The Justice, February 14, 2012 issue

ARTS PAGE 20

FORUM Prop 8 overturn is justified 11

WOMEN’S WORDS

SPORTS Track squads bolt to Regionals 16 The Independent Student Newspaper

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of

B r a n d e is U n i v e r sit y S i n c e 1 9 4 9

Justice

Volume LXIV, Number 20

www.thejustice.org

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

STUDENT LIFE

FESTIVAL OF SOCIAL JUSTICE

Pachanga’s fate still undecided for spring 2012 ■ The dance, which used

to be held every semester, was scheduled to occur this semester following the last one held in fall 2010.

By SARA DEJENE JUSTICE EDITOR

Members of the International Club and the administration say that they are assessing whether or not Pachanga, the dance that is traditionally hosted by the club, will be held this semester. The administration is “on board” with holding Pachanga this semester, President of the International Club Andrea Verdeja ’14 said in an interview with the Justice, but issues, such as location of the event,

Messinger delivers keynote AJWS spoke about the organization’s involvement with grassroots projects.

By SHANI ABRAMOWITZ JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

Ruth Messinger, president of the American Jewish World Service, highlighted the first ever “festival of social justice” on the Brandeis campus with her keynote address for 'Deis Impact titled, “Local is Global: Bridging Domestic Action and Global Impact,” on Wednesday night in Sherman Function Hall.

Messinger spoke about the work of AJWS and how its impact and reach are significantly dependent on a fusion of local and global influence. Discussing grassroots projects of microfinance and agri-sustain-

Derek Komar ’15 was elected as the first midyear senator yesterday, following a recent push by several senators to create a new senate position in an effort to represent midyears. Komar, who won against four other candidates with 29 of the 79 total votes, will represent the 110 students that make up the midyear class of 2015.

Ethan Stein ’15 came in second in the vote with 21 votes. A large majority, 71.8 percent, of eligible voters participated in the election.

"I’m very grateful," said Komar in an interview with the Justice.

"Everyone put their trust in me, and I take that seriously." Komar said that being Brandeis’ first midyear senator is "very exciting."

As for his goals for the semester, Komar said that he would like to address "the Village bubble and the midyear bubble" by attempting to decrease their isolation from the rest of the campus.

The midyear senator position was created by a constitutional amendment passed on Feb. 1. The amendment was voted on by the student body, where it was ap-

'Deis Impact, sponsored by the International Center for Ethics, Justice, and Public Life and the Brandeis Student Union, along with the ‘Deis Impact Core Committee, made up of six students, was a weeklong “festival of social justice,” made possible by the more than 32 clubs and students organization which planned events throughout the week featuring performances, exhibits and discussions. University President Frederick Lawrence, who arrived from India earlier in the evening, spoke next, followed

by Student Union President, Herbie Rosen ’12.

Rosen spoke about the importance and purpose of 'Deis Impact.

“My peers hear the words 'social justice,' and while we love it and hear it often, we also struggle to figure out what the action [of] social

See IMPACT, 5 ☛

proved by a vote of 315 to 52, with 10 abstentions. “[Midyears are] a large enough group of students that they should have some representation,” said Student Union President Herbie Rosen ’12 at a January Senate meeting. He added in an interview with the Justice that “midyears are a really important part of our university.”

The position was proposed during the Constitutional review in 2009, but was not created due to errors in the voting process, which led to the impeachment of the then-Union Secretary and President.

The Charles River senator position was also open, following the resignation of Deena Horowitz ’13, but no candidates entered the race. The voting was won by the "abstain" option, meaning that the seat will remain vacant for the rest of the semester.

Horowitz resigned due to scheduling conflicts and an unclear understanding of her duties as senator.

—Sam Mintz and Tate Herbert

Top 5 spring courses

Men struggle in UAA

Tightened security

“Films of Disney” is one of the most popular new courses of the spring semester.

The men’s basketball team plunged to sixth in the conference standings after two road losses last weekend.

Heightened tensions between Iran and Israel have caused many Jewish U.S. institutions to raise alertness.

FEATURES 8 For tips or info email editor@thejustice.org

See PACHANGA, 6 ☛

Senator elected by midyear class of 2015

SOCIAL JUSTICE FESTIVAL: President of AJWS Ruth Messinger discussed the work the organization has done and its future.

ability, Messinger described an encounter with issues that in their seeming invisibility, pose tremendous challenges for the organization.

AJWS works to "realize human rights and end poverty in the developing world," according to its website. While building communities around the globe, AJWS pays great attention to "collaborating internally and externally, domestically and internationally" and emphasizing its role in "strengthening people’s ability to achieve their individual and collective goals."

Marci McPhee, associate director of the International Center for Ethics, Justice, and Public Life and one of the co-creators of 'Deis Impact, introduced the night’s event while briefing the audience on the purpose and goal of 'Deis Impact.

McPhee went on to outline the basic structure of 'Deis Impact.

still have to be determined.

In an interview with the Justice, Associate Dean of Student Life Jamele Adams also said that the administration has nothing against holding Pachanga this semester.

“We’re all working together to see if Pachanga will be successful,” Adams said. Both Adams and Verdeja declined to discuss anything more specific about what had happened between the club and the administration in the meetings, saying that it is too early to speak about those details until more meetings are held.

In the event that Pachanga is approved by the administration, the Finance Board has allocated $10,000 to fund the event, according to F-Board Chair Gabriel Weingrod-Nemzow ’12 in an interview with the Justice.

BRIEF

JON EDELSTEIN/the Justice

■ The President of

Waltham, Mass.

Let your voice be heard!

Submit letters to the editor online at www.thejustice.org

INDEX

SPORTS 16

ARTS SPORTS

17 13

EDITORIAL FEATURES

10 7

OPINION POLICE LOG

10 2

NEWS 3

COPYRIGHT 2012 FREE AT BRANDEIS. Email managing@thejustice.org for home delivery.

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

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THE JUSTICE

NEWS BRIEFS

POLICE LOG

Administration to review East path

Medical Emergency

The administration is considering options to close off the path in the woods leading from the back of East Quad to South Street due to complaints from neighbors, Director of Public Safety Ed Callahan wrote in an email to the Justice.

Senior Vice President for Administration Mark Collins explained in an interview with the Justice that the path, which has unofficially formed over the years as an alternate route for students to access South Street, is a concern for Waltham residents living on Wheelock street. Residents have complained to the University when students are unusually rowdy and noisy; however, Collins said that this behavior did not apply to a majority of students.

“We hear about it when the behavior is not neighborly,” he explained. He also added that the path is dangerous because it is unlit and isolated, which is an ideal situation for problems to emerge.

Callahan wrote that “a review will be initiated to determine the best option to address the matter.”

Although Collins said he was unaware of a review, he said he was considering putting up a fence around the path, an option that could potentially be implemented by the end of the upcoming break.

When asked about the way in which this would impact the student body, Callahan wrote that this change would not affect students’ access to South Street because there are alternate routes.

“Community members may be required to continue their direction of travel on the sidewalk adjacent to South Street and access the stairs by Stoneman,” he wrote, adding, “This sidewalk is lit and heavily traveled.”

Feb. 6—University Police received a call that a male student in the Charles River Apartments was having trouble breathing.

BEMCo responded, and an ambulance was notified for transport to the hospital.

Feb. 7—A student in Deroy fell in the shower, and University Police and BEMCo responded. The party was treated on-scene

by BEMCo with a signed refusal for further care.

Feb. 7—A student passed out while in line at Einstein Bros. Bagels. University Police and BEMCo responded; the student was transported to the Golding Health Center by University Police cruiser for further care.

Feb. 8—A BEMCo member requested the on-duty BEMCo units to respond to the Shapiro Campus Center for a female with severe abdominal pains. The patient was transported via police cruiser with members of BEMCo on board to the hospital for further care.

Feb. 8—A student in Ridgewood C complained of eye pain. BEMCo treated the party on-scene with a signed refusal for further care.

Feb. 9—A reporting party stated that his roommate had been drinking alcohol and was vomiting. University Police and BE-

MCo responded; the party was treated onscene with a signed refusal for further care.

Feb. 9—A student in the Usdan Student Center called University Police and reported that a student was having an allergic reaction on the ground floor between the Provisions on Demand Market and the mailroom. BEMCo was sent and an ambulance was requested; the student was not transported to the hospital.

Feb. 10—A student swimming in the pool in the Joseph M. Linsey Sports Center was kicked in the face. BEMCo treated the party on-scene with a signed refusal for further care.

Feb. 11—A caller reported a female party was vomiting in Hassenfeld Residence Hall. The party was transported to the Newton-Wellesley Hospital by University Police cruiser with BEMCo staff on board.

Feb. 12—A party in Village B reported feeling ill. BEMCo treated the party onscene with a signed refusal for further care.

Harassment

Feb. 6—A party reported that an upset driver followed her to campus. University Police stopped the vehicle and spoke with the operator.

Feb. 11—A student in Shapiro Residence Hall reported receiving harassing phone

Brandeis has been named a “best value college” by the Princeton Review. The list of 150 such colleges and universities, based on surveys of students and administrators, was announced Feb. 7.

According to a BrandeisNOW press release, Senior Vice President and publisher at Princeton Review Robert Franek praised the listed institutions “for all they are doing to keep costs down … while maintaining excellent academic programs.”

The top-ranked schools on the list were the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and Williams College. Schools outside the top ten, like Brandeis, are unranked.

The schools selected are “able to provide stellar academics with a modest price tag,” according to the Princeton Review website. They were selected based on factors including undergraduate academics, costs and financial aid and the debt of graduating seniors.

Brandeis’ tuition this year is $40,514, without fees or room and board. Tuition at Williams College, the Princeton Review’s top-ranked private school, is $42,938, according to the schools’ website.

In an email to the Justice, Senior Vice President for Students and Enrollment Andrew Flagel wrote: “While all rankings should be considered in context, recognition of our ongoing commitment to maintaining qualified student access, regardless of ability to pay, to a Brandeis education is always welcome.”

—Sam Mintz

NOTE TO READERS: The Justice is on hiatus for midterm recess. Our next issue will be published March 6, 2012.

The road not taken

JOSHUA LINTON/the Justice

Administrators may take action to close the path between the East Quad Lot and South Street due to safety concerns and noise complaints from Waltham residents. For details, see the brief on this page.

CORRECTIONS AND CLARIFICATIONS

The Justice welcomes submissions for errors that warrant correction or clarification. Email editor@ thejustice.org.

Justice

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Feb. 9—A party came into the police station to report the theft of her backpack, which had been left unattended, from the kitchen area in the Usdan Café. University Police compiled a report on the theft.

Disturbance

Feb. 11—University Police dispersed a party of over 100 students from the Foster Mods. The party was not registered; University Judicial charges will be filed.

Feb. 12—Waltham Police Department received a 911 call of a large fight behind Renfield Hall. No weapons were involved, but a taxi driver was one of the fighting parties.

The WPD sent units to the scene, in addition to University Police units. The police found a taxi driver who reported a fare evasion. University Police handled the matter, and WPD units were cleared.

Feb. 12—A party in the Foster Mods reported a loud party. University Police found five people in the area; they were advised to quiet down, which they did without incident.

—compiled by Marielle Temkin

Four clubs chartered

Brandeis named best value college

n A caption in Sports incorrectly stated that a photo was taken at the Reggie Poyau Invitational on Jan. 12, 2010. In fact, the photo was captured at the event on the same date in 2011. (Feb. 7, p. 15)

Larceny

SENATE LOG

—Alana Abramson

Check our website, www.thejustice.org, for updates.

calls on his cell phone. University Police compiled a report.

The Senate chartered four clubs and recognized one at its meeting on Sunday. Fourteen senators were present.

The improvisational comedy group False Advertising was unanimously chartered. The club, which was already recognized, sought funding for transportation to and from off-campus performances. The club will continue to have a permanent roster of performers, while also holding open improvisation workshops.

The Brandeis chapter of Prevent Child Abuse America was also unanimously recognized. The club is affiliated with the national organization of the same name and shares its mission of encouraging awareness and prevention of child abuse.

The Rocky Horror Official Performance Ensemble, a group which aims to “bring shadowcast performances ... to the Brandeis community,” according to its constitution, was recognized and chartered by a vote of 12 to none with two abstentions. The club hopes to hold at least one free performance each semester.

The Senate chartered and recognized the Brandeis Coin Club by a vote of 11 to none with three abstentions.

The club will focus on coin collecting and hopes to bring experts on the subject to speak on campus.

A Brandeis chapter of the College Masonic Society International was chartered and recognized by a vote of eight to one with five abstentions.

The constitution of the Society, whose members are not Freemasons but are interested in ancient and secret societies, was approved with an amendment to disallow permanent membership for former club presidents.

The Senate passed one Senate Money Resolution of $50 to buy mats for the Village gym.

The meeting then entered executive session. Village Quad Senator Ben Beutel ’12 called for a vote to keep the proceedings public, but the proposal failed, as Beutel was the only senator to vote in favor of it.

—Tate Herbert and Andrew Wingens

ANNOUNCEMENTS The Ethics of Hope

What does it mean to have schizophrenia in the absence of a diagnosis? This lecture by Dr. Amy Sousa attempts to answer that question by critically examining how diagnostic conventions shape the everyday experience of serious mental illness.

Today from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. in Shiffman Humanities Center 216.

Lecture: “Philanthropy and Social Justice”

Prof. Andrew B. Hahn (Heller) will be giving a lunchtime lecture titled “Philanthropy and Social Justice.” The lecture is open to the entire Brandeis community.

Attendees are encouraged to bring their lunch. Light refreshments are provided.

For more information, contact the Heller Events team at hellerevents@brandeis. edu. No RSVP required.

Today from 12:30 to 1:45 p.m. in Schneider G3.

Waltham Group blood drive

Register to donate blood onine at www. redcrossblood.org, sponsor code 965. Don’t

forget to drink plenty of water, eat iron -rich foods and bring your ID with you. Donors will receive free T-shirts.

Today through Thursday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Sherman Function Hall.

Study abroad funding workshop

This session will help you prepare financially for your time abroad. You’ll learn how study abroad program fees are billed and how to determine how much it will cost to study abroad. Attendance at one of these workshops is required for all students applying to study abroad at any point during the 2012-13 academic year who receive financial aid. However, all study abroad applicants are welcome to attend.

Wednesday from noon to 1 p.m. in the Usdan Student Center International Lounge.

MAT open house

The Master of Arts in Teaching program invites you to an open house. This presents an opportunity to sit in on one of our classes, meet some of our faculty and visit

with current students. Lunch will be provided. If the open house schedule doesn’t work for you, the MAT program invites you to schedule a personal visit or phone consultation. Please RSVP. Thursday all day in the Abraham Shapiro Academic Complex Atrium.

“Spiritual Border Crossing”

This lecture by Anita Hannig examines a case of postpartum seclusion in the predominantly Orthodox Christian region of northwestern Ethiopia.

Thursday from noon to 1 p.m. in the Usdan Student Center International Lounge.

ISSO employment workshop

The International Students and Scholars Office’s spring 2012 employment workshops will cover Curricular Practical Training (for F1 Visa holders) starting at 3 p.m., Optional Practical Training (for F1 Visa holders) from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. and Academic Training (for J1 Visa holders) from 4:30 to 5 p.m.

Today from 3 to 5 p.m. in Kutz 215.

THE JUSTICE

public safety

3

Union hosts meeting on MBTA proposals ■ Students voiced their

objections to the possible fare hikes and service cuts at the town hall meeting.

By sara dejene JUSTICE editor

■ University officials report that there is no immediate threat to Brandeis.

By TATE HERBERT JUSTICE EDITORIAL ASSISTANT

As relations between Israel and Iran continue to deteriorate, concerns that Jewish institutions in America may be at risk have emerged. Nuclear tensions between the two Middle Eastern countries escalated Monday afternoon with the bombing of an Israeli embassy van in New Delhi, India and the attempted bombing of another embassy vehicle in Tbilisi, Georgia. While Brandeis officials report that there is no immediate threat to the University, the Department of Public Safety continues to work with local and federal law enforcement to monitor the situation.

“We don’t have any credible threat that is specific to Massachusetts or Brandeis,” said Senior Vice President for Communications and External Affairs Andrew Gully in an interview with the Justice. However, “[Director of Public Safety] Ed Callahan is routinely in touch with law enforcement agencies at all levels,” he said.

Callahan confirmed in an email to the Justice that he maintains communication with unspecified intelligence agencies and has received information on the matter that “reiterates tensions in the Mideast and outlines being cognizant of the situation at this time.”

“Our lives were all changed after 9/11 and we must be aware of suspicious occurrences,” he added. He encouraged students to report any concerns to the Department of Public Safety for review.

Because of America’s strong ties with Israel and its involvement in diplomacy in the region, the U.S. State Department recently issued a security alert warning of heightened risk to American “soft targets,” including Jewish institutions, according to a Feb. 7 Boston Herald article.

Boston police have stepped up patrols at the Back Bay Israeli consulate and “other prominent Jewish locations in the city” in response to the potential security risk, said the article.

It is still unclear who is responsible for Monday’s bombings, which injured four, according to a Feb. 13 CNN report.

The Israeli government points to Iran as the source, while Iranian officials claim that Israel carried out the attacks with the intention of blaming Iran.

The bombings come as Israel contemplates a military strike on Iran, citing concerns about the progression of its nuclear program. This concern stems from an Iranian plan to move nuclear development projects to an impenetrable underground facility, which would secure the eventual development of “bomb-grade fuel,” the New York Times reported in a Feb. 8 article.

The People’s Mujahedin of Iran, an Iranian rebel group which is reputed to be trained by the Israeli secret service, has already carried out several attacks on Iranian nuclear scientists, killing four since 2007, NBC News reported in a Feb. 9 story. The most recent strike occurred Jan. 11 in Tehran.

The United States recently stepped into negotiations in an effort to attempt to persuade the Israeli government to postpone action. Economic sanctions, including import bans on Iranian oil, could stall the progress of Iran’s uranium enrichment, U.S. officials argue.

The European Union has agreed to oil sanctions starting in July.

Explicit threats from Iran have mentioned U.S. bases in the Gulf area.

“Thousands of our missiles will target Israel and the 40 bases of America in the region” if an Israeli attack occurs, said an Iranian Revolutionary Guards commander in a statement released by Fars news agency.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

student life

FUN AND GAMES

Iran raises security issues

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NATHANIEL FREEDMAN/the Justice

Casino Night Students play card games during last Saturday’s Casino Night, which was hosted by various Hillel member groups. Activities also included a taboo competition and an a cappella performance. All proceeds went to charity.

The Student Union hosted a town hall forum last night on the proposed Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority fare hikes and service cuts to hear opinions from students who would be affected if the changes were to take place.

Student Union President Herbie Rosen ’12, Student Union Vice President Gloria Park ’13 and Senior Vice President of Communication and External Affairs Andrew Gully ran the meeting.

Rosen opened the forum by explaining the possible changes to the MBTA, which include two different scenarios. According to a document published by the MBTA last month, one scenario would include fare hikes that could rise as high as $2.40 for a subway ride and $7 for a ride on the Fitchburg commuter rail line into Boston from the Brandeis/Roberts station. In addition, it would include service cuts.

The second scenario would include “slightly lower fare increases but larger service reductions.” In both scenarios, commuter rail service into Boston on the weekend and weekdays after 10 p.m. would be cut.

Students who attended the meeting voiced objection to the proposed scenarios, saying that they would negatively affect students’ ability to travel to and from Boston. One student, who wished to remain anonymous for privacy reasons, said that higher fares and decreased service would result in fewer people traveling into Boston to shop and spend money, which would hurt Massachusetts’ economy.

“The entire eastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island region, which is like seven and a half million people, [is] going to be affected in one way or another because of this,” the student said. “We need to basically say as students … who use the commuter rail, we will not stand for this.”

Other students noted that while many local residents who would be affected would rely on cars more, this would not be feasible for many college students who do not own cars.

Those who attended the forum also discussed prospective students’ decisions to come to Brandeis because of its proximity to Boston and the ability to go into the city via commuter rail. They said that college students would be affected more than other local residents because of their already constrained budgets and inability to rely on more expensive forms of transportation, such as taxis and cars. “[This will] disproportionately affect college students versus other people,” said Asaf Reich ’12.

Gully noted that the cuts will not only affect students but also staff and faculty, who utilize the commuter rail to commute to and from the University.

In an interview with the Justice, Park said that the meeting, which was attended by three students, was “small-scale” but that “it was good to see that students cared ... and shared their opinion.”

Park said that she looks forward to spreading the word to the student body.

Rosen said that the Student Union will move forward by sending out a survey and petition to the student body and preparing to attend one of the MBTA’s local town hall -style meetings. One such meeting will be held in Waltham at the Government Center Auditorium on March 1 from 6 to 8 p.m.

Student Union

Amendments spur Senate dispute ■ Benjamin Beutel ’12 has

proposed a series of bylaw amendments on this issue.

By ANDREW WINGENS JUSTICE EDITOR

The Student Union Senate is considering changes to the way student clubs are recognized, but some members dispute how certain problems should be addressed by the Senate and one member walked out of last Sunday’s meeting.

Village Quad Senator Benjamin Beutel ’12 proposed a series of bylaw amendments last week intended to strengthen the Senate’s ability to reject clubs that have the same goals as another club already functioning at Brandeis.

Executive Senator Missy Skolnik ’12, however, used her executive privilege to move the discussion of the amendments into an executive session.

Beutel, in an interview, provided the Justice with a copy of the amendments that he drafted and proposed.

The proposals would set clearer and stricter standards for the accreditation of union organizations.

“In a nutshell, they raise the level of scrutiny for chartering clubs,” said Beutel. “They give the duality of purpose rule some weight. … The way it is currently written is very open. This really gives it teeth.”

Currently, the Senate bylaws state that a club must “[n]ot duplicate the purpose or goals of a currently Chartered Organization.”

Beutel said that duality of purpose was a major issue because it divides resources. “If we have multiple clubs doing more or less the same thing, they are going to divide up members, they are going to divide up [Finance] Board money,” he said.

Beutel’s proposal would add speci-

fications to that clause and a group’s national or international affiliation would not be a factor in the Senate’s decision to charter it. Senators would also be responsible for contacting other clubs to discuss any overlap or duality of purpose between clubs.

“A group whose on-campus operations, impact, and appeal would substantively be the same as that of an existing Chartered Organization will not be chartered,” reads one new sentence in the proposal. “If a club intends to be affiliated with a National or International Organization, this will have no bearing in determining duality of purpose,” adds another.

“It adds in specific standards for what duality of purpose means. … It

“

“At the end of the day, we are either doing our jobs or we are not.”

—Benjamin Beutel ’12 does increase the workload for the Senate, … but what are we elected for? … At the end of the day, we are either doing our jobs or we are not,” said Beutel.

Beutel’s proposals also add specific rules for revoking the accreditation of clubs and would require a two-thirds vote to charter a club rather than the current majority vote.

Currently, clubs must go through a process of attaining signatures of support from 135 students and a signature from one senator to certify that the club conforms to the necessary guidelines set by the Union constitution and senate by-laws. The clubs also need to go to a meeting of the Club Support Committee to discuss

the club and its potential accreditation.

The Club Support Committee largely handles those points of procedure, so that clubs may present themselves for accreditation at the weekly Senate meetings.

Once a club has presented its mission and goals, senators typically ask questions of the club to determine if the club abides by all the rules set by the Senate bylaws. Section one of Article VIII lists the requirements of accredited organizations, including that the club “[n]ot duplicate the purpose or goals of a currently Chartered Organization” and “[b]e open to all members of the Brandeis community.”

The Senate’s discussion often revolves around the question of whether or not the club in question has a “duality of purpose” with another club.

Controversy surrounding these amendments, however, reached a boiling point Sunday night as Beutel walked out of the meeting just prior to an executive session, following Skolnik’s use of executive privilege to discuss the bylaw amendments in the executive session, rather than on the agenda. Beutel later returned after several senators convinced him to do so.

Beutel tried to overrule Skolnik’s decision by a procedural vote, but it failed. Beutel was the only senator who voted to keep the senate in open forum. The senate can move into executive session by a majority vote.

Contents of that session cannot be “broadcast,” but the Senate cannot vote during that time.

Senators declined comment on the specifics of their discussion during the executive session.

Skolnik said in an interview with the Justice that she wanted to use the executive session to come to a consensus among the senators about an “intent and purpose” behind the pro-

posed amendments.

“Ben had drafted some amendment proposals and they were by-and-large very good, but the content needed to be discussed a lot and we haven’t had the opportunity as a Senate to talk about how we want to define certain things in the future. And in order to all be on the same page, I felt that it was a good idea for us to go into an executive session,” said Skolnik.

Skolnik said that she does not believe the discussion of the bylaw amendment proposals should be public at this point. “As elected officials it’s our job to get things right but we should be able to talk amongst ourselves and figure things out before … making them public,” she said.

Senator for Massell Quad Dean Kaplan ’15, who was not present at the beginning of the meeting but attended the executive session, said, “The reason that we were debating in executive session is that there are some things that are controversial, and they might not represent the opinion of the Student Union. We don’t want to cause too much uproar or controversy about things that will never make it past deliberations or quiet murmurings of a few students anyway.”

“Once we come up with a solid draft of the bylaw proposals, it will be proposed … at a senate meeting, open to the public,” added Skolnik.

Beutel said he disagrees with this use of executive session. “I don’t like the use of executive sessions when it is actually for determining policy, as this at least indirectly is.”

Skolnik said that she hopes at least some of the proposed amendments will be brought to an open session at the next Senate meeting. Otherwise, she said she would continue to use executive sessions to continue outlining the Senate’s opinions on the issue.

—Emily Kraus contributed reporting.

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

’DEIS IMPACT

Profs speak about social justice ■ Professors from several

departments joined about 30 students in a discussion of social justice in academics at Brandeis.

By JONATHAN EPSTEIN JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

An event called “Social Justice in the Brandeis Curriculum” was held in the Usdan Alumni Lounge on Wednesday as a part of ‘Deis Impact, a week of events highlighting social justice on campus. Professors and approximately 30 students engaged in small group discussions and in a larger dialogue about what social justice means to them and how it can be studied in an academic environment.

The goal of the event was to explore questions including: “What majors, courses and programs contribute to advancing social justice, and in what ways? How could other majors and courses contribute more to advancing social justice?

How do we define social justice, and how do we interact if our definitions differ?” according to an email sent to the student body.

The professors present were from different departments and provided

a range of personal definitions of social justice in an initial discussion.

Prof. Susan Lanser (ENG) spoke first and explained, “I see social justice as the fully equitable provision of rights, distribution of resources and access to opportunities for every individual and group.” She added that the humanities are necessary for understanding what social justice as a concept means. Prof.

Gordon Fellman (SOC) espoused an intuitive definition of social justice, saying “I know it when I see it, and I know it’s not there when I see it’s not there.” He added that social justice includes “fairness, empathy, compassion, empowerment, mutuality, a full recognition of the self and the other as entitled to all rights and aspirations.” Fellman criticized politicians for not discussing social justice. He said that his goal “in imagining social justice is to recognize and publicize and figure out ways to actually reconstruct society so that there are no more structures of violence.”

Prof. Tim Hickey (COSI) provided a more explicit definition: “I think of social justice as the process of seeking out unfairness and injustice … in our society and working toward the creation or evolution of a more fair and just society.” Prof.

Jennifer Cleary (THA) cited oppression on the individual and community as indicative of a violation of social justice and stated that it was important to validate each individual’s experience.

Two other professors defined social justice within the boundaries of their fields. Prof. Laura Goldin (AMST) viewed social justice in environmental terms, with a focus on global warming’s effect on the world’s poor. “Who gets hit first and who doesn’t have the ability to migrate quickly when their islands are sinking into the sea?” she asked.

Prof. Melissa Stimell (LGLS) cited Justice Louis Brandeis’ reputation as “the people’s lawyer” and her own background as a public defender in formulating her conception of social justice, which she defined as “listening and empathizing with those who do not have a voice in our institutions, those vulnerable populations, and really finding a way to help them be heard and give them a voice.”

In the ensuing smaller discussion groups, each professor drew from his or her field. Lanser talked about a new first-year seminar on social justice, whether Brandeis is succeeding in having a curriculum that supports social justice and the role of pedagogy in fostering deep

thinking and action.

Fellman led a discussion on how society works, its faults and how it can be changed and highlighted the recent actions of Occupy Harvard and the group’s potential. He also highlighted the Economics course “Social Priorities and the Market,” taught by Prof. Anne Carter (ECON), because Economics departments are traditionally considered to be less concerned with social justice than other departments, such as Sociology and Women’s and Gender Studies.

Hickey described social justices in the sciences and ways that scientists can affect society and the broader world. Goldin focused on expanding the role of environmental studies in social justice, and Stimell discussed experiential learning and social justice.

Dillon Harvey ’14 stated that many students participate in social justice as an extracurricular, but that this event allowed students to see it within an academic context.

The event was sponsored by the Office of the Dean of Arts and Sciences and the Programs and Departments of American Studies, Computer Science, Sociology, English, Environmental Studies, Legal Studies and Peace, Conflict and Coexistence Studies.

Panel discusses American healthcare ■ Students and alumni

shared their experiences working with underserved populations in the American healthcare system.

By RAQUEL KALLAS JUSTICE CONTRIBUTING WRITER

On Tuesday, Feb. 7, students, faculty and members of the Boston community were featured in the Social Justice and American Healthcare discussion panel. As part of ‘Deis Impact, Stacey Ha ’12, Emily Krainer ’12, Dimple Patel ’12, Samantha Watson ’01 MBA ’06 and Vanessa McClinchy of Vanessa McClinchy Consulting shared their experiences with working alongside underserved populations in the healthcare system.

The discussion focused on young adults with cancer, Native Americans, Alaskan Indians, African Americans, HIV/AIDS patients and children with psychiatric disabilities. The overarching theme expressed by all of the panelists was that their work with those in need not only benefitted the needy, but resulted in them finding a passion for service within themselves.

Samantha Watson is a graduate of Brandeis and teaches “Sociology of Disability” in the Heller School. She is also the founder and executive director of the SAMFund, a non-profit organization that helps young adults regain a normal life after cancer.

Watson was diagnosed with cancer twice as a young adult, once while she was an undergraduate student at Brandeis. She acknowledged, “I was very fortunate that I had a great support system, not only from my family and friends, but from the Brandeis community.” Watson noticed that not all young adult survivors have a similar strong support system, which compelled her to found the SAMFund to help them recover financially, psychologically and socially. “I felt this obligation to pay it forward,” Watson said.

Vanessa McClinchy works as a consultant for schools and hospitals to help facilitate what she calls on her website, “the power of human connection.” McClinchy discussed her most notable experiences with serving the underserved, describing the injustices and incongruity she has witnessed in healthcare over the years. She recounted the story of an African American man who would not confide his health issues to

JENNY CHENG/the Justice

BENEFITTING THE NEEDY: The panelists spoke about working with patients with HIV, cancer, and psychiatric disabilities. white doctors because of past occurrences. He had been turned away by multiple doctors and accused of trying to swindle drugs. McClinchy asserted that minorities “have a sense of disconnection [from the system] that fosters the racial disparity in healthcare.” She concluded by urging the audience to take action on issues that they are passionate about, stating “we can work with the disadvantaged and find out that it was we who were disadvantaged.”

Ha, Krainer and Patel are all seniors at Brandeis who have completed internships with the underprivileged in the field of healthcare.

Ha was a recipient of Hiatt’s World of Work grant, which allowed her to pursue an unpaid internship in New York City with HIV/AIDS patients.

Ha’s love of art prompted her to in-

corporate creativity into her work.

She claimed that there is a sense of liberation derived from art, an experience that she thinks should be translated into medicine.

Krainer also completed an internship in New York City, at Columbia University Medical Center’s Pediatric Neurology Department. Krainer’s focus on children with autism led her to the realization that there are many misconceptions and assumptions about the disorder. She said, “it really opened my eyes to the myths and stigmas associated with autism.”

Patel was another recipient of WOW, which enabled her to complete an internship in Colorado with Native American Cancer Research.

Patel asserted, “it’s about a personal connection when you’re working in

social justice.” She said that the internship forced her to step out of her comfort zone, but her motivation and sense of duty kept her committed. Patel said that she would like to continue on in the area of health policy, because she is very interested in public healthcare disparities.

She added “it’s so easy to look away because we’ve been doing that for so long.”

Leila Pascual ’15 commented “[The event] was great, it’s really awesome to take time off from the busy day to sit in on this event to hear from peoples’ experiences and the incredible passions that I realize I share with others in this school. The fact that it involved students, faculty, and people outside of Brandeis made it a community effort and a motivator.”

IMPACT: Speaker stresses getting involved CONTINUED FROM 1 justice really is. ‘Deis Impact is the time where we recognize, question and discuss the unexplainable institutional love we have here at Brandeis for local action,” said Rosen.

Messinger then took the stage, stressing a few main themes throughout her address.

“As AJWS grows,” she said, “we need to find more grassroots organizations to give them more help for what they need to make them more efficient.” Messinger continued, “We need to extend our reach and commitment to the people here.”

Messinger went on to emphasize the interdependency of today’s world and the importance of local and global reach.

She emphasized the fact that the awareness that one does not have all the answers is what will result in the ultimate benefit for both the organization and recipients of aid.

Prof. Larry Simon, director of the Sustainable International Development program at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management, and founder and former president of AJWS, followed Messinger’s remarks with an address largely related to the significance of nature and the importance of a well-planned strategy.

Simon said that the “disaster” element of a natural disaster comes with poor planning.

According to Simon, since the people are already there, and the geographical predisposition is not going to change, it is a social imperative to improve the planning and implementations of strategies that surround natural disasters.

Simon continued to talk about poverty and developing adequate leadership in developing countries. He emphasized the importance of getting involved and continually referred to the science of economics, stating the “the world is not static.”

Simon then opened the floor to student and audience questions.

In an interview with the Justice, Messinger spoke about the future of AJWS. “We hope to keep growing as an organization in the Jewish community, motivated by the Jewish commitment to justice to help more and more people in the world realize their human rights,” she said.

She concluded by saying that AJWS plans to do so using grassroots projects and by mobilizing the American Jewish Community.

In an interview with the Justice, Ariel Milan-Polisar ’14 spoke about the inspiration she drew from Messinger.

“The work that Ruth does is so inspiring, and her life is an example that is so incredible to college students that are looking to create their identities and figure out what’s important to them.”

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THE JUSTICE

ACADEMICS

ISRAEL AND THE WORLD

White House praises Posse ■ The Posse program at

Brandeis is the “flagship” of the White House's expanding science program.

By FIONA LOCKYER JUSTICE EDITOR

The science Posse program at Brandeis is among one of the major accomplishments of the United States science, technology, engineering and math initiatives, according to a Feb. 7 release from the White House Office of the Press Secretary.

According to the press release, “the Posse Foundation, an effective program to bring under-represented, urban students from diverse backgrounds to college and help them graduate, is announcing a commitment to create a ‘STEM Posse’ in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York and Washington D.C.” Brandeis became the first university in the U.S. to start a science Posse program in 2008, and the first class of accepted Posse students will be graduating this spring.

Since 2008, the science Posse program at Brandeis has drawn 10 students from New York City on a merit-based scholarship program for inner-city students seeking to study in the sciences. According to the Brandeis Posse Program website, it is one of the most competitive scholarship programs in the country and students regularly graduate with university and departmental honors.

However, the Posse Foundation and the creation of STEM programs have expanded beyond Brandeis.

In addition to Brandeis, Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Penn., the University of WisconsinMadison, Texas A&M University and Bryn Mawr College in Bryn Mawr, Penn. will also be creating science Posses of their own.

Prof. Irving Epstein (CHEM), who heads the science Posse program here, explained in an interview with the Justice that the science Posse of the University of WisconsinMadison is in its first year, and that Franklin & Marshall has just

finished recruiting the students for its science Posse, which will start this coming September.

“We and Wisconsin are drawing from New York [and] Franklin & Marshall is taking its posse from Miami,” he said. “The idea is to get up to 10 science Posses across the country taken from 10 different cities.”

According to Epstein, the nod from the White House is an indicator that the Posse Foundation could be receiving more funding in the future.

“I think in the long run, … it means that there’s going to be [more funding], maybe it depends on how the election goes, but if you assume that President Obama will still have something to say about this, what it sounds like is that there will be a significant amount of funding for STEM education and that clearly Posse has the attention of the people in Washington.”

As the “flagship science Posse,” Brandeis will likely be playing a role in helping new Posses get started, Epstein explained. This may mean receiving a share of any new funding that the Posse Foundation receives, but the Brandeis Posse program is also applying for additional funding.

According to Epstein, the program here has a proposal pending to the National Science Foundation for $600,000 to use primarily for scholarships for students in the science Posse program, whose scholarships are currently being funded by the general University scholarship pool.

Another use for any incoming funding may be used to create a second science Posse when the University feels it is ready, Epstein said. “We can have one Posse or we can have two Posses, but we can’t have one and a half,” Epstein explained, going on to say that “certainly if we did two science Posses, we would take them from different cities.”

So, would the Brandeis science Posse continue to draw from New York City?

“Probably, although that’s negotiable,” Epstein said. “We’ve been pretty happy with New York so far and I think it’ll depend on how things shake out.”

JOSHUA LINTON/the Justice

J Street U Conference Students from across New England met yesterday during a regional J Street U Conference to discuss current issues relating to Israel, such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

PACHANGA: More meetings to be held CONTINUED FROM 1 The dance, which was first held in 2001, was changed to an annual rather than semesterly event, according to a February 2011 interview with Director of the Intercultural Center Monique Gnanaratnam. The decision followed the Oct. 23, 2010 Pachanga dance, which resulted in overcrowding and the hospitalization

of multiple intoxicated attendees. The overcrowding was caused by the sale of fake wristbands. Eventually, a fire alarm was activated at 12:30 a.m., an hour and a half before the dance was scheduled to end. In an Oct. 25 email to the Brandeis community, thenUniversity President Jehuda Reinharz called the events that took place that night “unprecedented.”

According to Adams in a Febru-

ary 2011 Justice interview, Pachanga will now be held every spring, starting this semester in order to avoid “having a duplication of the negative things that surround the event happening.”

The final decision to hold Pachanga this semester has not yet been made, but Verdeja said that another meeting will be held this week in order to discuss the issue.

Summer Courses at Wheelock College

ACADEMICS

New seminars will promote Univ values ■ JustBooks seminars will

address social justice while upholding Brandeis’ ideal of intellectual inquiry.

By LUKE HAYSLIP JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

Brandeis has launched a cluster of seminars for entering students, called JustBooks, “in an effort to honor the University’s dual commitments to social justice and rigorous intellectural inquiry,” according to Prof. Susan Lanser (ENG).

“These new seminars will have the additional benefit of addressing in a curricular way the University’s commitment to social justice,” wrote Lanser in an email to the Justice.

The seminars will not replace the current First Year Seminars but merely complement them. Like University Seminar courses that Brandeis previously required first -year students to take, each JustBooks Seminar will be individually crafted around a specific topic consistent with the professor's field of expertise. Unlike the USEMs, each JustBooks Seminar will carry credit toward at least one major in a sponsoring department or program, and possibly toward more than one major or toward a minor. USEMs were

small seminar-style classes taught by distinguished faculty. They were interdisciplinary in subject matter and developed students’ critical thinking and writing skills through close analysis of significant texts.

Brandeis will have a kick-off lecture in the fall of this year for all sections as well as for the Brandeis community as a whole. The lecture will be presented by philosophy professor and Brandeis alumnus Michael Sandel ’75, the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass professor of Government at Harvard University, and a teacher of political philosophy. His class, titled "Justice," has attracted hundreds of students and is available online. He is also the author of Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do. Also like USEMs, faculty members have been asked to propose courses for next year designed in conjunction with JustBooks. “Right now we have asked faculty to propose JustBooks courses for next year, so we don’t yet know the specific seminars that will be offered—nor how many there will be,” commented Lanser.

“But we hope the idea will catch on with students and faculty alike.”

Lanser is responsible for the seminar name, JustBooks, but her colleague and Brandeis alum Prof.

Marc Brettler (NEJS) “thought it would be quite Brandeisian to [put] the two words together.”

Why Wheelock?

• Special summer tuition rate • Liberal arts and professional courses • Six-week sessions begin in May and July • Convenient Boston location just steps from the Green Line subway

Learn More and Register For details and to register, visit www.wheelock.edu/summer or call (617) 879.2269

Boston

features Lunchtime

just

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

VERBATIM | DR. SEUSS You know you are in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.

ON THIS DAY…

FUN FACT

In 1980, the musical West Side Story opened at the Minskoff Theater in New York for 341 performances.

On Feb. 14, Verona, Italy sees about 1,000 letters addressed to Shakespeare’s Juliet.

encounters

By TATE HERBERT

JUSTICE EDITORIAL ASSISTANT

If nothing else, the website BrandeisLunch certainly lives up to the description that creator Seth Riddley, a Harvard senior, gives it: “A different kind of interaction.” Anyone who has been on a blind date knows the feeling of nervousness and excitement that comes minutes before meeting the person with whom you have been set up. Because of the anxiety that embarking on an unknown and potentially awkward situation entails, many people intentionally steer clear of setups or blind dates of any kind. But, according to figures on brandeislunch.com, 1,722 students have willingly set themselves up through the program and its sister sites.

Over the past year and a half, the website, one of the many versions that Riddley tailored to individual schools from his original brainchild, HarvardLunch, has randomly paired student users with each other on blind lunch dates with the intent of helping them branch out of their usual social circles.

It enables users to “meet Brandeis students you might never encounter otherwise,” according to the BrandeisLunch website.

The ingenious ease and simplicity of the site is part of what has made it a sensation on several college campuses. Even the shyest, the most inactive or the most cliquish students need only submit their names and email addresses to receive the names of a potential new friends and a suggested meeting time delivered to their inboxes within minutes.

HarvardLunch was created in November 2010, when Riddley said he woke up in the middle of the night with the idea and immediately put it into action. Harvard’s student newspaper, The Crimson, ran an article about the website soon after it came out, and within days it became a campus wide phenomenon.

The HarvardLunch prototype is an “extremely simple site” and didn’t require a lot of work to set up, according to Riddley. During the beginning stages of the project, he was able to run it manually by himself; now that it has expanded considerably, the entire system is automated.

In the weeks that followed, the idea “took

THE JUSTICE

COURTESY OF BRANDEISLUNCH.COM

IT’S A MATCH: The website lets students enter their email addresses to pair them with other students. off,” with students from several schools approaching him to establish the website at their universities, Riddley said in an interview with the Justice. Since its inception at Harvard, four more universities have adopted the “Lunch” website: Yale University, Brandeis, Princeton University and the University of Chicago.

LunchEdu, the umbrella organization for HarvardLunch and its variations, added BrandeisLunch to its roster a couple of months ago when Alina Liu ’13 sent Riddley a message via Facebook, saying that she had read about the program online and wanted to see it at Brandeis. With some small adjustments to just two lines of code that changed the color scheme and the name of the site, BrandeisLunch was created and, at the beginning of this semester, was up and running.

The blind date feeling to the process certainly does not suit all personalities. “Some people find it really awkward; other people think it’s really cool,” said Riddley.

“It’s not that awkward for me because I talk a lot,” said Genevieve Zucchetto de Oliveira ’15, who used BrandeisLunch this

past week. “But if you’re a shy person, … you might be intimidated to walk up to a random stranger and be like, ‘Hi, are you this person?’”

Zucchetto de Oliveira was matched with an acquaintance who she had previously met through their scholarship program. The two are currently planning when and where to have their lunch.

“I definitely want to try again,” said Zucchetto de Oliveira. “I feel like it’s good to get to know people that way.”

The multitude of stories like this suggest that a small student body like Brandeis’ may not be conducive to the kind of random encounter that BrandeisLunch seeks to generate. Brandeis, with 3,504 undergraduates and 2,324 graduate students, is the smallest of the universities that currently use the LunchEdu program. Harvard is the largest, with about 21,000 total graduate and undergraduate students, and the University of Chicago is next at approximately 15,000. Yale comes in at just over 11,000, while Princeton has almost 8,000 students.

Many participants were even matched to people with whom they were very close.

BrandeisLunch website makes matches for students to connect during meals “We always go to lunch and dinner together,” said Havisha Desai ’15 of her BrandeisLunch match, a friend from her high school.

“We decided that we would try to branch out together. We both signed up and got paired with each other,” Desai explained.

“We’re all very interconnected. It’s very hard to find someone who you don’t have any friends in common with,” Zucchetto de Oliveira said.

“With a more elegant system, [the website] could fix that problem,” said Riddley, referring to the lack of strangers generated by matches within small populations. “It could be done a lot better than it is, but it’s not something I can dedicate a lot of time to right now,” he said of the inefficiency and simple design of the site. His focus for now will be on his studies and other projects, he explained.

Having several options for each match, for instance, could have resulted in a better experience, suggested Desai. She said that she was unsure if she would try the website out again.

The small pool of candidates in the BrandeisLunch system may be due to the lack of awareness of the program, as well as the small student body size. While students on other campuses have taken it upon themselves to promote it, there has not been much buzz about it at Brandeis.

As it stands, it is still entirely possible to meet someone new through BrandeisLunch – or at least get to know them better. If you do happen to draw a total stranger, at this point, the size of the University will most likely work in your favor, as you and your match are likely to have something in common just by virtue of being part of the same small community.

For instance, you may discover that your new acquaintance is in a comedy or an a cappella group that you saw perform last semester, shares your views on Pachanga and Einstein Bros. Bagels’s hours or has a common connection with you in any of an infinite number of uniquely Brandeisian aspects.

With BrandeisLunch, all it takes to form a new friendship is for one student to enter her name into a database, then sit back and relax while the computer reaches out to another student for her. What happens next is up to them.

JOSHUA LINTON/the Justice

LUNCH, ANYONE?: Students are matched with others who submit their names on the BrandeisLunch website, but deciding the time and place to meet is up to them, although the site recommends a date.

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THE JUSTICE

Spring semester 2012 has given us an array of new classes that had students hovering over their laptops at registration time in order to get a spot. Each of these courses is new to Brandeis, as are some of the professors. Many of the courses are one-time offerings. Some had a waiting list after the first day of registration and have stayed full since. Students were eager to sample from these innovative classes; the unique reading lists, discussion topics and class activities have kept them interested. From courses on Disney films to French feminist thinkers, we have compiled a list of the five most exciting new classes of spring 2012.

top class

At the of the

PHOTOS BY JENNY CHENG/the Justice

COMPARING TEXTS: “The Art of Flirtation” students read ‘Dracula’ and ‘Twilight.’

Students consider the most popular new classes of the spring

FRENCH FEMINISM: Prof. de Gasquet’s (ROM) class analyzes Postcolonial France.

By SELENE CAMPION and BARBARA SOLEY JUSTICE CONTRIBUTING WRITERs

“The Art of Flirtation: Reading Romance from Pride and Prejudice to Harry Potter” The first book of the semester is Pride and Prejudice, followed

by Bridget Jones’s Diary. The two might seem an unlikely pair, but they are analyzed and compared in “The Art of Flirtation: Reading Romance from Pride and Prejudice to Harry Potter” taught by Prof.

Dawn Skorczewski (ENG).

“I wanted to pair books from different historical periods so students could think about the issues of flirtation in romance in, say, 1810 versus 1910, to see what they could discern about the differences in how romance was configured in those times,” Skorczewski says.

Currently, the class, offered for the first time this semester, is comparing Dracula and Twilight.

Other books on the reading list include Maurice and True Enough.

“One of the things I hope we discover is how conservative Twilight is compared to Dracula, that Dracula opens up all these questions that Twilight sort of closes down,” Skorczewski says.

It is the eclectic reading list and thoughtful discussions that have made this class an instant hit.

Unsurprisingly, the course has attracted a majority of women, but the three men in the class are always active participants.

“The men who are in the class are really engaged and have really interesting contributions. We’re spending a lot of time talking about gender so I’d like to challenge this idea that romance is only a woman’s story, but, I think, traditionally, romance was something for the ladies,” Teaching Assistant Kyley Caldwell says.

“I never paid attention to the intimacy of the relationships between characters before I was in a class with girls,” says Terrell Gilkey ’15. Whether or not more men decide to take a class on flirtation in literature, the class is sure to return within three years, according to Skorczewski.

“After Beauvoir: Gender, Culture and Politics in Postcolonial France” The name Simone de Beauvoir is often synonymous with the word “feminism.” The two terms are coupled in classrooms, books and

literary discussions around the world. However, there is much more to the study of both the French existentialist philosopher and the term than are explored in simple discussions.

Prof. Beatrice de Gasquet’s (ROM) class “After Beauvoir: Gender, Culture and Politics in Postcolonial France” addresses how feminism has been redefined since Beauvoir’s famous book, Le Deuxième Sexe (The Second Sex), was published in 1949. The class is taught entirely in French, a formidable task for any student to take on. Hannah Caldwell ’15 decided to tackle it. “Because my prior knowl-

Une Jeune Fille Rangée and Christine Bard’s Les Femmes Dans La Société Française au 20e Siècle.

“Both the literature component and the sociological component [are] obviously the main challenge[s] for me in the class, and at the same time can be very fruitful in terms of class content,” de Gasquet says.

She will not be able to revise the course to teach again next year, however. She is teaching at the University as a part of a two-year fellowship, and next semester she will develop another course combining sociology and gender studies. This is the only semester the course is offered and students like Hannah Caldwell are thankful they seized the opportunity.

“Topics in Theater and Drama: Short-Form Comedy” Prof. Jonathan Katz (THA) admits that he can’t exactly “teach” improvisation comedy to students.

However, he combines his experience as a professional comedian and working with Improv Boston, a non-profit sketch, stand-up and improvisational comedy theater, to give students “some of the stuff I’ve learned from being in the comedy business for 25 years,” in his class “Topics in Theater and

audience,” he says.

“I’m a theater minor. I saw this was a sketch comedy class and that’s all it took. I admit I did not know who Jonathan Katz was when I signed up for this course, but now I am very ashamed of that fact. He is an incredible comedian. … This is the best class I’ve had so far at Brandeis,” Ben Cantor ’13 says.

“The Films of Disney” An English class on Disney movies? You’ve probably already heard the buzz around campus about this over-enrolled class by now. It’s no wonder: The regular homework assignments for this course are to watch some of Disney’s most quintessential children’s films that most of us grew up with. The list includes Cinderella, The Jungle Book and The Lion King.

Prof. Caren Irr (ENG) created the class. “Most of the films I watch at home … with my daughter, and I just started thinking about how people learn to watch films,” she says. The class takes a deeper look into Disney’s animated films and focuses on their cultural influence.

“I thought [the class] would be childish, but we’re doing a really adult view of Disney films and their deeper messages,” says Dylan Schlesinger ’15. Irr believes that Disney films have something that is universal, a quality within all of their productions which she calls “Disneyfication,” or “lifting you up by your bootstraps” stories.

The class studies the original stories on which the movies are based. Some stories, such as those from the Grimm’s Fairy Tales are surprisingly gruesome. According to Irr, Disney has spun these tales into happy-ending stories, a formula for the studio’s films.

The class examines the deeper contextual meanings and cultural interpretations that can be applied to the films and literature and reads about the influence that Disney, the country’s largest media conglomerate, has had both on American cultures and cultures around the world.

“Our generation relates to Disney the most. It was really a big part of my childhood and even now I still like it,” Schlesinger says.

“Media and Violence: An Anthropological Approach” Each year, the University gives a prestigious award stipend called the University Prize Instructorship to a graduate student, allowing them to teach an undergraduate class in their field of research.

Graduate student Ieva Jusionyte (ANTH) received one of this year’s awards.

Students in “Media and Violence: An Anthropological Approach” are studying the media perspectives of the current Occupy movement. “The media usually takes sides depending on political views and social class. Either the police are bringing violence on demonstrators, or police are being law enforcement over lazy demonstrators,” says Jusionyte.

Originally from Lithuania, Jusionyte worked as a journalist before moving to Argentina to run a controversial television program on current issues, and then to the United States to continue to study the contexts and influences of violence in the media.

Her goal for the students in the class is to learn to challenge their perceptions of media. “I want the students to critically engage with the media and start discussing viewpoints that are not always comfortable with them,” she says.

In order to do this, Jusionyte has students create and update blogs.

They write entries about their personal interactions with media violence.

“One student went to an exhibition of the Disobedience Archive at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, on the history of protests,” she says. Jusionyte also examines relevant global issues currently being covered in the media.

“There are a lot of good case studies, says Gilda Di Carli ’13. “In class, we talked about propaganda videos and how the U.S. Army and Marines glorify war and the life of a soldier. They portray it as very heroic and noble. We analyze things that we encounter on a daily basis but never think about.”

Jusyionte is graduating from Brandeis in May with a Ph.D. in Anthropology, but “would definitely want to teach this class again if the opportunity arises,” she says.

A NEW TWIST: Prof. Irr (ENG) discusses the meanings behind the Disney classics. edge of the French Feminist Movement was severely limited, I appreciate the perspective the class has given me of the French woman’s experience,” she says.

De Gasquet taught at Paris-Sorbonne University established in the 12th century, for seven years before coming to Brandeis. There, most texts she read on feminism were in English. “I thought it was a nice thing to do the reverse story and teach French literature to Americans. Here you hear about French feminism and, in the more popular discourse, French women, so I try to demystify this and show a more complex picture,” she says.

The textbook list for the course is largely nonfiction and many of the texts are ones that are used in French universities. Readings include excerpts from Simone de Beauvoir’s Le Deuxième Sexe and

Drama: Short-Form Comedy” this semester.

“I have a captive audience once a week, which is great because I can’t stop making jokes!” Katz says.

Katz is a comedian most famous for his Comedy Central show Dr. Katz: Professional Therapist, an animation about a psychotherapist who has sessions with famous comedians and actors.

The class meets once a week for two hours to study the art of shortform comedy. Short-form improvisational comedy is a collection of fast-moving sketch performances of funny scenes created on the spot.

He also has students perform in class. Each class meeting ends with group sketch presentations from students. “I’m trying to get students to create something that’s funny, that’s five minutes long and maybe they can share with a larger

COMMON APPLICATION: Jusionyte asks students to blog about media violence.

THE JUSTICE

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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

9

Televised

redemption PHOTO COURTESY OF CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION

COMPANY COLLABORATION: President Stephen Flatt (left) and Marketing Director Chantelle Tersigni (right) of Upper Canada Soap were featured on the show ‘Redemption Inc.’ as they created a challenge for ex-cons.

Bryan Flatt ’12 gets a behind-the-scenes look at reality television

By BRYAN FLATT JUSTICE EDITOR

How real is reality television? I was skeptical of the authenticity of what I saw as tabloid television, until this past summer, when I had the chance to go behind the scenes and see the making of an episode of Redemption Inc., Shark Tank star and billionaire extraordinaire Kevin O’Leary’s new show. Thinking of Jersey Shore, The Hills and Survivor, I found that even my friends who religiously follow the lives of Snookie, Lauren Conrad and The Tribes still question the validity of the scenarios and scenes on the shows. Of course, hours upon hours of footage are shot and the producer must maximize the drama and stay true to the concept all in a 45-minute block. As a part of that whittling down, rumors purport that scenes occasionally need to be tweaked or manipulated. Although this may be true for other programs, my experience with Redemption Inc. felt mostly authentic.

The show is the brainchild of multi-billionaire entrepreneur Kevin O’Leary and British company Wide Eyed Entertainment and follows 10 recently freed ex-cons as they try to persevere through challenges in hopes of a chance at true redemption with a $100,000 start-up investment along with support and personal mentorship by O’Leary.

Over nine episodes and many unique challenges, including taking over a carwash and detailing center, selling charity tickets at a major sporting event and running a swanky art show, contestants are driven to work as a unified team while competing to be top-dog every week.

Imagine The Apprentice with a twist and a boss as equally unforgiving and ruthless as Donald Trump.

Throughout the series, the ex-cons, convicted for crimes concerning drugs, weapons, abuse and money laundering, are put to the test as team participants and leaders.

Unlike any other show, however, each week the weakest participant still gets the chance for some redemption with a package offer including educational scholarships, life-coach training and resources to help them continue to foster their entrepreneurial spirit.

The ultimate decision comes down to the last few minutes of the show where the contestant can pick the package and leave the show or risk it all and continue as a contestant without any future considerations. They can keep playing to win, but if they are in the bottom again, they give up any package the next time they lose and go home empty-handed.

My experience with Redemption Inc. began much earlier in the summer at a Canadian-based bath, body and cosmetic products company called Upper Canada Soap. I worked in the marketing department as the social media and e-commerce coordinator put in charge of boosting online views while working with a team to help revamp the website.

On a day-to-day basis, my work consisted of gathering information

PHOTO COURTESY OF BRYAN FLATT

NEW OPPORTUNITY: Flatt ’12 (right) worked on the show alongside his father, Stephen Flatt (left) and host Kevin O’Leary (center).

PHOTO COURTESY OF PROPER MEDIA

A SECOND CHANCE: The show’s contestants discuss the two-day project of all aspects of three products for a men’s line of soap. on the benefits of ingredients such as maple syrup, goji berry and vanilla for the skin and asking poignant questions to our loyal followers such as: “What is your favorite scent to put on every morning?” and “How do you fight the midweek work blues?”

Around mid-July, one of the show’s producers contacted Upper Canada Soap with a proposition to make the company a part of a new reality series by designing a challenge for the ex-cons participating in the show. My dad—company President Stephen Flatt—asked me

if the show was worth pursuing.

I responded with an enthusiastic “YES!” As a regular entertainment enthusiast, the chance to fuse my job with an opportunity for insight into the television world was quite exciting.

After signing waivers and conducting a couple creative meetings between the producers, my dad and Director of Marketing Chantelle Tersigni, the details were worked out and filming was ready to begin.

The task at hand was for the six remaining contestants to work together to design a product that

transcended Upper Canada Soap’s female-centric lines, a threeproduct men’s line. They were in charge of every aspect of the superstreamlined two-day product development—from target market, to logo, to fragrance and bottle design.

Seeing multiple cameras take over a workplace was one thing, but to actually see the drama unfold was a whole other ballgame.

During lunch breaks on both days in the office, I spoke with the contestants and heard a lot of their personal stories and experiences on the show. Somewhat surprisingly,

each contestant was frank about his or her background—whether crack dealer or financial schemer—and honestly seemed to want to get the second chance the show promised.

We think about society abandoning ex-cons after they do their time, but all of the six people I met legitimately wanted to make their lives—and the world— better. While each of the contestants was extremely nice and appeared fairly down-to-earth off-camera, they still were always thinking about the competition as tensions rose and allegiances started to form.

Despite being on a unified team, the feelings of the contestants from day one to day two quickly intensified. All the drama that is seen onscreen from the comfort of your couch is 100 percent true, and they needed to cut out a lot of additional material. I listened to the one-on-one testimonials of the ex-cons between challenge tasks and, at the end of the day, I really got to hear every piece of the puzzle come together while getting inside the minds of the contestants on the show.

Seeing the product—labeled “Alpha M”—go from an idea into an actual three-product line in just two days was pretty remarkable, but the true action happened on the final day of the shoot in the Redemption Inc. boardroom. Meeting up with O’Leary, we talked about the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate and I moved to the control room to see where the magic happens.

The three days of shooting accumulated over 20 hours of footage overall, and I couldn’t wait to see the final product air on television two Mondays ago.

After watching the episode, it was surreal reliving what seems to me to be highlights of a lengthy and unique experience behind the scenes. The producer did an excellent job taking the main excitement and making it prevalent while highlighting Upper Canada Soap and all its brand names and products.

There were even some twists in the episode that we didn’t have the chance to see during the filming process, making it all the more exciting to watch.

So how real is reality television?

Its entertainment comes not in the situations the contestants face, but in something much more basic—human nature. By pulling up the veil and seeing the good, the bad and the ugly of the entire experience, I not only was able to help be a part of an exciting time for Upper Canada Soap, but I got to re-examine my own relationship with reality television.

Now I don’t see it as just “tabloid television,” despite its inherent voyeuristic nature, but instead a character drama with real people I can support, hate, love and follow.

All it took was a little time on the other side of the camera for me to truly understand the synergy that is the “reality” and “television” in the ever-popular medium.

Plus, if nothing else, it made for an exciting week at work. Nothing says marketing like an hour on national television.

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THE JUSTICE

Justice Justice

the the

Established 1949, Brandeis University

Brandeis University

Established 1949

Emily Kraus, Editor in Chief Nashrah Rahman, Managing Editor Brian N. Blumenthal, Production Editor Andrew Wingens, Deputy Editor Alana Abramson, Rebecca Blady, Hillel Buechler, Eitan Cooper, Bryan Flatt, Rebecca Klein, Asher Krell, Fiona Lockyer, Tess Raser, Robyn Spector and Marielle Temkin, Associate Editors Sara Dejene, News Editor Sam Mintz, Acting News Editor Celine Hacobian, Acting Features Editor Shafaq Hasan, Forum Editor Adam Rabinowitz, Sports Editor Ariel Kay, Arts Editor Emily Salloway, Acting Arts Editor Jenny Cheng and Joshua Linton, Photography Editors Nan Pang, Layout Editor Maya Riser-Kositsky, Acting Copy Editor David Wolkoff, Acting Advertising Editor

Constitutional concerns At this past Sunday’s Senate meeting, Village Quad Senator Benjamin Beutel ’12 proposed several bylaw amendments specifically addressing the confusing process of chartering or recognizing clubs, clarifying the vague duality of purpose clause and working to involve senators more in the process.

Of the bylaw amendments that have been suggested, several serve to provide more structure and instruction for senators and students. As students and the Senate have both found issue with the process of chartering and recognizing clubs over the years, we support the bylaw amendments and encourage the Senate to continue improving the process.

As part of the requirements of becoming a chartered club, Beutel has proposed a bylaw amendment to clarify the duality of purpose clause. As it currently stands, the bylaw fails to provide a clear explanation of what would constitute a duality of purpose or what steps, if any, the Senate could take to rectify the issue between the affected clubs.

However, the amendment expands the language of the clause to include that a duality of purpose comprises having similar “on-campus operations, impact and appeal” as other already chartered clubs. Further, being affiliated with a national organization would not automatically prevent duality of purpose. These clarifications not only aid students looking to charter their clubs but also provide stricter guidelines for senators when assessing the credentials of a proposed group. The amendments further encourage more in-depth interactions between the Club Support Committee and students by requiring the committee to meet with the affected clubs before determining whether the prospective club should be chartered.

Along with clarifying the language of the clause to make it easier for students and the Senate to work together, the

Address chartering issues amendments will also directly involve the senators in the process of chartering and recognizing clubs. For example, after a senator signs a group’s constitution to recognize the club, one of the proposed amendments then requires the Club Support Committee and the senator to testify before the Senate as to “the merits and viability” of the club.

Not only does this compel the senator to critically consider the value of a club before recognizing it, but the amendment also works to improve the communication between potential club leaders and the senators.

While these amendments would encourage better communication between the student body and the Senate, they were discussed by the Senate in an executive session to keep the amendments confidential. While voting cannot take place during the Senate’s executive session, the sessions cannot be recorded, and therefore the public is not privy to the information senators share and the conversations they have during this time.

While we understand that there are circumstances in which an executive session is necessary and when confidentiality is required, this discussion of the amendments should have been an open one because of the effect it will have on club leaders who in the future hope to charter or recognize their clubs. We are disappointed this conversation could not have taken place in public, and we urge the Senate to open future discussions about these amendments to the student body.

Regardless of our reservations about the Senate’s procedure, though, we support these amendments and the changes they propose to the currently confusing and vague approach to chartering or recognizing clubs.

Enroll in iTunes U In his inaugural address nearly 11 months ago, University President Frederick Lawrence emphasized his commitment to “develop a strategic vision with concrete plans to secure Brandeis’ place as an elite global liberal arts university.” Two overseas trips later— most recently a productive trip to India—and it’s clear that we are well on our way to achieving his goal.

In addition to the newly formed academic partnerships Mr. Lawrence has made, this board suggests an additional, innovative approach: iTunes U. The five-year-old program is Apple’s attempt to make educational materials available free of charge to the world. It houses a library of recorded courses and their accompanying assignments, all easily downloadable through iTunes. According to the Apple website, iTunes U holds more than 500,000 resources. Hundreds of universities from all over the world participate in the effort, including three from our area: Boston University, Boston College and Harvard University. On

Continue global initiative one level, an iTunes U account would prove to be an effective admissions tool.

The Office of Admissions could include links to an iTunes U account in all of its promotional materials. As a result, students who are interested in the University would be able to easily access a sampling of the Brandeis education.

But more importantly, joining iTunes U would effectively market the value of a Brandeis education to the global community.

Showcasing the highest-rated courses and most prestigious professors would illustrate to the world what our university contributes to the liberal arts.

It would provide students with a taste of Brandeis—not only in India and Israel, but around the globe. It’s possible that an iTunes U initiative would lead to even more academic partnerships, as students and professors from all walks of life would be able to see just what makes us “elite.”

SARA WEININGER/the Justice

Proposed MBTA cuts will solve deficit issue Avi

Snyder voice of reason

Early last month, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority proposed a reduction in operating hours, a closing of several bus routes and modest fare increases in order to close a projected $161 million operating deficit and pay down a $5.2 billion debt. These proposals have, understandably, produced a tremendous amount of opposition from many groups, including the many Boston-area university students who rely on the MBTA’s services. I don’t have a car on campus. I rely on the T and the commuter rail to get to and from Brandeis. Nonetheless, I think that these proposed cuts and fare hikes are a necessary and fundamentally justifiable component of any plan to reduce the MBTA’s massive budget shortfall.

The first argument against the cuts is simply that there are effective ways to address the MBTA’s budget problems without so seriously inconveniencing commuters. I am, admittedly, not privy to the contents of the Massachusetts budget, but I haven’t yet heard any of these better ideas. Some, including Boston mayor Thomas Menino, have come out in favor of a gas tax hike, or some other levy to raise government revenues. However, all this proposal does is shift the burden to the state’s drivers rather than commuters. The money is still being raised on the backs of citizens, and, in this case, citizens who don’t primarily benefit from the public transportation they will be further subsidizing.

Others, including many within the Occupy Boston movement, have proposed having the banks simply cancel the T’s debt. Again, I do not know the state of the relevant lending banks’ finances, but there are no free lunches in real life. If the loans were to be forgiven, someone, presumably the banks and their shareholders, would simply have to bear the debt. As the past few years have taught us, there are inherent risks in loading banks up with a great deal of debt, and I worry about the consequences of doing so. Furthermore, debt forgiveness sends a message that governments and citizens can live beyond their means with little to no consequence. Citizens paying the price for poor government decision-making must demand better.

Finally, this “solution” also fails to address the fact that the MBTA does not only need funds to pay off debt, put that its operating budget is running deficits. Deeper changes need to be made to solve the MBTA’s budget problems.

Another, and I think far sillier, argument against these proposed cuts is that, as Mayor Menino argued, “Public transportation should be a public right.” I tend to think that that it is rather specious to claim that any government service is a “right,” because such a right inherently requires “Robin-Hooding” money from one group of citizens and redistributing it among other citizens. I certainly believe government is well within its rights to raise revenue from its citizenry to provide public goods, but to call such goods “rights” greatly stretches the meaning of the term. However, what is far more pernicious is that this argument encourages selfish, interest group politics at the expense of holistic and pragmatic policy making. Unfortunately, much of the discussion revolving around these proposed cuts focuses on groups that feel entitled to the MBTA’s services because it makes life easier for them.

Just look at the discussion of this issue on our own campus.

I have heard many students argue that eliminating commuter rail services on weekends is a bad idea, because that is when college students tend to go out. However, while students tend to use the rail on weekends in order to go out and play, most people use it on weekdays to get to and from work. Eliminating weekend services is a way of cutting costs while minimizing the effect of such cuts on the majority of people who use the commuter rail. Yet many college kids don’t see the issue this way, because they approach the whole p roblem from the perspective of how the policy change will effect them. The great irony of this whole argument is that most of us don’t even pay taxes to the state of Massachusetts. Unfortunately, many of the arguments made against the cuts exhibit a narrow-mindedness and a lack of civic consciousness. From arguing that banks should simply forgive the MBTA’s debt to approaching the issue from a myopic, interest group-based standpoint, too many who oppose these cuts are encouraging people to put their own interests and the interests of the groups before the public good. It bespeaks a selfish sense of entitlement that a student body claiming to be concerned with social justice and the welfare of the world at large ought to eschew.

OP-BOX Quote of the Week “We’re all very interconnected. It’s very hard to find someone who you don’t have any friends in common with.”

—Genevieve Zucchetto de Oliveira ’15 about BrandeisLunch, a website that matches you with someone on campus to coordinate a lunch (See Features, pg. 7).

Brandeis Talks Back How do you feel about the Brandeis memes?

Glen J. Chesir ’15 “Funny at the right time.”

Clair Weatherby ’12 “I’m happy there’s a new outlet for all the creativity Brandeis students have.”

Dan Straub ’13 “I think they’re pretty funny, actually.”

Haleigh Brockman ’14 “I think they’re funny. ... I really like them.”

—Compiled by Rebecca Klein Photos by Tess Raser/ the Justice

THE JUSTICE

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Courts justified in overturning Prop 8

By MICHAEL ABRAMS JUSTICE CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Last Tuesday saw a major victory for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer rights when the United States Court of Appeals struck down Proposition 8, California’s gay marriage ban, in a two—to—one decision. This upheld a previous ruling that also struck down the ban, which was proposed and passed by the people of California in November 2008. Even though it passed by a narrow margin—500,000 votes or just five percent of the total vote—Californians approved the ban on same-sex marriage in 2008. By finding Prop 8 unconstitutional and overturning the ban, the court rejected a democratic decision; a potentially dangerous action, but one I believe was justified.

In August 2010, two years after it was passed, Prop 8 was found to be unconstitutional. Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker of the Federal District Court for Northern California said Prop 8 was “unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause because no compelling state interest justifies denying same-sex couples the fundamental right to marry.” Last Tuesday, the Court of Appeals upheld the District Court’s decision that Prop 8 violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which states that no state can “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

The only time a state government can violate the Equal Protection Clause is when a “compelling state interest” exists, such as when there is a national security concern or a specific constitutional right would be violated.

However, both the district court and court of appeals have recognized that no compelling state interest exists that would allow the government to violate the Equal Protection Clause by banning same-sex marriage.

Therefore, it is unconstitutional for states to apply marriage laws exclusively to oppositesex couples, as same-sex couples are entitled to the same protection under those laws. This is the exact logic the Appeals Court used to declare Prop 8 unconstitutional.

The ruling also represents a great victory for LGBTQ rights. By upholding the lower court’s ruling, the Court of Appeals has strengthened the case against Prop 8. Unfortunately, the panel ruled same-sex couples have to wait until any further appeals to finish before marriages can resume. Regardless, the appeals court ruling makes it even more likely for the Supreme Court to strike down Prop 8 and set a strong precedent in favor of same-sex marriage for the entire country.

ARIELLE SHORR/ the Justice

That is, of course, assuming the Supreme Court hears the case.

Although this is a substantial constitutional victory, there is a potentially dangerous issue arising from the court of appeals’ decision.

Though the ruling was justified, the court did override a democratically—passed state constitutional amendment. By superseding the will of the people, the court of appeals could be seen as undermining the democratic process.

After all, the state and Federal Constitutions and the Bill of Rights are there to protect the people and provide a government to represent the people. Doesn’t that mean if a majority of the people wants to deprive a group of their rights, the courts should respect their decision?

Though this logic may make sense to an extent, our constitutionally guaranteed rights

are also there to help protect the rights of the minority from a “tyranny of the majority.”

In the case of Prop 8, the people of California tried to deprive a minority (gays and lesbians) of their right to marriage. If courts let any popularly passed amendment stay in a state constitution, anything from no more taxes to a ban on people wearing purple shirts could be put into effect.

In fact, the situation with Prop 8 is very similar to the Civil Rights movement, specifically the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In that case, Congress recognized that despite the fact that a majority of Southerners, along with other Americans throughout the country, supported segregation, legal action had to be taken to end the awful racist practices.

That means those unconstitutional discriminatory practices were unwarranted and done simply out of deplorable racial hatred.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended those prac-

tices and protected the rights of the black minority in the same way the court of appeals defended the rights of a minority by declaring Prop 8 unconstitutional.

The court is saying that just as African Americans are not threats to society because of their race, gays and lesbians, and by extension, same-sex couples, are not threats to society because of their sexual orientation.

By recognizing that the actions of same-sex couples (the “minority”) also don’t harm anyone, the court preserved the minority’s freedom, despite the wishes of the public. While the people’s voice has a place, when it is used to oppress and violate the rights of others, courts are justified in stepping in to prevent those abuses.

That is why I hope this ruling will be looked at as a profound victory for the Constitution, for LGBTQ people, for Americans and for human rights everywhere.

Restructure Hillel funding for unity’s sake

By DAVID CLEMENTS SPECIAL TO THE JUSTICE

Almost half the Brandeis student body is Jewish—it should be no surprise that Hillel is the largest club on campus.

In fact, every student at Brandeis is technically a member of Hillel. Like every other Hillel in the world, Hillel at Brandeis strives to bring Jews together from all walks of life. Its mission, according to its website, is to serve as the “nerve center of [the] Jewish community.”

It does this by acting as the “umbrella organization” for 20-plus member groups. This model requires that Hillel provide the resources and core identity to its individual groups, each of which has a distinct purpose and goal. More importantly, it assumes that Hillel can help groups to create a space under its “umbrella” for Jews who may not have otherwise met one another to interact and build community.

According to the umbrella approach, there exists a symbiotic relationship between Hillel and its subgroups. Without the Hillel umbrella, the various member groups would be ineffectual, weak and broken. And without the cooperation of its member groups, Hillel would be unable to construct the vibrant community it hopes for.

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But this model has largely failed at Brandeis.

Many member groups do not see themselves as a piece of the greater Hillel puzzle. They do not share the same passion that Hillel has for building a vibrant, colorful community. They see themselves as groups that cater to certain parts of the community and no one else. What is missing is the recognition that there is something greater than themselves and their groups.

When you ask the typical member of the Jewish community which Jewish groups he or she is involved in, he or she would most likely respond by naming a member group, not general Hillel. If Hillel were the true “nerve center” of the Jewish community, it would be the first group with which students associate themselves.

The unfortunate reality is that if the umbrella that is Hillel at Brandeis would disappear, nobody would get wet when it rains. The member groups would exist and continue to thrive while not caring to accomplish many of the broader, community-building goals that Hillel has for them.

This is not an indication of the effectiveness of Hillel’s leadership, but rather a systematic problem. Hillel member groups are officially recognized and chartered clubs, receiving their own unique University funding.

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Hillel, on the other hand, receives zero funding from the Student Union Finance Board. Last semester, the 20-plus Hillel member groups received a mere total of $4,000 from Hillel and over $13,600 from the F-Board.

This fact dispels the very notion of a Hillel umbrella. Most of the member groups can function independently of Hillel. It is no wonder that there is such a disconnect. Why would the leaders of Brandeis Orthodox Organization, for example, be loyal to Hillel’s mission when they receive more money per semester from the Student Activities Fund than Hillel has allocated to all of its member groups combined?

The solution requires a drastic systematic adjustment.

The vast amount of money that the F-Board normally grants the Hillel groups individually should go straight to Hillel to allocate to its member groups. Hillel must become a chartered (and perhaps secured) club, and all of its member groups should no longer request money from F-Board. Instead, they should be newly “chartered” as Hillel clubs.

This will not only cause the groups to rely on Hillel, but also will help reinforce what the Jewish community at Brandeis is supposed to be about. When the Student Union F-Board goes through the process of allocating money to its clubs, it weighs the necessity and effec-

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tiveness of the various programs the clubs have planned.

If the leadership of the member groups sat down together and underwent a similar process, the unity and commitment among the groups that Hillel has been lacking would finally come to fruition. There would be extensive discourse over how to improve Jewish life on campus, not just for one group, but for the whole Jewish population. This would be the beginning of fulfilling Hillel’s mission.

The member groups would still be provided the same amount of funds as they are now. It would just be coming from a different source, which would make a world of a difference. Financial dependence on Hillel would result in the member groups understanding their roles as important pieces that build the broader Jewish community. Ultimately, there would be greater Jewish unity on campus.

This won’t solve all the issues that face Hillel; there are still a lot of other problems that must be addressed.

However, this structural change would not only benefit the greater Jewish community, but would help Hillel actualize its mission: to build a vibrant, pluralistic community on campus.

Editor’s note: David Clements is a Student Union assistant treasurer and a member of the Class of 2014.

Editorial Assistants News: Tate Herbert Staff Senior Writers: Josh Asen, Aaron Berke, Wei Huan-Chen, Amy Melser, Shelly Shore Senior Illustrator: Sara Weininger Senior Photographer: Alex Margolis News: Shani Abramowitz, Tyler Belanga, Jonathan Epstein, Danielle Gross, Luke Hayslip Features: Claire Gohorel, Rachel Miller, Jessie Miller Forum: Aaron Fried, Philip Gallagher, Tien Le, Diego Medrano, Joshua Nass, Sara Shahanaghi, Naomi Volk Sports: Julian Cardillo, Jacob Elder, Henry Loughlin, Jacob Lurie, Jacob Moskowitz, Becca Elwin Arts: Alex DeSilva, Olivia Leiter, Amy Melser, Leanne

Ortbals, Louis Polisson, Mara Sassoon, Ayan Sanyal, Viet Tran, Dan Willey Photography: Jon Edelstein, Lydia Emmanouilidou, Nathaniel Freedman, Yifan He, Josh Horowitz, Davida Judelson, Josh Spriro, Madeleine Stix, Diana Wang, Michelle Wang, David Yun Copy: Aliza Braverman, Jennie Bromberg, Patricia Greene, Max Holzman, Eunice Ko, Megan Paris, Christine Phan, Mailinh Phan-Nguyen, Leah Rogers, Amanda Winn Layout: Rachel Burkhoff, Jassen Lu, Denny Poliferno, Michelle Yi Illustrations: Mara Sassoon, Arielle Shorr, Tziporah Thompson

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FORUM

Separate the politicians from the party

By JOSHUA NASS JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

The level of contempt and animosity directed toward Republicans is unmatched in the political arena. In my view, this is not by virtue of the views Republicans espouse as much as it is due to the party’s failure to properly project and articulate its views. While at times not ideologically fitting its principles, unpopular Republican politicians cause public support for the party to exponentially drop. It’s important for us as Americans to distinguish the actors from the party and its message; otherwise, we will inevitably be bound to misperceive the party and the values it represents.

Since its founding in 1854, the Republican Party’s popularity has been extremely oscillatory and volatile. But more extreme than its level of popularity over the course of its history has been the vitriolic names given to those that subscribe to its conservative ideology. These names include accusations of being bigoted, homophobic and racist.

Although each of these names are as laughable as they are inaccurate, the unfortunate truth is that the Republican Party has utterly failed to refute these falsehoods.

It has often been viewed as rooted in religiosity as it is seen as steeped in constitutionality. The long-standing myth of its policies and supporters being racist has failed to be debunked, though it was the Republican Party that eradicated slavery in the 19th century. Instead of focusing on some of its universally accepted and appealing views on fiscal responsibility and taxation, the Republican Party has chosen to emphasize its positions on the most divisive of issues: social issues. Now, more than ever, the Republican Party needs to hear a lecture on the importance of public relations, a subject which it has proven to be entirely incompetent about.

“

The party has too often been defined by its actors ... and politicians Aside from the misperceptions surrounding Republicans’ views, the party has too often been defined by its actors, messengers and politicians instead of its positions on different issues.

The irony of this is that many of these politicians don’t clearly represent the conservative principles and values that they claim to. For instance, in the 21st century, the popularity of the Republican Party suffered tremendously. Much, if not all, of this tattering of support was due to former President George W. Bush’s terms in office.

But did former President Bush govern as a genuine conservative?

Instead of examining each and every one of the policies he put into effect, let’s focus on the ones that Americans had the most disdain for: his handling of the economy.

Surely, fiscal responsibility is one of the more important issues which with Republicans are concerned. Bush left his predecessor close to an $11 trillion deficit.

Now, although he may have felt justified in fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which inevitably allowed for a sharp increase in the deficit, his decision to bail out auto companies and give banks funds in order to keep them solvent were not con-

servative actions whatsoever. But of course, it’s inevitable for an unpopular former president who claims to belong to a party to end up hurting that party’s popularity with his decisions.

But what about the misconceptions surrounding Republicans’ views outside of their representatives’ views?

It is no secret that many Americans believe Republicans are racist.

However, a simple reading of the most primitive history textbook will reject such nonsense. The very founders of the Republican Party were anti-slavery activists.

In fact, its beginning was rooted in its opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which would have allowed slavery to continue in those territories.

The Republican Party’s founding was based on its merciless resistance to the continuation of any form of slavery. How unfortunate it is that a party whose founders fought racism, now close to two centuries later are accused of being exactly what they fought against.

Having said that, heated and borderline racist rhetoric on the part of Republican politicians certainly does not improve the party’s image when it comes to the race issue. Republican candidate Newt Gingrich, for example, who is one of the last standing Republican presidential candidates, has recently gotten himself into trouble with this issue. He said he would go to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and explain “why the African-American community should demand paychecks and not be satisfied with food stamps.”

Instead of condemning Gingrich for his comments and thereby strengthening its credibility among moderates, the Republican Party remained silent and allowed the inevitable to happen: its image to further disintegrate in the eyes of moderate and independent voters.

The party has done its supporters a terrible disservice by emphasizing its hardline positions on social issues as opposed to drawing attention to its positions of fiscal responsibility, lowering taxes and preserving our capitalist way of life. But even in light of this drawback, the party has allowed falsehoods and gross hyperbole to generate the narrative that Republicans are somehow “anti-gay.”

In the least, the party could lend the issue the slightest degree of perspective. For example, although President Barack Obama, Secretary State Hillary Clinton and a whole host of Democratic politicians share the exact same definition of marriage as do most Republicans, somehow this fact gets conveniently tucked away in the sand. Why is this?

There is no rationale or logic that could possibly explain such public relations malpractice, aside from the party’s absolute incompetence to effectively project its positions to put our country back on the path of prosperity.

Additionally, it is the party’s responsibility to make it clear that when an elected Republican official behaves contrary to our conservative ideology, there is a distinction drawn between that actor and the values Republicans actually embrace.

We can no longer afford to lose our popularity as a party due to the mishaps of a particular politician because he is associated with the party in one way or another.

But most importantly, the Republican Party has failed its supporters by not properly articulating the positions which it espouses.

And in doing so, it has failed the American people by not affording them a clear alternative to the liberal policies of a democratic party which have proven catastrophic.

MAJOR SATISFACTION How satisfied are you with the department associated with your major?

37%

Extremely satisfied

37%

Satisfied Neutral

13%

Dissatisfied

11%

Entirely dissatisfied

2%

YES All students polled are seniors who responded about their respective majors.

Survey conducted by Rebecca Blady/the Justice.

Would you have chosen a different major?

NO

29%

72%

DESIGN BY BRIAN BLUMENTHAL and PHOTO BY JENNY CHENG/the Justice

Voice criticism about your majors before graduation Rebecca

blady Maelström

At Brandeis, we all need to major in something. Sure, majors have their merits. If you choose a good one, you can get a job in a specialized industry. You can apply to graduate school. From a philosophical perspective, you can add some meaningful focus to your college education.

If you’re into striving for a balance of breadth and depth in your life, your major was probably a great experience.

But I’m not so sure I’ve benefited as much as some others from choosing my major. At this point, with fewer than 100 days until graduation, I’ve finally realized that you just can’t have it all with 128 credits, even from a liberal arts institution like Brandeis. To add to the trouble, many of us have continually found it frustrating to work within the confines of things like major requirements and the bureaucracy of academic departments. They claim to have our best interests in mind when it comes to developing our particular knowledge about a subject.

But as someone who is always skeptical of institutions, I’ve decided to see if it really works. Are Brandeis students actually satisfied with their experiences in the majors they chose?

Let’s not underestimate how loaded this question is. In my quest to find the answer, I’ve collected some data from more than 60 Brandeis seniors, who have majored in a wide variety of subjects, to try to understand how they generally feel about their major, their department and their personal decision regarding their major.

The responses I obtained are solely based on the data I collected and not on my own opinion whatsoever.

Additionally, my informal survey should not be confused with Brandeis’ own institutional re-

search, which I’ve studied and will refer to later. I found that with six or seven semesters gone, Brandeis seniors have excellent insight into their particular fields of study.

They certainly have much to say about the bureaucratic experience as well about the experience of working with different Brandeis professors.

I’ll cut to the chase: Of those who responded to my survey, 39.7 percent of Brandeis seniors are satisfied with their major and 31.7 percent are extremely satisfied with their major.

This means 71.4 percent of those seniors surveyed in total are at least satisfied with their major.

Similarly, 71.4 percent—though not the same satisfied 71.4 percent—indicated that they would not have chosen a different major, while 28.6 percent would have majored in something else.

Seems like a lot of good news— until we look at the picture through a new frame. From a fivepoint scale, the mean satisfaction with one’s major was 3.86, with 5 being most satisfied. Of course, these responses do not represent every individual that majors in these subjects, nor does it indicate a universal criticism of the department. The data is based solely on those that responded to the survey.

In 2008, Brandeis’ institutional research team used the same scale of satisfaction I used to discover that the mean satisfaction of seniors with their primary major was 4.29. Rather than trust the face value of this mean, I looked into some of the responses I got from the lowest-rated majors.

Politics received an average score of 2.9. Some students enjoyed the broad and independent nature of course offerings. Other, more critical respondents pointed to the mixed quality of professors, the arbitrary requirements and the limited diversity in course offerings from year to year.

Psychology received an average score of 2.5. The statistic may appear rather distressing, but the level of dissatisfaction as expressed by the respondents overall seems not to deter, with 244 undergraduate students and 17 faculty members involved in the major.

One Psychology student’s response pointed out the research-heavy nature of the department and suggested that two tracks, one for research and one for the study of developmental and social psychology, be implemented.

Mathematics and Chemistry also fell toward the bottom of the scale, with scores of 2 and 2.5 respectively. These majors are significantly smaller: Mathematics has 107 undergraduates and 15 faculty members and Chemistry has 40 students and 16 faculty members.

Mathematics students wanted less abstraction, more real world application and more engaging professors. Chemistry students likewise suggested that faculty try better to engage undergraduates.

Overall, all of the responses I received contained impressively well thought-out criticisms. I chose to highlight the majors that received the most criticism according to the survey, not to call them out or demonize them, but to point to places where students themselves suggest that constructive change can happen. While this data is only representative of the information I received from the survey, these students still have valid suggestions to repair the things that upset them.

This in itself shows the capability of Brandeis students to assess the institutions in which they work.

Majors and departments should never hesitate to ask seniors—people who are clearly eager to channel their education in a productive way—what succeeded and what failed in the education they got.

Seniors, too, should feel free to express their feelings to their major’s administration, especially if you suspect your major falls below the 3.86 average.

Hey, you never know—maybe we can make some headway in challenging the academic bureaucracy that forced us to channel the scope of our liberal arts education in the first place.

Voicing constructive criticism about our particularly flawed experiences will hopefully shed light on matters Brandeis should be taking seriously. But I’ll save that for another column.

THE JUSTICE

●

TUESDAY, February 14, 2012

13

SPORTS WOMEN'S BASKETBALL

TRAPPED

Team fails to escape defeat ■ The women's basketball

team suffered two losses to seal a winless road record against their UAA rivals.

By ADAM RABINOWITZ JUSTICE editor

With four minutes, 45 seconds left in last Sunday’s match at Emory University, only trailing by three points, the women’s basketball team found its golden opportunity. Reeling from three consecutive losses on the road Brandeis needed a big play to seal the victory and stop the bleeding.

Forward Nicolina Vitale ’14 delivered the crucial shot, a layup, to cut Emory’s lead to 47-46. Victory was within the Judges’ sights. However, misfortune beset the women’s basketball team again. Emory junior forward Misha Jackson fired back with a jumper to extend the Eagles’ lead to 49-46. The women would not recover, failing to score another point in a 5346 loss. With a 53-37 defeat to No. 11 University of Rochester last Saturday, the Judges dropped to 8-14 and 1-10 in the UAA. Coach Carol Simon argued that the key factor in the loss was the Judges’ failure to contest easy shots.

“Defensively, in order to win games, we cannot allow easy baskets,” she said.

Guard Morgan Kendrew ’12 set the tone for the Judges at the outset of the match, drilling a jumper on a fast break for the first lead of the game. While Emory quickly regained control of the game, establishing a 10-5 lead, the Judges would counter, tying the match on a three-pointer from Kendrew. From there, Brandeis would battle with the surging Eagles for the lead in the first half.

The Judges broke open a 9-3 run, capped by a three-pointer from guard Kelly Ethier ’12 to stretch the lead to 23-17. However, Emory would not concede the lead of the game that easily, pulling to a 23-23 tie with 2:11 remaining in the half. A pair of free-throws from forward Shannon Hassan ’12 sealed a 28-25 Brandeis lead at halftime. The Judges finally had found their rhythm at a time when they desperately needed it.

The women did not step off the gas to start the second half, as they stretched the lead to 33-27, a gamehigh six points. Emory, as it did all game, clawed back from behind to push the score to a 35-35 tie. Ultimately, though, this would be the last lead

the Judges would hold. However, they certainly made the game interesting.

The Eagles’ largest lead, preceding the basket from Vitale, would be no more than three points.

After Vitale’s basket though, Jackson would single-handedly end Brandeis’ hopes of victory with her fateful jump shot.

Kendrew again led the offensive charge for the Judges, earning 11 points while also notching eight rebounds in the defeat. Forward Erika Higginbottom ’15 contributed a teamhigh 11 rebounds, six of which were on the offensive end of the court.

Last Friday against the University of Rochester, the Judges failed to score in key situations and ultimately could not handle the smothering Rochester defense. While the women managed to keep it close in the opening minutes, only trailing 10-6, they soon could not contain the explosive YellowJackets’ attack. Rochester went on a 17-4 scoring spree, shooting 42 percent from the floor to extend their lead to 27-10. Brandeis fought back and cut the lead to 12 points going into halftime.

While the women started to make big plays in the next half, making the game a much closer affair, it was an effort that proved to be too late.

Simon acknowledged the team continues to be plagued by an inability to convert on easy baskets. The Judges only shot 22 percent from the floor and failed to convert a three-point basket in the entire game.

“Our main issue continues to be offensive execution,” said Simon. “We need to limit our turnovers and be more efficient on offense.”

Kendrew was limited to eight points, marking only the second time she has been held to under 10 points in play this season. Vitale and Ethier both added seven points from the bench.

However, the Judges did prevail on the boards against Rochester, notching 47 rebounds as compared to the YellowJackets’ 46.

Simon noted this would be a key concern for the Judges heading into the weekend.

“Rebounding is crucial,” said Simon. “We must win the battle of the boards if we want to be successful against these teams.”

While this did not help the Judges against Rochester, it will hopefully help them in their last stretch of home games in the regular season.

Brandeis will next host Washington University in St. Louis this Friday night at 6 p.m.

FENCING: Squads face Division I foes CONTINUED FROM 16

The women’s fencing team, while performing well against top-ranked opponents, still left this weekend’s Duke Invitational with a 1-4 record.

After a 18-9 victory against the Air Force Academy, the Judges fell prey to an array of national powerhouses, including a 15-12 loss and a 22-5 defeat to Duke.

The women also were defeated by two of the top 10 teams in the country, losing to No. 1 Penn State 20-7 and No. 8 Temple University 18-9.

While all three weapons emerged victorious against the Air Force, the épéeists came away with the most decisive victory in this match, winning 7-2.

The foilists would provide the only other victory of the day, winning 7-2 against UNC. Despite the Judges’ 5-4 defeat, Leah Mack '14 went undefeated in épée against the Tar Heels.

Although the sabreists suffered a

tough 8-1 loss in competition against UNC, they managed to find a bright spot against Temple, as Zoe Messinger ’13 delivered a 3-0 victory en route to a close 5-4 loss.

The toughest opponent, however, were the host Blue Devils, against whom no Brandeis fencer achieved more than one individual win.

Despite the struggles, Messinger was still proud of the team’s individual accomplishments at Duke.

“This weekend proved we could hold our own against some of the strongest teams in the nation,” said Messinger.

“There was a lot of passion and camraderie and that definitely helped us with our success.”

Both fencing squads will square off this evening at Harvard University for the 2012 Beanpot Tournament.

They will compete against Bostonarea schools such as Harvard, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Boston College.

JOSHUA LINTON/Justice File Photo

CONTESTED SHOT: Forward Alex Stoyle '14 struggles to find room for a layup in a blowout loss to Emory University on January 15.

MBBALL: Men struggle in the final minutes against conference rivals CONTINUED FROM 16 mately, it was too late to change the course of the game.

“We came together after the first half,” he said. “We had a much better team defense, our guys found their way, and I simply could not ask more from our teammates. It just did not work out the way we wanted it to.”

The Judges struggled to keep up with Emory’s fast-paced offense at the outset of the game, costing them dearly. The men shot at a 41-percent clip and committed 15 turnovers just in the first half. Emory led by as many as 13 points and eventually held a 33-22 lead at the end of the half.

In the second half, the Judges stormed right back as they have all season. Brandeis drew to within one point at 43-42 with just over 11 minutes remaining. However, Emory responded with a scoring spree of its own, reeling off a 7-0 run to push their lead back to eight points.

At the end a 9-0 Judges run, the men would hold their first lead of the game at 51-50. With just over four minutes left, Emory led once again by a 58-55 margin and would not look back.

Center Youri Dascy ’14 led the

Judges with 15 points and posted seven rebounds. Kriskus and Bartoldus each scored 13 points.

Kriskus also grabbed 10 rebounds to notch a double-double. He is now just 21 points shy from becoming the 30th Brandeis player to post 1,000 career points.

Freeman scored nine points in his first start of the season. Guard Tyrone Hughes ’12 tallied two points, six assists and six turnovers, while playing 40 minutes for the sixth time this season.

Last Friday, the men suffered a crushing 76-61 defeat at the hands of the University of Rochester YellowJackets. The Judges burst out of the gates, a rarity this season, opening up a 14-8 lead just 6:23 into the game.

However, the host YellowJackets responded with a 16-3 run over the next five minutes, taking a 24-17 lead. Rochester relied on 18 points from junior John DiBartolomeo to take a 37-29 lead into halftime.

The YellowJackets scored the first five points of the second half and opened up a comfortable 42-29 lead. With 7:11 left and trailing 6251, the men would not surrender.

The Judges reeled off six straight points, capped by a jumper from Alex Stoyle ’14 that cut the lead to just five. However, DiBortolomeo

came through in the clutch once more, drawing a foul and proceeding to knock down both free throws.

The YellowJackets then coasted down the stretch for the win.

The story revolved around Rochester's junior guard. DiBortolomeo finished the game with 9-11 shooting, including 4-4 from downtown and 5-5 from the free throw line. He also tallied six rebounds, three assists and no turnovers in 37 minutes of action.

Kriskus led the Judges with 21 points on just 7-18 shooting, 1-6 being from beyond the arc. He led all players with eight rebounds. Freeman scored 12 points off the bench, while Dascy scored 11 points on 5-7 shooting. The Judges only turned the ball over nine times, but shot just 43.4 percent en route to the loss.

While last weekend may have been a setback for the team, Freeman believes the team can still rebound and prepare for success.

“We are bringing it every day,” said Freeman. “We are ready and prepared, but we have to simply be more consistent, have more rhythm, and play to the abilities that we know we have.”

The Judges take on conference leader Washington University this Friday at 8 p.m.

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THE JUSTICE

Men’s BASKETBALL TEAM STATS

Points Per Game

Not including Monday’s games UAA Conference Overall

W L W L Pct. WashU 9 2 17 5 .773 Emory 7 4 18 4 .818 NYU 7 4 18 4 .818 Rochester 6 5 15 7 .682 Chicago 6 5 13 9 .591 JUDGES 6 5 12 10 .545 Carnegie 2 9 7 15 .318 Case 1 10 9 13 .409

UPCOMING GAMES Friday vs. WashU Sunday vs. Chicago Sat, Feb. 25 vs. NYU

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

15

CLUB SPORT

jUDGES BY THE NUMBERS UAA STANDINGS

●

Vytas Kriskus ’12 leads the team with 12.3 points per game.

Player PPG Vytas Kriskus 12.3 Derek Retos 11.3 Ben Bartoldus 11.0 Youri Dascy 10.0

Ice hockey team looks to defend division title

Rebonds Per Game Youri Dascy ’14 leads the team with 6.9 rebounds per game.

Player RPG Youri Dascy 6.9 Vytas Kriskus 5.6 Alex Schmidt 3.2 Ben Bartoldus 3.0

WOMen’s basketball UAA STANDINGS

TEAM STATS

Not including Monday’s games

Points Per Game

UAA Conference Overall

W L W L Pct. Chicago 11 0 22 0 .1000 Rochester 8 3 19 3 .864 WashU 8 3 18 4 .818 Emory 7 4 16 6 .727 Case 5 6 12 10 .545 NYU 2 9 10 12 .455 Carnegie 2 9 8 14 .364 JUDGES 1 10 8 14 .364

Morgan Kendrew ’12 leads the team with 12.6 points per game.

Player PPG Morgan Kendrew 12.6 Diana Cincotta 8.8 Hannah Cain 6.9 Shannon Hassan 4.8

UPCOMING GAMES Friday vs. WashU Sunday vs. Chicago Friday, Feb. 25 vs. NYU

Rebounds Per Game Samantha Anderson ’13 leads with 6.3 rebounds per game.

Player RPG Samantha Anderson 6.3 Hannah Cain 5.7 Shannon Hassan 3.7 Kelly Ethier 3.6

FENCING Results from the Duke University Invitational last Saturday.

TOP FINISHERS (Men’s)

TOP FINISHERS (Women’s)

SABER Adam Mandel

RECORD 11-3

FOIL Vikki Nunley

RECORD 11-3

FOIL Julian Cardillo

RECORD 10-5

SABER Zoe Messinger

RECORD 9-6

FOIL Noah Berman

RECORD 11-4

ÉPÉE Leah Mack

RECORD 9-6

UPCOMING MEET: The men’s and women’s teams will travel today to play at the Beanpot Tournament at Harvard University.

PHOTO COURTESY OF GENE ARCIPRETE

LOOSE PUCK: Several members of the Brandeis ice hockey team, including Gene Arciprete ’14, vie for control of the puck.

■ After a slow start, the

Brandeis club ice hockey team has resurged, looking ahead to the playoffs in May.

By MADELINE STIX JUSTICE contributing writer

TRACK AND FIELD Results from the Valentine Invitational at BU last Saturday.

NOTABLE FINISHES (Men’s)

NOTABLE FINISHES (Women’s)

60-METER DASH TIME Vincent Asante 7.16 MILE RUN TIME Chris Brown 4:05.98 3,000 METER RUN TIME Alex Kramer 8:36.42

5,000-METER RUN TIME Kate Warwick 17:03.44 60-METER DASH TIME Brittany Bell 8.05 HIGH JUMP DISTANCE Lily Parenteau 4 ft, 10.25 in.

UPCOMING MEET: The men’s and women’s track teams will next compete at the New England Division III Championships at MIT this Saturday.

While Brandeis may not compete with the likes of Boston University and Boston College in the Beanpot Hockey Tournament, Zachary Meyerowitz ’12, captain of the club ice hockey team, described the experience as enjoyable, yet rigorous.

“It’s great. We get to do what we love in a competitive but fun environment,” he said.

Acting as both captain and coach for the club ice hockey team, Meyerowitz learned the skills he would need to lead the club in the most competitive hockey environment of all—his native hometown of Toronto. When he studied abroad in Israel last semester, Massachus-

setts native Gene Arciprete ’14 took charge, organizing the team for the beginning of the season in October, which will last until the playoffs in early May. Matthew Zuckerman ’14 stated he enjoyed the team dynamic at work in this club.

“I love it,” he said. “I think we are friendly with each other. There is good team chemistry, and the team is coming along really well.”

The ice hockey team competes in the New England Senior Hockey League, considered to be Boston’s premier adult ice hockey league with over 330 teams in Massachusetts.

The Brandeis team, composed of 20 students, plays one to two games a week in the C Division at Boston University’s Walter Brown Arena.

The Judges began the fall season with a 1-10 record but have gotten off to a great start this spring, earning a 4-0 record since the beginning of this semester.

Last Wednesday, the Judges

capped their resurgence with a 7-1 victory against the NESHL Scapegoats. While only leading 2-0 going into the third period, Brandeis broke the game wide open in the remaining period, winning 7-1.

Ezra Bernstein ’11, a Brandeis graduate student, led the team with three goals, while Zuckerman added two goals to keep the winning streak alive.

The team has high hopes for the rest of the spring season, looking to defend the division championship for the second consecutive year.

While the playoffs are quickly looming for the club team, Arciprete stated that it is best for the team to enjoy the experience and focus on one game at a time.

“We are just looking to have fun, play hockey and win another championship.”

The team will next compete Feb. 26 at Canton SportsPlex Rink against “Guns-N-Hoses,” another NESHL team.

boston bruins beat Bruins recover from their February struggles, overtaking the Predators in a crucial shootout victory The Bruins traveled back to TD Garden last Saturday with their tails tucked between their legs, having suffered a 6-0 defeat to the last-place Buffalo Sabres.

However, Boston quickly erased any memory of that disappointing loss, sealing a 4-3 shootout win against the Nashville Predators.

Bruins goalie Tim Thomas denied Nashville’s two shootout attempts.

Centers Tyler Seguin and Patrice Bergeron capitalized, notching shootout goals for the comeback victory.

With just over one minute remaining in the third period and trailing 3-2, left wing Milan Lucic scored a power play goal to force the game into overtime.

The goal was his 20th of the season, making him the only player in the NHL with at least 20 goals and 100 pen-

alty minutes this season.

Lucic was the first to admit that his game-saving goal was not the main factor behind the Bruins’ victory.

“It’s up to different guys at different times to step up and play big, and that’s what we had here today,” Lucic said. “This team has a lot of pride.”

Bruins left wing Daniel Paille was just one of those many players who stepped up, sneaking the puck past Nashville net-minder Pekka Rinne, following a quick backhand pass from right wing Shawn Thornton.

The goal gave Boston a 2-1 lead early in the third period, but it would not be enough to stop the surging Predators.

Midway through the third period, Predators right wing Sergei Kostitsyn penetrated through the Bruins defense and delivered the feed to fellow right wing Patric Hornqvist for the

goal that would tie the match at 2-2.

Just seven minutes later, Hornqvist would deliver the assist for center Michael Fisher’s go-ahead goal.

The Bruins occupied Predators goalie Pekka Rinne for the entire game, outshooting Nashville 41-22.

Despite his 38-save performance, Rinne would not derail the Bruins’offense.

Lucic noted, though, that Rinne displayed a valiant effort in the net despite the Bruins’ relentless attack.

“It just goes to show you how good of a goalie Pekka Rinne is,” said Lucic. “We had to work 59 minutes to send it into overtime.”

Bergeron seemingly found Rinne’s weakness early on, scoring a shorthanded goal in the first period as well as the game-clinching shootout goal.

Left wing Brad Marchand delivered

the assist for Bergeron’s early shorthanded goal, which gave the Bruins a 1-0 lead. Marchand kept the puck on the penalty kill, breaking through two Predators defenders toward the goal.

He then passed it off to Bergeron, who drilled the shot for his first shorthand goal this season.

Nashville, ranked third in the NHL in power play percentage, oddly struggled to find a rhythm in the power play situations during the first period.

The Predators, however, rediscovered their power-play magic in the second period, when defenseman Ryan Suter fired off a pass to fellow defender Shea Weber, who ripped a one-timer past Thomas to even the game at one.

After a rough patch in which the Bruins only won five of their past 12 games, this victory was just what the

Bruins needed at this point.

Paille acknowledged the defeat earlier in the week to the Sabres may have been the inspiration the Bruins needed to eke out this victory.

“We’ve had a little bit of a rough patch,” said Paille. “We didn’t want to lose that way again.”

Thornton noted that with this victory, the Bruins seem to have righted the ship.

“We’re going in the right direction,” Thornton said. “I think everyone was trying to buy into the game plan, which was good.”

The Bruins will need a near-perfect game plan Tuesday against the Eastern Conference-leading New York Rangers, seeking revenge from a 3-2 overtime loss earlier in the month.

— Louis Berger

just

Sports

Page 16

SKATING TO SUCCESS The ice hockey club team rediscovered its chemistry, surging to the New England Senior Hockey League playoffs in May, p. 15.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Waltham, Mass.

MEN'S BASKETBALL

MATCH POINT

Judges encounter a major setback in UAA matches ■ The men's basketball

team plunged to sixth in the UAA after two losses on the road last weekend.

By JACOB MOSKOWITZ JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

The men’s basketball team has lived this story countless times during the season: Trailing late in the game, Brandeis manages to nail the clutch basket to force overtime and eventually pull away with the win. Once again, the Judges trailed by one possession, this time at Emory University last Sunday. The Judges were down by three points with less than one minute remaining and had possession of the ball.

Forward Vytas Kriskus ’12 nailed a three-pointer with just 35 seconds left, tying the match at 62. The game unfolded according to plan.

Unfortunately for the Judges, fate decided to take a different route last Sunday. Emory sophomore forward Jake Davis drained a three-pointer to put the Eagles up by three points with just three seconds left in the game. After a timeout, the men failed to get a shot off, and Emory walked away with a thrilling 65-62 victory. Brandeis stands at 12-10 and 6-5 in the University Athletic Association with the loss.

Guard Jay Freeman ’13 stated that the team provided a great effort in the second half, but ulti-

See MBBALL, 13 ☛

track and field

Teams end the regular season on a high note ■ Both track squads fared well at BU, their final tuneup before the New England Championship meet.

By jacob elder JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

JON EDELSTEIN/Justice File Photo

BUSTED: Épéeist Harry Kaufer '13 (left) notches a point against an NYU fencer in the Eric Sollee Invitational on Sat., Feb. 4.

Squads battle against top-ranked opponents ■ The men's and women's

squads competed at the Duke Invitational, facing off against top-ranked teams.

By BECCA ELWIN JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

The men’s and women’s fencing teams headed to Duke University last Saturday from two entirely different paths. The men, on one hand, were looking to replicate their success at the Eric Sollee Invitational, while the women sought to erase memory of a disappointing performance. Both squads, though, had one goal: excel at the Duke Invitational, the nation’s most challenging Division I fencing meet.

While the records may not indicate so, the goal was certainly accomplished. The men’s team finished 2-3 at the meet, defeating Johns Hopkins University 17-10 and the University of

North Carolina 14-13, while suffering a 15-12 loss to the Air Force Academy and 14-8 losses to Duke and Penn State University. Épéeist Alex Powell '12 was impressed with the squad’s performance in such a competitive invitational.

“The meet at Duke this weekend was our toughest so far of the season,” he said. “We fenced tough matches for the second time this season against very hungry and competitive teams."

While last week’s victory against Johns Hopkins brought up memories of Brandeis’ thrilling victory over the Blue Jays at the Sollee Invitational, this rematch was decisively in the Judges’ favor.

In saber and foil, the Judges earned 7-2 and 6-3 victories, respectively, while the épée fencers fell by a margin of 5-4. Rookie sabreists Jess Ochs-Willard ’15 and Adam Mandel ‘15 were undefeated in action. Powell also won all of his matches in the épée competition.

Competitors in all three weapons

fought tough matches against a UNC team that had delivered a loss to the Judges on Dec. 2.

All three came down to the final rotation. Brandeis edged out the Tar Heels in two of the three weapons to achieve a close 14-13 victory.

Powell would once again save the day for Brandeis, earning a 5-3 victory to give the Judges the edge. Although UNC edged out the Judges’ sabreists, Ethan Levy’s ’15 5-2 finish and Noah Berman’s ’15 5-3 finish, led the Judges to a win in foil.

Despite losing to the Air Force, Penn State and Duke, Powell believed the Invitational provided a good benchmark of the team’s talent and growth.

“I think this meet was a good test of our abilities as a team,” he said. “We have been preparing very hard and diligently for this weekend’s [upcoming] competition at the Beanpot at Harvard.”

See FENCING, 13 ☛

Improvement has been the story of the season for the track teams.

Chris Brown ’12 has served as a textbook example of the growth the squads have displayed.

In a field filled with Division I prospects, Brown continued his stellar season in the one-mile run with a 21st-place finish, running in 4:05.98 at the non-scoring Boston University Valentine Invitational last weekend.

Compared to his 4:10.34 finish at the Boston University Terrier Classic, Brown has shown immense progress and now holds the fastest finish in the UAA this season by four seconds.

Brown is nearing the historic fourminute mark. While his marked improvement from previous races shows he could reach that milestone, Brown is quick to tone down expectations.

“Perhaps in the future I could reach this goal, but at least for this year, I will probably not achieve this mark," Brown said.

Taylor Dundas ’14 placed 59th in the mile-run with a time of 4:16.13, while Marc Boutin ’12 rounded out the field with a finishing time of 4:23.63.

Vincent Asante ’14 continues to show he is a Renaissance man, finishing well in numerous events.

In the 60-meter dash, Asante notched a 27th-place finish with a time of 7.16 seconds, while in the 200-meter dash, he finished 53rd with a time of 22.8.

In the 800-meter run, Mik Kern ’13 placed 77th with a time of 1:56.80. In the 1000-meter race, Michael Rosenbach ’15 finished 49th with a time of 2:34.21.

Alex Kramer ’13 ran a strong race in the 3000-meter run, notching a time of 8:36.41. Ed Colvin ’14 placed 79th in the same event with a finish-

ing time of 8:48.44.

In the men’s long jump, Kensai Hughes ’14 finished in 33rd place with a height of 5.78 meters.

Kate Warwick ’12, with a 10th place finish in the 60-meter dash at 17:03.44, headlined a string of solid finishes for the women.

Brittany Bell ’13 also impressed in the event with her 26th-place finish in a field of over 50 runners. Bell also placed 54th in the 200-meter dash with a time of 26.35 seconds.

Ali Kirsch ‘14 continued her streak of strong finishes in the 800-meter run, placing in 70th in a field of 151 runners, with a time of 2:21.21.

In the 1000-meter run, a Brandeis trio dominated the field. Erin Bisceglia ’12 finished 40th with a time of 3:03.8, Victoria Sanford ’14 finished 42nd with a time of 3.04.81 and Kristi Pisarik ’15 rounded out the field in 43rd with a time of 3:05.55.

Lily Parenteau ’12 had another notable day in the women’s high jump, leaping at a height of 1.48 meters. Kim Farrington ’13 placed 20th in the women’s triple jump with a height of 10.6 meters.

As Brandeis nears the midpoint of the season, Mik Kern ’13 is quick to credit his coaches for the success Brandeis has had this year. “[Coach John Evans] has been great with training ... He has really personalized a training schedule that has helped me succeed in the last four years. He gave me the tools to succeed.”

As Brandeis prepares for the New England Division Championships next week, Kern stated that the squads need to be in their best form to succeed.

“We want to be running our fastest times at the end of the season,” Kern said. “[We need] to take each week as it comes by not burning ourselves out each week.”

Both track squads will compete this Saturday at the New England Division III Championships.

The men will compete at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, while the women will travel to Smith College for the weekend's competition.

just

February 14, 2012

ARTS

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Photos: Anna Yatskar/the Justice. Design: Robyn Spector and Josh Horowitz/the Justice.

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TUESDAY, February 14, 2012 ● THE JUSTICE

POP CULTURE

INSIDE ON CAMPUS

19-21

■ ‘Jiro Dreams of Sushi’

19

■ AraabMUZIK concert

20

Documentarian David Gelb answered questions regarding his film about a renowned sushi chef based in Tokyo.

The mash-up artist rocked the Levin Ballroom on Saturday night along with opening artist Basic Physics.

■ ‘Vagina Monologues’

20

■ 24-hour play festival

21

The Vagina Club was at it again with the much-anticipated annual performance of Eve Ensler’s ode to female sexuality.

BET successfully put on a series of short plays written, directed and produced in only 24 hours.

■ ‘Sh*t Brandeis Students Don’t Say’ viral video

21

JustArts scored an interview with the student comedians behind the web hit.

OFF CAMPUS

22-24

■ Grammy night reflection

22 After the excitement of Sunday night’s award show, there is a lot to discuss.

■ Whitney Houston obituary

22

■ ‘The Grey’ review

23

■ ‘Safe House’ review

23

JustArts looks back on the career of the classic singer who died at 48.

Liam Neeson plays an oil driller who must fight off killer wolves in order to survive.

This new action thriller about CIA agents leaves much to be desired.

CALENDAR

Interview

by Shelly Shore

This week’s big story centered, surprisingly, not around Hollywood movie stars but on another entertainment art form: ballet. Italian ballerina Mariafrancesca Garritano was fired from the famed La Scala ballet company this past weekend, and many are blaming the controversial topics brought up in her recent book: The Truth Please, About Ballet.

In the text, and again in a December interview with The Observer (a British newspaper), Garritano reported the harsh treatment she received from her ballet instructors (they teased her with names like “Chinese dumpling” and “Mozzarella”) and how she stopped getting her period for a year between the ages of 16 and 17 because she had dropped to a sickly 95 pounds due to the extreme pressure. She estimated that seven in 10 dancers at the La Scala Academy in Milan have lost their menstrual cycles, one in five have anorexia and that many of her colleagues are now physically unable to have children due to the strain of constant weight fluctuations on their hormones and reproductive systems.

Criticism of the ballet world is nothing new. Last year’s film Black Swan raised serious questions about the physical and psychological pressure to conform to a certain body type after the already-slim Natalie Portman lost 20 pounds for her role as a prima ballerina. In 2010, New York Times critic Alastair MacAulay came under fire for calling ballerina Jenifer Ringer, who is not even slightly overweight, “the Sugar Plum Fairy [who] looked as if she’d eaten one sugar plum too many,” prompting questions over the policing of body types of ballerinas who are considered by many to be athletes. When it surfaced that Ringer had suffered from anorexia in the past, MacAulay’s article received even more harsh criticism, with many bloggers accusing him of perpetuating the culture of unhealthy ballerinas.

BTV to air new episode of sketch comedy ‘The Hall’

 Brandeis Television is working on quite a few projects this semester, most prominently a comedy web series about a college-themed reality show.

PHOTO COURTESY OF MARYGARRET.COM

SKIN AND BONES: Garritano (above) criticized the Italian ballet company La Scala in her new book.

The policing of female athletes’ bodies is nothing new. There’s even a medical diagnosis for the women who are pushed too far. Female Athlete Triad refers to a combination of three conditions: disordered eating; amenorrhea, loss of menstrual period; and osteoporosis, weakening of the bones.

It’s been proven over and over again that weak, too-thin bodies don’t perform as well as bodies that are well-fed and strong. So why does the ballet industry—and other athletic and aesthetic industries where women are put on display—insist on pressuring these women into eating disorders that can have serious effects on their physical, psychological and reproductive health just to perpetuate the image of the tiny, delicate dancer?

And more importantly, why do we continue to let it happen?

What’s happening in Arts on campus this semester

ON-CAMPUS EVENTS

‘Mother: Caring for 7 Billion’ screening

In this film, Beth, the mother of 12 children, travels to Ethiopia and meets with Zinet, the eldest daughter in a family of 12.

When she sees Zinet’s struggles, Beth begins to realize the impact of population growth.

Sponsored by the International Center for Ethics, Justice, and Public Life; the School of Science; the Center for German and European Studies; Environmental Studies; the Women’s and Gender Studies program, and the graduate program in Sustainable International Development, the film confronts the controversial topic of population on our planet, which has nearly doubled since the 1960s. Speakers after the film include Robert Walker, president of the Population Institute, and Purnima Mane, president of Pathfinder International.

Tonight at 6:30 p.m. in the Wasserman Cinematheque.

Ethnomusicology colloquium

Prof. Ann E. Lucas (MUS) will be giving a speech titled, “Music Fit for a King: Music, Song and the Culture of Empire from the Timurids to the Safavids” as part of the ethnomusicology colloquium sponsored by the music department.

Today at 3:30 p.m. in the Mandel Center for the Humanities Reading Room 303.

MERIE WALLACE /Fox Searchlight Pictures

FILMS OF 2011: Brandeis Film Collective will be hosting an Oscar party on Sunday, Feb. 26, the last day of February break. Students will watch as films like ‘The Tree of Life’ (above) vie for Best Picture.

The documentary based off Dr. Sabrina McCormick’s book, No Family History: The Environmental Links to Breast Cancer, will be screened the film and a speech will directly follow the film.

Thursday at 3:30 p.m. in the Mandel Center for the Humanities Reading Room 303.

tate discussion among students, educators and community members about how the arts can ease suffering and be used as a tool to help create peace in areas of conflict. There will be events leading up to the conference, such as this introduction, which will include a screening of the documentary Acting Together on the World Stage and a talk by Cindy Cohen, the director of the program.

Tuesday, Feb. 28 from 12:30 to 2 p.m. in the Epstein Hall of the Women’s Studies Research Center.

Music colloquium

OFF-CAMPUS EVENTS

‘No Family History’ screening

Prof. Yu-Hui Chang (MUS) will be speaking about composition as part of the music colloquium. Having earned her Ph.D. at Brandeis, she has gone on to win several awards in composition, including the Aaron Copland Award in 2008.

Thursday at 4:30 p.m. in the Slosberg Recital Hall room 212.

Trivia night

Student Activities is hosting a trivia competition in Ollie’s Eatery. There will be food and prizes.

Thursday at 10 p.m. in Ollie’s Eatery.

Lowell Humanities Series and Fiction Days present Junot Díaz

Junot Díaz is the acclaimed author of such novels as Drown and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The Dominican author, whose works often feature elements of Latino culture, will be reading from his works at this free event.

Tomorrow at Boston College in the Murray Function Room of the Yawkey Athletic Center, located at 140 Commonweatlth Ave., Chestnut Hill, Mass.

‘Classical Lovers’

Brandeis Film Collective is hosting a viewing party of the 86th Annual Academy Awards at the end of February break. There will be food provided to snack on during the screening.

Sunday, Feb. 26 at 6 p.m. in the Polaris Lounge.

Ballet is one of the most romantic forms of dance. The José Mateo Ballet Theatre is putting on Classical Lovers this month. The performance combines three ballets by classical composers, each reflecting a different type of love.

Running through Feb. 26 at José Mateo Ballet Theatre, located at 400 Harvard St, Cambridge. Tickets are $38.

Introduction to Peacebuilding and the Arts

‘Shrek the Musical’

Oscar screening mixer

Each year, Brandeis holds a Peacebuilding and the Arts conference, designed to facili-

Shrek the movie debuted in 2001, and since then has wormed its way into our hearts

through its sly allusions to classic fairy tales, its gross-out humor (remember when Shrek made a candle out of earwax?) and its message: It’s what’s inside that counts.

Feb. 24 to 26 at The Hanover Theater, located at Two Southbridge St. Worcester, Mass.

Tickets are $35 to $65.

Art and Architecture Tours

The Boston Public Library is hosting tours of the landmark, designed by Charles Follen McKim and Philip Johnson. The tour will also cover sculptures and paintings located in the Library.

Running through Feb. 29 at the Boston Public Library, located at 700 Boylston St., Boston.

‘Forever Kings: A Tribute to Michael Jackson & Elvis Presley’

Two giants of pop music, Jackson and Presley, will be honored in this high-energy multimedia show. Impersonators will give it their all as they try to capture the iconic images and voices of these two Kings of Pop. Feb. 29 to March 4 at CityStage and Symphony Hall, located at One Columbus Center, Springfield, Mass. Tickets are $36 to $40.

‘Medea’

You may have read this classic Greek tragedy in middle school, but there’s nothing like seeing the show live. This bloody play, written by Sophocles in 431 B.C.E., tells the story of Medea, a woman who is so overcome by jealousy because her former husband has married another, that she plots to kill his new wife and her own children so that he will never be happy again.

Running through March 4 at the Multicultural Arts Center, 41 Second St., Cambridge.

JustArts emailed with the president of Brandeis Television, Ethan Mermelstein ’12, to find out more about the show and the creative process that goes into producing a web series. Mermelstein let us in on the hectic schedule, the breakdown of roles on set and how everything seems to come together in the end.

JustArts: What is ‘The Hall’ about?

Ethan Mermelstein: The Hall takes place in a small liberal arts university in the midst of a financial crisis. In a desperate attempt to generate revenue, the dean of the school decides to find a group of semi-consenting incoming freshman [sic], and create a reality TV show based on their lives in college. Essentially, The Hall is a show within a show. It’s mainly about the tension between the students’ interest in academics and reasonable privacy concerns and the dean’s drive to make an exciting reality TV show. We plan to release the first three episodes every Wednesday, starting this Wednesday, Feb. 15 at thehalltv.tumblr.com.

JA: What are your roles in the creation of the series?

EM: So far, I’ve written, directed and produced each episode. I also play the role of the dean. In an early version of the show, I played all the characters, but focus groups said it wasn’t believable, due to the whole hair thing.

Because I’m often tied up in the creative end of things, I rely on a great team to help get the episodes out. Jerry Genser ’12 acts as a co-producer/production manager, making sure everything goes smoothly on set. Myles Tyrer-Vasell ’12 is the head director of photography and has edited some episodes. Sam Bender ’14 is the codirector of photography, and Hanna Wellish ’12 is the other primary editor.

JA: What is it like to direct? Had you ever done this before?

EM: The night before we shot our first episode, I was sure things were on the verge of falling apart. I had never done anything on this scale. Golden Globe winner Nikki Blonsky would be flying in from New York the next day to guest star, and I was terrified that we weren’t ready. The shoot ended up going more smoothly than I could have hoped for. The atmosphere on set is very collaborative. I’ve been lucky to have a team that fully understands the tone of the project. Because everyone is on the same page, I feel comfortable deviating from the script through in-character improvisation.

I usually make sure we have coverage of scenes that closely follow what is written in the script, and then shoot one or two takes that are completely improvised. The last episode we shot, I left the last scene largely unscripted, and improvised the ending with the cast of 12 actors.

This type of approach gives freshness and spontaneity that fits the documentary-style tone of the show. It also makes the editor of the episode want to slice my throat and watch me bleed out slowly.

JA: Describe the typical cycle of creation for each episode.

EM: I usually set a shooting date regardless of whether I’ve finished the script, to force myself to finish writing and keep the whole process moving forward. Ideally we’ll be able to leave ourselves a week or two for pre-production (booking spaces, casting actors, building/ buying set pieces if necessary). The night before shooting, I’ll have a breakdown of the mental or emotional variety and rethink my entire life’s purpose. [Genser, Tyrer-Vasell] and I usually get up at 6 a.m. the morning of the shoot to set up whatever location we’ll be working with.

JA: What do you think the Internet has done for aspiring filmmakers and for your web series?

EM: Paradoxically, the Internet allows for a little bit of sloppiness in some regards and demands a higher standard of content in others.

When I watch something online, I tend to overlook lower production values when the content is more engaging and original. The lack of censorship online also provides a perfect platform for a show like The Hall that has the potential to alienate large audiences with its vile dialogue.

JA: What else is BTV up to these days?

EM: To name a few of our major projects from this semester: [Tyrer-Vasell] just finished up shooting on an unofficial music video. ...

Aaron Berke ’12 is casting for an original short film, The Note, a mystery/suspense film told in two timelines about a family and the secrets of their past. Rohan Narayanan ’15 and Ethan Roseman ’15 are working on a semi-improvised sketch comedy show that challenges social norms called Taking it Too Far.

—Emily Salloway Editor’s Note: Aaron Berke ’12 is a senior writer for the Justice.

THE JUSTICE

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TUESDAY, february 14, 2012

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ON CAMPUS FILM

Gelb brings legacy of sushi chef Jiro to US ■ In ‘Jiro Dreams of Sushi,’

director David Gelb follows an award-winning sushi chef and his sons in their craft.

By ANDREW WINGENS JUSTICE EDITOR

There is no dearth of savory sushi in David Gelb’s first documentary feature film, Jiro Dreams of Sushi, but the movie is more than just a sea of close-up shots displaying colorful fish and rice as well as chefs massaging octopus and slicing tuna. For the sushi lover, the images transmit umami (Japanese for deliciousness), but the film also offers a human story for those less interested in the difficult process of getting the fish from sea to mouth.

The Magnolia Pictures documentary, which was screened in the Wasserman Cinematheque on Thursday night ahead of its scheduled limited release March 9, focuses on Jiro Ono, an 85-year-old sushi master who is widely considered to be the best susushi chef in the world.

Jiro owns Sukiyabashi Jiro, a 10seat, sushi-only restaurant, located in a Tokyo subway station. The restaurant has won numerous awards, including the esteemed three-star ranking in the Michelin Guide, a European hotel and restaurant guide.

To get a seat, you need to make a reservation a month in advance and be willing to shell out upwards of 30,000 yen (about $350).

The film, at 81 minutes, draws viewers in with slideshow images of freshly made sushi set to classical music. The plot holds their attention by telling the story of Jiro and his son’s encounters with sushi.

The movie portrays sushi making as an art form, which Jiro practices and has mastered over decades of work. Food critic Masuhiro Yamamoto compares the three-course meal to a symphony of sorts. Each course serves a purpose, with a crescendo of flavor during the final serving.

“In dreams, I would have visions of

sushi,” said Jiro in the film.

The film also delves into Jiro’s personal life. The chef was orphaned at the age of nine and was forced into an apprenticeship in the food industry.

He discovered, however, that he loved the art of sushi making and has worked his entire life to be the best in his profession. Jiro has always loved his job and rarely takes breaks or vacations. But he insists that he has not yet reached perfection, and he always strives to create a better piece of sushi.

Jiro is a creature of habit. He follows a strict daily routine and understands the value of repeated practice; that is how he became the best. “You have to fall in love with your job. You must dedicate your life to mastering your skill,” said Jiro.

Jiro’s two sons, Yoshikazu and Takashi, also play crucial roles in the film’s storyline. Takashi is the younger of the two and served as an apprentice under his father but left to open his own restaurant so as not to fight with his elder brother, Yoshikazu.

Yoshikazu works as the chief apprentice in his father’s restaurant and plans to carry on the family business. In Japan, culture largely dictates this right of primogeniture.

Jiro was especially hard in training his sons, as he hopes that they will continue his legacy of reaching for perfection in the creation of sushi.

The film also briefly touches on challenges that Jiro and his sons expect to face in coming years, including a serious shortage of fish in Japan. Over-fishing in the country has caused prices of a simple fish, such as tuna, to skyrocket while other, more exotic fish, have disappeared completely.

After the screening of the movie, director David Gelb answered questions from the audience during a 30-minute question-and-answer session moderated by BTV president Ethan Mermelstein ’12.

Gelb said this movie brings together his two greatest passions: sushi and filmmaking.

He said that he originally envi-

JOSHUA LINTON/the Justice

SUSHI SUCCESS: The director of ‘Jiro Dreams of Sushi,’ David Gelb, answers questions from Ethan Mermelstein ’12 (above); Jiro Ono (below) has made a name for himself as the best sushi chef in the world. He owns a restaurant in a Tokyo subway station. sioned the movie to be like the BBC series Planet Earth, so he shot video of multiple sushi chefs in the United States. However, Gelb realized the footage was unsustainable as a feature film, because there was no “human through line [within the plot].”

Once Gelb found Jiro, he “could tell there was a real kind of human story here. I got very excited,” he said.

Gelb added that he draws inspiration from acclaimed filmmaker Errol Morris, who created such films as The Fog of War, in the sense that he tries to portray a story through an expert’s eyes. It is the people and their stories, said Gelb that make a documentary special.

“I was just glad that I could find that in Jiro, someone who could tell not only everything that I wanted to convey about sushi, but an incredible perspective on living and how to work and live a life,” concluded Gelb.

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20

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

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THE JUSTICE

MUSIC

Students get down at February concert ■ Headliner AraabMUZIK and

opener Basic Physics created an energetic dance party in the Levin Ballroom.

By ARIEL KAY JUSTICE EDITOR

The signs on the doors to the Levin Ballroom read, “Strobe lights will be used during this performance.” Let the party begin.

As I walked into the ballroom on Thursday night, a small group of students had already gathered, eagerly anticipating the opening performer of Student Events’ February concert, Basic Physics. When the disc jockey stepped onto the stage, the audience surged tighter together, clamoring for a taste of the hip-hop flavored jams for which the young mix-master is known.

Basic Physics is a one-man operation. The mash-up artist first hit it big in 2010 when his mix “Stuntin’ with a Milli,” which combines songs

by Lil Wayne, Phoenix and Pretty Lights, became a hit on YouTube and SoundCloud, a popular music streaming site. At the time of publication, the song was viewed over 42,000 times on each site.

Since 2010, Basic Physics has released two mixtapes: Nightlife in the Northwoods and Liftoff. The blog BarStoolU, which helped sponsor Liftoff, said of the mixtape, “Basic Physics mixes all your favorite house with infectious pop anthems, creating the perfect rage music for any occasion.”

Back in Levin, Basic Physics did not disappoint. The entertainer— that’s truly what he was—played infectious beats featuring many top40 artists like Katy Perry, Ludacris, Lady Gaga and Maroon 5. He knew just when to let the beat slow down, creating tension in the crowd until the speakers suddenly exploded with the chorus of a well-known song.

Basic Physics was clearly enjoying himself as well, singing along to his mash-ups as well as waving his hands back and forth, nodding his head and occasionally encouraging the audience with yells of excitement.

After Basic Physics’ 45-minute set, AraabMUZIK took the stage. An up-

ANNA YATSKAR/the Justice

FUTURISTIC BEATS: AraabMUZIK performs using an Akai Music Production Center to simulate the sounds of drums. He also uses samples from other songs to create his music. and-coming performer, AraabMUZIK was different from any other DJ I had seen before. He didn’t simply take samples of popular songs and mix them together. Instead, using an Akai Music Production Center drum machine, he created rhythms of his own, throwing together beat after beat in increasingly rapid succession. The MPC is similar to a synthesizer; it looks like a large pad containing 16 square buttons configured in four rows of four. Each of these buttons makes a different drum sound. When AraabMUZIK played the MPC, it sounded like he had an entire drum kit in front of him.

This style of performance may seem futuristic, but it’s a natural progression for this performer. According to AraabMUZIK’s official website, “When I first started making beats, I went from the keyboard to a software program and to an MPC. My motivation at that time was just for the fact that I wanted to hear and make my own music. All my old beats on the keyboard were like a good three to four minutes long and as I got better, so did the beats.”

AraabMUZIK doesn’t just use the MPC as a way to get around real musical talent—he knows how to play the drums for real and breaks out a

full kit at some performances. But by combining the MPC with other electronic equipment, he has the ability to create heart-pounding beats and add in samples of other songs as well.

At the concert, a large screen was connected to a camera that filmed directly over the machine. That way, the audience could see AraabMUZIK’s fingers flash over the keys as they danced to the rhythm.

AraabMUZIK was more than just an energetic performer. His whole body rocked back and forth as he slammed his fingers down on the buttons, seemingly lost in the musical world he was creating. Clothed in a

dark hoodie and flat-brimmed baseball cap, he looked like a stereotypical rapper or MC. But his songs had no words and he rarely spoke to the audience. He was too engaged in making rapid-fire beats that washed over the dancers on the floor. For its part, the crowd seemed to love it, grooving to the vibrations and expressing their disappointment when the beat-maker finally left the stage.

Editor’s Note: Bryan Flatt ’12, Student Events’ director of concerts, is a Justice Associate Editor.

THEATER

Cast unites in Eve Ensler’s flawed ‘Monologues’ ■ ‘Monologues’ may not

connect to students today the way it used to, but the actors this year were still impressive.

By TESS RASER JUSTICE EDITOR

The first time I heard of The Vagina Monologues, it was being parodied on Saturday Night Live when I was about eight years old. The show was new then, and I did not really think twice about it, other than that I knew it was a topic of conversation. It was not until college that I saw the Monologues performed: three times at Brandeis and once at another college. The stories are entertaining, but I’m not entirely convinced that the Monologues is as empowering for the audience as it is for cast members.

In the Monologues, a lot of the pieces are now outdated—after all, the show was first performed in 1996. For example, violence against women and rape as a weapon of war is still relevant, but the conflict in Bosnia (in the piece “My Vagina Was My Village”) is unfortunately not a conflict that audience members in 2012 are entirely familiar with. The show too simplistically suggests that there is a sort of crosscultural sisterhood among women through their connections to their vaginas. I think that there should be more of a place for men in the show that does not leave female audience members resenting all males.

With that said, my issues with The Vagina Monologues have nothing to do with Brandeis’ production of the show this past weekend, but with the creator, Eve Ensler’s, origi-

ROBYN SPECTOR/the Justice

WOMEN’S WORDS: Marisa Turesky ’13 had the audience in fits of laughter with her monologue about women’s moans. nal work. The 30 cast members blew me away with their investment in each of their characters, a task I imagine would be difficult given we college students have comparatively few shared experiences with the portrayed characters.

An early standout performance was that of Laura Ben “LB” Moore ’14. She recited “Hair,” the story of a woman whose husband requested she shave “down there,” regardless of her positive feelings toward her hair. Moore seemed completely

comfortable on stage, and her performance was more like watching a seasoned storyteller than an actor giving a performance.

Maya Grant ’13, who followed soon after, performed “The Flood,” an elderly woman’s account of her fears of her own sexuality after an embarrassing situation she had the first time she was kissed. Grant, dressed in a long floral dress, was seated in her chair during the entirety of the performance but still engaged the audience through the humorous ac-

cent she gave her character. At one moment, I completely believed that Grant was a 72-year-old woman infatuated with Burt Reynolds.

Jemesh Hunter ’15 shined in “My Angry Vagina,” as she yelled her frustrations over hospital gowns, tampons and long underwear not being appropriately comfortable and elegant as her vagina would appreciate. Hunter gleamed with confidence with every stomp of her four-inch heels.

The highlight of the show for me,

and probably for a lot of audience members, was Marisa Turesky’s ’13 brilliant interpretation of “The Woman Who Loved to Make Vaginas Happy.” In the past, I remember feeling slightly ill at ease watching my fellow classmates moan on stage, but Turesky’s humor and comfort in the spotlight convinced me that several minutes of fake orgasms in the Carl J. Shapiro Theater was natural.

The entire cast was fantastic because of the obvious level of comfort they had reached together. It seems to me that The Vagina Monologues is empowering for the cast members in that they establish close bonds and meaningful friendships in the process of putting on the show together.

It was nice to to see how supportive and excited the actresses were when their colleagues performed.

Over the years, it has been interesting to see new students take on the roles that I, along with anyone else who has seen the show before, know well.

In addition to my aforementioned criticism, I feel that The Vagina Monologues does not inspire many in-depth conversations after its viewing. I hope that in the future the show is replaced by a show with similar themes, but that is more relevant to the women of 2012.

However, while we wait for the next wave of feminism and offBroadway sensation, the University’s production of The Vagina Monologues will suffice.

Director Meg Evans ’12 and coordinator Sarah Steele ’12 did an excellent job of putting on a really terrific show that, despite my having seen it three other times, kept me entertained and proud of my fellow Brandesians.

THE JUSTICE

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TUESDAY, february 14, 2012

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comedy

Brandeis Basement creates sensation ■ With their new video going

viral on the web, four campus comedians are making a name for themselves.

By ariel kay JUSTICE editor

“Hey man, I’m sober. Let’s go to Ollie’s.”

By now, this satirical quip has become ubiquitous on campus, thanks to Paul Gale ’12, Adam Lapetina ’12, Aaron Sadowsky ’13 and Joshua Seiden ’13. The four students released their first video Brandeis Basement, titled “Sh*t Brandeis Students Don’t Say,” last Wednesday. The video, which follows the “S­— Some Group Says” meme format, quickly went viral. It has accumulated over 16,000 views by press time. For nonmath majors, that’s five times the population of the student body.

“We were like, ‘We’re starting this website online,’ … and people

could share it on social networks, and that would be the end of the day. Or we could do something that people would really want to share and would get our name out,” Gale said. This is the group’s first video for Brandeis Basement.

Campus Basement, Brandeis Basement’s parent site, is a platform for college students to broadcast humor relating to their individual schools. Seiden originally contacted the site to create the partnership.

Now that their first video has proven to be such a success, a sequel is the first thing the guys are working on: The second “Sh*t Brandeis Students Don’t Say” project will be “a combination of both [new and previously shot footage], but mostly new things,” said Lapetina. Seiden added, “We made some allusions to the first video in the second video.”

Sadowsky said, “We established some really strong characters which we’re going to carry over to the second video.” The students cracked up as Gale mentioned perhaps the

most-well known joke in the video, “J. Scott Van Der Meow.” This crack refers, of course, to Assistant Dean of Academic Services and Director of Study Abroad J. Scott Van Der Meid. Van Der Meid has apparently taken the joke in stride, even posing for a picture with the four video creators. “For the next video, we should just have a cat, … a cat studying abroad,” Gale offered.

The Brandeis Basement team is hoping to increase the number of campus celebrities in their next video, including University President Frederick Lawrence. “We’ll tone it down for him, … make it as tame as possible,” Lapetina joked.

Though it’s unlikely that University policy makers will show up in the next video, “Sh*t Brandeis Students Don’t Say” has clearly made an impact on campus.

Many people, both students and professors, have complimented Gale, Lapetina, Sadowsky and Seiden on their work and encouraged them to create more content. “It’s

been fun to have such a high response. It’s cool to see something that pretty much everybody at Brandeis liked, and that’s a unique thing,” Seiden said.

“Except for four people,” Gale interjected, referring to the four dislikes the video has gotten on YouTube.

“Yeah, well, those four people can f— themselves,” Seiden teased in mock-anger.

All kidding aside, the video has had a real positive impact on its creators. Lapetina, who has not worked in front of the camera previously, remarked, “It’s been nice, because I’ve become a little more confident in my acting ability as a result of this. Working on [my] delivery and workshopping it, it’s been a really fun experience, and I’ve learned a lot. I think it will maybe lead into some other opportunities down the line.”

Students are already eagerly anticipating the new video, which, along with the creation of the

Brandeis Memes Facebook page, has ushered in an upsurge in online student-created humor.

The memes page takes popular picture-and-caption formats that have been on the internet for years—including Forever Alone, the Most Interesting Man in the World and Awkward Penguin— and alters them to apply to Brandeis life.

One example is the page’s take on the Ryan Gosling “Hey Girl” meme, in which a picture of Ryan Gosling is covered by a cheesy pick-up line.

The caption on the Brandeis picture reads “Hey girl, is your name Rabb Steps? Because you just took my breath away.”

The Memes page includes several GIFs from the “Sh*t” video.

As more and more humor goes from print to the web, and videos can go viral in a matter of hours, it is fun to watch a group of Brandeis comedians gain a bit of cyber celebrity. Look out for the team’s second video, which will be posted after February break.

PHOTO COURTESY OF AARON SADOWSKY

FUNNY GUYS: Comedians Joshua Seiden ’13, Paul Gale ’12, Aaron Sadowsky ’13 and Adam Lapetina ’12 pose with Assistant Dean of Academic Services and Director of Study Abroad J. Scott Van Der Meid.

THEATER

BET begins tradition of 24-hour play festival ■ Over the weekend, five

writers, four directors and several actors came together in a marathon of theater.

By LYDIA EMMANOUILIDOU JUSTICE CONTRIBUTING WRITER

The countdown started at 5 p.m. on Saturday evening. Interested directors, writers and actors met in the Castle Commons with a singular purpose: to write, direct, rehearse and perform a series of short plays in the span of 24 hours. Although more students had expressed interest in participating by signing the sign-up sheets in the Shapiro Campus Center during the week leading to the festival, only seven students attended this initial meeting. In fact, cultivating interest was one of the greatest challenges for coordinators David Benger ’14 and Abigail Clarke ’12, as most actors in the Brandeis community were already committed to rehearsing for other spring semester productions.

Benger led the 10-minute meeting.

Initially, the plan was to pair writers up, but because participation num-

bers were low, students were asked to write their original plays individually. Benger requested that all five writers begin working on their plays immediately after the meeting and submit them to him via email between 4 and 5 a.m. It would then be Benger’s and Clarke’s responsibility to edit the resulting four plays, before the scheduled 8 a.m. meeting for actors and directors.

During the morning meeting on Sunday, Benger and Clarke assigned parts to eight actors and actresses based on the gender breakdown and then gave each of the four directors the chance to choose the play they were most interested in working on.

The actors and directors got to work shortly after the meeting and only stopped to take a quick lunch break.

Because of the other on-going theater productions, participants were unable to start rehearsing on the stage until a mere four hours before the scheduled 5 p.m. performance.

The schedule in the theater also discouraged Benger and Clarke from designing a set that fit a theme for this festival, as it would be difficult to build a set while other groups were rehearsing. But even though writers were instructed to free-write and

most did not collaborate with one another (directors Julian Seltzer ’15 and Amanda Stern ’15 were the only directors who co-wrote their play), there was a unifying theme among the productions.

All four plays dealt with issues of sexual orientation, unconventional sexual relationships and, more broadly, sexuality. Although they dealt with modern and relevant issues, all four had a comical twist.

While most actors and actresses used scripts during their performances, the plays did not fail to capture the heaviness of the issues discussed.

Seltzer and Stern’s “Sudden Feelings” was a 15-minute thoughtprovoking story of a lesbian couple working in a sex shop in a conservative town. During the play, the town’s Republican primary candidate pays a visit to the sex shop while the couple is working, in pursuit of sex paraphernalia. Amusing and provocative, this original piece dealt with the issue of sexual orientation within a given social and political context.

According to Stern, the inspiration for this play came from and article she and Seltzer read together a few weeks back. She also commented

that the most challenging part of this process was “deciding when to stop [writing].” The duo wrote from 6 p.m. to 2 a.m.

Elly Kalfus’ ’13 “The Penis Dialogues”–a satirical spin-off of The Vagina Monologues—opened with two male characters who claimed that they would use such materials as interviews with other men to argue against the notion of the male privilege. In this play, female actresses represented male characters, while male actors represented female characters. This play was successful in fulfilling it’s ultimate purpose: to make the audience laugh at the incoherence of the arguments against the notion of male privilege. Although not persuasive (as was intended) it touched upon some controversial truths about self identification.

In Aaron Fischer’s ’15 “The Forgeries of Jealousy,” two young men are visited by the ghost of their exgirlfriend. Her inability to choose between the two of them while she was alive has left them both bitter and resentful towards one another.

During the play it becomes clear that the three were involved in an unconventional relationship, as both men were romantically involved with

the now-dead-ex-girlfriend, yet were aware of each other’s involvement.

Emily Duggan’s ’15 “Mirrors” centered around a young woman on her wedding day. Before she walks down the aisle to marry the woman she loves, she reminisces with her brother and talks about the quest to realizing and accepting her sexual orientation.

In the end, only the coordinators remained awake for the duration of the 24 hours. Seltzer described the process as “two 12-hour shifts,” with the writers having the first shifts and the directors and actors the second.

This is the first time this type of production has been attempted at Brandeis. Benger and Clarke took their inspiration for the event from the annual Hillel Theater Group’s 24-hour musical that happens in the fall and “Quickies,” the Brandeis Ensemble Theater’s fall festival of student-written short plays.

They hope the 24-hour play festival will become a spring semester tradition.

In the future, Benger and Clarke hope that the festival will take place closer to the beginning of the semester so as not to interfere with other productions.

22

TUESDAY, february 14, 2012

●

THE JUSTICE

OFF CAMPUS REMEMBERING A LEGEND

MUSIC

Grammys honor Houston, Adele ■ Whitney Houston’s death put a damper on the ceremony, but stars provided a respectful show.

By bryan flatt JUSTICE editor

We are officially in the middle of award season. Every year from midJanuary to early March, the entertainment world is inundated with award show after award show. However, the Grammys stand as a bit of an anomaly among the other ceremonies. While the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild Awards, Writers Guild of America Awards, British Academy of Film and Television Arts awards and the Academy Awards all commemorate successes in film and television through montages, monologues and speeches, the Grammy Awards dedicate the whole night to music.

BEACON RADIO/Flickr Creative Commons Looking at the nominees really reNEW DIVA IN TOWN: Adele shone at the Grammys, taking home awards in each minds one just how much progress of the categories for which she was nominated, including album of the year. each year brings to the music world.

From Kanye West’s genius My BeauOft criticized for her live perfortimely single “My Valentine” and tiful Dark Twisted Fantasy to Adele’s mances, Rihanna was surprisingly then, as the grand finale, he played powerful 21 to Lady Gaga’s surprisentertaining with “We Found Love” an iconic Abbey Road medley movingly uninteresting Born This Way, and while accompanying Chris Maring from “Golden Slumbers” to “The 2011 brought many A-game perfortin on stage in “Princess of China.”

End” with help from rockers Joe mances by a slew of singers and But the usually upbeat Coldplay Walsh, Dave Grohl and The Boss– songwriters. But the variety also sounded tired and weak in their reneach with his own solo.

ASTERIX611/Wikimedia Commons makes things difficult. How can one dition of “Paradise.”

Unforgettable was Jennifer HudCHART TOPPER: In her life, Houston broke many barriers for black female musicians. compare Adele, Bruno Mars, Taylor The Beach Boys celebrated their son’s emotional performance of Swift and Cee Lo Green? Thus, the 50th anniversary and reunited on Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Grammy Awards does something the stage with “Good Vibrations,” Love You.” As if channeling the late unique to give more time and honor while getting some help from estabvocal star, Hudson beautifully sang to its many nominees—all of whom lished pop stars in Maroon 5 and the the song in front of a montage of are skilled in their own genres—the quickly up-and-coming Foster the Houston’s many appearances at the show is just as much about the live People, who played “Surfer Girl” Grammys. performances as it is the awards. and “Wouldn’t it Be Nice,” respecOf course, though, that leaves the But this year’s Grammys was a bit tively. The Beach Boys proved they biggest winner of the night—Adele. different from past years. With the are quintessential aged stars—still With six wins—in every category death of Whitney Houston on Saturtalented, a little awkward yet in love she was nominated for including alday afternoon, a cloud seemed to be with the crowd. bum of the year for 21—and a tour de hanging over the heads of everyone The night had plenty of more lavforce live song (her first live perforin the music world. Memory, thereish micro-shows throughout: The mance since she had vocal surgery fore, became the theme of the show.

Foo Fighters, DeadMau5, David late last year), it was clear this was After Bruce Springsteen and the E Guetta and Chris Brown rocked the the British singer’s year. The Foo Street Band played skillfully (as aloutdoor stage in a genre-bending Fighters were the other big winners gan modeling and became the first ways) host LL Cool J came out and event; Taylor Swift, The Band Perry, with four pre-telecast awards and ■ woman of color to grace the cover of addressed the elephant in the room.

Blake Shelton and Lifetime Achieveone award (Best Rock Album) durSeventeen. While she was offered a In a solemn voice, he acknowledged ment award winner Glen Campbell ing the show. Unfortunately, their record contract at the age of 14, she Houston’s death and said a prayer in brought their A-game to the country earnest speech about having pride declined the offer, opting to finish her memory on behalf of everyone sphere. Carrie Underwood and Tony in true instrumentation and muschool instead. Several years later in the room. And with an “Amen,” Bennett got together for a beautisicianship was cut off by a song by at the age of 20, Houston signed the tone shifted again and he said ful duet of “It Had to Be You” from electro-group LMFAO. with Arista Records and released a excitedly, “Welcome to the 54th Bennett’s Grammy-winning album In his opening talk LL Cool J— self-titled debut album in 1985.

Grammy Awards.”

Duets II, while Nicki Minaj gave the who was fairly silent as a host but By rebecca klein February Open House.truPublish Tuesday, Februaryand 7 @theatrical $75 for 1/5made page transitions ad. Deadlineless awkward— Whitney Houston spawnedThea Justice ad for The ensuing 16 award ceremony most shock-worthy JUSTICE editor string of hits, including “You Give ly embraced the subject of memory spectacle of the night while singing stated, “Tonight we will make our February 4. in musical ways, too. Bruno Mars her new song, “Roman’s Revenge.”

Despite an upbeat reunion perGood Love,” “Saving All My Love own Grammy memories.” From the formance from The Beach Boys; a For You,” “The Greatest Love of dived right into a doo-wop perforWith a mixture of singing, acting Beach Boys to Blake Shelton to Jentechno collaboration from Chris All” and “How Will I Know.” In the mance that channeled a James and dancing, Nicki Minaj appeared nifer Hudson’s tearful and touching Brown, Lil Wayne and David Guetyears that followed, she racked up Brown, ’50s funk-pop vibe with a as if she were performing a song tribute and all the awards given ta; and an opening performance several awards, more hit singles phenomenal backing band, while from an elaborate play and proved out between, LL Cool J was right. I from Bruce Springsteen, a somber and recognition as one of the muAlicia Keys and Bonnie Raitt played to the world she is a triple threat. think more than any other year I’ve mood hung over the 54th Grammy sic industry’s most sought after a touching tribute to Etta James Finally, Sir Paul McCartney rocked watched, this year’s Grammys were awards. Talk of Whitney Houston’s and well-respected vocalists. By with “A Sunday Kind of Love.” the stage twice–first with his new really unforgettable. death overshadowed the most fash1994, she solidified her status as a ionable celebrities’ dresses, and pop icon with her lead role in the host LL Cool J skipped the typical movie The Bodyguard, which was opening monologue in favor of a complemented by a hit soundtrack prayer. featuring her song, “I Will Always Cool J said: “Heavenly father, Love You.” The song is currently we thank you for sharing our sisthe best-selling single of all time by ter Whitney with us. … We remain any female artist. truly blessed to have been touched While in recent years Houston’s ELEMENTARY ◦ MIDDLE ◦ HIGH SCHOOL ◦ MULTIPLE FIELDS by her beautiful spirit, and to have career faltered as a result of subhad her lasting legacy of music to stance abuse and personal issues, cherish and share forever.” In the at the peak of her career, Houston audience, larger-than-life celebrepresented what most musical artrities, including Lady Gaga and ists aspire to someday reach. She Nicki Minaj, bowed their heads in did not box herself into any categohomage. ry or gimmick and was seen simply Super pop diva Whitney Houston for her talent. was pronounced dead in a Beverly She was considered beautiful, Hills hotel room at 3:55 p.m. this but Houston never had to capitalize past Saturday, sending massive on her sex appeal in order to sell ripples throughout the pop world. records or gain attention. While Houston’s death prompted countHouston was a black artist, she did less montages in her memory and not appeal to only black audiences. fueled a slew of articles speculating Her voice transcended color lines. about the scope and importance of She was a universal artist.

A b r ah a m Sh ap i ro A c a d e mi c C o mpl e x her legacy. The singer was only 48 It could be argued for hours years old. where Houston’s true legacy lies.

Daughter of entertainment exHowever, I think the scope of her ecutive John Russell Houston and importance can really be seen in Ask questions • Meet with faculty • Attend a class gospel singer Cissy Houston, the the reaction of those most proNew Jersey native began performfoundly influenced by music—the ing in her church’s gospel choir at artists themselves. a young age. Growing up, she was One has to look no further than The Brandeis MAT program will provide you with the guidance, support, and influenced by her notable gospel Sunday night’s Grammy awards, challenge you need to become a bold and effective teacher committed to singer cousins Dionne Warwick where tears swelled up in Jennifer and Dee Dee Warwick and her godHudson’s eyes while she performed social justice, powerful learning for all students, and democratic schooling. mother, Aretha Franklin. a Houston tribute, and as Stevie In her teens, Houston sang Wonder proclaimed, “I love you, Come to the Open House and have your application fee waived. backup vocals for notable singers Whitney,” to know that Houston’s such as Chaka Khan and Jermaine music and influence will not be forTo RSVP and for more info: mat@brandeis.edu • (781) 736-2022 Jackson. At the same time, she begotten.

Lauded diva Houston dies

Whitney Houston, the singer of the best-selling single of all time by a female artist, passed away at 48.

B RA ND EI S U NI VE R SI TY MASTER OF ARTS IN TEACHING

What are you going to do?

Have you thought about TEACHING?

Open House

Thursday, February 16, 8am – 6pm

www.brandeis.edu/programs/education/mat

THE JUSTICE

●

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2012

23

FILM

INTO THE WILD

Low stakes in ‘Safe House’ thriller ■ Denzel Washington and

Ryan Reynolds give strong performances, but they’re not enough to save this flick.

By MAYA SHEMTOV JUSTICE CONTRIBUTING WRITER

KIMBERLEY FRENCH/Open Road Films

TRUDGING ALONG: Ottway and his band of bearded men brave freezing temperatures and a terrifying pack of wolves in the new film ‘The Grey,’ about oil drillers in Alaska.

Neeson strengthens ‘The Grey’ ■ The plot of the film may seem absurd, but it succeeds in delivering a message of hope in desperate times.

By alex desilva JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

The Grey may very well be the best argument for never setting foot in Alaska. The film presents the nation’s largest state as a desolate, inhospitable place where terrain, weather and animals all conspire to kill any and all humans as quickly and gruesomely as possible. It’s a land made up of jagged peaks and drifting dunes of snow, where blizzards can come and go in the blink of an eye. The deadliest features of The Grey’s Alaska are the wolves.

They’re territorial and stealthy, and unlike us fleshy humans, they’re built to survive in the subzero temperatures of Alaska’s mountains.

It’s in this desolate environment that we find our hero, Liam Neeson’s John Ottway, a sharpshooter hired by an oil company to protect the workers from the packs of wolves that also call this place home. Ottway hates the men he works with, who are, in his words, “not fit for society.”

They’re a group of drinkers, brawlers and criminals, and the quiet, introspective Ottway is the only one standing between them and the vicious predators. Luckily for them, Ottway hates himself just as much. He’s suicidal, and the duty to protect these men is the only thing keeping him alive at this point.

It’s in this cheery state that we find Ottway boarding a plane to Anchorage, Alaska, with the rest of the rig’s crew. However, not long after takeoff, a sudden storm brings the plane down in one of the most terrifying crash sequences ever put to film. Ottway wakes up to find himself tossed from the wreckage, with only six other workers left alive.

Struggling to find food and shelter in the barren mountains, it soon becomes clear that they’ve crashed right in the middle of a wolf pack’s territory. It’s not long until the wolves begin to attack the survivors’ meager camp, and it’s up to

KIMBERLEY FRENCH/Open Road Films

FROZEN STARE: Liam Neeson plays the tough-guy sharpshooter John Ottway, who leads his co-workers in a fight for their lives.

Ottway to lead them away from the pack’s territory in a desperate bid for survival.

This is, of course, much easier said than done. The wolves in The Grey are probably matched only

by Jurassic Park’s velociraptors in their cunning, tenacity and seeming omnipresence. They have an almost supernatural ability to appear anywhere, fading in and out of the fog and announcing their presence with a ghostly chorus of howls.

They work incredibly well as villains, giving a face to the cold, relentless danger bearing down on these men, who are facing down the threat of starvation and death from exposure as well as being eaten alive as they try to scramble down the mountain and back to civilization.

With all this in mind, it goes without saying that The Grey is a pretty bleak movie. Putting aside Ottway’s self-loathing, it’s made clear early on that barring a miracle these men have very little chance of making it

off the mountain alive. But director Joe Carnahan is skilled enough to avoid making this a simple celebration of people’s suffering. Instead, The Grey shows just how much inner strength can be drawn out of even the most hopeless situation, as Ottway and the crash survivors band together and put everything they have into this one desperate attempt to get to safety.

They might live. They may very well die. But either way, they’re going to fight for their survival, and they’re going to fight together.

In this way, The Grey differs from other famously bleak works like The Road, which come off as having a nearly pornographic interest in seeing just how much it can make its characters suffer.

Another point in the film’s favor is how well the characters are fleshed out by the actors. Ottway begins the movie feeling nothing but contempt for his coworkers. But as they come together after the crash and begin to face down the wolves,

the workers are softened. We get a look at who they actually are, and begin to see that these are all people—with lives, families, hopes and dreams. It’s this depth that keeps the film interesting.

A lesser movie would have made these characters one-dimensional types whose only purpose was to be picked off by the wolves. Instead, The Grey makes its characters likeable and believable, which makes it all the more terrifying when the wolves show their faces.

I’m going to admit that when I first saw advertisements for The Grey, I was less than impressed. It looked like just another mediocre action movie, the kind that tends to be released just after the holiday flood of films aiming for the awards season.

Instead, I found a surprisingly deep, wonderfully tense study about people on the fringes of society finding the strength to stand up to even the most hopeless of situations with dignity.

The tagline “No one is safe” is a dead giveaway.

Walking into Safe House one expects a fast-paced action thriller, and the film embodies its promise.

Director Daniel Espinosa, best known for his award-winning short The Fighter (2003) not to be confused with the 2010 Oscarnominated flick of the same name, and feature films Snabba Cash (2010) and Outside Love (2007), explores another story line with Safe House. Starring Denzel Washington as Tobin Frost, an ex-CIA agent and one of the most dangerous men on earth, and Ryan Reynolds as Matt Weston, a new, young CIA agent in charge of the safe house in which Frost is kept.

The film opens with shots of a crowded city, cars and people going about their daily lives. Rays of light shine down on the street from the bright South African sun. One of the wonders of the film is its beautiful portrayal and use of Cape Town, South Africa, as a backdrop to the action.

Frost, a dangerous criminal, is shown being brought into the safe house where Weston works. Suddenly, alarms sound, lights flash on and off, the security camera seems to have been turned off, men grab their guns. The safe house where Frost was brought for questioning and holding has been broken into. Everyone is shot. Weston, the only man left, takes the advice of Frost himself: grabs his gun, the criminal and escapes.

This last scene sets the stage for the rest of the film. Weston must now keep his hold on Frost until more forces come: the film portrays his struggle as he is left alone to watch the a wanted criminal, who surpasses him both in age and experience. In this way the film shows more than just a riveting fast-paced action thriller with fights, crashes and highspeed chases; it also highlights the interesting and complex relationship that emerges between Weston and Frost. Their relationship is as dynamic as the locations involved in the film—they go from strangers to enemies, two “agents” to a criminal and his captor. Washington plays his part perfectly, embodying the prowess of his character, evading America’s most intense forces, and unlike his usual position as a laudable hero, he maintains a dark twist essential to playing such a man.

Reynolds, on the other hand, seems the opposite of Washington. His look, although loved by the media and girls everywhere, was a little more “boy-next-door” than crime-fighting agent. Although this reflects Weston as the unlikely hero, a fresh young agent, inexperienced in the field, he was just a little too pure and innocent to be believable.

The film, although it does capture and comment on the interesting relationship between criminal and captor, lacks tension. It is well-done and exciting, but the story line focuses a little too much on the chase and less on development of peripheral characters.

Throughout the film, Weston and Frost are really the only characters which the audience can understand and relate to. That said, Safe House, although not spectacular in any way, is definitely an enjoyable watch that keeps the audience at the edge of their seats.

24

TUESday, february 14, 2012 ● THE JUSTICE

TOP of the

ARTS ON VIEW

TRIVIA TIME

CHARTS

1. Where was the first Roman aqueduct, the Aqua Appia, built?

2. What kind of creature was the Scylla?

3. Thornton Wilder’s play, The Matchmaker, was later made into what famous musical?

4. The present, past and past participle of draw, drew and drawn are examples of what kind of verb?

5. Which musical artist had a single hit with “Rebel Rebel?”

6. Where was American outlaw Billy the Kid born?

7. What movie featured the fictional land of Florin?

8. Where are the Comoros Islands?

9. What kind of animal was said to have raised the infants Romulus and Remus, twin founders of Rome?

10. How are members of The Religious Society of Friends more popularly known?

ANSWERS 1. Rome 2. A six-headed sea monster 3. Hello, Dolly 4. Irregular 5. David Bowie 6. New York City 7. The Princess Bride 8. Off the east coast of Mozambique, Africa 9. A female wolf 10. Quakers

STRANGE BUT TRUE  It was noted American wit and columnist Franklin P. Adams who made the following sage observation: “Elections are won by men and women chiefly because most people vote against somebody rather than for somebody.”

It’s certainly something to keep in mind during this strife-ridden election season.  Americans make more collect phone calls on Father’s Day than on any other day of the year.  It was a German company, Interstuhl Manufactur, that made the world’s most expensive office chair. With a price tag of $65,500, you shouldn’t be surprised that the chair is plated in gold and comes with a matching ottoman. lHave you ever wondered where we got the phrase “the dog days of summer”? According to tradition, the dog days start in July—and not just because it’s usually pretty hot then. At one time, that was when Sirius, also known as the dog star, rose at sunrise. The Romans associated Sirius­ —called the dog star because it is the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major, or “large dog”—with hot weather, and at the beginning of the dog days, they would sacrifice a dog in the hope of ameliorating the sultry weather.  If you were to take the entire world’s water supply and compress it into one single gallon, freshwater would make up just four ounces, and freshwater that is easily accessible would be just two drops.  Considering the fact that it’s home to much of the American film industry, it’s probably not surprising that the sprawling city of Los Angeles has the world’s third-largest gross metropolitan product.

Top 10s for the week ending February 12 BOX OFFICE

1. The Vow 2. Safe House 3. Journey 2: The Mysterious Island 4. Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace 3D 5. Chronicle 6. The Woman in Black 7. The Grey 8. Big Miracle 9. The Descendants 10. Underworld Awakening

NYT BESTSELLERS

NATHANIEL FREEDMAN/the Justice

HISTORIC HAUNTS: Justice photographer Nathaniel Freedman (GRAD) captured this scene of the former watch factory in Waltham on the banks of the Charles River as the sun set behind it.

Nonfiction 1. American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History — Chris Kyle with Scott McEwen and Jim DeFelice 2. Ameritopia: The Making of America — Mark R. Levin 3. Steve Jobs ­— Walter Isaacson 4. Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever — Bill O’Reilly and Martin Dugard 5. Quiet — Susan Cain

CROSSWORD ACROSS 1. Break suddenly 5. Cash dispenser 8. Actress Sorvino 12. Luxurious 13. Carnival city 14. Prayer ending 15. Not domestic 17. Bridge 18. Checked out 19. Old Portuguese money 21. Praise in verse 22. Carpet style 23. Sapporo sash 26. Lab goings-on (Abbr.)

28. Dada artist Max 31. Weaponry 33. Antiquated 35. Of planes and such 36. Phi Beta — 38. Meadow 40. Rotation duration 41. Steals from 43. Latin 101 word 45. Sesame Street’s Oscar, e.g.

47. Super-active person 51. Guns the engine 52. Begged 54. Sheltered 55. By way of 56. Locate 57. Physiques, slangily 58. Novelist Radcliffe 59. Crazes DOWN 1. Skewer 2. Iditarod terminus 3. Venomous vipers 4. Pic 5. Erte’s style 6. Dead heat 7. Fashions 8. Eyelash enhancer 9. Attacked verbally 10. Peruse 11. — Domini 16. Cincinnati team 20. That boat 23. Erstwhile acorn

Fiction 1. Home Front ­— Kristin Hannah 2. Private: #1 Subject — James Patterson and Maxine Paetro 3. Taken — Robert Crais 4. Defending Jacob — William Landay 5. Death Comes to Pemberley — P. D. James

iTUNES

24. Support system?

25. Made better 27. Under the weather 29. Spanish Mrs. 30. Gift from Santa 32. Husband and wife 34. Very inexpressive 37. 1970 Jackson 5 hit 39. — nitrate 42. Hindu destruction god 44. Switch type 45. Snatch 46. Move, in realtor-speak 48. Met melody 49. Repair 50. Probability 53. Hr. fraction

1. Fun. feat. Janelle Monáe — “We are Young” 2. Kelly Clarkson — “Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You)” 3. Whitney Houston — “I Will Always Love You” 4. Adele — “Set Fire to the Rain” 5. LMFAO — “Sexy and I Know It” 6. David Guetta feat. Nicki Minaj — “Turn Me On” 7. Madonna feat. Nicki Minaj, M.I.A. — “Give Me All Your Luvin’” 8. Gotye feat. Kimbra — “Somebody That I Used to Know” 9. Flo Rida — “Good Feeling” 10. Adele — “Someone Like You”

BILLBOARD

1. Adele — 21 2. Lana Del Rey — Born to Die 3. Leonard Cohen — Old Ideas 4. Various Artists — 2012 Grammy Nominees 5. Kidz Bop Kids — Kidz Bop 21

Top of the Charts information provided

by Fandango, the New York Times, BillBoard.com and Apple.com.

Solution to last week’s crossword

STAFF PLAYLIST

King Crossword Copyright 2012 King Features Synd, Inc.

“Chill Zone”

By SAM MINTZ

SUDOKU

Justice NEWS EDITOR

INSTRUCTIONS: Place a number in the empty boxes in such a way that each row across, each column down and each small 9-box square contains all of the numbers from one to nine.

Thought for the Day: “An intellectual is a man who takes more words than necessary to tell more than he knows.”

— Dwight D. Eisenhower

Solution to last week’s sudoku

Sudoku Copyright 2012 King Features Synd, Inc.

Most of the music that I’ve listened to recently falls under the “chill” category. These all do too, and they’re perfect for studying, sleeping or, obviously, chilling.

THE LIST 1. “Down by the Water” — The Decemberists 2. “Incomplete and Insecure” — The Avett Brothers 3. “No Rain” — Blind Melon 4. “Africa” — Toto 5. “The General” — Dispatch 6. “Fire and Rain” — James Taylor 7. “All For You” — Sister Hazel 8. “Rain Song” — Air Traffic Controller 9. “Run-Around” — Blues Traveler 10. “A Long December” — Counting Crows