the department within 24 hours from the receipt of this order.” Grant believed expelling all the Jewish residents from the area of his command would shut down the illegal Confederate cotton trade infiltrating his department. Though some Jews were involved, there were many other participants. Grant’s own father, Jesse R. Grant, had been involved in the scheme, according to Sarna. However, to the Union general, the distinct ethnic names of first and second-generation Jewish immigrants stuck out among the rest. The order did not stand long. Days later, prominent Cincinnati Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise and Prussian immigrant and Kentucky businessman Cesar Kaskel, along with other Jewish leaders, journeyed to Washington as a delegation to take the issue up directly with President Abraham Lincoln, who willingly met with them. Lincoln had no prior knowledge of the situation, and immediately promised to force Grant to rescind the order.
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resident Grant sat in the front row at Adas Israel’s dedication ceremony and settled in for the three-hour service. It was June 9, 1876, and Grant was in the waning months of his second term. According to the Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington, he donated $10 to the synagogue’s dedication fund, the equivalent of a little over $200 today, and stayed throughout the entire service. At 619 6th St. NW, Adas was in the heart of a young and growing city. The newly expanded Capitol dome loomed less than a mile away as congregants left after the service.
Adas is now the oldest of D.C.’s synagogues and the largest of the conservative denomination. “The fact that just a couple of decades later, the president actually comes to the dedication of the synagogue building really is a signal of how much has changed from days where you wondered whether a synagogue could be built at all,” Sarna, the Brandeis historian, said. The original synagogue building still stands today, but not in the same location, which is now occupied by Absolute Thai Restaurant in Washington’s Chinatown. As post-Civil War immigration led to a ballooning congregation, Adas began to look
Georgetown JSA Members pose at their annual retreat. Photo courtesey of Jewish Life at Georgetown
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NOVEMBER 17, 2017
Illustration of the inside of Adas Israel Synagogue’s sanctuary. Though the Jewish community has grown both at Georgetown and in the wider city, neither has been immune to acts of anti-Semitism. GUPD reported the fourth swastika found on campus this semester on Sept. 20, the night of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year. The swastika, discovered on an LXR bathroom wall, was paired with threatening messages promoting violence towards women. University President John DeGioia condemned the graffiti in an email to the student body: “There is never a time or place for these acts, and this incident is even more disturbing during Rosh Hashanah. We stand in solidarity with our Jewish community and strongly condemn this act of hate, anti-Semitism, and sexism.” Georgetown is not alone. Northwest Washington’s Without Walls High School discovered a swastika drawn on the wall of a boy’s restroom in early March.
“We are a lot more than the oppression. Look beyond the swastikas, anti-Semitism, Israel.” According to the FBI’s 2015 hate crime statistics, almost 20 percent of hate crimes were due to bias against religion, the second highest motivation. Of anti-religious hate crimes, anti-Jewish bias was the most common motivator, responsible for 52 percent of all incidents. “It’s not just Grant. There’s a tremendous amount of anti-Semitism in the world,” Gerger said. “We have not, thank God, been directly affected, but we have had congregations in this area have anti-Semitic slogans written on their buildings. So it’s heartbreaking. We hear so often, the United States of America has given the Jewish people boundless opportunities in this country. And yet, we have Nazis marching 100 miles away from here … It’s part of the Jewish people, sadly.” “Bigotry in all its various forms will never disappear, be it anti-Semitism or misogyny or racism or homophobia,” Aronson said. “I don’t think it’s going away.”
Egan Barnitt
Cunnings believes the campus response has been positive, as religious clubs have joined together for interreligious displays of mutual support and solidarity. “Every element of this is important to our values, and I don’t care about what that one person did. I care deeply about what everyone else did,” Aronson explained. “I thought it was beautiful.”
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epublican presidential candidate Grant took a break from his campaign to write a private letter to Rep. Isaac Newton Morris, a Democrat from Illinois. The 1868 election was fast approaching, the first since the Civil War, and the popular Union war hero hoped to defeat former New York governor Horatio Seymour for the oval office. Jews across the country had not forgotten Order No. 11 and neither had southern Democrats. Grant waited until after his election to allow his letter explaining his regrets to be published. Sarna believes Grant wanted it be clear he was not pandering for the Jewish vote. “I have no prejudice against sect or race, but want each individual to be judged by his own merit,” Grant wrote. “Order No. 11 does not sustain this statement, I admit, but then I do not sustain that order. It never would have been issued if it had not been telegraphed the moment it was penned, and without reflection.” Grant went on to appoint many Jews to federal and local Washington positions. He made German immigrant and Ohio attorney Simon Wolf the Recorder of Deeds for the District of Columbia. Grant also chose Edward S. Salomon to be governor of Washington, as the city was administered as a territory at the time. The Civil War veteran and German immigrant was the first Jew to serve as a sitting American governor, Sarna said. At the advice of Wolf and other Jewish-American leaders, Grant intervened in Russian and Romanian internal politics to try to negotiate the end of Jewish discrimination and persecution abroad, even dispatching an American Jewish consul to the region.
After establishing a general Jewish studies program in 2003, Georgetown expanded the program into a formal Center for Jewish Civilization within the SFS last year due to a $10 million donation for Holocaust research from Norma and Irma Braman. But just as the Jewish community is not monolithic, neither is Jewish scholarship. While some academics actively engage with histories of anti-Semitism, others believe a narrow focus ignores the wider world of Jewish religion and culture. Aronson experiences this debate specifically in the context of the Holocaust. While he believes it is important to honor the victims of acts of anti-Semitism, he is also conscious of other, often undervalued stories. “On one hand, telling their stories is very vital,” Aronson said. “On the other hand, when you’re talking about a thousand upon thousand year culture of literature and art and poetry and architecture and you give so much power to about 12 years and to a slaughter, why?” “We are a lot more than the oppression,” Cunnings added. “Look beyond the swastikas, anti-Semitism, Israel.” The Hilltop has transformed since Lazarus first stepped foot on campus in 1834. Georgetown is not only the first Catholic and Jesuit university in the country to employ a full-time rabbi, but also the first university in the nation to employ a fulltime imam. The theology department currently features professors of a variety of religious beliefs alongside atheists. For Aronson, Georgetown is not simply a Catholic institution in the religious sense. He pointed out that “catholic” also has an underused dictionary definition, meaning “universal.” “We’re here for our Catholic students and students of every other faith and no faith at all,” Aronson said. “Being the first Catholic and Jesuit school to have a Muslim imam and a Jewish rabbi for over 40 years on our staff reflects the fact that certainly Judaism is not just tolerated but actively welcomed and embraced.” Jewish students only account for a few hundred members of the student body, and the anti-Semitic incidents on campus this semester have added to a deplorably long list that is not unique to the hilltop. But if the history of Jewish communities on campus and in D.C. has proven anything, it’s that they will continue to make their voices heard.
By Alex Boyd
THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
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The Queens of Campus:
Women’s Soccer Meets Lofty Expectations in 2017 Season By Jorge DeNeve Georgetown sports information
When Wake Forest junior goalkeeper Nonie Frishette saved three penalties in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, Georgetown women’s soccer’s (14-3-4) season abruptly ended. Yet only five days before that frustrating night in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, the team was weightless after winning its second straight Big East Championship, so much so that head coach Dave Nolan said a joking “no pressure” to men’s Head Coach Brian Wiese as the Hoyas left the field to celebrate. Within that week lies the story of Georgetown women’s soccer, a squad that either pounds opponents into oblivion or runs out of time chipping away at a defense before fully breaking them down. This season, senior midfielder Rachel Corboz led the offense again with nine goals and 12 assists. Unlike last year, no Hoya recorded double-digit goals, yet the offense still produced comparable numbers to the 2016 season. The Hoyas were shutout only six times this season, and also had 10 wins of three goals or more, yet they only had one other multi-goal game. They were still dominant offensively, taking 18.6 shots per game, but for all of their chances, the Hoyas weren’t as clinical as they were the prior season when they averaged five fewer shots. Redshirt sophomore forward Amanda Carolan is the epitome of this year’s Georgetown attack. Last year’s Big East Freshman of the Year remained Nolan’s first choice at striker and added another nine goals to her career tally, tying the team-high despite missing three games due to injury. Four of those strikes came in a 5-0 victory at Villanova (6-12). Junior forward Caitlin Farrell picked up some of the slack left behind by class of 2017 forwards Grace Damaska and Crystal Thomas with eight goals of her own, and sophomore forward Paula Germino-Watnick’s quick feet on the ball let her wriggle out of tight spaces and create chances for her teammates. The freshmen duo of forward Jenna Menta and midfielder Grace Nguyen provided depth for the team and will likely take a larger role next year. “We had a lot of new people step up,” Corboz said. “I think it was good to get more new people in the offense and create more opportunities, and we saw that with those big wins that we had.” At the other end of the pitch, the defense adjusted well after the loss of both Marina Paul and Corey Delaney, who were
Georgetown sports information
part of a backline that only allowed 15 goals and kept 17 shutouts in 2016. Initially, Nolan’s unit began the year allowing five goals in its first five games, four of which came from a routing at the hands of Stanford. “To this point they’ve outplayed bloody everybody,” Nolan said. “Stanford, that’s the measuring stick, and that’s why I like to play them; that’s why we play them every two or every three years because I want to see how far we are from the top.” The Cardinals distorted the Hoyas’ early season defensive statistics, and Georgetown only allowed two more goals after the Sept. 1 loss in Palo Alto, matching the previous season’s shutout total in five fewer games. Senior captain Elizabeth Wenger led the way in the back, marshalling four other defenders who appeared regularly. Her fellow defensive returner, senior Drew Topor, who started every game last season until a head injury kept her out of the national semifinal against Southern California, started only seven matches in 2017. She competed all year with junior Jenna Staudt, sophomore Meaghan Nally, and freshman Kelly Ann Livingstone for playing time. But what isn’t apparent in the stat sheet is that the other six field players do as much defensive work as the back four itself. “It started from last year, it was a shift in mentality of how we defended, and it’s not just the defense, it’s the whole team,” Wenger said. “We put pressure on teams higher up the field, and we were just that much more committed to stepping and winning the ball.” The defense was so dominant that senior goalkeeper Arielle Schechtman only had to make 37 saves on the year, down from 69 the year before. This was in part thanks to Wenger’s Big East Defensive Player of the Year performance, yet Schechtman still made big saves when necessary, most notably in overtime matches against Rutgers (13-2-5) and Wake Forest (11-5-4), and earned Big East Goalkeeper of the Year honors. Senior midfielders Taylor Pak and Chloe Knott performed their vital defensive and distributive work that makes the Hoyas tick, and the team will lose all three of its midfielders before the start of next season. Whoever Nolan decides to play in midfield next year will have to fill big shoes despite limited playing time this year. “It was hard to crack our midfield three this year,” Nolan said. “We had a midfield trio that are seniors that carried our
team last year as juniors and did a great job again this year as seniors, so you look at them and you’re going, ‘Hey, there’s some good young players now that we’re excited to get to grips with in the spring and start to try to get them ready for the fall.’” Corboz, the Big East Midfielder of the Year, finishes her career at second place in both all-time points and assists as a Georgetown player, behind her sister, Daphne, in the former and Ingrid Wells in the latter. This year, she scored a free kick against Xavier (8-8-4) to win the Hoyas’ first ever Big East regular season title and recorded eight points (three goals, two assists) in the Big East tournament in front of a home crowd. Shaw Field is now a fortress. The team has lost a total of three games at home in the last two seasons and has actively hoped to earn home field advantage for the conference tournament. Winning the regular season paid off, as the Hoyas brushed aside Marquette (13-7-1) and Butler (13-2-6), outshooting their opponents 43-6 in a dominant tournament display. “When we sat down in August and talked about what we wanted out of the year, two of the tangible things were winning regular season, win the championship tournament, and we also added a third one: beat DePaul,” Wenger said. “We accomplished all of those.” The Hoyas accomplished their goals for the year, but fine margins held back another deep postseason run. The team failed to score against a ranked opponent until putting three goals past Butler in the Big East final. Georgetown was unranked leading into the final three matches of the Big East season, and despite finishing the year ranked No. 15 in the nation, it wasn’t strong enough to merit a home match in the NCAA Tournament. Corboz was a shot off the post away from a winning goal against Rutgers in September that would have launched the Hoyas into a higher ranking, just as a win over Rutgers last year catapulted them to a magical 2016. Farrell hit the post in the NCAA first round, and instead of the team playing Penn State (13-4-4) in the second round of the Tournament, Frishette stonewalled the Hoyas’ run before it began. After 2016’s College Cup appearance, the 2017 Hoyas wanted to make their own history. They finished their season as undisputed queens of the Big East.
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NOVEMBER 17, 2017
La Dolce Estate: Call Me by Your Name Captures Fleeting Love By Caitlin Mannering
IMDB
There is a scene in Call Me by Your Name when Elio’s father, an archeologist dredging up Hellenistic-era statues from the sea, flips through slides of recent findings. One character sighs, remarking how all of the statues are “so incredibly sensual.” These are the perfect words to sum up Call Me by Your Name, an aching, exquisitely-rendered look at a transformative love. “Summer 1983, Somewhere in Northern Italy” serves as our introduction into director Luca Guadagnino’s dizzyingly beautiful Italian summer. Call Me by Your Name, adapted from André Acimans’ novel, follows 17-year-old Elio Perlman (Timothee Chamalet) as he falls in love with Oliver (Armie Hammer), his father’s research assistant for the summer, tracing every awkward encounter and frustrated sigh. The film takes place in an isolated, idyllic utopia. We are given an intoxicating summer—bees buzz by lazily, ripe fruit droops from trees, and soft golden light lingers on into the evening. He has created a world in which reading tattered paperbacks and simply being is enough. Piano music features prominently throughout the film— Elio is a gifted multi-instrumentalist and plays variations of Bach on the piano for Oliver. But Call Me by Your Name is able to weave together classical music and 80s pop hits seamlessly, marrying the music to the movie. The most expressive music is Sufjan Stevens’ poignant original compositions, perfectly situated at such points of the film so as to essentially trace its emotional arc. Guadagnino worked with cinematographer Sayombhu Mukdeeprom to give the film a vibrant, yet somehow faded feeling. The film is sun-kissed, but tinged with melancholy— like bittersweet nostalgia. Elio Perlman, precocious yet impetuous, lives an unusual but lovely life in the summer of 1983. In the company of his parents, two international academics portrayed by Amira Casar and Michael Stuhlbarg, Elio spends each summer at a villa in northern Italy that his mother has inherited. Their house is filled with books and vibrant discussion, and the family seamlessly transitions between French, Italian, and English. The Perlmans could easily have felt pretentious, but they never do. There is a natural intimacy in the family’s relationships with one another, and one could almost imagine stepping out into the warm Italian evening to a lively discussion over dinner on their patio. There is a subtly brilliant scene where the usually sunny Italian countryside succumbs to rain, and the family curls up on the couch. Elio places his head in his mother’s lap as she translates a 16th-century German fairy tale to him and his father, the soft music from a record in the background intermingling with the sound of the rain. Elio’s mother’s gaze lingers on them, asking unspoken questions of both as she reads, “Is it better to speak or to die?” Oliver is clearly an American outsider among the Perlmans. Elio scoffs as he watches Oliver, “the usurper,” arrive from the window of his room that he will have to give up for the remainder of the summer. The 20-something grad student quickly falls into place with the family, debating the
etymology of the word “apricot” with Elio’s father and biking off into town on his own. However, the family continues to gently mock Oliver’s nonchalant “later” whenever he leaves the house. Elio spends his days transcribing music, reading, or effortlessly playing the piano. He attracts the attention of a few French girls staying in the town, but his true fascination lies with Oliver, whose tall frame and chiseled good looks directly call to mind the very statues that he and Professor Perlman are studying. Guadagnino traces the two young men’s attraction to one another delicately. There’s a gentleness to each interaction, undercut by a rippling intensity of feeling. The film’s long takes often give way to short bursts, giving us the rhythm of memory and of desire. We not only watch Elio fall in love for the first time, but also the film gives us cues, pulling the viewer under the summer’s intoxicating spell. Elio finds ways to be around Oliver—biking into town with him and taking him to the local swimming hole—but he is slow to confront his feelings. He is unsure how to read Oliver’s laid-back attitude and confidence, almost flinching from Oliver’s casual touch on the shoulder. For his part, Oliver is clearly interested in Elio but wary to act since Elio is his boss’s young son and relatively inexperienced. Hammer is brilliant as he skillfully displays cocky selfassurance while still possessing a certain vulnerability. Oliver lets Elio initiate. However, the film is clearly Chamalet’s, who, at 21, gives a mature and thoughtful performance. Every motion possesses a restlessness and an impatient physicality. His face conveys an inconceivable depth of emotion—the heartbreaking last five minutes of the film are merely a closeup of Chamalet’s face. The gaze of the camera focuses almost solely on the two young men. It captures the brimming tension of the creaky hallway between their adjoining bedrooms. A long take holds on the departing figures of Elio and Oliver biking into a golden afternoon. It follows them holding each other and dancing and singing on an empty street at twilight, both expressing a boundless joy. Elio’s confession of love bubbles up out of him, words hurriedly tumbling out of his mouth. They come together in clumsy abandon. However, their happiness is tinged with melancholy, trapped by the ephemerality of the summer. It is a look at two people trying to find one another before it is too late. And while the film places much of the focus on Elio and Oliver, Stuhlbarg still manages to deliver a profoundly moving monologue that serves as the emotional climax of the film, telling his son to let pain live alongside happiness: “Don’t make yourself feel nothing so as not to feel anything. What a waste.” Call Me by Your Name feels like remembering, with its gentle, fluid cadence and the swirling emotion of youth. In some ways, it is not a literal rendering of Elio’s summer, but his bittersweet, treasured memory. It is a coming-of-age story that possesses none of the cliché lessons but is instead deeply sincere and perceptive.
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THE GEORGETOWN VOICE
LEISURE
Pickett’s Charge Brings History to Light at the Hirshhorn Museum
By Ryan Mazalatis
courtesy HIRSHORN/joshua white
Few moments in history carry as much weight in the modern day, and are as widely misunderstood, as the American Civil War. After more than 150 years, the Civil War still captivates our nation, manifesting itself in neo-Confederate demonstrations, political races, and most recently, remarks from Chief of Staff John Kelly. In the past few years, Confederate sympathizers have flocked to protect monuments that honor Confederates while simultaneously debating the role slavery played in causing the war. Perhaps our continued fascination and exploitation of the deadliest war in American history comes as a result of the modern political landscape: two distinct sides battling for power over issues, many of which are inherently racial, with the future of the country seemingly in the balance. LA-based artist Mark Bradford plays off of this in his exhibition Pickett’s Charge, on display at the Hirshhorn Museum. Bradford, using Civil War imagery and everyday materials, sheds light on the complexity of history, offering a critique towards those who espouse lopsided versions of historical narratives for their own gain. Bradford became known in the international art scene in the late 2000s for his collages, which combined paint, found objects, and abstract imagery to provide political commentary on modern American society. His pieces focused on the urban decay of his hometown of Los Angeles and provided insight to issues plaguing both the city and the nation. This mesh of political commentary with abstraction is evident in Pickett’s Charge, which combines everyday materials with Civil War imagery. Bradford based Pickett’s Charge off of the work of 19th century French artist Paul Dominique Philippoteaux, whose large cyclorama of Pickett’s Charge from the last day of the Battle of Gettysburg became one of the largest items of mass entertainment in mid-19th century America. In many ways, cycloramas played the role of today’s cinema, with music
often playing in the background and a narrator providing the story behind the depicted events. Philippoteaux’s cyclorama was so lifelike that it purportedly moved Civil War veterans to tears. The medium of the cyclorama allowed Bradford to take full advantage of the circular structure of the Hirshhorn Museum, resulting in an exhibition whose magnitude is all-encompassing, even overwhelming. Pickett’s Charge consists of eight huge collages, each portraying different moments or aspects of the Battle of Gettysburg. Some, such as “The High-Water Mark,” pay homage to particular moments of the battle, while others such as “Witness Tree” address the ways in which we remember our history. Bradford uses images from Philippoteaux’s cyclorama and overlays it with colored paper, rope, and other commonplace materials, creating images that are abstract and sometimes difficult to identify. Bradford further incorporates the abstract by breaching the canvas, with some portions of the collages completely shredded and others riddled with holes. This combination of found materials and the 19th-century depiction of the battle creates a juxtaposition between the abstract and the absolute, beauty and violence, and personal stories with the tidal wave of history. Bradford does more than encapsulate a fateful day at the most decisive battle of the Civil War; he challenges the way we choose to remember history. Bradford’s choice to depict Gettysburg, as opposed to other famous battles, is particularly symbolic. Apart from being the one of the bloodiest battles in American history, the Battle of Gettysburg also represented one of the last chances for the Confederacy to win the war, and Pickett’s Charge was the last attempt on the part of the Confederacy to turn the battle to their favor. In the decades that followed, the battle and Pickett’s Charge were romanticized by both the defeated and the victors. For Confederates, Pickett’s Charge represented the demise of
the Antebellum South, and it would be idolized by the Lost Cause movement which infamously erected the hundreds of Confederate statues and monuments that have stoked tensions across the nation. Undoubtedly the battle was a crossroad in the American experiment, one that determined whether a young country could exist or whether its systemic racism and elitism would destroy it. That moment in history is still significant a century-and-a-half later, Bradford suggests, because we are at a similar crossroads. In many ways, the Civil War never fully ended, as the racism that caused it is alive and well in modern society. For this reason, our national dialogue keeps coming back to the Civil War, and the history is often distorted by the privileged and powerful to justify prejudice and oppression. Pickett’s Charge forces us to reevaluate preconceived notions and reveals that there is no such thing as a truly faithful representation of history. Pickett’s Charge is a powerful statement on American society, one that history buffs and art enthusiasts alike can appreciate. The exhibit is a particularly humbling experience for those concerned with the fate of American democracy. The national crisis that led to the Battle of Gettysburg lives, and it appears almost as urgent now as it did then. We live in a post-Charlottesville America, one where interpretations of history depend upon an individual’s biases. In these times, fully understanding American history is more important than ever before. The artist masterfully captures the national tension that modernity and the Civil Warera both share, and he shows how the lessons countless Americans died to teach us between 1861 and 1865 have been completely forgotten or perversely distorted. History, as Bradford demonstrates, is fluid, and its message depends entirely on the interpreter.
COURTESY hirshorn/JOSHUA WHITE
COURTESY hirshorn/Agata gravante
courtesy HIRSHORN/joshua white