Chicagomaroon111516 by The Chicago Maroon

NOVEMBER 15, 2016

THE INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO SINCE 1892

Admissions Paid Workers Months Late

VOL. 128, ISSUE 14

SG Hosts Title IX Coordinators

BY JAMIE EHRLICH

SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR

Some students who work in the Office of College Admissions did not receive payment from the University for a period of several months during fall quarter, according to two sources in the office who would only speak anonymously for fear of reprisal. A University spokesperson said in an e-mail last week that all issues were resolved, and some employees said they were satisfied with the efforts of their supervisors to resolve the delay. The spokesperson said that “technical difficulties” caused the delays and that all student will receive their full pay. T he University was also months late in issuing financial aid packages this year due to delays that the Office of College A id attributed to a new electronic system. The delays do not appear to be related: the admissions off ice says its technical issues were related to its electronic system for logging hours. The first student reported that he exper ienced a twomonth delay in getting paid for the hours he worked as a Student Visit Coordinator (SVC). The second student admissions worker, also an SVC, reported not getting paid for several weeks and called the issue “widespread.” One of the students estimated that the delays affected 30 –40 percent of student employees; the other estimated that around 50 percent of students working in admissions experienced delays. The first student employee said the delay made it harder to pay for food and rent. “ It might not be a lot to the school, but a lot of students need it to live,” the student wrote in an e-mail. The f irst student worker reported being paid on November 10, which was his first time being paid since the second week of fall quarter.

goes by cycles. After I’ve been in Chicago for about a year or so, I start yearning like “I need to go back to Spain. I need to go

The University’s Title I X coordinators updated Student G over n ment (S G) on thei r work so far this quarter at a General Assembly meeting on Monday. Title I X coordinator Sarah Wake and Deputy Title IX coordinator Shea Wolfe presented new prog rams within the University, such as a new mandatory training program for faculty and staff, enhanced in-person training for staff most likely to receive reports, and enhanced 10 hour/ year training for staff members on the University-wide disciplinary committee, which adjudicates reports of sexual misconduct. The Title I X office developed workshops for students and student organizations to learn more about support systems in place and resources available. A workshop has al ready ta ken place for Un iversity coaches, and athletes will be undergoing a comprehensive workshop in the coming weeks. T he workshops, held th ree times a quarter, are designed to encourage student groups— including, Wake said, Greek organizations—to participate. When asked about the disciplinary reports released last year and the seemingly minor warnings issued to accused assaulters, Wake emphasized a new 10-hour “enhanced mandatory training” for those who sit on the disciplinary panels. “I’m hopeful that we’ll see some different outcomes going forward,” she added. Resources from the Title IX office are now available on an enhanced UMatter site and a newly designed section of the Provost’s website. Wake expressed excitement at the increase of personnel in the Title IX office. They have hired a graduate student intern and Wolfe was hired in July. Wolfe will additionally be chairing a new student adviso-

Continued on page 5

Continued on page 4

Too Little, Too Late Page 7 Who ever thought it would be the Republicans calling for safe spaces where they can be free to express their ideas without name-calling or judgments?

Feng Ye The admissions offi ce paid some of its student employees months late due to technical diffi culties.

Uncommon: Sotomayor, CS Faculty and Campus Personality BY EMILY FEIGENBAUM ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR

T H E M A RO ON sat down with seni or lecturer in computer science and Overheard at UChicago personality Borja Sotomayor last Tuesday to discuss his experience as both a UChicago alumnus and current faculty member. Sotomayor recently published a satirical article critiquing the administration’s decision to organize diploma ceremonies by residence halls. C HICAGO M A ROON : Where are you from? Borja Sotomayor: I’m originally from Spain, specifically from Bilbao, which is a city in the north of Spain, in the Basque country region. But I’ve been living here in Chicago since 2004. I moved here for graduate school; I got my

Brooke Nagler

Ph.D. at the University of Chicago. I go back to Spain about once a year or so, but Chicago feels like home at this point. It’s funny because now…. It kind of

Diner chez nous: Campus Supper Club Serves Up

No. 11 Chicago Thrives at Home

Page 10

Page 16

Nous is a supper club started by third-year Alex Ye out of his apartment serving impressive food in a low-key setting.

Two games in two days didn’t faze the No. 11 women’s soccer team as they advanced to the Sweet 16.

Baroqueback Mountain: Purcell’s Fairy Queen Goes to Vegas Page 12 Las Vegas and the Baroque met in a wild adaptation of Henry Purcell’s “The Fairy Queen.”

Contributing to THE MA ROON

If you want to get involved in THE M AROON, please email apply@chicagomaroon.com or visit chicagomaroon.com/page/apply.

Excerpts from articles and comments published in T he Chicago Maroon may be duplicated and redistributed in other media and non-commercial publications without the prior consent of The Chicago Maroon so long as the redistributed article is not altered from the original without the consent of the Editorial Team. Commercial republication of material in The Chicago Maroon is prohibited without the consent of the Editorial Team or, in the case of reader comments, the author. All rights reserved. © The Chicago Maroon 2016

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

Frank Lloyd Wright Building in Kenwood Back on the Market BY EMILY FEIGENBAUM ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR

Three years after being listed for sale, architect Frank Lloyd Wright’s Isidore H. Heller House in Hyde Park is back on the market. T he Heller House was the f irst of Wright’s Hyde Park projects, constructed in 1897, five years after the establishment of UChicago. Located at 5132 South Woodlawn Avenue, six blocks from Wright’s Robie House, the residential property is recognized as an early example of Wright’s transition to the Prairie School architectural style. The residence was designated as a Chicago Landmark in 1971 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.

According to Zillow, the three-story home measures 6,100 square feet with seven bedrooms, four bathrooms, four fireplaces, an elevator, stained glass windows, and oak f loors. The house is situated on a narrow 75 x 165 foot lot and has a two-car garage. The Heller House has been bought and sold several times since its construction, most recently in September 20 04 for $1.8 million. According to Curbed Chicago, the residence was put up for sale for $2.5 million in January 2012 and spent 1,000 days on the market. The price was lowered by $75,000 before the listing was taken down. On November 10, the house was put back on the market for $2,425,000. Creative Commons license Frank Lloyd Wright’s Heller House is on sale in Kenwood.

President Commits to “Diversity and Inclusion” in Wake of Post-Election Events BY JAMIE EHRLICH SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR

The University President and the Provost sent a campus-wide e-mail Sunday afternoon reaffirming the University’s values of diversity, inclusion, and free speech following a string of racist events on campuses since the election of Donald J. Trump to the presidency. According to president Robert J. Zimmer and Provost Daniel Diermeier, the values of free expression and inclusion are not mutually exclusive. “Recent national events have generated waves of disturbing, exclusionary and sometimes threatening behavior around the country, particularly concerning gender and minority status,”

the e-mail reads. “As a result, many individuals are asking whether the nation and its institutions are entering a period in which supporting the values of diversity and inclusion, as well as free expression and open discourse, will be increasingly challenging. “We are writing to reaffirm in the strongest possible terms our unwavering commitment to these values, and to the importance of the University as a community acting on these values every day.” The Provost, president, and News Office were not immediately available for comment on which “recent national events” inspired the e-mail. The University entered the national spotlight in September following a

letter to incoming first-years warning them not to expect safe spaces or trigger warnings on campus. The letter also reaffirmed the University’s commitment to free speech. Zimmer additionally penned an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal addressing the attacks against free speech on college campuses. Now the University is reaffirming its commitment to diversity and inclusion in the wake of several incidents on college campuses across the country following Trump’s victory. A student at the Un iversity of Michigan, A nn A rbor was allegedly approached by a man who told her to remove her hijab or he would set her on fire. Several students at University of Pennsylvania were targeted in a rac-

ist GroupMe. “ Trump!” was graffitied on the door of a Muslim prayer room at New York University. At Canisius College, photos of a black doll hanging from a dormitory curtain rod surfaced— and was created into a meme with language about “Trump fans.” Both in the spring and in the fall, chalkings across the University of Chicago campus reading “ Trump 2016 ” sparked mini-controversies surrounding free speech on campus. On Wednesday following the election results, a “primal scream” was held in the center of the campus quad, where protesters lit Trump paraphernalia on fire. A “StopTrump Walkout and Rally,” coordinated by UChicago Student Action, is planned for Tuesday afternoon.

Professor Discusses Increase in Conspiracy Theories in the U.S. BY ALEXIS KIM MAROON CONTRIBUTOR

According to Miami University professor Timothy Melley, belief in conspiracy theories is on the rise in the United States. Melley, a professor of English and the director of the Miami University Humanities Center, led a discussion on Thursday in Swift Hall entitled Conspiracy Narrative and the Epistemology of Security Society. According to Melley, president-elect Donald Trump took advantage of the public’s mistrust of the government. Melley described Trump’s success as a reflection of widespread skepticism and fear of conspiracy. In two sentences, he summarized Trump’s message to the public: “Faced with a rigged system, as corrupt as that in any Hollywood thriller, there was only one way out. Trump would pour his personal fortune into the tireless work of reforming the corrupt public sphere, correcting injustice, and revealing conspiracy wherever it hid.” Melley further examined how a culture rife with conspiracy theories is possible in a democratic society: “On the one hand, modern liberal societies laud the ideals of the public spheres: transparency…openness, free speech… On the other, they are increasingly organized around the bio-political regulation of life, mitigation of threats to

public health and safety, and the restriction of liberties as a way of securing liberty itself.” This paradoxical relationship between maintaining security and maintaining bureaucratic transparency, he said, is what ultimately “provides fertile ground for conspiracy narratives and conspiracy thinking.” Melley said that citizens are aware that concealed information exists, but cannot know exactly what that information is. This affects the way people think and how they respond to knowledge given to them. “We are all aware of the things that we cannot be aware of. And that is a very strange and powerful thing to know and be obsessed with,” he said. According to Melley, the media is also responsible for the development of this paranoid culture. He referred to popular television shows, such as Scandal and House of Cards, as examples in media that portray the state as conspiratorial. He explained that such shows paint the state as a “god-like and technologically miraculous structure that’s both comforting and terrifying.” Melley closed by commenting once more on Trump’s contribution to the existing conspiracy culture in the nation. He stated that Trump’s use of conspiracy theories to generate panic and suspicion proved him to be a “rumormonger” whose actions were motivated by a “wounded narcissism.”

Ahona Mukherjee T he Chicago Ce nte r for Conte m por ar y T heor y hos t s T imot hy M e lley, Profe ssor of English and Director of the Humanities Center at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, in Swift Hall on Thursday, November 10.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

NEWS IN BRIEF Over Community Opposition, Target Receives Liquor License, With Restrictions BY EUGENIA KO MAROON CONTRIBUTOR

Pete Grieve Target will be able to fi ll these pointedly empty shelves following the city’s decision to allow Target to sell alchohol on a limited schedule.

The Target on 53rd Street will begin selling alcohol when it receives its fi rst shipment from its supplier. A city commissioner approved Target’s application for a limited liquor license Friday. Fourth Ward Alderman Sophia King’s office e-mailed community members Friday with a plan of operation. After objections to Target’s application for a liquor license from both King and community members from groups like the Nichols Park Advisory Council (NPAC), Target will be able to sell alcohol during restricted hours. Liquor will be available for purchase from noon to 10 p.m. Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Saturdays, and 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Sundays. The plan of operation prohibits Target from selling any liquor products that are

single-serving or cost less than $5. It also requires Target to work with the NPAC to help clean up Nichols Park. The revised plan is a result of a community meeting last Wednesday where community members and representatives of NPAC spoke to Target representatives and city liquor commissioner Maria Guerra Lapacek about their concerns. At the meeting, individuals raised concerns about Target’s proximity to Nichols Park and Murray Elementary School. “A lderman K ing is committed to ensuring our community interests are respected and broadly adhered to,” Seventh Ward Chief of Staff Keiana Barrett wrote in an e-mail to neighborhood residents. “Therefore, we invite you to continue to engage our office, in an effort to establish a healthy co-existence with Target and all other stakeholders.”

Students Plan Walk-Out, Protest on Quad in Protest of President-Elect Trump BY EMILY FEIGENBAUM ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR

A coalition of student activists that supported Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primary has organized an anti-Trump walk-out and rally on Tuesday. At 3 p.m., UChicago Student Action (UCSA) will protest the election of Donald Trump on the main quad. Student Action, the umbrella organization of UCSA, is organizing this event on 11

additional campuses, five of which are in Illinois. “This election has brought out a terrifying sentiment in a good portion of our population,” the event description reads. “Trump’s rhetoric has emboldened white supremacists and bigots and they’re already making it clear they won’t be staying in the shadows. But we have to hold onto the hope we held for a moment in the Sanders campaign. A self-proclaimed democratic socialist won more than 13

Former Top Admin Takes Position at Prestigious Dallas All-Girls’ School

million votes in the Democratic primary, with promises of tuition free college and single-payer healthcare. If we preserve this vision and fight for it, we can forge the multi-racial grassroots movement we need to create a world where all of us can thrive.” According to the Facebook event, those who are outraged by “the surge in hateful violence and racist abuse sparked by Trump’s victory” are encouraged to walk out of their classes and

In a Variety of Venues, Professors, Others Respond to Trump

BY OLIVIA ROSENZWEIG

BY ANJALI DHILLON

ASSOCIATE NEWS EDITOR

A former top administrator has taken a position at an all-girls’ prep school in Dallas, TX. The Hockaday School announced Thursday that K aren Warren Coleman, former vice president for campus life and student services, will become its head of school on July 1, 2017. Coleman announced in May that she would step down from her position at the University at the end of the last academic year. Michele Rasmussen, dean of students, became head of the Campus and Student Life (CSL) office following her departure. “[Coleman] implemented programs and services at the University of Chicago that supported a diverse and inclusive campus community and offered opportunities to help create a sense of belonging for all members of that community,” the Hockaday School’s announcement read. She will become the 13th head of the Hockaday School since its founding in 1913. “Karen was the most important person in helping me interact with stu-

Several University professors and organizations have responded to Tuesday’s presidential election of Donald Trump. In a Financial Times article, Douglas Skinner, dean of the Booth School of Business, is reported to be unsettled by the prospect of immigration control, but he is “cautiously optimistic” about Trump’s presidency. Skinner suggested that in the unlikely chance that job opportunities decrease and the economy suffers, the domestic demand for M.B.A.s will increase. Law School professor Eric Posner published an op-ed in The New York Times, in which he discussed the “immense but not unlimited power” that Trump will hold with the Republican House and Senate majorities. However, Posner also identified a few barriers the Trump administration will face, such as possible fi libusters in the Senate, Obama-appointed judges in federal courts, federal bureaucracy, and the media. Geoffrey R. Stone, a Levi Distinguished Service Professor at the Law School, discussed the election and the future of constitutional law in a Huffington Post article. Stone wrote that he

caption caption

Courtesy University of Chicago

dents. I depended on her to understand what was going on with them and to deal with people on a one-on-one basis. She is gracious, calm, and always extremely professional,” University of Chicago president Robert J. Zimmer told the Hockaday School.

join the demonstration. UCSA’s campaigns are organizing for a $15 per hour minimum wage, divestment from fossil fuels, and tuition-free higher education. The demonstration coincides with a “day of action” against the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. “[Come] to send a message to Obama and Trump that UChicago stands with Standing Rock,” organizer Christina Uzzo wrote to a UCSA e-mail group.

is not looking forward to a conservative Supreme Court if any of the older justices vacate their seats. Beyond University professors, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the AAUP Collective Bargaining Congress labor union responded to the election in a public statement published on Wednesday. The statement noted Trump’s unpopularity among college and university faculty members and criticized his divisive rhetoric that jeopardizes the safe exchange of ideas. The statement reads, “Many no doubt fear that his election threatens some of the core institutions of our democracy and may be the greatest threat to academic freedom since the McCarthy period.” A AUP pledged its efforts to oppose privatization of public higher education, discrimination and silencing in the educational environment, attacks on labor unions and faculty economic security, and the infringement of academic freedom. In addition, some professors have granted students assignment extensions and postponement of midterms in the week following Trump’s election, as seen on an Overheard at UChicago thread on Facebook.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

BLM Activist Mckesson Addresses College Republicans BY LAUREN PANKIN MAROON CONTRIBUTOR

College Republicans (CR) hosted a discussion Monday night with prominent Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson. Mckesson, a fellow at the Institute of Politics (IOP), answered questions from a politically mixed crowd of 30 University students. He said this is the first time he has spoken to a chapter of CR. CR president Matthew Foldi kicked off the Q&A session by asking, “What do you view as the future of working together with Republicans? Are there things we can agree on?” Mckesson said that building coalitions based on shared interests and identities will be important for both liberals and conservatives in the years to come. He said that people on both ends of the political spectrum tend to agree that police should not “wantonly” kill civilians—an issue which catalyzed Mckesson’s activism during the 2015 St. Louis and Baltimore protests. Mckesson said many differences in opinion result from misinformation. He said that the popular belief that there is a correlation between violence in cities and police violence is not supported by data.

Police killings of civilians are not officially counted because the government receives its data exclusively from newspaper reports, Mckesson said. FBI Director James Comey has said that starting in 2017, the federal government will begin to collect data independently, with the first data analysis due in 2019. The latter half of the discussion focused on Mckesson’s thoughts about Donald Trump and the ramifications of his election. “I don’t blame the Republicans for Trump,” Mckesson said. “I blame a lot of people for enabling him, from the Left and the Right. I think about Trump and conservatives as very different things.” Mckesson then addressed Trump’s most immediate task: selecting top White House aides and Cabinet members. He said he “understands” Reince Priebus as the pick for Chief of Staff, but that he is alarmed by the prospect of “creationist” Ben Carson becoming Secretary of Education. Mckesson said that Trump has a responsibility to “temper” racist attitudes, and that appointing Stephen Bannon, who is “crazier than Karl Rove,” as chief strategist would belie this duty. “What do you expect to see from the Left going forward? What do you hope to see?” second-year student Santa Ruiz asked.

Evangeline Reid A Trump/Pence fl ag burning at the “Primal Scream” event on the quad Tuesday night.

Courtesy Matthew Foldi Attendees of the College Republican event pose with Mckesson.

Mckesson said the Democratic Party needs to figure out why 40 million voters stayed at home on Election Day and continue to rely on celebrity engagement as a tool to inspire young voters. The party also faces the threat of “implosion” as it tries to unify members with beliefs ranging from big government proponents to anarchists, he said. “The Left has a tendency to eat itself,” Mckesson said.

This was the last University event for Mckesson, who returns to his position as Chief of Human Capital for the Baltimore Public Schools today. “It is important that we talk to each other instead of siloing ourselves off from different perspectives and defriending people with different ideas,” Foldi said. “This is an important learning experience for all of us, regardless of political affiliation.”

Workers Have Been Paid After Delays, and Some Say They Appreciate Efforts on Their Behalf Continued from front page

On September 25, in an e-mail obtained by T HE M A ROON , admissions of-

ficer Colleen Belak instructed students experiencing trouble with UChicago Time —the program associated with

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the techn ical d i f f iculties — to keep track of their hours manually. T H E M A R O ON obtained an e-mail sent from Belak to admissions workers Monday notifying them that “ T HE M A ROON has elected to write a story on [the UChicago Time] issue.” Belak directed her employees to talk to her if they have concerns with UChicago Time. University Spokesperson Marielle Sainvilus confirmed Monday evening that the admissions office experienced technical difficulties specifically with UChicago Time. “We are looking into the situation so we can address the issues with the system,” she wrote. The second student said there was administrative turnover within the office that could have caused the delays. Sarah Idzik, formerly the primary point of contact for UChicago Time errors, recruitment, and general development for the SVC program left the office for graduate school this past summer, leaving Belak and Christina Rivers to oversee the program. “[Belak] and [Rivers] tried to be proactive in addressing the problem, but unfortunately myself and many other students were denied access to UChicago Time,” the second student said. Sainvilus did not list understaffing or turnover as a reason for the delays. While they waited to get paid, many students filled out manual time-cards to log their hours. Illinois law requires that wages for employees with bi-weekly pay periods be paid within 13 days of the end of that pay period. The damages paid to employees would be, in this case, negligible, should an employee file a successful claim. T he University d id not add ress whether or not severances or fines will be levied, and no employee indicated to T HE M A ROON that they planned to file a claim with the Illinois Department of Labor. The Chair of the Student Government Committee on Student Employ-

ment (C SE ) a nd g raduate student Claudio Sansone said that the admissions delays are particularly egregious because they only impacted students who are less able to advocate for themselves compared to full staff. “ The CSE is collecting information on this and related issues like late Financial Aid announcements and late payment of stipends. We find this issue particularly reprehensible because it seems to have affected students only, and not faculty or administrative staff, which compounds our apprehensions that system-wide negligence is affecting precisely those employees who are least able to leverage the administration and that the University as a whole ought to safeguard the most,” he said. The University did not respond for requests for comment on whether or not full staff was paid on time. Accord ing to Sainv ilus, the admissions office has been in constant contact with the affected students, and worked with them to resolve any issues. “We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused,” she said. A few student employees praised admissions’ management in the wake of the mishap. “I experienced the delay for a few weeks but my bosses were really helpful in making sure the payment system ended up working,” Zander Cowan, second-year admissions employee, said. “I really got the impression Christina and Colleen were doing their best to stay on top of it,” the second student admissions employee told T HE M A ROON. “ They’d e-mail and check that issues had been sorted out, they’d posted a Google Form to log errors, etc.” The Office of College A id experienced similar technical diff iculties this year, causing some financial aid packages to be four or five weeks late, which the office also attributed to technical difficulties.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

T-Shirts, Diplomas, and Overheard at UChicago Continued from front page

back to the people and the food and everything.” And once I’m there for a couple of weeks, I’m like, “I miss Chicago, I want to go back.” CM: I have to ask: last week the administration announced that diploma ceremonies would be organized by residence hall. You responded with a satirical essay on Medium, writing that “dividing the ceremony by dorms is a clueless and ham-fisted solution” and that it should be organized by academic divisions instead, if it were to be restructured. Why do you think the administration made this decision, and do you think the diploma ceremony will ever be organized by division? BS: I can’t speculate about their actual motives, but the way it seems, from the outside looking in, is that there’s sort of been this push to build up house culture at the University, which I actually think is a very reasonable goal. If they want to build up a greater sense of community,

I don’t think the fact that I suddenly became an instructor now precludes me from participating in those kind of forums.

a greater sense of pride in your house, your dorm, et cetera, I think that that’s great, but they’re taking a hatchet at it instead of a scalpel. CM: Okay, let’s go back to you. When did you fi rst become interested in computer science? BS: I’ve been interested in computers since I was a little kid, and so far back that I can’t even remember when exactly. I always liked tinkering with computers; I probably must have been nine or 10 years old when I got my fi rst computer. My parents bought me a computer, I had some relatives who bought me books on using computers, programming computers, and stuff like that. I really took to it. It sort of developed into “Okay, I really want to study this, I really want to go to school for this.” The aspect I most

enjoyed about it was the problem solving. I usually tell students in programming classes I feel like I have the kind of job, the kind of skill set, where I get to work on solving puzzles all day and I get paid for it. I’ve talked to a lot of programmers, software developers, et cetera, and that’s the way that they describe it. They sort of say “I’m moving from one puzzle to another.” And it’s fun, it’s legitimately fun. It actually feels like a really fun thing to do. But it’s one of those things where it was very clear from an early age that “Okay, this is what I’m going to study. There’s no debate.” CM: Do you remember what model your fi rst computer was? BS: Yes, my fi rst computer was a Sinclair Spectrum +3. It was a computer model that was actually fairly popular in Europe, it wasn’t well-known here in the U.S., and it’s an odd kind of computer because when you look at it, it looks like it’s just a keyboard and it has a disc drive attached to it. That was actually considered really fancy at the time, because the Sinclair Spectrum models that most people had would actually load programs and games from audio cassettes. So you actually had to load an audio cassette and wait 20 minutes for it to play and load up. I had discs and those would load really fast so friends would come to my place because they would say “Oh, we don’t have to wait for the game to load if we’re just loading it from a disc.” But that computer actually allowed you to do some programming. You could enter an interface where you could actually write your own programs. An aunt of mine who was really into technology at the time —this is like mid to late ’80s—gave me a book on programming so I was like “Oh, I’ll just play around with this.” So I sort of learned the basic concepts of programming that way. The next computer we had was a traditional PC, and year after year more powerful PCs. But the fi rst one was the Sinclair Spectrum. CM: You are very active on Overheard at UChicago, both as someone who posts and someone who is often posted about. What is it like to be a professor involved in the online culture of the student body? BS: I joined Facebook in 2005, when I was still a student, and me being active on social media just carried over when I became an instructor.

I don’t believe that there necessarily needs to be a huge barrier or wall between the students and the faculty. Actually one of the things I really like about UChicago is the faculty, by and large, is happy to help students, is always happy to provide individual attention, et cetera. I think it’s actually one of the legitimately really great things about the University of Chicago. I don’t think the fact that I suddenly became an instructor now precludes me from participating in those kind of forums. I’m not as active as many students might be in that group, and there are defi nitely times when I will overhear something and I’ll bite my tongue like “Uh, I better not write this.” Also, I got into Overheard when it really was about overhearing things. The spirit of the group was very lighthearted and comedic in nature. Now there’s obviously still a lot of that, but occasionally you’ll get these huge dumpster fi res on Overheard. When that happens, I’m like “I want no part of this. I was just here to read funny shit.” It does, however, feel like an out of body experience when someone posts about me because you sort of feel like “Oh, I was there…I know that happened!” CM: In addition to being a celebrity on Overheard, you’re also well-known for your signature quirky t-shirts. This question comes in two parts. First, how many odd t-shirts do you own? Second, which is your favorite one? BS: I think about a year ago, I was at one of these events that the alumni offi ce runs called Dinner with 12 Ma-

I probably have maybe 50 or so?” Then I went home, and said, “Oh, how many do I have?” I counted all of them, and it turns out I had 125. CM: One hundred and twenty-five? BS: Yes, I mean they’ve been accumu-

Now there’s obviously still a lot of that, but occasionally you’ll get these huge dumpster fires on Overheard. When that happens, I’m like “I want no part of this. I was just here to read funny shit.” lating over the years and I’ve also had to retire many of them because at a certain point you just can’t keep on using them. I remember taking two big boxes full of t-shirts to the Brown Elephant [a Chicago thrift store] a while back and thinking “Man, I hope whoever ends up buying these actually likes geeky shirts.” I don’t think that I have a single favorite one, but I think the ones that I particularly like are the ones that require the understanding of one or more fandoms to actually get because then if someone reacts to them and actually gets them, you’re like, “Oh yeah, you get what’s going on here.” CM: Are you referring to a specific shirt?

Then I went home, and said, “Oh, how many do I have?”I counted all of them, and it turns out I had 125.

roons. They get some current students, some alums, a faculty member, and you get together for dinner. Someone at the time asked me “How many t-shirts do you have?” I sort of realized “Oh, I don’t know.” I eyeballed it and said “I guess

BS: So, for example, I have this one shirt that manages to be both a reference to Battlestar Galactica and Twilight at the same time. Someone will see it and say, “Oh, that’s a Twilight reference, but I don’t recognize the guy.” It has Edward James Olmos on the T-shirt, “But I don’t recognize that guy.” Or someone will say, “Hey, that’s Battlestar Galactica,” but they won’t get there’s a Twilight reference there. When someone gets both, I’m like, “Yessssss.” For a longer version of this interview, which touches on Sotomayor’s path to teaching, the new home of the CS department and why he’s asked people to raise money for charities providing services to the LGBTQ+ community on his birthday.

SG Also Passes Amended Bylaws, Makes E&R Year-Round Continued from front page

ry board to address sexual misconduct and assess current University resources. Wolfe said the advisory board was seated Monday. The presentation from the Title IX advisers was followed by updates from the executive committee. The executive slate informed the body of an upcoming meeting with University president Robert Zimmer, an all-campus e-mail, a sustainabili-

ty town hall, and an “identity week” in the spring featuring cultural- and identity-based organizations. Following the executive slate’s presentation, the body voted in a series of bylaw changes, which made Elections & Rules a year-round committee and also safeguarded funding code integrity. Additionally, the bylaws were amended to allow College and Graduate C ouncil to make the decision to send liaisons to the other council.

Eva I Title IX coordinator Sarah Wake (right) and Deputy Title IX coordinator Shea Wolfe (left) addressed SG at Monday’s Assembly meeting.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

Thousands Demonstrate Against Donald Trump Downtown On November 12, University of Chicago students joined protestors who gathered at Millenium Park and then marched down Chicago streets, passing by Trump Tower on the way.

Feng Ye

Samuela Mouzaoir

Feng Ye

Samuela Mouzaoir

Feny Ye

Samuela Mouzaoir

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

VIEWPOINTS Letter: UChicago Students Cannot Forget the Communities Obama’s Presidential Library Will Affect the Most For better or for worse, the Obama presidential library is poised to transform the neighborhoods that surround the University of Chicago. Construction alone will pour $500 million into 21 acres of Jackson Park, and a University-commissioned study purports that the whole project will create 1,900 permanent jobs and an annual economic impact of $220 million. But what this will mean for residents of the South Side remains to be seen. On May 12, 2015, in a campus-wide e-mail, President Robert Zimmer assured us that “a faculty committee concluded that bringing the presidential library to one of our neighboring South Side communities would benefit the University and those communities.” And just last month, here in THE M AROON, Peter Draper and Jake Bittle exhorted us to be skeptical of the library backers’ intentions. Indeed, it’s hard to take Zimmer’s assertion at face value, not only because of the University’s history of intervention in the South Side, but also because the word “community” is fraught with racial and political tension. Since this part of the South Side has a long history of inequality and social strife, it’s worth asking exactly who or what Zimmer is talking about when he says “neighboring South Side communities.” Where are we, the students, amid “the University” and “those communities”? It’s not always clear what we even mean when we use the word “community.” Around campus, we often say “community” to refer to the people who live around the University but whom we don’t see as part of it—even if they are subjected to its policing, attend its charter schools, ride the CTA routes it subsidizes, and rely on

its hospital. Susan Sher, a senior advisor to President Zimmer and former Chief of Staff to Michelle Obama, uses the word “community” in this way when she gives perfunctory soundbites like “We look forward to hearing further community input.” That use of the term is often hard to distinguish from cases where “the community” is a euphemism specifically for black South Siders, like in last year’s leaked Alpha Epsilon Pi emails that referred to black people as “community members.” In contrast, sometimes the word is used to describe a small of group of local elites whom University administrators have decided are the legitimate voice of “the community”—like the University’s hand-picked Community Advisory Board for the Obama Presidential Library, which consists mostly of people with titles like “President,” “CEO,” or “President and CEO.” This ambiguity, underscored by the University’s having led the effort to bring the Obama library to Jackson Park, should give us pause. It’s easy to forget, but the history of UChicago-led development efforts in Hyde Park, Woodlawn, and Washington Park is instructive—and disturbing. As historian and UChicago alum Rick Perlstein reminded us last year in The Baffler, “exercising dominion over wider and wider swaths of Chicago’s South Side has been the U of C’s operating principle since the middle of the twentieth century.” According to Arnold Hirsch’s book, Making the Second Ghetto: Race and Housing in Chicago 1940–1960, in 1958, Chicago’s City Council approved an “urban renewal plan” crafted and promoted by the University of Chicago that authorized the clearing of 105.8 acres of land in

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Hyde Park, which would displace over 4,000 families (Hirsch 161), 60 percent of whom were black (169). In 1997, the University and Bishop Arthur Brazier of Woodlawn’s Apostolic Church of God successfully pressured the CTA to tear down the segment of the Green Line that used to run above 63rd Street from Cottage Grove to Dorchester. Shortly afterward, nearly all of the businesses along 63rd Street closed, vacating lots that remain barren today. More recently, the University has evicted small businesses owned by people of color on 53rd Street, and it has spent over $18 million buying property near the intersection of Garfield Boulevard and King Drive, which led to the shuttering of the area’s only grocery store. Given this history of discriminatory and destructive “urban renewal,” it’s hard not to wonder if the University’s bid for the Obama Library will similarly “benefit” those communities. Unsurprisingly, residents of the South Side are organizing to ensure that the Obama library actually benefits the people who live in surrounding neighborhoods. A campaign led by Southside Together Organizing for Power (STOP), the Kenwood-Oakland Community

Organization (KOCO), and the Bronzeville Regional Collective (BRC) is now underway to demand that the Obama Foundation, President Zimmer, and Mayor Rahm Emanuel sign a community benefits agreement (CBA). Such an agreement would, among other things, guarantee that the plan to develop the library will create jobs for working-class people of color, support black-owned businesses, preserve affordable housing, and improve public transportation. Over 500 people have participated in town hall meetings to produce the specific objectives of the CBA. Nevertheless, in an astonishing display of historical, political, ethical, and cognitive dissonance, Obama Foundation President Marty Nesbitt opposes a community benefits agreement, yet insists unironically that “this presidential center is for the community.” If the library is to be for “the community,” the community must have the power to determine how the library will affect their lives, in a negotiated, legally-binding agreement. The University, the City, and the Obama Foundation cannot be expected to cede this power voluntarily—so people are going to have to organize to claim it. Winning concessions from be-

hemoths like the University and the city is always a tall order, and our neighbors deserve our support. That’s why students are organizing, too: The Prayer and Action Collective (PAC), a group of UChicago students, works in solidarity with the CBA coalition. After all, too rarely do we students discuss “the community” as including ourselves. But when students listen to and speak up for our neighbors, change is possible. Recent history proves as much. For instance, UChicago students supported residents of public housing who were fighting displacement when the Grove Parc public housing project was facing foreclosure. More recently, with support from student allies, young black organizers from organizations now leading the CBA coalition successfully pushed the UChicago Medical Center to build an adult Level I trauma center. These victories demonstrate what can be accomplished when we students broaden our understanding of “community” to include ourselves and begin to live and work in community with our neighbors. William Thomas is a fourthyear in the College majoring in mathematics.

Too Little, Too Late Trump Supporters Asking for Understanding Forget How They’ve Treated Minorities BY SARAH ZIMMERMAN VIEWPOINTS EDITOR

A recent viral blog post argues that it’s not right that millennial Republicans on liberal campuses “need to hide or downplay our satisfaction over our victory because of the fear that our opposing peers will label us.” Like many conservatives post-election, the writer feels as though she can’t express herself without being labeled as a sexist, bigot, or racist. These insults, she claims, force her to remain silent; she is afraid to express herself. “[Republicans] should feel safe in expressing their joy and optimism for the future of this country without the fear of being ostracized,” she writes. With over 10,000 Facebook shares, it’s clear that her post has resonated with Trump supporters across the country. The prevailing narrative after the election is that liberals have lived in a bubble, heartlessly detached from the concerns of white, rural, and blue-collar voters. Many have called for “peace and understanding,” arguing that we must engage in civil dialogue if we want to

move forward as a country. Conservatives are asking for their side to be heard, claiming that they are not racist or homophobic just because they voted Trump. Instead, they say, they were voting for economic prosperity and a more hardline stance against ISIS. These Trump supporters argue that liberals merely need to accept that the will of the majority has spoken; maybe, if Clinton supporters just worked hard enough to understand the other side, America could actually prosper under a Trump presidency. This rhetoric highlights the truly otherworldly dimension we have entered since the election. Who ever thought it would be the Republicans calling for safe spaces where they can be free to express their ideas without name-calling or judgments? Isn’t it ironic that right-wingers are asking to not be ostracized based on their identity or political affi liation? It reflects an astounding level of ignorance in these Trump supporters that they plead for acceptance and understanding after years of bashing and silencing minorities and their allies for demanding the same thing.

What kind of collective amnesia must have taken place for so many conservatives to forget how they have treated minorities? How they have consistently sided with a corrupt and racist police force that has shot down hundreds of black men and women in cold blood? How they have told Mexicans and Muslims that they don’t belong and should go back to where they came from? How they have treated the transgender community—refusing to accept their gender identity and insisting that they will poison children’s minds simply by using the bathroom? Of course, as this election’s 17-candidate Republican primary demonstrated, Republicans are hardly an ideologically unified group. Not all Republicans can be accused of adhering to all of these beliefs, but these issues nevertheless reflect a general apathy to the concerns of minorities. When minorities asked for basic sympathy, Republicans ignored their wishes. There was no acceptance. There was no reaching across party lines to try and understand a point of view different from their own. For Republicans to claim that they are Continued on page 8

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

No Reason to Come Together Continued from page 7 now the marginalized, simply because people have rightfully accused them of racism and bigotry, is the incarnate of privilege. The lives of Trump supporters are not at stake. They don’t stand to lose their rights, to lose their health care, to be deported, to be placed on a national registry because they are seen as dangerous individuals in the eyes of the government. If anything, Republicans’ blubbering and calls for peace show that they’re not equipped to handle opinions that differ from their own. By calling for peace and understanding, they are making the conversation about themselves, and silencing minorities and their rightful grievances in the process. Arguing that liberals should accept Trump because “the will of the people” elected him implicitly ignores all of the injustices minorities have had to face and will continue to face under a Trump presidency. They beg liberals for understanding while making absolutely no effort to understand any of the harsh

realities a Trump presidency will entail for a large portion of the nation. Why should we work with you? Why should we even try and understand your point of view when it’s blatantly clear you have no interest in understanding ours? Of course liberals will want to collectively mobilize, protest, and even block Trump supporters on Facebook. Conservatives have ignored us for so long, and complaining about the righteous backlash only proves that they have no intention of working with the progressive agenda and accommodating minorities. Only when the right shows a willingness to understand the other side and work toward compromise can progress be made. But, if conservatives are only asking to be understood so they can continue to espouse their bigoted rhetoric without fear of backlash, then there is little hope for a unified America. Sarah Zimmerman is a fourth-year in the College majoring in English and a Viewpoints Editor.

Sarah Komanapalli

Letter: UChicago Has a Moral Obligation to Stand Up to Trump Now that our government will be controlled by a lying, bigoted supervillain, it falls to private institutions to defend truth, justice, and the American way. Universities have a certain amount of power in society that they must use in this truly exceptional case. I n genera l , u n iversities bill themselves as apolitical, partly out of fairness to their students and partly to avoid attacks that they are private

islands for the “liberal elite.” This case is different, though: The threat of Trump’s presidency is not its conservatism but its hostility to dissent, diversity, and even reason itself. If we cannot be roused to defend these crumbling pillars, it is our own house that will fall. Over the last year and a half, Trump has proven himself hostile to science and fact, to Middle Eastern and Latin American cultures, to women,

Sarah Larson

and to LGBTQ+ and disabled individuals. Shall we welcome students from these g roups into our midst without speaking out against their oppression? Shall I teach my students the importance of thoughtful, civil discourse and the pursuit of evidence-based conclusions, and will we as an institution say nothing about the collapse of such discourse without? Universities must oppose Trump not because he is conser vative but because he is anti-liberal, as in the phrase “liberal education.” Immediately after the election, even the politicians most critical of Trump began to push for unity and collaboration. We, as universities, cannot collaborate in the destruction of our own values. As the tide of irrationality rises, universities will become liberal islands whether we accept the epithet or not; if we do not, we will not deserve it. In August, President Zimmer bravely spoke out to protect the freedom of speech in education, writing in The Wall Street Journal, “the process of questioning demands an ability to rethink one’s own assumptions, often the most difficult task of all… Essential to this process is an environment that promotes free expression a nd the open exch a nge of ideas, ensuring that difficult questions are asked and that diverse and challenging perspectives are considered. This underscores the importance of diversity among students, faculty and visitors—diversity of background, belief and experience. Without this, students’ experience becomes a weak imitation of a true education, and the value of that education is seriously diminished.”

At that time, Zimmer compared the current suppressions of speech by students to past suppressions not from within the university, but from society at large. He wrote, “we have seen efforts to suppress discussion of Charles Darwin’s work, to insist upon particular political perspectives during the McCarthy era, to impose exclusiona r y acts of racia l and religious discrimination, a nd t o dema nd compl ia nce with various forms of “moral” behavior. The silencing being advocated today is equally as problematic. Every attempt to leg itimize silencing creates justification for others to restrain speech that they do not like in the future.” We don’t know exactly what the Trump administration will do, but we have abundant evidence—his attempted intimidations of reporters and his pr oposed ba n on Musl i ms, for example —that the freedoms guaranteed by the First A mendment a re in danger, and therefore that liberal education is in danger as well. If we would stand up for Darwin, against McCarthy, we must stand up now; we cannot afford a wait-and-see policy. I was pleased to receive President Zimmer’s message to the University community this weekend reaffirming his commitment to the values he espoused in The Wall Street Journal. I now urge him to put for wa rd some concrete steps this university can take to become an early leader in the fight against Trump’s illiberalism. In President Zimmer’s own words, we need to “demand more of ourselves as a community, and together be forthright and bold in demon-

strating what our community aspires to be.” In that spirit, our immediate priority must be to decide on commitments we can make as an institution. For example: 1. Publicly and officially condemning the threat Trump poses t o F i rst A mend ment freedoms, science, and civil discourse. 2 . Suppor ti ng publ ic schools (primary, secondary, and tertiary), including afterschool programs, and defending science curricula that teach evolution. 3. Supporting public libraries, museums, and institutions of reason that stand to lose federal funding. 4. Supporting free and independent journalism. 5. D ivesti ng f rom fossi l fuel companies that deny climate change. T hese companies are anti-science, and we are pro-science; one of their CEOs or lobbyists will be the next Energ y Secretar y and will hasten the calamities of climate change. As an institution of science, we must make the clear statement that this is unacceptable. I hope that other universities will follow suit if we implement these and similar strategies, but in any case it is our obligation to mount whatever defenses we can in preparation for —and not in reaction to—the dangers to come. This university has grown and transformed under President Zimmer’s leadership; how he translates principle into action will determine whether history judges our institution heroic. Ni ch ol a s B ellin son i s a third-year Ph.D. student in the Committee on Social Thought.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

Read It and Weep Even With Pleasure Reading on the Decline, We Cannot Forget the Immeasurable Benefits of Literature

Natalie Denby On October 13, the world was rattled by two revelations. Bob Dylan was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, and we received official confirmation that the members of the Nobel Literature Committee probably don’t read books. This was an unprecedented decision, given that the Nobel Prize in Literature has historically (and obviously) been awarded to authors. It might have been a tragic moment. But it became funny when Dylan failed to respond for weeks and was deemed “impolite and arrogant” by aggrieved Swedes, who were somehow still suffering from the delusion that the Nobel Prize in Literature is worthy of effusive thanks. Put aside for a minute the arrogance of a committee that demands praise for bestowing book awards on musicians. Put aside the fact that Nobel Committee ended a 25-year streak of not acknowledging American authors to honor Bob Dylan, of all people. After all, the slight isn’t exactly new: Mark Twain, Henry James, Don DeLillo, Thomas Pynchon, John Updike, David Foster Wallace, and Kurt Vonnegut are just a few American giants snubbed by the Nobel committee. It would appear as though the Nobel Prize for Literature generally acknowledges excellence by ignoring it. What really boggles the mind is how unsurprised we all are by the Dylan fi asco. Shouldn’t we be more shocked? Shouldn’t we care? Does anyone worry about the future of reading––or is fret-

ting over it now sort of like slapping a band-aid on a cold corpse? Maybe Dylan is indeed a worthy recipient of such a prize in an era in which pleasure readers sometimes seem like members of an endangered species. Even here, at an elite university, pleasure reading is a chimera. Who has the time to read for fun? Ask students the last great book they read of their own volition, and you’re likely to discover that they haven’t, not since high school. Ask students what their favorite novels are, and you’re bound to assemble the standard curriculum of AP English. These books certainly belong in the pantheon of great literature, but it reflects a certain lack of intellectual curiosity that students only read novels when forced. But you probably shouldn’t bother with these questions at all. Conversations about pleasure reading usually end with both parties feeling guilty and depressed. If you’ve got a heavy course load, pleasure reading is unlikely to be your top priority. But even while classes here often feel suffocating, you are unlikely to have substantially more free time after graduation. One of the basic points of a college education is gainful employment. And with gainful employment comes a workload that will probably be heavier than college. So if you’re too busy to read today, you sure as hell won’t be reading much five years from now. But, in all likelihood, you ar-

en’t actually too busy to read. I can’t count the number of times I’ve found people staring blankly at walls in dorm lounges for want of work, or complaining about how bored they are. How many comatose dorm mates do we have to stumble upon at house tables and on Reg couches to realize that free time isn’t really that scarce? It certainly isn’t scarce enough to justify how little we read. Our insistence that we don’t have the time for even one measly novel is more a testament to a culture of competitive complaining than it is an accurate reflection of the average student schedule. What we mean to say is that we don’t have the impetus to pleasure read anymore. Pleasure reading is a leisure activity of last resort. But it’s not like anyone expects you to pleasure read an organic chemistry textbook. We’re talking about novels. The good ones aren’t a chore. It would be premature to declare the death of pleasure reading, but its importance in our culture has been drastically reduced. We have access to thousands of leisure options, all readily available and entertaining. And books, for all of their cognitive benefits and edification, require work. The world of YouTube videos, Game of Thrones, and Pokémon Go has little room to spare for Pynchon or Dickens. This isn’t to disparage the novel features of modern culture. TVs, video games, and other entertainment outlets don’t have to be a death knell for pleasure reading. But that’s what we’ve turned them into. While the state of the world might markedly improve if we all read Gravity’s Rainbow right

Peng-Peng Liu

now, the unfortunate reality is that the fight to save reading may have already been lost. A quarter of Americans haven’t read any books in the past 12 months. The Americans who do read read abundantly, but their ranks shrink with each passing year. When the world’s most “prestigious” literary award is given to a singer, it becomes obvious that the threat to literature is a global one. When that singer’s last public controversy involved a bizarre cameo in a Victoria’s Secret commercial, it may feel like it’s time to give up on literary culture altogether. Despite all evidence seem-

ingly suggesting otherwise, there may still be hope. We live on a campus replete with libraries and excellent bookstores. With Kindles and iPads everywhere, it’s easier than ever to acquire a good book. And with acclaimed books dotting the curricula of our Core classes, it’s next to impossible to forget the benefits of reading. So pick up a book. There are better authors out there than Bob Dylan, no matter what the Nobel Committee says. Natalie Denby is a second-year in the College majoring in public policy.

Director’s Cut: A Comedy of Errors Take Two

Zoe Kaiser

Left: Isaiah Newman’s set design featured puns on Shakespeare’s other plays; Top: A panopoly of off-beat characters join in a performance that was surreal but deeply human. Bottom: Kane, Grant-Funck, and Tempest Wisdom as Antipholus.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

ARTS Diner chez nous: Campus Supper Club Serves Up Unpretentious Flair BY NATALIE PASQUINELLI ARTS STAFF

If you’ve heard of supper clubs, you’ve probably heard stories of famous chefs, high society, and secret underground locations— or at least that’s all I knew of them before eating at Nous last weekend. A supper club is a restaurant that isn’t in a restaurant: attendees pay a certain amount of money, meet at a designated location, and share a meal with a group of strangers. Nous, started by third-year Alex Ye, is all of these things, but without the notorious grandeur. Ye started Nous after a photographer from Bite, a University food publication, mentioned she would be willing to pay for the food he cooked. “Once my roommate Cristian and I agreed, Nous began its small, word-by-mouth service, serving 4 people dinner every Saturday in my cramped apartment,” Ye wrote in an e-mail. Last weekend, and nearly a year after its creation, I attended a Nous dinner with a group of eight strangers. If the idea of a supper club sounds intimidating, rest assured that Nous knows its audience. The location was a typical student apartment (we even took our shoes off at the door), and the atmosphere was unassuming and casual. Ye’s vision for Nous reflects its unpretentious nature: “It’s about cool people enjoying good food,” he said. Though the vision is modest, the execution was impressive. The Nous team consisted of a dozen or so people, all buzzing around the apartment, greeting, seating, cooking, and serving. The group was extremely organized, guiding one group of diners to the dinner table as soon as the last had finished, but also responsive—when running behind schedule they were sure to keep us updated. Not to mention the food—crispy pork belly on sourdough, adorned with

kimchi—all delicious and made in-house. Certainly, Ye and his team are stretching apartment cooking to its limits, offering two experiences in one: the ease and speed of a restaurant with the integrity and dedication of a home-cooked meal. Yet though the culinary element was excellent, the social experience of Nous felt uncertain. The 30-minute time slots were very short and left little room for anything but eating. When my group was first seated, it seemed we were on the brink of conversation; given a few minutes longer we would have shared in the foreign wonder of the supper club experience. But the food came almost immediately, and the need to converse outside of predetermined groups didn’t arise again. This and other factors—kitchen steam heating up the apartment and a brief power outage—made the night feel a bit like a machine working beyond its capacity. However, the idea itself—a supper club for students—has great potential. The supper club is foreign territory to most college students. For this reason, it brings its attendees together in a way that their typical social gatherings cannot. I felt Nous set the scene well: We were all equally out of our comfort zone and primed for friendly conversation, free of assumptions and insecurities. Luckily, Ye and his team are in the perfect position to tweak their setup. As an autonomous project with a devoted following (it was tricky getting a reservation for two a week in advance), the Nous team has enviable flexibility. After just one session, Ye is already reworking the timing. “We thought at first that 60 minutes was too long and the timing of 45 too awkward. However, after the setback we had with power outage, we’ve decided to work at minimum with a 60-minute slot,” Ye wrote in an e-mail.

To Err Is Human, and Also Hilarious

Peggy Xu

Top: Appetizer of scallops, serrano peppers, ponzu, and nori, from Nous 01/30/16. Bottom: New York strip steak garnished with cremini mushrooms and guacamole, from Nous 02/13/16.

While such an independent project lends Nous flexibility, Ye nonetheless hopes Nous will become a part of UChicago culture. Ye and his team are already taking steps to collaborate with existing University organizations like UChicago Ceramics, which is currently creating a plate-lending program that would allow the two art forms to merge. Ultimately, Ye hopes Nous will live on

EXHIBIT [A]rts [11/16] WEDNESDAY

BY NICK OLGILVIE MAROON CONTRIBUTOR

It was about halfway into The Comedy of Errors when all hell finally broke loose; underpinned by a rolling piano, the action of a manic chase scene slowly starts to spiral out—into the wings, out into the audience, out almost into the world beyond. In this short sequence alone, there’s a dizzying array of sights. Characters f loat on and off the stage through doors seen and not, hide amongst the audience, and burst through every door imaginable, pausing only brief ly to play a card game with the audience (of course). At one point a stage hand might have even been on stage, but at this point the audience can’t really remember anymore. That scene is merely one example of the definite streak of vaudeville and slapstick that runs through the heart of this production of The Comedy of Errors put on by UT/TAPS and The Dean’s Men last weekend. The set design was populated with puns of Shakespeare’s other titles. ‘Larry the Piano Player’ (Adam Johnson) riffed in the background, engaging with the players on stage, then finally, donning a balaclava and ever-important glasses, joining them on stage as an executioner. Musical inter-

ludes marked the gaps between acts, characters dressed in early 20th-century Americana, and a character got knocked out during a scene change before literally popping back into scene a couple of acts later. Channeling that manic, almost unrefined, energy of one of Shakespeare’s earliest and most farcical plays, University Theater brought it to life as self-aware and cheerfully self-deprecating. Think a little less Royal Shakespeare Company and little more Wes Anderson and Charlie Chaplin. But as with anything so finely constructed, a myriad of chaos wound together with marks and timing, the characters were who really let the audience engage. Without this energy from the characters, the audience watches breathless and morbidly waits for one of the pieces to fail; but with it, the audience just watches breathless. Like any real work of British comedy, the humor comes from the eternal ineptitude of class struggle: Regardless of who you are, you face misfortune as you’re trying to climb up the social ladder with society smiling as it tries to push you back down. Angelo, the perpetually poor goldsmith (Tess Gundlah), gets arrested while selling a gold chain, Dromio the slave (Ian Grant-Funck) Continued on page 13

at UChicago, even simply as an inspiration for other foodies on campus. “I hope we can become a University institution and that other students contribute to the underground dining scene, even if the name Nous is not attached to it,” Ye wrote in an e-mail. Look out for Facebook events to sign up for upcoming Nous sittings, typically every Saturday night. $15 for a one course, one drink pairing.

7–9 p.m. Celebrate Poetry magazine’s fall editions with poetry readings, performances, and its fi rst live taping of its podcast at the Poetry Foundation downtown. 61 West Superior Street. Free. 7 p.m.–midnight. Dance your way through 8th week at The Promontory’s monthly salsa night! The UChicago Ballroom Latin Dance Association will lead a free lesson from 8 –9 p.m., followed by performances and open dancing. The Promontory. Free.

[11/17] THURSDAY 4:30 –5:30 p.m. Enjoy a jazz combo and 1940s bebop as part of the UChicago Music Department’s Tea Time C onc er t S er ie s. C ompl i ment a r y tea and cookies will be ser ved at 4:15 p.m. Fulton Recital Hall. Free. 7:30–9 p.m. The UChicago Brass Ensemble presents arrangements of classic and contemporary favorites, including works by Mozart, Bach, and Claude Debussy. Fulton Recital Hall. Free.

[11/18] FRIDAY 8 –10 p.m. R apper V i nc e St a ples will be performing at Mandel

Hall for the Major Activities Board’s fall show, hyping you up two quarters in advance to Summer Breeze! Mandel Hall. $5 students, $10 other. 7:30–9 p.m. Run away with the school circus at Le Vorris and Vox’s annual Fall Showcase, featuring various circus arts such as poi, partner acrobatics, silks, and more! Logan Center, room 701. Free.

[11/19] SATURDAY 7:30–11 p.m. Join the Chicago Swing Dance Society for a night of swing dancing to a live jazz band, LePercolateur. There will be a beginner lesson from 7:30–8:30 p.m., followed by open dancing. Ida Noyes Hall. $5 student, $7 other.

[11/20] SUNDAY 3–4:30 p.m. Listen to the University Chamber Orchestra perform pieces by Rossini and Beethoven, as well as feature the 2016 UChicago Concert Competition third place winner, Isaac Friend, as the soloist for Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 9 in E-flat major, K.271, “Jenamy.” Logan Center, Performance Hall. Free.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER B 15, 2016

cooking with nous 1 1/1 5/1 6 HOISIN-GLAZED PORK BELLY + DIY KALE KIMCHI Nous is the Greek word for mind, or intellect. It also puns nicely with the French for “us”. As in, come eat with us—food cooked from the heart, with the spirit of rigorous inquiry. This year, Nous is taking Hyde Park apartment cooking to its limit. We’ve experimented heavily with fermenting, pickling, and aging foods—techniques that, outside of initial prep work, require very little labor. We aim to maximize convenience without sacrificing quality. We’ll walk you through the fruits of our November 5 pop-up dinner, specifically our kimchi and pork belly. It’s a combination familiar to Korean culture, and with good reason: The tart, funky kimchi cuts the richness of the pork belly, while the sweet-savory fatty pork mellows out the heat of the kimchi. The goal with the following recipes is for you to develop a comfort and intuition with food over time. Ingredient amounts are left ambiguous as the recipes are flexible: As you prepare them (hopefully over and over!) you’ll develop a sense for what the dish should look, smell, and even sound like at each stage. We think of home cooking as a self-guided process of discovery—an approach far more versatile and useful than religiously following cookbooks.

KIMCHI Cooking by the season means affordability. Kale is in season, and similar to other tough greens (think mustard greens, collard greens, and the like), its fibers need to be broken down, either through prolonged heating or—as we explore here—fermentation. The key here is to salt the kale after boiling it brief ly, so that the excess water may be drained off. Don’t be impatient, or else you’ll get a soupy, sriracha-y, veggie mess. TO-DO:

PORK BELLY When we heard that pork belly was high in supply and only $3.99–4.99 a pound, we jumped on the opportunity. It is tricky to cook, with alternating layers of tough flesh and fat. We want to a) to render out as much fat as possible and b) keep the flesh tender, but supple. The key here is to cook the pork twice: fi rst at a lower temperature to render the fat, then at a higher temperature to crisp the skin. We also used hoisin sauce to flavor the pork, although any other sweet sauce works just as well. (Sorry not sorry, ranch.) TO-DO:

You’ll Need: • • •

Pork belly Salt Hoisin sauce or similar

This recipe leaves most of the heavy lifting to the oven, so focus on preparing the skin and adjusting the temperature. Score the skin of the belly with a knife, cutting to just above the flesh so the fat has more surface area to render. Cut across the entire surface of the pork belly in one direction, then repeat at a perpendicular angle: Your pork should have a nice, even surface grid. Salt generously.

Only two elements of this recipe require work: blanching the kale and preparing the fermentation paste. Blanching is briefly submerging your produce into boiling water to break down their fibers and kill any bacteria that washing under cold water did not rinse away. We recommend a minimum of five seconds and a maximum of 30 seconds to blanch. Transfer the blanched kale onto ice to stop the residual heat from overcooking. Heavily salt the kale and set aside for thirty minutes to a few hours—you’ll want to wring out much of the excess water so the finished kimchi is crisp. Rinse off the excess salt and give the leaves one last squeeze.

You’ll Need: • • • • • • • •

Kale Sriracha Fish sauce Sugar Salt Garlic, minced Spring onion, chopped Airtight container

Tip: the longer the blanch, the more tender the kale. Using a large bowl, mix sriracha, fish sauce, sugar, and salt until it forms a paste. Taste often, adjusting according to preference. You should have enough to generously cover the kale. We also added minced garlic, as well as black radish and green onions (cut into thin slices) for added f lavor and crunch.

Tip: Sriracha and fish sauce kickstart the fermentation: the more you add, the faster the kimchi will pickle. Adding sugar will also accelerate the fermentation process.

Tip: Salting the skin releases water, which helps the belly crisp up better in the oven. For best results, leave pork uncovered in fridge overight after salting and pat dry. Bake the pork belly skin-side up at 250–300 degrees Fahrenheit first for two hours. (Remember to preheat the oven!) Crank up the temperature to 450–500 degrees to crisp and color the skin

Tip: Cutting the pork belly against the grain yields a tender portion that doesn’t fall apart.. Cut the pork belly into half-inch slices. Coat slices thinly in sauce, shaking off the excess. In a very hot pan, flash sear both sides of the pork belly in oil, 15–30 seconds each. You should hear an immediate, aggressive sizzle: The goal is to caramelize the sugar in the sauce and brown the cut surface of the meat.

Tip: Add a spritz of lime juice or ponzu sauce in the pan while searing to add a refreshing, acidic note, which cuts down the richness of the pork.

To make vegan kimchi, simply leave out the fish sauce. Serve with seared tofu, which can be glazed much the same way.

Tip: Black radish and green onions release water, which helps thin out the fermentation paste. Add sparingly (or not)! Tightly pack the the solids into airtight jars. You want to leave as little air in the container as possible—add some of the brine from the bottom of the bowl from vigorously mixing the kale with the fermentation paste, if needed. Be careful if you’re using a glass container: Fermentation creates carbon dioxide gas thanks to the lactobacillus bacteria. Open the container every other day to release built-up gases. Let sit in the fridge for at least a week.

Tip: Fermentation produces the sour, funky taste of a pickle. Keeping the kimchi fermenting for longer accentuates those flavors. bon appétit!

Alex Ye + MJ Chen We served our pork belly sandwiched between slices of sourdough, garnished with fingerling potatoes and garlic aioli.

Photos by Peggy Xu

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

Baroqueback Mountain: Purcell’s Fairy Queen Goes to Vegas BY ROBERTO VELASCO-ALVAREZ MAROON CONTRIBUTOR

Las Vegas and the Baroque met in the recently restored 20th-century Studebaker Theater, home to a wildly entertaining adaptation of Henry Purcell’s The Fairy Queen by the Chicago Opera Theater (COT). The production presented an overthe-top but entertaining and well-sung version of Purcell’s semi-opera, starring Marc Molomot as Puck, manager of the Club FQ in Las Vegas; Kimberly E. Jones as Tanya, the Fairy Queen; Cedric Berry as Ron, the Fairy King; and Roberto Gomez as Shakes, the Poet. The action started with a very Brechtian encounter with Shakes, the Poet, who yelled drunken banter at the audience from a balcony. This set the tone for the spoken part of the play that wittily inserted Shakespearean verses from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, upon which Purcell originally based his work. Gomez, a baritone with over 90 roles with international and regional companies in his repertoire, delivered a powerful interpretation of “Fill up the Bowl.” Besides sonnets, the production was

plagued with racial and gender stereotypes, which ranged from a Latina strip dancer calling Ron “papi” to a mention of menopause and outdated queer characters. Nonetheless, it was definitely fun to watch Berry dance 17th-century Purcell as cha-cha-chá. The introduction of the characters and their conflicts ended with a beautiful interpretation of “O Let Me Weep” by soprano Jones in her role as Tanya, carefully accompanied by the Haymarket Opera Orchestra (HOO), conducted by Jory Vinikour. The orchestra specializes in period music, using historically accurate instruments to reproduce the sound of the Baroque. Things got really heated when pinkhaired Puck gave the characters the famous love-juice, rebranded by the COT as “mecstasy.” Molomot, with a rare high-tenor voice, displayed not only command of baroque technique but great aptitude as a comic actor. In particular, his scene suggesting (not very subtly) raunchy gay sex with Shakes, the Poet, was certainly the most laughable moment of the evening. During the drug-influenced bacchanalia, the primarily pink-colored set designed by COT general director Andreas

Courtesy of Liz Lauren

An ebullient, pink-haired Puck (Marc Molomot) welcomes you to to Club FQ.

Courtesy of Liz Lauren

Helena (Alexandra Martinez) and Ron, the Fairy King, (Cedric Berry) share a tender moment.

Mitisek lit up under club lights, taking the already overloaded design to the next level. The characters became swingers—bisexual and sex-driven marauders—but also delivered arias of careful vocal technique. The striking Zacharias Niedzwiecki appeared after the intermission, dressed—undressed might be more appropriate—in a fetish harness and (very tight) golden briefs to pole dance and receive a bondage-style whipping in front of a primarily gray-haired audience. Ryan Belongie (Lysander), a countertenor who recently debuted with the Lyric Opera of Chicago, joined the party shirtless. His interpretation of “Here’s the Summer, Sprightly, Gay” was meticu-

lous and delicate. The characters continued the celebration among the audience, dancing and giving away neon lights. Act V, musically speaking, was a good endnote for the very hectic masque. “Thus the Gloomy World,” by Molomot, was graciously interpreted for the delight of an audience that was taken for quite a ride in what is, no question, Chicago’s gayest and most hectic show of the week. How would Baroque Londoner Henry Purcell feel about this post-modern adaptation? That is only part of the entertainment. Certainly, not a work for the opera purists but two hours well spent for the singing, the music, and the laughter. And, for this critic, for those golden briefs.

What Died? Funeral Music at the CSO, Profound and Heartfelt BY BRYAN MCGUIGGAN MAROON CONTRIBUTOR

Perhaps the least-known war in the second half of the 19th century took place between musicians. The “War of the Romantics”—an admittedly melodramatic term—raged between the conservative-minded composers championed by Johannes Brahms, and the radical mold-breakers, searching for a new harmonic language, championed by Richard Wagner. This weekend’s performances at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) put these opposing sides into conversation with two of their greatest canonical representatives, Wagner’s “Prelude and Liebestod” from Tristan und Isolde and Brahms’s Ein Deutsches Requiem (A German Requiem), along with Mozart’s Maurerische Trauermusik (Masonic Funeral Music). The Mozart provided a gentle entry point for this program of death and remembrance. The piece was written in 1785 for the funeral of two aristocratic Freemasons ( Mozart was a Freemason himself ). The CSO’s playing of the piece was both colorful and stylistically faithful. Conductor Jaap van Zweden displayed his keen sense of shaping, following the musical lines by subtly highlighting specifi c instru-

ments. Special praise goes to the low winds, basset horns and contrabassoon; they played with tremendous confidence, giving the orchestra’s timbre a thrilling and appropriate growl. The Prelude to Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde showcases some of the composer’s most revolutionary harmonic innovations, particularly the “Tristan chord.” A bitterly dissonant chord that remained unresolved for much of a fi ve-hour opera, the Tristan chord shocked contemporary listeners. The remaining music from the opera featured by the Prelude and Liebestod (a standalone orchestral piece) displays Wagner’s signature lush harmonies and gushing phrases. In a brilliant moment of metaphorical painting, the resolution to the Tristan chord comes in the “Liebestod” (“LoveDeath”), concurrent with the moment when Isolde dies, symbolizing the double romantic and spiritual release that occurs when her love for Tristan comes to a tragic end. The CSO performed this work with visible passion. The strings, in particular, played with a luxurious, sensuous sound that was perfectly befitting the music, both stylistically and expressively. Van Zweden’s interpretation was sophisticated and beautifully wrought. Musical ideas from the opening bars, such as the elongated F after

Courtesy of Alex Garcia

a major sixth, were carried through the performance in such a way as to create dramatic tension and maximize musical interest: a bit of a subtle observation, but one that added to the piece’s unity. The orchestra itself was fully invested in these designs and played the enormous climaxes with chill-inducing intensity. The highlight of the evening, even after the exceptional fi rst half, was Brahms’s Ein Deutsches Requiem. T he work

was premiered in its complete form in Leipzig in 1869, shortly after the death of Brahms’s mother. Holding to his conservative ideology, Brahms included two large-scale fugues at the conclusion of movements, complete with Bach-style sequences. Especially fascinating about the piece is the lack of Christian content in the text, unlike the Kyrie, Lacrimosa, and Domine Jesu in the traditional Continued on page 13

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

The humor comes from the eternal ineptitude of class struggle. Continued from page 10

keeps finding money and immediately gets punished for it, while the weeping Duke Solinus (Eli Harter) and the merchant Aegeon (Quinn Kane) weep in each other’s arms and apologize profusely as one condemns the other to death. Despite th is, the aud ience can laugh with, not just at, the perpetually lovelorn Adriana (Larkin Smith) and sister Luciana (Julianne Lorndale), never without wine or snacks (or both) in hand, as the schadenfreude is tempered w ith empathy. Even through all the surrealism, every break of the fourth wall, every sock-puppet twin, and every equally casual disregard for the rules of theatre —the humanity of the charac t ers a nd thei r st r uggles sh i ne through and above, lighting up the piece a nd engag i ng the aud ience. Ultimately though, despite how improbable, surreal, bizarre, and off beat farces like these allow themselves to be; they’re always puzzlingly more human than the audience might expect. Errors and failure to avoid them are surpris-

ingly comforting. So really then, this play truly is a comedy of errors, in that although nothing of what’s happening on stage ever really seems to make a whole lot of sense, it always kind of does.

These three pieces display three completely different views on death... Continued from page 12

Latin Requiem. In fact, Brahms himself said that he might have called the piece a “Human” (“Menschliches”) Requiem, rather than a “German” Requiem. The use of German is itself a nod to humanism; Brahms fi nds himself participating in the complicated history of the language’s sacred usage, going back to Martin Luther’s translation of the Bible. Though all participants delivered fi rst-rate performances this weekend, baritone Michael Nagy exhibited a truly stellar performance. His voice carried tremendous power and beauty in sincere, heartbreaking prayer, and then with zeal and immediacy in describing the moment of judgement. His interpretations did justice to Brahms’s unpretentious and profound vision of

human life and death. Soprano Christiane Karg also gave a fine performance, with elegant phrasing and clear interpretive communication. The CSO excelled throughout—particularly in the fourth movement, where van Zweden once again showed his interpretive prowess by fully “playing” rests to punctuate Brahms’s complex orchestral textures, allowing for moments of silence that refreshed and engaged. These pieces display three completely different views on death: for Mozart, somber and understated; for Wagner, enormous and high-Romantic, a release of spiritual tension; for Brahms, at once serene but also glorious. The program, curated as such, offered the audience a moment of reflection, an escape from an otherwise tumultuous week.

Zoe Kaiser

Documentary Screening Honors Veterans Day BY ABBY KUCHNIR MAROON CONTRIBUTOR

On Friday evening, the Maroon Veterans Alliance, a University organization based out of the Institute of Politics, screened Thank You For Your Service, a documentary chronicling Iraq War veterans’ struggles with PTSD. The film follows the healing processes of a few veterans as they reintegrate into society, find community after leaving the armed forces, and attempt to come to terms with the horrors of war. Before the presentation, Baxter Stein of the Maroon Veterans Alliance led a discussion with former Marine and Iraq War veteran Maura Sullivan. Sullivan spoke of her own experience coming back to live in the States after her final tour. PTSD is a challenge for many veterans, but Sullivan said that for her and many others, so is loneliness. The transition from living with a close-knit group of people willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for one another, to living in a city where your closest neighbors may not know your name is a jarring one. Sullivan lauded programs like Team Red, White, and Blue and others that provide a sense of community for veterans by organizing social events.

Once the film started, it became clear that feelings of loneliness and isolation upon returning to civilian life are not unique to Sullivan’s experience. The documentary by Tom Donahue was in turns harrowing and heartwarming as it followed three Iraq War veterans through the months and years of transition to their lives back home. All suffered from some degree of post-traumatic stress. These veterans grappled with the civilian deaths they negligently committed, the constant fear of being attacked, and the nightmares that haunted their nights with the specter of war. They struggled to reconnect with their families and friends, searching for a sense of community, security, and peace. The crux of the film was the glaring lack of mental health infrastructure in the armed forces. Blocked by stigma and limited resources, half of veterans who suffer from some degree of depression, anxiety, or PTSD do not seek treatment or help. The documentary calls on the U.S. Department of Defense to provide education on mental illness for soldiers before they ship out, mental health resources and support during their service, and continued support after they return home as veterans. It praises organizations that are providing veterans with the community they need.

Courtesy of DreamWorks

Perhaps most importantly, the film seeks to inform civilians of these struggles in the military and demonstrate to its veteran viewers how universal mental illness is among them. The film succeeded in showing how pervasive the mental health crisis is in the military. It also had some beautiful cinematographic moments, connecting the South Dakota prairie to the desert surrounding Fallujah through shots of their wide, flat landscapes. The scenes were beautiful visually, but paired with an urgent score that illustrated

the anxiety that soldiers and veterans feel when exposed to such an environment. This anxious moment was followed by a scene of a veterans’ group meditating on a beach, sans score, besides the crashing of the waves. Throughout, the artistry of the documentary worked to create an emotional climate that rose and fell in accordance with the bumpy path of healing from the invisible wounds left by a war. As Sullivan said, “The civil-military divide is vast.” Documentaries like this one help to close that gap.

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

Maroons Rock Regional Meet CROSS COUNTRY

BY SIDDHARTH KAPOOR SPORTS STAFF

On Saturday, the men’s and women’s cross country teams headed to Oshkosh, WI for the NCAA DIII Midwest Regional. Both squads had a successful showing, as the women finished third out of

38 teams, while the men were ninth out of 33 teams. The women collected 124 points on the 6K route, while Wash U finished first with 66 points. On the men’s side, the South Siders earned 278 points on the 8K course, while North Central finished first with 37 points. The runners had a good showing

individually, as well. On the women’s side, the highlight was definitely thirdyear Khia Kurtenbach, who finished in first place with a time of 21:41.22, an average time of 5:49 per mile. Two weeks ago at the UA A championships, Wash U second-year Aly Wayne beat Kurtenbach by 22 seconds for the first

University of Chicago Athletics Department

The women’s cross county team huddles up before their NCAA qualifying meet.

place title. This time around, Kurtenbach turned things around to win by nearly two seconds over Wayne. In addition, third-years Cassidy McPherson and Kelsey Dunn as well as fourth-year Madeleine Horvath all finished within the top 40, thereby earning All-Region accolades. This was very impressive considering a total of 265 women took part in the meet. On the men’s side, Nick Nielsen received All-Region status by finishing 34th with a time of 25:36.1. Fourthyears Timofey Karginov and Eyal Hanfling both placed in the top 60. Karginov had a time of 25:57.5 and finished 51st while Hanf ling finished at 56th place with a time of 26:06.0. Considering 247 men took part at Lake Breeze Golf Club, the Maroon men left quite an impression with an impressive performance. But while this was a valiant performance, the men could not qualify for DIII Championship as they had left too much ground to cover in the end. The women, on the other hand, were able to make it and earned a berth. With momentum on their side through Kurtenbach’s stellar performance, the Maroons will go into the event with a significant advantage. With a runner-up position in the UA A championship along with this third placed finish, the Maroons will look to provide another strong showing. They will be looking to beat the all-time UChicago record of fourth place in 2013. The meet will take place this Saturday at Louisville, Kentucky at 11 a.m. EST.

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THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

Chicago Opens Season at Home MEN’S BASKETBALL

BY EMMETT ROSENBAUM SPORTS EDITOR

The UChicago basketball team kicks off its season Tuesday by hosting North Park University. The Maroons are looking for an encore to last year’s impressive year, which saw them go 17–8, set a school record with a 13-game winning streak, and just narrowly miss out on making the NCA A tournament. The squad will be looking to establish a new identity after losing six fourth-years last season, including

starters Nate Brooks, Alex Voss, and Jordan Smith. However, third-year forward Ryan Shearmire is not worried about any of the new faces that are joining the group. “The chemistry for this year’s squad is great,” an enthusiastic Shearmire said. “ We graduated high-character guys from last year, but the new guys have stepped into their roles and the freshmen coming in have been great. I would say [this] team’s chemistry is definitely one of our strengths.” The team will surely rely on fourth-

year leaders like guard Tyler Howard and forward Waller Perez to lead both in the locker room and on the court. Younger players will also have more expected out of them as they shoulder a much greater responsibility than last year. Some incoming first-years may even be asked to contribute right off the bat. The team has bolstered its backcourt with its freshman class, adding four guards to the team. These additions will likely help with Chicago’s run-and-gun style offense, as last year’s

University of Chicago Athletics Department

The men’s basketball prepares for its upcoming and highly-anticipated season.

squad was often defined by its lightening fast transition game. While the Maroons have never been a huge team, this year’s group only contains four players six-foot-six or taller, so speed and shooting will certainly be the name of the game. With ball and player movement the priority, the team’s success will likely come down to communication. The Maroons are definitely looking to get off on the right foot Tuesday, and how the group communicates will definitely be a key indicator of how it is doing. “We will absolutely be looking at our communication,” Shearmire said. “If we are communicating well on defense and playing team basketball on both ends of the floor, we will surely be clicking.” As for Chicago’s opponent, North Park is hoping for a repeat of last year’s season opener, when the Vikings hosted and beat Chicago 72– 66, while the South Siders are undoubtedly seeking revenge. North Park ended up finishing the season 14–11, so they are not to be taken lightly this time around either. Expectations are high for the Maroons after last year, as a NCA A tournament berth is where the bar is set. However, armed with dependable returning veterans and a host of fresh new faces, the team will be looking to not only make the tournament but also to make a deep postseason run. UChicago will face North Park on Tuesday, November 15 at the Ratner Athletics Center. Tip-off is scheduled for 7 p.m.

Offensive Showdown Ends in Loss for South Siders FOOTBALL

BY MIRANDA BURT SPORTS STAFF

The Maroons finished off the 2016 season with a hard fought 43–34 loss against the Wash U Bears. Chicago finished the season 4–6 overall and carries a 4–4 SAA record into the offseason. The game also saw the end of 17 fourth-year Maroons’ careers at Stagg Field. The two teams exchanged scores throughout the game, as the first three quarters ended deadlocked, until the Bears used a 15–6 advantage in the fourth to ul-

timately pull away. The Maroons finished with 604 yards to the Bears’ 562 yards, and decisively held the lead in time of possession 39:53 to 20:07. Despite this offensive advantage, Chicago’s turnover margin, 3 to Washington University’s 1, doomed the home side. “It was a challenge at first this year learning the next offense and pretty much starting from scratch. But as the year progressed, we continued to improve, and by the end of the year we were really rolling,” said fourth-year quarterback Burke Moser. “Saturday we couldn’t come out with a win, but we still did a lot of great things.”

Linebacker Jackson Garrey rushes past his opponent’s offensive line.

The team was led by a 17-member senior class, who finish their careers with a 24–15 overall record over the past four years. The class also won the 2014 UAA title. Moser again starred for the South Siders, ending his final game going 43–73 for 455 yards and four touchdowns. Moser finishes his career holding records for most passing yards in a game, touchdown passes in a game, passing yards in a season, passing touchdowns in a season, and passing attempts in a season. “My first two years I didn’t play, so I had to keep my head down and work hard

University of Chicago Athletics Department

while I waited for my opportunity. When my number was called, I was able to rise to the occasion and do a lot of special things that will be remembered in the record books,” Moser said. “It was a challenge at first this year learning the next offense and pretty much starting from scratch. But as the year progressed, we continued to improve, and by the end of the year we were really rolling,” Moser said. “Saturday we couldn’t come out with a win, but we still did a lot of great things.” Moser was helped out by fellow fourthyear wide receiver Syd Reynolds, who had career highs with 10 catches for 172 yards and two touchdowns. Defensively, Chicago fourth-year linebacker Jackson Garrey closed out his career with a fumble recovery, giving the Maroons their only takeaway of the day. While the Maroons lose a great senior class, a number of underclassmen stepped up on the day that will contribute again next year. First-year Dante Nepa had eight catches for 71 yards. Third-year running back Chandler Carroll had 36 carries for 176 yards and one touchdown, along with one receiving touchdown. “It has been such a great experience playing for this football team this year. It’s a very special group of guys with amazing coaches. The seniors were so welcoming, and that really helped our team chemistry,” Nepa said. He finished his first year with 899 yards and 8 touchdowns. “It has been an honor to play by their side this year. We are excited to improve this offseason and build upon this past year in hopes of a successful first season in our new conference and a chance at a run in the playoffs.”

THE CHICAGO MAROON - NOVEMBER 15, 2016

SPORTS

Rest Spells Success for No. 1 Maroons MEN’S SOCCER

EMMETT ROSENBAUM SPORTS EDITOR

The No. 1 Maroons advanced to the Round of 16 in the NCA A tournament by dominating the Westminster College Blue Jays 4–0 in the second round on Sunday at Stagg Field after a first round bye. Unlike Chicago, the Blue Jays had to defeat the Dubuque Spartans 3–2 on Saturday in order to earn a spot in Sunday’s match.

This year marks only the second appearance in the third round or later in program history and the first since 1996, when the South Siders lost to Kenyon 3–2 in the national semifinals. Chicago opened the scoring just 93 seconds into the game when second-year forward Max Lopez pounced on the ball in the scramble that followed a corner kick and found first-year forward Dayo Adeosun for a point-blank finish. The strike was the team’s second quickest of the season.

The home team then put the game out of reach with three quick goals from second-year forward Matthew Koh, first-year midfielder Renato Corghi, and Lopez in the 26th, 28th, and 29th minutes, respectively. From there, the team cruised and kept its clean sheet for the rest of the game. The lead allowed head coach Mike Babst to rotate his team and as a result 23 players received playing time.

University of Chicago Athletics Department

Juan Barrero attempts to kick the ball up the field towards his teammates.

“ We just knew this oppor tunity isn’t going to come again, so from the start it was high intensity,” Adeosun said. He now has scored seven goals this season. “ We were motivated and determined and we knew that we just had to start off with a good bang and so really we were just connecting on all cylinders. It was probably the best we ever played all season.” The team’s victory ends a run of relatively poor form the team went through to finish the season, when it drew two of its last three and scored only two goals in that stretch. This performance also stands out from the rest of the regular season, when the Maroons were usually stronger in the second half. “ We knew we were pretty much a second half team and so we wanted to be more of a 90-minute team,” Adeosun said. “Our coach gave us a pep talk before the game and said, ‘let’s have a great game for 90 minutes,’ and we hadn’t really had a great game for 90 minutes in a while, so we just put it all together at the start with total focus on our objectives.” The team achieved its high offensive standard despite the absence of fourth-year forward Brenton Desai, who was serving a suspension for a red card he picked up against Wash U. Desai will be eligible to return Saturday for the team’s next game, which bodes well for the squad moving forward. The Maroons will host a four-team regional next weekend. Their next opponent will be No. 20 Redlands next Saturday at 11 a.m. The winner of that game will play the winner of the Benedictine Eagles and the St. Thomas Toms on Sunday. All three games will take place at Stagg Field.

No. 11 Chicago Thrives at Home WOMEN’S SOCCER

DANNY EISGRUBER SPORTS STAFF

The South Siders, ranked No. 11 nationally at the season’s end, had a fantastic playoff weekend, sweeping both Augsburg College and Webster College at home. The wins improve the Maroons to 11–0 at Stagg Field. The final scores were 6–0 against Webster on Saturday, and 2–0 against Augsburg on Sunday. The Maroons had an even scoring attack during the game against Webster, notching three goals during both halves of the game. This game was a rematch of 2014’s first round, where Chicago won 1–0. It didn’t take long for the team to strike, with third-year Mia Calamari knocking one in off the right post in the 18th minute, with classmate Caroline Olivero assisting. First-years Hanna Watkins and Rachel Dias also scored in the first half, pouring goals in during the 24th and 40th minutes, respectively. Dias’s goal was particularly impressive, as she scored while striking the ball blindly with her back heel. The second half was just as efficient as the first, with fourth-year Anase Asom scoring her first goal of the season during the 64th minute of the game. Calamari then struck again for her second goal of the game, and eighth goal this season, at 68 minutes in.

Right before the end of the game, first-year Adrianna Vera scored, assisted by fourthyear Sophia Kim and second-year Dana Urlich. For the game, Chicago dominated shots, leading 28–6, and won the corner kicks game 3–1. Not surprisingly, Webster led in fouls, with four to Chicago’s eight, and saves, protecting eleven times as opposed to Chicago’s two, indicating that the Maroons were attacking ferociously and often. The game against Augsburg was less even in terms of scoring, as the Maroons’ only offense came during the first half. Much like last game, first-year Adrianna Vera scored, with a header during the 27th minute, while third-year Caroline Olivero provided the other goal 43 minutes and 19 seconds into the match. Chicago once again won the battles of shots and corner kicks, leading 15–9 and 9–4 in those statistics, respectively. Interestingly enough, Chicago actually lost saves, 4–3, but still managed to pull out the shutout. As for fouls, the Maroons were perhaps more overly aggressive than usual, losing 9–7. Despite Augsburg having one more win under their belt for the season, this did not deter the Maroons, who improved to 17–3 with the win. This win brings Chicago to the Round of 16, with just four wins separating the team from gold and glory. Firstyear Clare Suter, who assisted Vera on her

goal during the Augsburg game, remarked on the efforts of the defense this weekend, which was particularly spectacular. “A shutout didn’t mean that much because they weren’t that threatening, however, we expect to face much more challenging teams in the Sweet Sixteen and forward,”

Suter said. “But shout out to the offense for scoring and Katie Donovan for the amazing saves.” The next game for the Maroons is next Saturday, November 19, against No. 3 Thomas More. The game is at Stagg Field and the time has not yet been announced.

University of Chicago Athletics Department

Mia Calamari passes the ball to one of her teammates.