The Justice, May 24, 2011 edition

ARTS Page 19

SPORTS Softball earns silver 16

ERROL MORRIS

FORUM President Lawrence reflects 10 The Independent Student Newspaper

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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 LXIII, Number 28

www.thejustice.org

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Waltham, Mass.

60TH COMMENCEMENT

Brooks stresses commitments ■ The NYT columnist gave

a humorous speech, and cellist Yo-Yo Ma performed at the commencement By sara dejene JUSTICE editor

New York Times op-ed columnist David Brooks spoke to the graduating Class of 2011 about making commitments and their correlation with happiness in an uncertain future in his keynote address during the University’s 60th commencement ceremony. According to BrandeisNOW, the ceremony, which was held May 22 in the Gosman Sports and Convocation Center, was attended by about 8,000 students, family members and faculty.

As one of this year’s six honorary degree recipients, Brooks received a degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa. Executive Assistant to the President and Assistant Secretary of the Corporation John Hose described Brooks as an “oasis” of both reason and humor at the ceremony.

Brooks began his speech humorously. “As I look out on this audience, the first thing I realize is that the Rapture must actually have hap-

pened yesterday,” said Brooks. “because, from the looks of it, America is now 50 percent Jewish.”

He later gave advice for the graduates' futures while reflecting on their pasts.

“Young Americans today live the most supervised childhoods in American history,” said Brooks. He referenced cartoon images of the “Tiger Moms, Über-moms and Helicopter Parents” who raise their children to be well-rounded and extremely accomplished.

“So, by the time these Über-mom kids will apply to college, they will have cured four formerly fatal diseases, started three companies, done environmental awareness training in Tibet and competed in the Olympic trials in some completely obscure sport like fencing or competitive yoga,” joked Brooks.

“Over the past 15 years of your life, you have been funneled through a set of rigorous and supervised institutions. The paths have been marked out; the grades you had to get and the tests you had to do well on,” said Brooks. “But, starting today, or in a few years when some of you leave graduate school, you will shoot out

See GRADUATION, 5 ☛

ACADEMICS

ASHER KRELL/the Justice

A SENSE OF HUMOR: NYT columnist David Brooks encouraged his audience while providing jokes and advice.

dining services

Scarry speaks to Workers to negotiate contract Phi Beta Kappa ■ The current contract

between Aramark and Dining Services workers was last negotiated 5 years ago.

■ The speaker drew protest

at the organization’s initiation ceremony speaking about nuclear weapons.

By Robyn spector JUSTICE editor

Harvard University English and American Literature Prof. Elaine Scarry spoke at Saturday’s Phi Beta Kappa initiation ceremony about how beauty can inspire in-

dividuals “to repair the injuries of the world” and argued—with an audience member’s interruption— that nuclear proliferation is a “destroyer of beauty.”

There were mixed reactions about Scarry’s speech from this year’s 71 seniors and nine juniors inducted into the national academic society and from their family members in attendance.

The 49th ceremony, which took place on the Spingold Theater

See SCARRY, 6 ☛

By andrew wingens JUSTICE editor

With their contract set to expire on the last day of June, Dining Services workers and UNITE HERE Local 26 will begin negotiating a new contract with Aramark on May 26, said Dana Simon, a staff member with UNITE HERE Local 26, in an interview with the Justice.

UNITE HERE Local 26 is the union that represents about 125 unionized Brandeis Dining Services workers.

The current contract between

garding which proposals they will put forth during the bargaining process with Aramark, according to Simon.

As of May 13, Simon said the proposals were finalized and that UNITE HERE representatives and volunteers from among the workers would meet with Aramark executives for the first time on May 26.

At that meeting, the union and the workers plan to present their proposals to Aramark management, said Simon.

The most important issues for the union members include livable wages, decent and affordable health insurance and regular and predictable employment, said Simon.

Simon said these issues are con-

See ARAMARK, 6 ☛

Aiding Africa with art

Baseball falls in upset

Jack Mandel dies

 Jessye Kass ’13 cofounded an NGO to help children in Ghana express themselves.

 The baseball team finished off a solid season in disappointing fashion, falling 8-5 to Anna Maria College.

 Philanthropist and benefactor Jack N. Mandel passed away at the age of 99.

FEATURES 8 For tips or info e-mail editor@thejustice.org

Aramark—the food service provider contracted by the University—and the workers was last negotiated 5 years ago, wrote Director of Dining Services Aaron Bennos in an e-mail to the Justice.

If a new contract is not negotiated by the last day of June, the current contract will expire. However, Simon said he plans to continue negotiating.

Senior Vice President for Administration Mark Collins declined to comment on the negotiations, saying that the University contracts with Aramark to provide dining services and is therefore not involved in the talks between Aramark and the workers.

Dining Services workers have been meeting for several months in an effort to come to a consensus re-

Let your voice be heard!

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

INDEX

SPORTS 16

ARTS SPORTS

17 16

EDITORIAL FEATURES

10 7

OPINION POLICE LOG

10 2

COMMENTARY

11

News 3 COPYRIGHT 2011 FREE AT BRANDEIS. Email managing@thejustice.org for home delivery.

2

TUESDAY, MAY 24, 2011

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THE JUSTICE

NEWS FACULTY LOG

POLICE LOG

Faculty approve degrees and discuss search committees

Medical Emergency

At the May 19 faculty meeting, University President Frederick Lawrence reported that the May 20 Board of Trustees meeting would include interactive breakout sessions to discuss strategic issues at the University.

The Board, he said, would also begin to interact more with faculty to assist in strategic planning.

University Registrar Mark Hewitt presented the list of degrees to be awarded at the University’s 60th commencement on May 22. According to Hewitt, the University awarded 776 undergraduate degrees and 53 percent of graduates received Latin honors.

Prof. Bernadette Brooten (NEJS) said that she could not vote to approve the list of degrees.

Brooten proposed an amendment that read, “This vote to award the degrees does not extend to a student whose name appears on this list of degree candidates but has been accused of serious violations of Rights and Responsibilities and whose disciplinary process has not yet been concluded. Should the process be resolved in favor of said student, the vote of this body would extend to the student.” The name of the student and the charges against that student were not stated due the information’s confidential nature. Hewitt explained that because the issue is a behavioral matter and not an academic one, it would not change the student’s graduation status.

Provost Marty Krauss spoke against the amendment and said that if passed, the amendment would be a punitive action against someone not yet found responsible.

She noted that the motion would be “premature” and would “prejudge the sanction.”

The motion proposed by Brooten failed when it went to a vote. The faculty then voted to approve the degrees as originally submitted by Hewitt.

Lawrence then reported that the search committee for a new Senior Vice President for Students and Enrollment is at an “advanced stage”—a list of finalists has been compiled and there should be an “expeditious completion” to the search process.

Prof. Peter Conrad (SOC) reported that the search committee for a new Dean of Arts and Sciences had interviewed six candidates and that the names of some of these candidates will be submitted to the president and the provost for the next stages of the search process.

Prof. Sacha Nelson (BIOL) said the search committee for the next provost is in its final stages. The committee received nearly 70 applicants and interviewed 13.

As of May 19, three of the finalists visited campus and met with faculty and student leaders, said Nelson. The final list has been presented to Lawrence.

Krauss then reported that the role of the University Advisory Council would be altered and the Council would serve as an academic strategic planning group.

Faculty can now be nominated to the council through the faculty senate nomination process, said Krauss. Additional members such as the vice president for Global Affairs, the chair of the University Budget Committee and the senior vice president for Institutional Advancement will also be added to the council, explained Krauss.

The faculty also unanimously approved the second reading of the Undergraduate Curriculum Committee proposal to establish an interdisciplinary minor in Sexuality and Queer studies.

May 11—BEMCo reported a female with a possible sprained thumb in the Shapiro Campus Center. BEMCo treated the party on-scene with a signed refusal for further care.

May 18—An 80-year-old female fainted and was unresponsive in Epstein. BEMCo treated the party on-scene with a signed refusal for further care.

May 19—A party reported an intoxicated male in Stoneman.

BEMCo treated the party onscene with a signed refusal for further care.

May 22—A party felt ill in the lobby of the Gosman Sports and Convocation Center. BEMCo treated the party on-scene, and she was transported to the Newton-Wellesley Hospital.

Larceny

May 14—A party reported the theft of a banjo, guitar and wal-

let from Scheffres Residence Hall.

May 19—A student reported items missing from his room in the Castle. University Police compiled a report.

Disturbance

May 20—A party complained of loud music in the Foster Mods. Occupants of the Mod did not answer the door for University Police, so additional units were dispatched. Before additional units arrived, the occupants opened the door and shut off the music.

Traffic

May 18—Workers from New England Carpet Master reported that a University vehicle struck their van at Gosman Circle and left the scene. There were no injuries and University Police called both parties to the scene. University Police composed a report.

Miscellaneous

May 14—A Community Development Coordinator confiscated a small amount of marijuana from the Charles River Apartments. University Police placed the drugs into evidence and the CDC filed a judicial referral.

May 16—A party reported two people having sex in an elevator and disturbing the occupants of Ziv Residence Quad.

An officer checked the area and found it all quiet and in order.

May 17—A staff member reported harassment by telephone from a woman in Anderson, S.C. An officer spoke with Anderson County Sheriff’s Department and the woman is known to have mental health issues.

May 18—A party reported that his window in Ziv was vandalized at 3 a.m. University Police arrived on-scene, and

Stalled Lawrence loft project to open in July LAWRENCE, Mass.—A troubled and long-stalled loft project, once touted as key to reviving this struggling northern Massachusetts city, is set to open as rental units, the developer of the project announced Tuesday.

Developer Bob Ansin said that the “Monarch on the Merrimack” project is opening as rentals instead of condominiums in July after receiving around $30 million in bank funding and tax credits. The $200-million project, which aimed to transform the historic Wood Worsted Mill into 200 loft-style condos, has been suspended since 2007 due to lawsuits, fights with the city’s fire department and the downturn in the real-estate market.

Ansin said the project is now 40 percent complete and will begin renting some 34 lofts. The other units will open as construction is completed, he said. The quarter-mile-long, solid brick edifice is the site where Lawrence workers launched the 1912 “Bread and Roses” strike.

As part of the plan to continue the project, Ansin’s MassInnovation joined a U.S. Department of Interior program that gives tax credits for revitalized historic buildings in exchange for allowing the projects to become rentals for at least 5 years.

Ed Chazen, who teaches real-estate finance at Babson College and is not affiliated with Ansin’s project, said the rental market is strong because many would-be buyers don’t have the credit to buy homes as mortgage companies have imposed stricter standards.

CORRECTIONS AND CLARIFICATIONS

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

Justice

the

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The Justice Brandeis University Mailstop 214 P.O. Box 549110 Waltham, MA 02454-9110 Phone: (781) 736-3750

—compiled by Andrew Wingens

AP BRIEF

—Andrew Wingens

n An article in News incorrectly stated the stipulations of the new pass/fail proposal. Students are not able to fulfill a foreign language requirement using a pass/fail course, but 10 and 20 level foreign language classes can be taken pass/fail. (May 3, pg. 6) n An article in News misstated a student’s title. Jake Crosby ’11 is a contributing editor at Age of Autism, not an intern. (May 3, pg. 4a) n An article in Sports misstated the statistics of a baseball player. Rephael Stern ’11 was not charged with the loss, he did not give up any runs and the team’s season is not over. (May 3, pg. 16) n An article in Arts misstated the graduation year of a student. Elana Friedland is in the Class of 2011, not the Class of 2013. (May 3, pg. 22) n An article in Arts should have included an editor’s note. The writer of “Boris’ Kitchen appeals to a variety of tastes” is a staff writer for Boris’ Kitchen.

(May 3, pg. 19) n An article in Arts misspelled a student’s surname.

He is Robert St. Laurence ’11, not Robert St. Lawrence ’11. (May 3, pg. 22) n A photo in Arts was attributed to the wrong photographer. The far-left photograph of Dom was taken

by Yosef Schaffel, not Asher Krell. (May 3, pg. 20)

the reporting party said that he was trying to avoid paying for the broken window.

May 21—A rock was thrown through the front window of a Mod. The glass was broken but the window frame was still holding. Facilities was notified and University Police composed a report.

May 21—A caller reported an unknown white male sleeping in her bed in the Foster Mods.

University Police investigated and found that he was an intoxicated non-student who was visiting his brother for Commencement.

May 22—A party reported the unlawful touching of an underage party by a student. University Police composed a report and forwarded the report to the Assistant District Attorney for further action.

NOTE TO READERS:

ROBYN SPECTOR/the Justice

Senator Schumer talks policy

Senator Charles Schumer, a Democrat of New York, spoke to a full Carl J. Shapiro Theater on May 6 about how the U.S. can remain economically “ascendant” in the present and heading into the future. To read more about the event, visit go.thejustice.org/schumer.

The Justice is on hiatus for summer recess. Our next issue will be published August 30, 2011.

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

BRIEF

University listed on honor roll for community service achievement and contribution Brandeis was listed on the 2010 President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll, according to a May 12 BrandeisNOW press release.

The University is one of over 600 colleges and universities recognized on the honor roll list for having a “exemplary, innovative, and effective community service program,” according to the website for Learn and Serve America, which encourages education through community service among U.S. students and which launched the honor roll in 2006.

According to the website, the honor roll list commemorates the commitments higher educational institutions have made to community services and raises awareness of their work among the public.

In an interview with the Justice, Director of the Department of Community Service Lucas Malo said that recognition on the honor roll was “phenomenal.”

“It was an honor,” said Malo. “It speaks

to our student body and the work that [they] are doing.”

Malo referenced programs that students started and participated in, such as Junior Brandeis Achievers, an after-school program in Waltham elementary schools; Language and Cultural Enrichment, a tutoring program for English Language Learning students in order to work with kids to develop their English; and WATCH Tenant Advocacy Clinic, which provides Waltham residents with free legal advice regarding housing rights. Information on these and other community service projects can be found on the Waltham Group website, said Malo.

Malo said that the application process to be on the honor roll was “eye-opening.”

“It really allowed us to look at all our social justice efforts and pull them together,” he said. According to Malo, Brandeis students put in about 40,000 hours of community service last year.

Malo said that the recognition “paints a very positive picture” of students and the University and also helps community service groups on campus reach out to potential donors in order to receive funding for current and future products.

In addition, Malo said that he was glad that both the University and the students were recognized for their community service effors. “No way could we have gotten this honor without our students,” said Malo. “Our students are basically staff members with the work that they’re doing.”

Malo said that this is the first time that the University has been recognized on the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll.

According to the BrandeisNOW press release, an award will be presented at the National Conference on Volunteering and Service in New Orleans in June.

—Sara Dejene

THE JUSTICE

OBITUARY

Polish immigrant who came to the United States when he was 9 years old.

By NASHRAH RAHMAN JUSTICE EDITOR

Jack N. Mandel, a major benefactor whose foundation with his younger brothers created the Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education and the Mandel Center for the Humanities, died May 12 at the age of 99, according to a May 16 BrandeisNOW press release.

Members of the Mandel family were not available for comment by press time. “[Mandel’s death is] a big loss, obviously, to the Mandel family and therefore to the entire Brandeis family,” University President Frederick Lawrence said in an interview with the Justice. Lawrence added that because he started his term as president in January, he did not have the chance to form a personal relationship with Mandel.

“Jack Mandel was a very gentle, very wise, very generous person.

[He] always had a smile on his face, always engaged everybody he met in conversation, always had something interesting to say,” University President Emeritus Jehuda Reinharz, who knew Mandel for 10 years, said in an interview with the Justice.

Mandel was born in Kolbusowa, Poland and moved to the United States when he was 9 years old, according to the press release. Along with his brothers Joseph and Morton, Mandel established the Mandel Foundation in 1953 to “help provide outstanding leadership for the nonprofit world,” according to the foundation’s website. Reinharz is the current president and CEO of the foundation.

The Mandel Center for the Humanities was created in 2010 with a $22.5 million grant from the foundation. At the Oct. 26 dedication ceremony, then-University President Reinharz said that it was the largest grant ever given by the foundation and that it is also

among the largest gifts given to support the humanities in the United States.

The Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education was created in 2002 with the support of the same Mandel foundation.

In addition to his commitment to the Foundation, Mandel served on the boards of the Montefiore care center, which provides support services for Cleveland’s aging Jewish and general community; the Cleveland Sight Center, which provides rehabilitation services for the blind and visually impaired; and the Cleveland Play House, a professional regional theater, according to the press release. The press release also states that he was a life trustee of The TempleTifereth Israel and the Jewish Federation of Cleveland.

Reflecting on Mandel’s roots as a Polish immigrant, Reinharz said that Mandel’s is a “story of great success and a wonderful example of paying forward, of giving back to society and feeling good about it.”

Reinharz also said that the Mandel brothers started the foundation “before they had a lot of money all the way back in 1953 and so it’s remarkable that [Jack] and his brothers have ingrained in them the notion of giving back to society that they’ve never stopped doing to this very day.”

Prof. Sharon Feiman-Nemser (NEJS), the director of the Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education, said in an interview with the Justice, “[Mandel] had a very warm and winning smile.

He, like his brothers, was very modest and gracious. I was very touched by the loving, warm relationship among the three brothers.” She said that she had the opportunity to meet Mandel twice.

Mandel is survived by his brothers; sister-in-law and Brandeis trustee Barbara A. Mandel; a son, Sheldon Mandel; and several nieces and nephews, according to the press release.

BRIEF

Changes to LTS end in-room phone service, phones returned Students were required to return their Cisco IP phones to Library and Technology Services at the end of the semester after it discontinued its room phone services, due to a “dramatic decline” in interest and usage of the room phones, according to the LTS website and May 4 e-mails from Community Development Coordinators to the Brandeis community.

The Board of Trustees originally passed a budget for fiscal 2011 during a March 23, 2010 meeting that included the initiative to stop distribution of room phones, according to an April 20, 2010 Justice article.

The LTS website stated that students have been using their cell phones more often to make calls. The discontinuation is also a part of the removal of wired network services in campus dorms with upgrades to the wireless service, according to the website.

According to Director of Network and Systems John Turner in an April 5 Justice article, these upgrades to the network, part of a $6 million capital project, are scheduled to strengthen

the signal of the existing network and are scheduled to be completed by the end of summer 2012.

Turner did not respond to further request for comment.

A smaller version of these type of wireless upgrades has already been implemented. According to the LTS website, during renovations to the Charles River Apartments in 2010, the wired network was removed and replaced with upgrades to the wireless network and there have been few complaints of service in that area.

According to the LTS website, during the fall 2010 semester, room phones were not distributed to incoming first-years but were available for students who specifically requested a room phone.

Additionally, the website stated that mounted wall phones will be installed in every residence hall, suites and apartment for safety and precautionary reasons and, as before, students can also contact Public Safety with their cell phones.

—Sara Dejene

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

3

SITTING WITH THE FIRST LADY

Philanthropist Mandel passes away at 99 ■ Jack N. Mandel was a

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TALI SMOOKLER/the Justice

TEA TIME: First Lady Kathy Lawrence sits with the now-graduated seniors while discussing their memories of Brandeis.

Seniors join first lady in creating tea-time tradition ■ The Thelma Sachar Tea, an

idea of seniors Julie Judson and Lexi Kriss, will become a semi-annual event next year.

By FIONA LOCKYER JUSTICE EDITOR

Last Wednesday, a new Brandeis tradition was created when approximately 50 seniors of the Class of 2011 gathered with first lady of the University Kathy Lawrence to discuss their time at Brandeis and their hopes for the future at the Thelma Sachar Tea. According to Lawrence, the tea party will become a semi-annual tradition effective with the Class of 2015, where incoming first-years will be offered a tea with the first lady at the beginning and end of their time at the University.

Students were seated in groups of six around tables laden with usual tea-time fare—assorted triangular tea sandwiches, four square cakes and fruit tea—when Lawrence addressed the crowd to introduce herself and the thought process behind the event, which was to begin a tradition and to provide a time for reflection.

After having walked from table to table talking to students before her initial address, Lawrence spoke to the

crowd lightheartedly, but also shared advice with students.

“We want as many of you to succeed as possible because now you’re alumni; you’re representing Brandeis,” she said to Helena Gvili ’11.

During her address to the gathered students, Lawrence said that the tea party event, the idea of graduating seniors Julie Judson and Lexi Kriss, was created in memory of first lady Thelma Sachar, the first first lady at Brandeis.

“This is one of the things she loved to do at the president’s house in Newton,” Lawrence explained.

“We’re honoring Thelma Sachar as the unsung hero [of Brandeis], and of course there is a little feminist twist to this idea,” explaining that through these events, the University’s first lady is able to also make a difference on campus.

Following her welcome address, several students addressed the crowd using the open microphone in the room and shared their thoughts on applying to and attending Brandeis and the significance of their time here.“It has been a welcoming community in every subcommunity and group and club and small niche of the Brandeis community which is so diverse and has so many things going on; … in everything that I’ve been involved with

on campus I’ve encountered an incredible warmth,” Noam Sienna ’11 said.

In an interview with the Justice, Lawrence explained that as the first lady, “students ... and anything pertaining to student life” are a “huge interest” to her. “We want more school spirit, we want to go to all of the games,” she said of her and University President Frederick Lawrence, also saying that she and President Lawrence plan to do more entertaining at the president’s house.

A member of the English department, Lawrence also said in an interview with the Justice that she plans on teaching a course on Henry James next spring, titled “When Genius is a Family Affair.”

“I had never met Kathy before, so I was really excited to come [to the event]” said Megan Straughan ’11 in an interview with the Justice. “Her speech had the perfect balance of emotion and nerdy jokes that was apropos to the Brandeis culture, I think she’s lovely, I’m excited for Brandeis.”

Marie Zazueta ’11 said, “It seems like an exciting tradition, I hope it continues.”

“I think she’s going to be a great first lady,” Zazueta continued. “She seems really involved, she seems to genuinely want to hear our perspectives.”

ALUMNI

White House nominates alumni

■ The alumni—graduates in

Anthropology, Psychology and Mathematics—follow Daniel Shapiro’s ’91 March appointment as the U.S. Ambassador to Israel.

By Andrew Wingens JUSTICE EDITOR

United States President Barack Obama nominated two Brandeis alumni to posts in his administration April 12, according to a White House press release. Lisa Kubiske ’75 was nominated to be ambassador to Honduras and Robert J. Zimmer ’68 was nominated to be a member of the National Science Board of the National Science Foundation.

A career member of the Senior Foreign Service, Kubiske graduated from Brandeis with a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology and Psychology. She is currently the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Brasilia and has previously served as the Director of the Office of Regional Economic Policy and Summit Coordination in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs.

Kubiske joined the Foreign Service in 1983 and has served in many different positions, including deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Santo Domingo; direc-

tor for the Office of Economic and Political Affairs at the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong; economics officer at the U.S. Consulate in Shanghai; and Science/Technology officer and consular officer at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico.

She has also been assigned to positions in the U.S., including special assistant to the Undersecretary of State for Economic, Business and Agricultural Affairs; financial economist in the Office of Monetary Affairs; economic/commercial officer in the Office of China and Mongolia Affairs; staff officer and operations watch officer in the Office of the Executive Secretariat.

After graduating from Brandeis, Kubiske earned an Master of Science in foreign service from Georgetown University.

Zimmer, who was nominated to the National Science Board of the National Science Foundation, wrote in an e-mail to the Justice, “I would be eager to contribute towards the ability of the NSF to continue and in fact enhance its crucial national role.”

Zimmer, who is the current president of the University of Chicago, graduated from Brandeis with a bachelor’s degree. in Mathematics and obtained his doctorate from Harvard University in 1975. He was the provost at Brown University from 2002 to 2006. Zimmer also serves on the executive committee of the

Council on Competitiveness and is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He served on the President’s Committee on the National Medal of Science until 2010.

He wrote in his e-mail that two Brandeis faculty members, Michael Spivak and Al Vasquez, had a big impact on his thinking regarding mathematics.

While at Brandeis, Zimmer “spent a great deal of time in the library working on mathematics … and a great deal of time discussing, analyzing, and arguing with [his] friends,” he wrote.

Zimmer added that his undergraduate work at Brandeis “was very stimulating and … was an excellent foundation for everything I have done since graduating.”

These two nominations of Brandeis alumni follow the nomination of Daniel Shapiro ’91 in March to be the U.S. ambassador to Israel.

Shapiro, a Near Eastern and Judaic Studies major, was nominated to the post of U.S. ambassador to Israel on March 9, according to a White House press release.

He is currently the National Security Council’s senior director for the Middle East and North Africa and is considered the Obama administration’s central liaison to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

4

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

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THE JUSTICE

COMMENCEMENT 2011

TALI SMOOKLER/the Justice

A celebratory occassion

ROBYN SPECTOR/the Justice

From clockwise starting above: University President Frederick Lawrence and Provost Marty Krauss presented an honorary degree to Judge Nancy Gertner; graduates celebrated and danced; Class of 2011 Senators Abraham Berin and Michael Newborn led their class into the gym; Ilana Spector ’11 wished luck to her classmates in her speech.

TALI SMOOKLER/the Justice

ASHER KRELL/the Justice

SAYING GOODBYE TO THE CLASS OF 2011 Excerpts from the Commencement speeches Student speaker Ilana Spector ’11 “The world is overwhelming, scary and at times, unkind. But we, here and now, are better than OK. We are leaving a fabulous fantasy bubble with diploma in hand, a ticket to our future which does not expire. Brandeis showed us that life is more of a game than anything else. We made it from freshman level to sophomore level to junior level to senior level, and just because we won this game (seniors let me hear you!) does not mean that it is game over. The world will be full of hurdles and obstacles to climb, duck under or jump over, but even though it may feel like you have lost all of your lives and your saves are all gone, every day is a new opportunity to restart and succeed.”

University President Frederick Lawrence “Having watched [NBA star Julius Irving] make one of his extraordinary moves, his coach supposedly called him aside and said ‘Son, never leave your feet without knowing where you’re coming down.’ To which the young Dr. J. is to have replied, ‘Sir, I can’t play basketball that way.’ And you can’t you live life that way either. You have learned that well at Brandeis.”

♦

“It is absolutely striking to me how many Brandeisians tell me that their closest friends continue to be their Brandeis classmates. There is much you take from your time here, but most of all what you take is each other. You are undergraduates for 4 year—you are alumni for the rest of your lives.”

Commencement speaker David Brooks “At Brandeis you’ve had two educations. The first education gave you a set of conscious skills, and that’s a very important education. But second, you educated your emotions. You absorbed ways of being from your professors and your peers. You absorbed ways of thinking and reacting. You absorbed standards for how a decent person lives.”

TALI SMOOKLER/the Justice

THE JUSTICE

●

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

5

COMMENCEMENT 2011

GRADUATION: Ma performs at ceremony CONTINUED FROM 1 into a world that is unprecedentedly wide open, with an unmarked variety of lifestyle options, a global variety of places to live, an incredibly diverse number of careers, most of which you have never even heard of.”

Brooks said to graduates that they are entering a “new, unmarked, uninstitutionalized phase of life” where they will most likely move from job to job and location to location, sampling different careers and lifestyles.

“While you do this, by the way, your parents will be going slowly insane,” joked Brooks.

Brooks contrasted recent graduates to those of 1960, who, Brooks said, did four things in rapid succession: received degrees, became employed, married and bought homes—all before their 30th birthdays. Brooks later referred to this period of time as “hunting for commitments,” which he said requires “extraordinary skill.”

“You can’t just commit to the first thing that comes along,” said Brooks.

“But you can’t wait and miss your opportunities. You have to struggle against the signals of your culture and commit to serious things that will give your life significance.”

Brooks brought up marriage as an example, deeming it as the most important commitment in one’s life. “I tell educators they should compel every student to major in marriage. Students should be compelled to take courses on the psychology of marriage, the literature of marriage, the neuroscience of marriage, the history of marriage.”

In addition, Brooks said that graduates should commit to solving a problem. Brooks referenced poor management, diseases like Alzheimer’s and high scholastic drop-out rates as challenges to solve.

Brooks told graduates that instead of answering posed questions and completing given assignments-—such as in the structured world-—they will have to find their own questions and assignments on which to work.

TALI SMOOKLER/the Justice

BEAUTIFUL MUSIC: Acclaimed cellist Yo-Yo Ma, who received the Doctor of Humane Letters, performed during commencement.

According to Brooks, a Brandeis education gave graduates both an academic education as well as an emotional one, about which he said, “Learning is the byproduct as you search for pleasure” among professors and classmates.

Brooks also spoke about happiness and its relation to material wealth and

making commitments.

“Once you hit the middle class, getting richer isn’t going to make you that much happier,” said Brooks. “The relationship between friendship and happiness is strong.”

Brooks challenged his audience to enter into “the commitment hunt” in the upcoming years, saying that hap-

piness is achieved by engaging in such commitments.

“Most of us are egotistical and most of us are self-concerned most of the time, but it’s nonetheless true that life comes to a point only when the self dissolves into some larger task and summons,” said Brooks. “The purpose in life is not to find yourself. It’s to lose

yourself.”

Before Brooks spoke, University President Frederick Lawrence, who conferred the honorary degrees, also addressed members of the graduating class on their futures, posing the question of whether it is “realistic to be optimistic.”

Lawrence gave two reasons for students to be optimistic: one being the “training” students received at Brandeis and the other being the connection students hold with each other and also with the University. Lawrence said that the training students receive at Brandeis extends beyond the academic scope into all parts of campus life, including the emotional and risk-taking aspects. On connections, Lawrence said that there is a paradox in feeling connected to other people or locations. “The paradox is this: Places do not belong to us, but we belong to places. You will always belong to this place, to its values and what it stands for,” Lawrence said.

The graduating Class of 2011 included 777 undergraduates, out of whom 644 graduated with Bachelor of Arts degrees and 133 graduated with Bachelor of Science degrees. Out of the undergraduates, 173 graduated cum laude, 176 graduated magna cum laude and 65 graduated summa cum laude. In addition, 782 graduate students received master’s degrees and 88 students received doctorates.

Charlie Kivolowitz ’11 said that he thought Brooks was “surprisingly funny. … I was very impressed,” he said.

Annie Jennings M.A. ’11 said of Brooks, “He was so funny but serious at the same time. He was really inspiring.”

Jane Becker ’11 said, “I thought [Brooks] was excellent. I confess that I hadn’t known who he was, but I really enjoyed his address. I think there can be a lot of wisdom in humor. I appreciated that he was really funny.”

—Fiona Lockyer, Andrew Wingens and Nashrah Rahman contributed reporting.

2011 Honorary degree RECIPIENTS

ASHER KRELL/the Justice

Thomas Buergenthal Thomas Buergenthal, a former judge serving on the International Court of Justice and the Lobingier Professor of Comparative Law and Jurisprudence at the George Washington University Law School, was presented the Doctor of Laws. A specialist in international law and human rights, Buergenthal has committed himself to the idea of “never again,” as a survivor of the concentration camps at Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen. He emigrated to the U.S. in 1951 and is the author of more than a dozen books on international law, human rights and comparative law subjects.

ROBYN SPECTOR/the Justice

Nancy Gertner Nancy Gertner, a federal judge for the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, was presented with the Doctor of Laws.

She has reinterpreted admissibility standards for expert testimony, ordered the federal government to pay a record $101.7 million for withholding evidence that could have exculpated four men wrongfully convicted of murder and reduced the fines of a Massachusetts college student defendant in an Recording Industry Association of America case from $675,000 to $67,500, citing arbitrarily high statutory damages as violating the due process section of the Constitution.

TALI SMOOKLER/the Justice

Yo-Yo Ma Yo-Yo Ma, considered to be one of the most famous cellists of the modern age and a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, was awarded a Doctor of Humane Letters.

He founded the Silk Road Project and is currently the artistic director of its ensemble, which brings together musicians from countries which were historically linked by the Silk Road.

In 2006, he was named United Nations Peace Ambassador, and in 2009 U.S. President Barack Obama appointed Ma to serve on the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities.

He has performed for a number of U.S. presidents and has appeared on various movie soundtracks.

ROBYN SPECTOR/the Justice

Errol Morris Errol Morris, an acclaimed documentary director as well as an online New York Times columnist, was awarded the Doctor of Humane Letters. His documentaries, created from 1978 to 2011, strive to portray the narratives of historical accounts in film. His first film, Gates of Heaven, has long been on Roger Ebert’s list of the 10 greatest films ever made. Morris’ films focus on stories of the struggle for justice; his most notable documentary, The Thin Blue Line, famously helped to prove the innocence of a man wrongly accused of murder.

He is also the recipient of an Academy Award for Best Documentary.

ROBYN SPECTOR/the Justice

Jehuda Reinharz Jehuda Reinharz Ph.D. ’72, University president emeritus, was awarded the honorary Doctor of Humane Letters. After serving as provost and senior vice president for academic affairs between 1991 and 1994 and as University president from 1994 to 2010, Reinharz transformed the University through an unprecedented campuswide expansion, having created 32 endowed faculty and staff positions, 29 new or renovated campus buildings and 17 new research centers and institutes.

He is now the president of the Mandel Foundation, a philanthropic organization that invests in leadership education programs.

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SCARRY: Phi Beta Kappa speaker draws disruption CONTINUED FROM 1 Center Mainstage also featured a change in leadership between Phi Beta Kappa officers and the presence of University President Frederick Lawrence, a member of the academic society himself, who spoke at the event.

In total, the speech lasted for 58 minutes; though according to outgoing chapter President Prof. Andreas Teuber (PHIL), the guideline the organization had given Scarry was 20 to 30 minutes.

Scarry, the Walter M. Cabot Professor of Aesthetics and the General Theory of Value at Harvard, discussed what she referred to as the innate destructive nature of nuclear weapons and explained how the U.S. practices “readiness” with their possession of such forces.

Scarry said that even though the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970 mandates that countries limit their possession of nuclear weapons, there has been tension between countries over the total obliteration of the weapons.

For example, over 78 countries have filed legal complaints in the International Court over the U.S.’s possession of nuclear weapons, Scarry said.

According to Scarry, the current United States stance on nuclear weapons is that owning, threatening to use and using nuclear weapons is not illegal.

When Scarry used literary examples to bolster her argument that nuclear weapons are an excessively violent measure, Joseph Burg, a relative of one of the inductees, interrupted the remarks, saying, “Beautiful books were burned in Germany before the atomic bomb.”

In a later e-mail interview to the Justice, Burg wrote, “I stopped her to say that beautiful books and people were burned in World War II before the atomic bomb was even invented. … Just because we concentrate on beauty does not keep our enemies from trying to kill us.”

In a departure from her prepared remarks, Scarry responded, “There’s no way that what happened in Germany can excuse our current arsenal.”

In a phone interview with the Justice, Scarry said, “I don’t look on [nuclear proliferation] as a politicized topic; I look on it as a deeply intellectual topic completely commensurate with the intellectual aspirations of people who have just been elected to Phi Beta Kappa.”

Scarry also said that she has never had somebody try to interrupt her in the middle of a lecture.

“I understand, of course, that it’s a challenging subject, and I understand why people would either rather not think about it or think that we’re safe by having such weapons or other countries are safe, … but I think that’s a deeply mistaken idea,” she said.

Phi Beta Kappa inductee Liza Behrendt ’11 said after the event, “I was really glad that her talk was not a generic ‘go forth and pursue knowledge’ [speech], but it was an opportunity for us to use the critical thinking skills we’ve developed in college to think about her argument and the various philosophical and political implications of it.”

Following the ceremony, Matthew Kriegsman ’11, another inductee, said in an interview with the Justice, “What I thought was

inappropriate and what I guess most of the people agreed with was that the context of her talking about a political issue … was inappropriate at a Phi Beta Kappa ceremony.”

Kriegsman continued that the speech was delivered with very little context and focused minimally on the graduates.

Though there were objections to the speech, Scarry said that students approached her after the event with “good feedback.”

Robin Debacker, mother of new inductee Emilie Schuler ’11 said at the reception following the event, “I love [her] point about beauty making you become less self-centered, and in the presence of beauty you feel marginalized … but very happy to be there.”

In a statement made to the Justice at the reception following the event, the respective outgoing and incoming Phi Beta Kappa Presidents Teuber and Prof. Kathryn Graddy (ECON) said, of the fact that audience members were upset by the speech, “We both think that it was very unfortunate and we did not know what she was going to say.” They both noted that they were speaking as individuals and not on behalf of the larger organization.

Later on, Teuber and Graddy released an official written statement to the Justice that confirmed that they did not know the content of Scarry’s speech in advance.

The statement added, “The Officers of the Brandeis Chapter sincerely wish that no matter what anyone in attendance may think or feel about the views expressed by any one of its speakers. … These views, thoughts and feelings do not take away, not one jot, from the astonishing accomplishment each and every one of the students elected to Phi Beta Kappa has achieved.”

The speakers are chosen “on the basis that they are likely to have something to say and be able to say it well,” according to the statement released by Teuber.

“The point of the ceremony is to celebrate and honor the new members. This is also the point of the address, to celebrate their accomplishment by engaging them at an intellectual level to which they are accustomed, to provoke thought, spark debate and encourage them to continue to apply their skills to every problem they encounter once they graduate,” he added in the statement.

In an individual statement, that did not reflect the chapter's views, Teuber wrote, “As outgoing President of the Brandeis Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa I am not happy and very sorry if anyone was offended

by Elaine Scarry’s remarks.”

The Brandeis Mu chapter is the youngest chapter in the national Phi Beta Kappa organization and began in 1962, according to a history given at the event from chapter Vice President Prof. F. Trenery Dolbear, Jr. (ECON).

This year, Teuber, who has served as president of the Brandeis chapter for about 10 years, will be leaving the position along with Dolbear, said Teuber. They will be succeeded by Graddy as chapter president and Prof. Angela Gutchess (PSYC) as vice president.

—Fiona Lockyer contributed reporting.

SAYING GOODBYE

YOSEF SCHAFFEL/the Justice

Faculty farewell University President Frederick Lawrence kissed Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs Marty Krauss on Thursday after she delivered remarks reflecting on her past 8 years as provost. Dean of Arts and Sciences Adam Jaffe, who is also stepping down from his post as dean, made similar remarks on his time in that role. To read more about their reflections, view the full story at go.thejustice.org/jaffekrauss.

ARAMARK: Negotiations are set to take place this week CONTINUED FROM 1 nected to the “movement for sustainability,” which includes food grown and produced in sustainable ways.

Sustainability also refers to jobs “on which you can sustain yourself and your family” and have reliable employment, said Simon.

“One of the problems many or most of the Aramark workers have right now that we want to solve in the bargaining process is they don’t necessarily know what their income is going to be week-to-week,” said Simon. “Many people are struggling to be able to get 40 hours of work [per week]. Part of that is the result of the overuse of temporary workers— workers that are brought in from the outside that are very specifically not paid a livable wage with decent benefits.”

Simon added, “The issue of sustainable jobs has become really heightened over the past few years as people have been struggling to get full-time work in many cases while at the same time they have seen dramatically increased use of temporary workers.”

Temporary workers are brought in “almost every single day,” and those involved in the bargaining process will thus try to reduce the number of temporary workers employed by Aramark, said Simon.

Workers have won greater wages and benefits over the years, but “those wages and benefits are not all they could be, and we want to address that in bargaining,” said Simon. Additionally, “wages have not kept pace with the cost of living, so it is time to renegotiate the wages,” he said.

“You have a group of Brandeis dining hall workers that are very committed to Brandeis and understand Brandeis. They are also very committed to the students. Some of those workers have worked here 20,

30 years and have very strong bonds with the institution and with the students,” Simon said.

Simon added that there is a “very strong feeling with the workers that everyone in the workplace deserves to be treated with respect. … One of the things that they are going to want to express in bargaining is they feel very strongly that workers day-in, day-out need to be treated with respect as human beings.”

Therefore, Simon said, “we want an affirmative and active commitment that everyone will treat each other with respect—managers and workers alike.”

When asked if the negotiations will affect students who work for dining services, Simon said, “hopefully it will make their lives better also,” both in terms of wages and “issues of workplace respect.”

Simon declined to go further into detail about the bargaining proposals, as they have not yet been presented to Aramark management.

Bennos, who is employed by Aramark, wrote in an e-mail to the Justice that “all decisions are important when it relates to our employees,” and that salaries have increased for employees every year and that is expected to continue.

Bennos also wrote that a commitment to sustainable employment is “already in place.” He did not respond to a further request for comment.

The Aramark website includes a section titled “Social Responsibility.” The site states, “As one of the world’s largest employers, our 255,000 worldwide employees are our most valuable and important asset. We provide competitive wages and benefits, embrace diversity, promote inclusion and encourage personal and professional development.”

Rachel Sier ’11, a member of the

Brandeis Labor Coalition, a student club that focuses on promoting economic justice, described the goal of the BLC in an e-mail to the Justice.

“In the upcoming negotiations the Brandeis Labor Coalition’s role is to rally the support of the Brandeis community so that the dining services workers win a contract with raises, rights, respect,” she wrote.

“It is important to acknowledge that the dining services workers are contracted directly with Aramark and not the University, so it is our goal to demonstrate to the Aramark administration our Brandeis values and the inclusive community we have here on campus,” she added.

The BLC recently circulated a petition titled “We support workers” that was designed to demonstrate “that Brandeis students, faculty,and staff are in favor of a contract that provides raises, rights and respect for all workers,” according to the petition.

The online version of the petition garnered about 250 signatures with an additional 150 signatures in print.

Bennos wrote that Aramark would consider student opinions in the process. “We appreciate and listen to students opinions as it [sic] relates to dining,” he wrote.

UNITE HERE Local 26 also represents other food services and hospitality industry workers in the greater Boston area.

For example, the union represents Harvard University dining services workers, who are involved in a similar bargaining process with the Harvard administration.

On May 13, Harvard dining hall workers and UNITE HERE members marched in Harvard Yard displaying signs and chanting, “We want justice!” and “Union power!” according to a Harvard Crimson article published that day.

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VERBATIM | LES BROWN Life takes on meaning when you become motivated, set goals and charge after them in an unstoppable manner.

ON THIS DAY…

FUN FACT

In 2000, Israeli troops withdrew from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.

The king of hearts is the only king without a mustache.

PHOTO COURTESY OF MICHELLE ZEITLER

SURVIVOR NETWORK: Samantha Eisenstein Watson ’01 (second from left), executive director and co-founder of the SAMFund, met three young adult cancer survivors and grant recipients at an event held in Chicago.

Suppor ting cancer sur vivors An alumna’s battle with cancer inspired her to start a nonprofit

By DAFNA FINE justice editor

In the middle of her senior year in 1999, as senioritis set in and her classmates soaked up the last of their college years, Samantha Eisenstein Watson ’01, who later received an master’s degree in business administration from the Heller School for Social Policy and Management and now works as an adjunct lecturer teaching “Sociology of Disability,” was diagnosed with Ewing’s sarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer. While her classmates prepared for graduation, 21-year-old Watson took time off from school to undergo extensive chemotherapy and surgery to remove the tumor in her leg.

Watson returned to Brandeis in January 2001 after months of therapy and treatment, but she was diagnosed that April with secondary Myelodysplastic syndrome, a precursor to leukemia caused by the treatment she underwent, which destroyed her bone marrow. That summer, just months after her graduation, Watson received a bone marrow transplant.

Through her personal experiences, Watson recognized the hardships young adult cancer survivors face and was inspired to help others in similar situations.

“I met a lot of people along the way, and it seemed like there was so much support while we were going through treatment, and [when] we were done people said, ‘OK, now go live your life.’ … And it’s just not that way on a practical level. Young adults don’t have savings, a job to go back to or a safety net. …

We’re starting from scratch with a lot of bills [to pay],” she said.

After attending a conference for young adult survivors at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2003, Watson and a friend were inspired to help others in the same position and planned to do a fundraiser for their peers. While they searched for an organization which they could donate to that would give direct financial support to young survivors getting back on their feet, they realized that there weren’t any at the time.

“So we started one,” Watson explained of establishing a new nonprofit organization that is successful and thriving today. “I didn’t realize how much it was going to explode.”

The ambitious pair solicited professional help to get things started, and 8 years later, Watson is running the SAMFund, short for Surviving and Moving Forward, as the executive director and co-founder of the organization. The SAMFund is a “nonprofit organization created to assist young adult survivors of cancer with a successful transition into their post-treatment life, by providing financial support through the distribution of grants and scholarships,” according to its mission

PHOTO COURTESY OF MICHELLE ZEITLER

SAMFUND ALUMNI: The Alumni Leadership Council relaxes with chef Joanne Chang during their meeting. statement.

Whether in high school or college, working or searching for a job, on or off their parents’ health insurance, the SAMFund helps survivors between the ages of 17 and 35 who are finished with active treatment and struggling to pay a variety of expenses.

“Because our numbers have increased so much over the past few years, we need to focus on those in dire stress,” Watson explained of choosing their applicants. “[Such as the applicants who are] only taking their medication half the time and [are] skipping follow-up appointments because they can’t afford the cost.”

“We used to give undergraduate tuition help, [but] we don’t anymore because other organizations do. College is expensive, which we can all relate to. A huge percentage [of people] will have to take out loans, but that’s not specific to cancer—it’s a boat we’re all in at some point. So [we help with things like] medical bills, prescription co-pays, rent and mortgage assistance,” Michelle Zeitler ’01, program director of the SAMFund who graduated from Brandeis with Watson, said.

With an average of 1,000 applicants per year, the SAMFund carefully chooses its recipients through a lengthy two-part process that first focuses on the applicant’s financial situation, followed by a committee of four to five people who review tax and doctor forms, in addition to essays explaining how a grant would help the survivor move forward with their goals.

Fundraising through the Internet, Facebook, networking, events and private donors, the SAMFund is able to provide financial support for approximately 70 lucky applicants

each year from their overwhelmingly large applicant pool. “Over the last few years, not only have we given more money, but we’re also seeing results from the grants we gave in 2005. The biggest thing for us is that we don’t have to explain the needs of [survivors] in our own words. We just tell the stories of our grants recipients,” Watson said of the fundraising.

This past year, the SAMFund received $20,000 after winning the Chase Community Giving Challenge, a competition that awards large cash prizes to the 100 charities that receive the most online votes. Since 2005, the SAMFund has given $600,000 to 300 cancer survivors, with the average grant amount being around $1,900.

“We try not to give out too many grants that are tiny. We’re really trying to have an impact, so we try to give out fewer grants that are more impactful,” Zeitler said. “Just a few months [of support] can help them float so they don’t get evicted from their apartment.”

Watson and Zeitler have been fortunate to meet more of their recipients over the past few years after starting an Alumni Leadership Council of past recipients who run events and give back to the organization. The organization also offers a network of survivors so that recipients can spend time together in a relaxed social environment.

“We love getting to meet them, it brings the whole thing to life. For the majority [of recipients], we e-mail regularly. We’re on the phone regularly, we know their story and they know what we do, and it seems like we know each other well, but getting to meet them in person brings it to a whole other level,” Watson said.

This month, Brandeis students, including

Watson’s students, cancer survivors, and friends and relatives of survivors are working to raise $1,000 during May to donate to the SAMFund. “It’s not a cohort you hear about every day. Lifetime movies are about mothers and children. These are also people that have stories and need to be helped,” Sara Miller ’11, one of the coordinators for the fundraiser and a former student of Watson, said.

“We all have different connections to cancer,” Miller said of the group running the fundraiser. “Some of us are survivors, some of us have had parents or close family members [that are survivors] and some of us had friends that are survivors of cancer. That’s what’s cool about it. We’re survivors raising money for other survivors [who are] our peers.”

The group raised $100 in one night alone when they put out a last-minute donation box at the Midnight Buffet. In total, since the fundraiser started in the beginning of May, $372 has been raised, and Miller is optimistic that the goal will be met by the end of the month even with students away from school.

“It’s a lot easier to check your e-mail and respond to something like that when you’re not focused on your final that’s in 2 hours. We’re hoping once students go home, they’ll be able to talk to their families about it so they can help out. … In the first 2 days, we invited 1,000 people to the Facebook event. If they each give a dollar, that’s our fundraiser,” she said.

While the SAMFund is unable to provide financial support for all of its applicants despite its large number of supporters, the organization recently began a free webinar series called Moving Forward With Your Financial Health to reach more survivors by helping them “increase their financial literacy [and give] them some tools to better their situation,” Zeitler said.

“We get a lot of the same stories and challenges faced by people in this demographic.

The majority of young adults coming out from treatments face large medical debts and they ask, ‘How do I even start?’… We designed this series to address all these questions. We have financial professionals who donate their time to provide [survivors] with resources and ideas to tackle these challenges themselves.

We’re trying to find cost-effective ways to help more people each year,” Watson said.

With a thriving community in northern California and Boston and growing in other cities as well, the SAMFund continues to explore ways to raise more money and reach as many young adult survivors as possible.

“We’re always trying to meet the needs of all our applicants. We can only meet the needs of a fraction of our applicants, and we’re always working to increase our fundraising to help more folks,” Zeitler said.

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Helping Africa

through the

arts

PHOTO COURTESY OF JESSYE KASS

INTERCULTURAL CLASS: Jessye Kass ’13 spent time teaching English to a nursery school class at the Vision Seed Academy, a school in Ghana where she worked during one of the two summers she spent in Africa.

Jessye Kass ’13 cofounded an NGO to help children in Ghana By tali smookler JUSTICE editor

Most of us remember two—maybe three— projects we did in third grade, few of which we would say impacted our lives in any significant way. However, this is not the case for Jessye Kass ’13. She remembers doing a project in the third grade on the country of Zimbabwe, and since then she has been “obsessed with the idea of going to Africa,” she says. Today, not only has she traveled to Africa on multiple occasions, but she has also helped found the Attukwei Art Foundation, a nongovernmental organization that helps children in Ghana express themselves through art.

Kass is a rising junior who is double majoring in Anthropology and African and Afro-American Studies with a minor in Social Justice and Social Policy. She is the founding president of the Anthropology Club, as well as the undergraduate department representative for the AAAS department.

She explains that her first opportunity to travel to Africa arrived with her Brandeis acceptance letter. Kass says that she “ended up picking Brandeis because of the midyear acceptance, which meant that I entered in January instead of August. So basically I had a semester to do whatever I wanted.” She began to look into programs in Africa that would allow her to teach English without a degree but her options were limited because she didn’t know French. Eventually, she decided to participate in a program in Ghana with an organization called Projects Abroad, which organizes international trips for students and others interested in volunteering abroad.

So in summer 2009, she packed her things and headed off to Ghana for the 6-month program where she taught English at an orphanage. “One of the crucial moments for me was teaching a toddler how to walk. The project of working with him for a few weeks and finally seeing him walk, … even though it was hard, made it harder to leave and made a difference in my life,” Kass remembers.

Her experience was so powerful that upon returning to the United States, she knew that she wanted to go back to Africa. “When I got to Brandeis, I started as a midyear and was obsessed with Africa; ... [I] talked about it all the time. When the summer [of 2010] came around, I decided that I wanted to go back,” Kass says.

During Kass’ second summer in Africa, she traveled both to Ghana and to Kenya. In Ghana, she worked at the same orphanage as she had the previous summer, raised money for tuberculosis vaccinations for the children and took the kids on field trips, allowing her to become more personally involved with her work.

During her time in Kenya later that summer, she was part of a program called International Volunteer Headquarters, where she was placed in a medical clinic to volunteer.

“I was working in the maternal and infant ward in the medical clinic and was faced with a patient who was 16 years old, pregnant and HIV -positive,” she says. “And she did not know that she was HIV-positive, and I had to be the one to

PHOTO COURTESY OF JESSYE KASS

EXPRESSION THROUGH ART: Serge Attukwei Clottey teaches drawing to a class of young students in Ghana. tell her. And going through that experience, telling her that she was HIV-positive and seeing her face and her reaction and how that destroyed her inside really made me want to do something.”

As an Anthropology major, she explains that she wanted to find a way to help that wouldn’t impose her own Western influence too much.

“So I came up with the idea of a support group. It was just simple and could be something that dissolved after I left or something that stayed after I left. It was up to them,” Kass says.

She started to organize a support group, put signs up, called patients who were HIV-positive and raised money through family and friends.

And in the first meeting at the St. Therese Medical Dispensary, where Kass worked during the day, 25 people, most of whom were in their 40s, attended, as well as some younger group members. Though she would prompt questions in English, the discussion took place in their native tongue, Kiswahili, a language that she had been learning.

“It was all for them,” she says. “I was just there to provide snacks and a place for them to talk. About halfway through, there was a lull in the conversation so I decided to add volleyball.

So we set up the volleyball net in the back of the clinic. And seeing these people who were so sad [when] everything in their life was a mess at that point, with a smile on their faces just playing around in platforms, in skirts and holding babies and playing volleyball, it was just really fun and a good day.”

“I really didn’t know what I was doing,” she admits when discussing facilitating the support group. “It was sort of figuring out what I was doing in the moment and taking a chance, and I

was able to get them to all be talking and laughing. I’d ask them questions and sort of [leave] it up to them to talk about whatever they wanted to talk about. And doing that was more effective than me just prompting questions.” The support group continues to meet even after her departure, and she continues to receive updates from Elizabeth, one of her HIV-positive patients. This experience, she says, got her “on the track of creating things and of creating sustainable change.”

Upon returning to Brandeis as a sophomore after her second trip, she wanted to continue organizing programs to create lasting change in Ghana after seeing the success of her support group.

Serge Attukwei Clottey, whom she met in Ghana at the orphanage where she worked, discussed his idea with her of creating an organization that would bring art to poverty-stricken children. Kass took an interest in his idea and has been working to help start the Attukwei Art Foundation these past two semesters.

Kass, who serves as vice president of the foundation, has been working on getting the initiative started by creating its website, getting it registered legally and opening a bank account for the project. While she has been working from Massachusetts, Clottey, who serves as founderpresident, has been working on the organization in Ghana.

“We want to provide cathartic means for children to express their story through [an] art medium: children who were victims of child labor, sex slavery or living in poverty-stricken areas, or living on the streets or in an underprivileged place. … The idea is just to give them an outlet for art,” Kass says. The organization goes into

schools and runs art programs that allow children to express themselves creatively.

Kass received $4,000 from the Sorenson fellowship, a Brandeis fellowship that funds summer internships, and will use the money this summer to fund her trip to Ghana to help strengthen the organization. “I will be working this summer to sort of get the NGO from where it is now, where it’s sort of like a baby ... just fluttering around, to actually be a strong NGO,” she says. Though she has been working from Brandeis until this point on this specific project, she says, “It’s definitely difficult [working from here], which is why it’s crucial that I am going this summer.”

For this coming summer, she says that they will be doing outreach, working with children at schools and working to fundraise with partner organizations.

“I’ll also be teaching memoir writing to children in a group home. I’ll be working with children on the street doing painting and sculpture and will be doing hands-on projects while making sure the NGO is strong enough to sustain itself,” she says.

Since the website went live just a month ago, Kass and Clottey have already accepted two interns—one who will be joining them in Ghana this summer and one next fall.

“It’s crazy, I’m not a volunteer anymore; I’m in charge of the volunteers. I’m picking them up from the airport, bringing them to the hostel. …

It’s just been such a cool process, learning how to be in charge of these things and find legal registrations and partner organizations,” she says.

“This NGO is not about creating change in the world, it is about providing a way for children to experience the cathartic nature of art. … Balancing my desire to create social change and study and practice real anthropology has been a battle, because anthropology does not include sustainable change, or any change. It is about observing and writing, not changing. They don’t want ethnocentric Western ideologies imposed on indigenous communities,” Kass explains.

“I do think that art ... [can be] cathartic and can be great for people. I think I can help make a difference in their lives and in their emotional selves, but I don’t think that this project at least is going to change Ghana or issues of poverty.

Our tagline is helping relieve poverty through the arts. We aren’t relieving poverty, we are relieving some of the hardships of poverty in the sense that we are giving them a way to have happiness when otherwise things are really difficult,” she says.

Though she does not know for sure what her future holds, she says that “I do see myself moving there after graduation, maybe not permanently, but for at least 5 or 10 years. Whether working on that or a different NGO or other project there, … I think that Ghana will always be my home country.”

For now, she is looking forward to this summer. “I am excited about the progress of this project, and this summer will really cement whether or not it’s going to be successful. But so far we have been incredibly successful, so I have high hopes for continuing for 10, 15 years,” she says.

THE JUSTICE

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TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

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WORLDVIEW: THE NETHERLANDS

A country of celebration By rebecca klein SPECIAL TO THE JUSTICE

It is currently 11:14 p.m. on a Monday night in Maastricht in the Netherlands. With my door slightly ajar, I see an Irish man wearing a lady’s dress and heels, and I can hear my Spanish-speaking neighbors walking down the hall after just having finished their dinner, making out words in their conversation like musica and fiesta as the smell of cheap beer floats in and out of my room. It is the night of a cross-dressing party at the Highlander, a local bar, and as per usual, all of my fellow exchange students in my dorm are finding reasons to celebrate despite a weekend spent traveling and an 8:30 a.m. class tomorrow.

Two themes have defined my time in the Netherlands thus far: intercultural understanding and celebration. The Netherlands are well known for tolerant policies and the people’s open-minded global outlook—it seems as though everyone knows at least three languages, making me feel grossly inadequate.

In fact, the university I attend here, Maastricht University, sells itself on being a “global” university, and I have never had more than a few Dutch students in any one of my classes.

My comparative government class allows me to debate the benefits and drawbacks of various governmental structures with German, Belgian and Australian students.

I have never encountered a Dutch citizen who resented me for my lack of fluency in his or her language, and throughout this small country most things come with translations for English, French and German speakers.

As far as celebration goes, the Dutch have broadened my understanding of what it means to party. In the weeks leading up to Carnival, the festival before the Christian season of Lent, there are parades with brass bands and costume-clad children every few days. A particularly Catholic city, Maastricht is a popular destination for the 3-day festival, during which all students have off from school.

The bars stay open for 24 hours during Carnival, and everyone from infants to grandparents dance in the streets from dusk till dawn. In fact, what strikes me about partying in Maastricht in particular is its lack of age discrimination.

In this student-filled town, it is the middle-aged and older people who monopolize the bar scene, as I see most bars swarming with parents at every hour of every day.

It often feels as though my dormitory, aptly named “the Guesthouse” as it is solely filled with exchange students, has taken on those characteristics unique to the region, acting as a microcosm of the Netherlands as a whole. I live side-by-side with four other Americans, five Spaniards, three Australians, two Italians, two Indians, one Mexican, one French person and one Colombian.

By sharing a communal kitchen, I have been enlightened regarding how to make a Spanish omelet, why authentic Mexican tacos really are supreme and why vegemite isn’t so bad. At dinnertime, with the Americans eating the earliest and Spaniards eating the latest, the smells

A DUTCH ATTRACTION: A church in the Netherlands is often visited by both tourists and natives alike.

STREET CELEBRATION: Parades frequently fill the streets of Maastricht during the weeks leading up to Carnival, the festival before the Christian season of Lent.

Rebecca Klein ’12 finds a festive culture with intercultural understanding while in Maastricht of authentic Italian pasta, Indian curry and simple American-style sandwiches share one small, common space.

In our corridor of 20, we have each needed to confront the preconceived notions our neighbors had of us based on our respective nationalities. “Just because I’m Spanish does not mean I’m lazy.” “Just because I’m American does not mean that I am messy.” I have also been reminded of what it feels like to be a minority, a feeling I so often forgot existed as a Jewish student at Brandeis. Here, I have been greeted with looks of shock when I mention my religion: “We don’t have those in Europe, although I did used to watch that American show

The O.C., and they were Jewish,” I heard one day. But on the whole, people don’t refer to or ask about the vast differences in each other’s lives caused by the oceans between us. We are all students, we share a dorm, we respect each other, and we are friends.

Drawing from the relaxed, jubilant atmosphere of Maastricht, the Guesthouse has become a place of constant celebrations. Here, even the little things can be reason for festivities. On days where it is particularly sunny or warm, the world stops as everyone gathers on the lawn outside our dorm. Music blasts. People dance. Why? Because it is a nice day. Why not?

There isn’t a night that goes by when I am

LEISURE TIME: People in Maastricht take time to relax and enjoy themselves throughout the day, taking walks through the streets of the city to visit local bars, shops and restaurants in between or after work.

not awakened by the sounds of students walking back in the middle of the night and into the morning. What strikes me the most is that they are constantly singing. How often in America do you hear students singing out loud for the pure and simple joy of it? And most of all, there is no excuse here not to be celebrating. So many times I have engaged in the same conversation with Spanish, Australian and Latin American students as I list excuses for why I cannot go out on any given night. They tell me, “You have an early class? You have homework? No. You are in Maastricht, you will have fun.”

Editor’s note: Rebecca Klein ’12 is a former Features editor for the Justice.

HATS OFF TO THE QUEEN: Klein shows off her Dutch spirit during the festivities throughout Queensday.

♦ Photos courtesy of Rebecca Klein

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TUESDAY, MAY 24, 2011

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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 Rebecca Blady, Asher Krell, Fiona Lockyer, and Robyn Spector, Associate Editors Sara Dejene, News Editor Andrew Wingens, Acting News Editor Dafna Fine, Features Editor Eitan Cooper, Forum Editor Jeffrey Boxer, Sports Editor Wei-Huan Chen, Arts Editor Ariel Kay, Acting Arts Editor Yosef Schaffel and Tali Smookler, Photography Editors Nan Pang, Acting Layout Editor Marielle Temkin, Copy Editor Cody Yudkoff, Advertising Editor

Scarry speech was inappropriate At Saturday’s Phi Beta Kappa induction ceremony, Harvard English Prof.

Elaine Scarry spoke on a controversial topic that disrespected the solemnity and celebration that should be part of such a ceremony.

We are disappointed in both Ms. Scarry and the event’s organizers for tainting what should have been an occasion to celebrate the high intellectual achievements of our students with a speech that reflected a one-sided political agenda. We encourage outgoing chapter President Prof. Andreas Teuber (PHIL) to extend the regrets he expressed in an interview with the Justice to the new inductees of Phi Beta Kappa and their families.

Because students’ families also attended the Phi Beta Kappa ceremony, the chapter president should take care to choose a speaker that will reflect the intellectual achievement of this select group in a manner that is both meaningful and accessible to their families, who are also guests of this university. At an event marking the accomplishments of some of the University’s most academically driven students, the speech should indeed have been engaging and thoughtprovoking. A political speech without contextual grounding was wrong for this event.

Ms. Scarry’s speech, which focused in part on nuclear proliferation and which was interrupted by an offended family member of one of the inductees, reflects poorly on Brandeis’ chapter of Phi Beta Kappa.

Additionally, the length of the talk (which, at more than twice the length of last year’s address, overstepped the typical 20- to 30-minute guideline set forth by Brandeis Phi Beta Kappa) only exacerbated the existing discomfort felt by those in attendance at the induction ceremony.

Even more importantly, though, Ms. Scarry’s speech detracted from what

Remarks were offensive should have been a proud moment for the students being inducted. Membership in Phi Beta Kappa is one of the biggest honors that an undergraduate can achieve, and the ceremony marking that achievement should have been enriching and enjoyable for students and their families.

This said, we appreciate Mr. Teuber’s stated recognition in a comment to the Justice “that a number of those in attendance at this year’s initiation Ceremony in Spingold were disturbed when Professor Scarry turned, half-way through her address, to the subject of nuclear proliferation and called for a reduction and eventual elimination of all nuclear weapons from the earth.”

However, this board believes that given the degree of unease and insult felt by students and their families, Mr. Teuber should extend an apology to the inductees and their families. This would help to alleviate the discomfort that slightly tainted graduation weekend.

Moving forward, we hope that the new president of the chapter, Prof. Kathryn Graddy (ECON) learns from this episode and selects speakers who are engaging without being offensive.

Despite all of this, we approve of Mr. Teuber’s decision not to interrupt Ms. Scarry’s speech even as students and family members left in protest; to do so would have reflected poorly on the University as an institution and would have been antithetical to our core values of free speech and open debate.

Brandeis’ strength lies in students who are passionate about learning, and the undergraduates in Phi Beta Kappa have likely participated in academic debates during their time here. Though politically slanted speeches are expected—and even welcome—in many times and places, this ceremony should have had a different focus.

Farewell, Justice seniors This editorial board congratulates the members of the Class of 2011 and wishes all of them the best in their future endeavors. In particular, we want to take this opportunity to extend our deepest gratitude to the seniors who have been a part of the Justice over these last 4 years and thank them for all of their hard work and dedication.

Brian Fromm’s commitment to this paper was evident throughout his entire college experience: as a member of the Copy staff, Copy editor, deputy editor and editor in chief, he worked tirelessly since his first year to improve the Justice. His leadership and ability to remain calm in difficult situations set an example to all of those around him, and his vast knowledge of the Justice’s history demonstrated his love for the paper as an institution.

Furthermore, his personal attention to editors and staff members as individuals made him not only an effective leader, but a good friend as well.

Jillian Wagner, who served as News editor and as an associate editor, showed consummate professionalism and poise when dealing with incredibly difficult stories during her tenure, in particular the Rose Art Museum’s closure. She taught editors and staff alike about journalistic

Dedication much appreciated

protocol and ethics, which greatly improved our work as a paper. Her kindness and genuine care for those around her made working with her a pleasure, and her presence in the office will be sorely missed next year.

Ian Cutler proved his dedication to the Justice during his time as Sports editor and associate editor. He took initiative in creating a relationship between the paper and the Boston Bruins.

His passion for Brandeis sports was apparent in his in-depth coverage of major developments that took place during his time here, such as the golf team’s disbandment and the Linsey Pool’s closure and planned renovation. His sense of humor and his personality made working with him enjoyable, and we wish him best of luck in the future.

The Justice also wishes to thank all of the graduating seniors who have served on the staff for their commitment to the paper and their work to improve it, in particular Senior Illustrator Eli Tukachinsky, Senior Sports Writer Melissa Siegel and former Advertising Editor Adam Richman. We wish them and the rest of the Class of 2011 much success.

NASHRAH RAHMAN/the Justice

Retain optimism as future approaches

By FREDERICK LAWRENCE SPECIAL TO THE JUSTICE

Presidents are not supposed to have favorite classes. But how can I not feel a special connection with the Class of 2011? You have spent your last semester as students here during the time that I spent my first semester as president.

My family and I will forever be grateful for the way in which you have welcomed us into your lives and your world here at Brandeis. But the special connection between us goes beyond that.

Lately, we all have been thinking about transitions—about standing in the present at a threshold, contemplating what we have achieved in the past and imagining what we hope to build in the future. Change can be disconcerting, but change is also exciting. Change is about opportunity, about potential, about growth and, above all, about beginnings. After all, the graduation ceremony is not called “conclusion” or even “transition”— it is called “commencement.”

For this year’s graduates, this is a time to contemplate what you have achieved so far in your lives and all that has brought you to this point. But it is also a time to begin to contemplate your lives ahead. One member of the Class of 2011 recently asked me if it was realistic to be optimistic at a time when the world seems to be in so much turmoil: economically, socially, politically and environmentally.

It is a fascinating question: Is it realistic to be optimistic? The world has changed dramatically over the past 4 years. There is also a heightened level of uncertainty and concern as we face an economy and a world that has been greatly shaken over the course of your time here at Brandeis. Without question, times such as these breed anxiety.

And yet, I believe that you have every reason to be optimistic as you face the future. Why? I would point to two sets of reasons.

First, your training here at Brandeis prepares you for the challenges of a world that we literally cannot imagine.

You have been trained to analyze carefully.

You have been trained to solve problems.

You have been trained to communicate effectively.

You have been trained to turn information into knowledge.

All of these skills will serve you well not only as you graduate, but also decades from now, when the workplace has changed in ways that are unimaginable to us today. It was roughly 2,500 years ago that the Greek philosopher Heraclitus said that “nothing endures but change.” This has never been truer than it is today. It is precisely the training that flows from the liberal arts education that you have received that will provide the skills to adapt and adjust to this ever-changing environment.

Mental agility and creativity will be in highest demand.

But when I think of the training you received at Brandeis, I define it as not only what took place in the classroom, but also in the laboratories and libraries, studios and stages, playing fields and courts, dining halls and dormitories. Here you learned two vitally important lessons: emotional intelligence (which is sometimes called EQ, as opposed to IQ) and risk taking.

Your training has taken place in a vast array of social settings at Brandeis, from one-on-one conversations to an astonishing range of student organizations. The willingness to engage in real relationships and build real communities is, in many ways, the hallmark of a Brandeis education. Brandeis fosters your abilities to understand your own motivations as well as those of others. This is the essence of emotional intelligence recognized by psychologists today as most closely predictive of success.

As for risk taking, is there any greater risk to take in this society than the sheer risk of being yourself, and of trying approaches to life without certainty of success or outcome? Our graduates have learned that well at Brandeis. I have every confidence that this graduating class will achieve amazing and unique things in this world as its members go off to law school, medical school, graduate school, new jobs, to start their own companies and in a full range of adventures that lie ahead.

My second reason for saying that it is realistic for you to be optimistic is that as you leave this place, you are most decidedly not alone. It is absolutely striking to me how many Brandeisians tell me that their closest friends continue to be their Brandeis classmates. There is much you take from your time here, but, most of all, what you take is each other. You are an undergraduate student for 4 years—you are alumni for the rest of your lives.

You will always belong to this place, to its values and what it stands for. I hope that in the months and years ahead, you will always feel that Brandeis is a place to which you can return, either in your mind or, even literally, here to campus—to find a beacon of clarity in an all-too-uncertain world.

Editor’s note: The writer is president of the University.

OP-BOX

Quote of the Week “It seemed like there was so much support while we were going through treatment, and [when] we were done people said, ‘OK, now go live your life.’”

—Samantha Eisenstein Watson ’01 on creating a nonprofit to support young adult cancer survivors (See features, page 7)

Brandeis Talks Back What was your favorite part of commencement?

Edwin Gonzalez ’13 “I wasn’t there. But I heard it was a pretty good event.”

Jason Henry Simon-Bierenbaum ’11 “David Brooks. He was honest, insightful, fun and got away with things I wish I could have on that stage.”

Amanda Feldman ’11 “I really liked David Brooks’ speech. I also liked when Fred and Jehuda hugged. It was cute.”

Rebekah LaFontant ’12 “Toss up between David Brooks’ speech and Yo-Yo Ma’s performance.”

—Compiled by Eitan Cooper Photos by Tali Smookler / the Justice

THE JUSTICE

READER COMMENTARY Review misunderstands band In response to your article “Bands rock Brandeis” (Arts, May 3): I’m sorry, but has this person ever listened to of Montreal before? They’ve been integrating performance art into their shows long before Lady Gaga even began her career.

The statement that their music lacks “the substance of a real story or narrative” is ludicrous. Their entire discography is a narrative; their last three albums detailed singer Kevin Barnes’ struggles with depression and anxiety disorders while going through a divorce and facing his own personal demons throughout his process of recovering.

I would hardly call songs like “The Past Is A Grotesque Animal,” an uncomfortably detailed 12-minute description of a nervous breakdown, “wacky” or “silly.”

Yes, the band did mostly play their more fun songs during this set, but if this reporter had decided to do some research before writing this, she would have realized that their music is born from something far deeper than the desire to wear strange costumes.

—Jacob Moore ’13

Expect increased voting participation In response to your article “State of the Union details plans” (News, May 3): I just wanted to point out that I was hoping for a 75-percent student turnout by next year’s final spring election.

Due to the placement in our rushed semester, we were not expecting that high of a turnout for yesterday’s election. But we find it realistic to possibly increase student voting to 75 percent by next spring; apologies if this was not clear.

—Herbie Rosen ’12 The writer is the Student Union president.

Applications to Brandeis increasing

In response to your article “More students accepted for the Class of 2015” (News, May 3): Hardly mentioned in your article is the encouraging fact that applications to Brandeis continue to climb, and, in fact, they have reached a record high of 9,000—higher than many other top liberal arts programs with similar-in-size enrollments.

If this trend continues, it will be because Brandeis’ reputation as a top or first choice for the brightest students continues to grow.

In that case, the admissions rate will ultimately decline.

Of course, continued vigilance and planning are necessary to ensure that the marginal increase in enrollment does not diminish quality of life.

Quality of life is central to the Brandeis experience, and I know the administration shares that belief and will not only accommodate the slightly larger student body but utilize it to increase the strength and diversity of the University.

—Stuart Young ’77

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TUESDAY, May 24, 2011

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Study candidates’ private lives By pHILIP gALLAGHER JUSTICE cONTRIBUTING WRITER

With both American and French presidential elections approaching in the coming years, the intense personal scrutiny that every candidate must endure is becoming more evident. As college students, we are young and intelligent adults who have very recently reached the legal voting age.

Many of us have never participated in a presidential election, making our decisions of how we vote all the more significant. Thus, an important question that many should consider is what qualities should be sought after in our candidates. Other than simply having good policy standpoints and a thorough knowledge of government, should they also be judged on conduct in their personal lives? I believe the answer is no—to an extent.

Some individuals might argue that the quality of decisions that individuals make in private can foreshadow the quality of their public decisions, but I disagree. Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Bill Clinton were two U.S. presidents who both had private indiscretions but who, in my opinion, made excellent presidents. In contrast, I believe that Jimmy Carter, who seemed to have an ideal private life, did not make an excellent president.

We should consider candidates’ private lives as irrelevant to their politics until their personal behavior begins to spill over to their public actions. For instance, if they violate a law or begin to preach values contrary to what they practice privately, candidates’ personal lives are fair game in a political election. It may seem that these two conditions are rather specific, and they are, because they refer to two politicians: Newt Gingrich, a candidate for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, and Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the head of the International Monetary Fund and a Socialist politician in France who was previously expected to run for president against incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy. Both of these politicians have committed transgressions in their private lives that have managed to spill over into their public lives, bringing their ability to run a government into question.

Last week, Strauss-Kahn allegedly attempted to sexually assault a maid in a New York City hotel. According to CNN, he was arrested on a plane bound for Paris at the John F. Kennedy International Airport and has been charged with a list of crimes, the most significant being a first-degree criminal sexual act.

If Strauss-Kahn is found guilty, French voters should take his crime into consideration if he decides to run for any political office.

However, in 2008, he was found to have had an extramarital affair with a young female staffer in his office, according to CNN. The difference between these acts is clear: Assault is illegal and punished with jail time, while

INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND/Flickr Creative Commons

CORRUPTION: Last week, Dominique Strauss-Kahn was indicted for allegedly assaulting a maid in a hotel. adultery, though illegal in some regions, is seldom prosecuted and generally a private transgression. Committing a crime that is severe enough to be punished with jail time shows an alarming disregard for the standards that other citizens must follow and could hint at a future lack of regard for the law while governing. Strauss-Kahn’s affair from 2008, however, is not a reason to keep him out of public office.

Although one might argue that he is showing poor moral character, the affair is a part of his private life that should not affect his ability to govern.

Gingrich has also had a tumultuous personal life characterized by infidelity during two of his three marriages. According to an article from MSNBC, Gingrich approached his first wife with divorce papers while she was recovering in the hospital from cancer surgery.

According to an article from The Washington Post, Gingrich asked for a divorce from his second wife over the phone on his mother-inlaw’s 84th birthday. Both of these events show poor moral character on Gingrich’s part. In spite of that, Gingrich’s political competency

cannot be judged solely on his personal indiscretions, as they alone do not appear to have any impact on how he would govern as president. Gingrich has, however, frequently campaigned on wholesome family values, as described in articles from MSNBC and ABC, which runs contrary to his personal conduct.

This contradiction should definitely be taken into account during his presidential campaign, as Gingrich’s personal values do not appear parallel to his public values. His hypocrisy reflects an individual who does not believe in practicing what he preaches; an important action for a politician who wants to be taken seriously. If Gingrich had not preached those family values, his affairs would be completely irrelevant to his presidential campaign.

When considering the criteria of what makes a competent president, it is important to consider how a candidate’s personal behavior will be taken into account. By doing so, we determine what we believe to be the most important aspects of a presidential candidate for ourselves.

Closing pay gap requires slashing cost of college Leah

Smith In a Word

Harvard University, Princeton University and Yale University, in addition to being Ivy League schools and counting themselves among the top 10 universities in the nation, are also some of the most expensive schools in the country. None of them has a tuition that is under $36,000 a year.

In fact, when you look at U.S. News & World Report’s list of the top 50 schools in the country (a list which Brandeis is included), almost none of them have a tuition that is less than $30,000 a year, and many have tuitions upwards of $40,000 a year. This means that the cost of attending a top-50 university in the United States will fall somewhere between $120,000 and $160,000 for 4 years, and that cost is just tuition alone.

Just to impress upon you the staggering cost of college in the U.S. a little more: Oxford University in the United Kingdom (the 12th- best university in the world) only costs between

Write to us

The Justice welcomes letters to the editor responding to published material. Please submit letters through our Web site at www.thejustice.org. Anonymous submissions cannot be accepted.

Letters should not exceed 300 words, and may be edited for space, style, grammar, spelling, libel and clarity, and must relate to material published in the Justice. Letters from off-campus sources should include location. The Justice does not print letters to the editor and oped submissions that have been submitted to other publications.

Op-ed submissions of general interest to the University community­—that do not respond explicitly to articles printed in the Justice—are also welcome and should be limited to 800 words. All submissions are due Friday at 12 p.m.

$5,830 and $14,991 per year, depending on household income.

Suddenly, John Hrabe’s April 22 op-ed on the Huffington Post arguing that community college is a good choice makes a lot more sense.

Yet even with community college as a relatively more affordable option for some, all forms of higher education—including community college—are still acutely expensive.

Higher education in the U.S. is a catch-22.

You can’t find a “good” (read: well-paying) job without at least a bachelor’s degree, and most jobs these days require a master’s degree or a doctorate as well. Yet most people who go to a “good” college (read: a well-known brand name) will find themselves in insurmountable debt after they graduate. And even if they can find a good job right away, which in this economy many cannot, it will still take years before that debt is settled.

Community colleges and other public schools do provide a viable alternative to brand-name schools like Yale and Harvard. However, when it comes to finding a job, the name value and networking resources available to those who go to prestigious, well-known schools can often give them a greater advantage. Furthermore, those who do go to community college often need to transfer to a 4-year institution and end up paying an exorbitant sum anyway, as most community colleges only offer 2-year degrees.

Fine Print

The opinions stated in the editorial(s) under the masthead on the opposing page represent the opinion of a majority of the voting members of the editorial board; all other articles, columns, comics and advertisements do not necessarily. For the Brandeis Talks Back feature on the opposite page, staff interview four randomly selected students each week and print only those four answers.

The Justice is the independent student newspaper of Brandeis University. Operated, written, produced and published entirely by students, the Justice includes news, features, arts, opinion and sports articles of interest to approximately 3,200 undergraduates, 800 graduate students, 500 faculty and 1,000 administrative staff.

In addition, the Justice is mailed weekly to paid subscribers and distributed throughout Waltham, Mass. The Justice is published every Tuesday of the academic year with the exception of examination and vacation periods.

Advertising deadlines: All insertion orders and advertising copy must be received by the Justice no later than 5 p.m. on the Thursday preceding the date of publication.

All advertising copy is subject to approval of the editor in chief and the managing and advertising editors. A publication schedule and rate card is available upon request.

Subscription rate: $35 per semester, $55 per year.

Additionally, if one considers the actual cost, even community college may not be a viable option for a low-income family that lives hand-to-mouth. The average cost of community college is $2,076 per year. That’s significantly less than any public or private institution, but it’s still a large sum for a family that lives from paycheck to paycheck and may not have any savings or assets to fall back on.

Essentially, the higher education system in the United States represents one of the most pervasive structural inequalities in our society. As I said before, it is almost always necessary to have a bachelor’s degree or master’s degree to get a job that pays well enough to render its employees “middle class.” But those degrees are only readily available to those who can pay, have good enough credit to take out loans or are lucky enough to get a sizable scholarship. Higher education is not at all accessible to the lowest classes of America.

In some cases, the cost of just applying to college—SAT preparation and registration fees, application fees, transportation for tours and interviews—is too high in its own right, let alone the cost of tuition and fees.

And what happens to those who are lucky enough to make it to college? Once there, those whose parents cannot support their cost of living must work to get by, possibly taking away from their academics, extracurricular activi-

The Staff

For information on joining the Justice, write to editor@ thejustice.org.

ties and social lives. Without funding, they would not be able to afford an elusive unpaid summer internship, another factor considered “necessary” for obtaining a “good” job after graduation. These days, just a college degree alone is not enough. Without extracurricular activities or an internship, one would likely not stand out in a competitive pool of job applicants and be left no better off than before going to college.

If a low-income family wants to “lift” itself up, the parents need to send their children to college. If they cannot afford college, they must take out loans to be able to do so. When the children graduate, they will be mired in debt with no job and no assets. If they do not go to college, they will still have no job and no assets.

How have we allowed this status quo to become acceptable? We wonder what we can do to help the poor, but running food drives and making monetary donations are only treating the symptoms—not the virus. If we want to close the income gap in the U.S., the first and most important step we can take is to make college affordable for anyone who wants to go.

And that doesn’t just mean tuition and fees: That means all of the costs associated with applying to and attending college. If we can lower the cost of college, we can make significant steps toward equality in this country.

Editorial Assistants Forum: Shafaq Hasan Arts: Emily Salloway Staff Senior Writers: Josh Asen, Max Goldstein Senior Layout Staff: Debra Friedmann Senior Illustrator: Rishika Assomull News: Shani Abramowitz, Tyler Belanga, Daniel Heinrich Features: Dave Benger, Rocky Reichman, Deborah Salmon Forum: Aaron Fried, Hannah Goldberg, Diego Medrano, Liz Posner, Sara Shahanaghi, Leah Smith, Avi Snyder, Elizabeth Stoker, Naomi Volk Sports: Julian Cardillo, Jonathan Epstein, Sam Liang, Jacob Lurie, Adam Rabinowitz, Natalie Shushan, Jonathan Steinberg Arts: Aaron Berke, Eric Chow, Alex DeSilva, Leah Igdalsky, Elly Kalfus,

Olivia Leiter, Morgan Manley, Amy Melser, Leanne Ortbals, Alex Pagan, Bryan Prywes, Mara Sassoon, Sujin Shin Photography: Amy Bisaillon, Jenny Cheng, Lydia Emmanouilidou, Morgan Fine, Nathaniel Freedman, Rachel Gordon, Hilary Heyison, Davida Judelson, Joshua Linton, Alex Margolis, Maya Shemtov, Josh Spiro, Diana Wang, David Yun, Janey Zitomer Copy: Aliza Braverman, Rebecca Brooks, Allyson Cartter, Hilary Cheney, Erica Cooperberg, Philip Gallagher, Patricia Greene, Celine Hacobian, Rachel Herman, Liana Johnson, Lauren Katz, Eunice Ko, Felicia Kuperwaser, Rachel Miller, Tarini Nalwa, Mailinh Phan-Nguyen, Maya Riser-Kositsky, Mara Sassoon, Holly Spicer, Dan Willey, Amanda Winn Layout: Rachel Burkhoff, Nadav Havivi, Denny Poliferno, Lenny Schnier, Michelle Yi Illustrations: Stacy Handler, Arielle Shorr, Ari Tretin, Sara Weininger Ads: Nicholas Violette

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TUESDAY, May 24, 2011

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Graduates, act with genuine character Hannah

Goldberg Everything Illuminated Last week, our 2011 commencement speaker, New York Times op-ed columnist David Brooks, published an article in The New York Times titled, “Nice Guys Finish First.” In his article, Brooks encouraged readers to “establish a reputation of niceness” in the face of competition.

The following week, a headline appeared in The New York Times bearing a warning stating “Many College Graduates Find a Tough Job Market.” This headline only serves to make Brooks’ point more important for graduating seniors moving forward and for underclassmen facing the competition inherent to their undergraduate careers.

When I was a first-year beginning at Brandeis, perhaps the most surprising realization was that I was no longer a big fish. Suddenly, I did not stand out from my peers because I was bright and motivated; everyone around me was equally, if not more, accomplished and wellrounded than I was.

While I was thrilled to be surrounded by interesting and passionate peers, no longer being the go-to girl for responsibilities and awards was a bit of a letdown. Now halfway through my undergraduate career, I have acclimated to the competitive environment of Brandeis and have even begun to thrive off of the constant pressure to improve.

However, I can only imagine that once I graduate, it will require me to adjust to a whole new form of competition in a world where I will not always get the job or acceptance that I want, or even that which I deserve.

As graduating seniors begin to search for jobs, many will likely be discouraged as they join the growing population of graduates who are wonderfully qualified for employment but are passed over for jobs due to the tough market.

However, it is important to remember that the way they can continue to shine is by being genuine— a virtue that has hopefully been instilled by their undergraduate experience at Brandeis. Upon re-

NAN PANG/the Justice

jection, it may at first seem obvious that a person must “step up his game” in order to compete with those who appear to be succeeding.

However, this is not—or at least I hope it is not—the way to achieve a goal. Sincerity and contribution must play some role in success.

Luckily, recent work has revealed a glimmer of hope for those who would like to get ahead sans ruthless competition. In his book that will be published next year, Jonathan Haidt, a psychology professor at the University of Virginia,

argues that natural selection does not always mandate that the strongest individual survives.

Rather, natural selection may suggest that the most cohesive and internally altruistic group has the greatest opportunity to pass on its genes. So to all of those who pause to bare their teeth when faced with the fierce postcollege competition, remember that it will be your morality and not your bite that will propel you to your destination.

This mindset will also benefit current undergraduates as they make

the most of the remainder of their time at Brandeis. Brooks’ message resonates particularly strongly now, after the stress of finals finally begins to subside.

Think of the times when, cramming in the library the night before an exam that will make or break your A-/A for a class, you reluctantly agreed to review topics you thought you had completely covered with friends who were less confident on the material. Usually in these situations, a tricky question is posed by a friend, which prompts

another tricky question, thereby revealing the holes in your knowledge that will inevitably appear on the next morning’s exam.

When competing against those equally or more qualified, keep in mind that your ability to be genuine and relate to other people—a quality hopefully instilled in you during your time spent at Brandeis spent studying for exams, volunteering or serving in a leadership position— will often be the key to allowing you to stand out from the rest of the pool of competent competitors.

CollegeACB at odds with University values Shafaq

Hasan Into the Fire

From the moment I came across College Anonymous Confession Board, I made it a personal goal to never revisit the site.

From one malicious post questioning an individual’s sexual orientation to another asking all readers to comment on the ugliest, prettiest and most sexually promiscuous girls on campus, I am truly disappointed and saddened that members of our student body are feeding into this abominable site that is fundamentally at odds with the values and beliefs of our university.

Taking private conversations into a public space, CollegeACB is a controversial online forum that allows individuals to anonymously post and discuss anything relevant to the students and the school.

Brandeis, along with some of the most prestigious colleges in the country, has an active section on the website.

While the previous owner Peter Frank claims this site is a confession board where students can

openly “share feelings and discuss sensitive topics in a sincere fashion,” it is at most a trashy gossip website that has compiled hearsay and hate speech under one domain.

Frank, who just sold the website to an undisclosed buyer earlier this year, is a rising senior at Wesleyan University who took over the site from its original founders, college graduates Andy Mann and Aaron Larner.

The website was conceived in 2008 in time to fill the void of JuicyCampus, another gossip website, which was created by a Duke University graduate and shut down in 2009 due to financial problems.

In a 2009 interview with Time, college students described the content on CollegeACB as ranging from legitimately helpful posts asking for missed lecture notes to others salaciously discussing which freshman girl is most likely to give fellatio.

While the creators of the site intended for real conversations about universities to take place that otherwise would not find a forum, the website has degenerated into an arena for students to slander other students without fear of retribution.

Though the website boasts on its front page that it’s trying to move in a more positive direction with “productive content,” the posts found on the Brandeis section of CollegeACB indicate the contrary. With their

posts uninhibited by site moderators or morals and ethics, students relentlessly malign others for entertainment value. The social justice motif championed by this university is lost somewhere between a post ranking the “best ass” on campus and another rating the first-year class girls.

“

Under the veil of anonymity, these individuals engage in ... cyberbullying.

This is not what I expected of my university—one that strives for academic excellence above trivial and idle gossip. Under the veil of anonymity, these individuals engage in what is essentially cyberbullying.

Without consideration of the emotional distress inflicted on the persons who they are disparaging, the posters engage in a virtual public stoning.

This disgusting display of the most primal and immature behavior undermines everything this university stands for: justice, inclusion and tolerance.

Perhaps in an ideal world the

space would be used constructively.

However, without a filter system or any accountability for destructive words, the positive, productive community Frank envisioned is woefully in ruins.

Even more disturbing, this information is available for anyone to view, regardless of which school they attend.

Professors, parents and even future employers can log on to the Brandeis section and see what individuals write about each other. I do not want my school to be represented by the words of the minority that posts on this site.

While anyone can request to remove a post, a deletion is not immediately guaranteed. It takes a few days to process the request and delete the post. We should really be working towards a more permanent solution.

This past April, nine sororities from Duke University collectively petitioned to have their school removed from CollegeACB, telling the school newspaper, “It has affected our chapters on a collective level.

It fuels a social hierarchy that leads to competitiveness between our sororities.” Cornell University, Drew University and Tulane University are taking similar steps to eradicate their schools’ affiliations with the website.

School administrators are seeing the serious impact the site is having

on students, creating an environment of hostility and hate—the antithesis of a college community. The ridicule sophomore Sage BurkeCabados endured on the site was so terrible he ended up transferring from Oakland University in Michigan to Central Michigan University.

Similarly, a freshman at Drew University was understandably upset to be called one the “fattest people on campus.” She went as far as to employ the aid of the state attorney general to remove the post on the website.

For the purposes of writing this article, I had to revisit the website, understanding that I would—ironically—inadvertently garner the site a few more visits from curious readers.

I urge those familiar with the site and as outraged as I am to follow Duke’s example to eliminate any interaction with the site.

Having scoured Brandeis’ section in depth, read the cruel posts singling out individuals by name and questioned how the values of this school could possibly be represented on this forum, I have personally lost respect for our student body.

As long as this site exists and is available to be viewed by anyone with access to the Internet, the integrity of our university and the reputation of our students will continue to be threatened.

THE JUSTICE

●

TUESDAY, MAY 24, 2011

13

SOFTBALL: Team ties for second

PLAY AT SECOND

CONTINUED FROM 16

runs in the first inning and eight runs in the second inning in the team’s 11-1 five-inning loss to Keene State. Nolan pitched 1 1/3 innings, giving up seven runs, four of which were earned. She also walked four batters and struck out two.

Right-hander Caroline Miller ’12 came in for Nolan and gave up four runs in 2 2/3 innings of work. Although three of the four runs were earned, Miller also walked more batters than she struck out, with two walks and one strikeout.

In the first game against UNE, Ducinski pitched a complete game five-hitter to lead the Judges.

She struck out and walked one Nor’easter in the win.

The Judges scored three runs in the second inning and two runs in the sixth inning to record the victory. Specker drove in two runners for the Judges, and eight of the Judges’ 10 players in the lineup recorded at least one hit.

In the first game of the ECACs, the Judges scored five of their nine runs in the first inning. Nolan and first baseman Courtney Kelley ’11 combined for six of the team’s

RBIs. Ducinski, Miller and Nolan combined to allow two hits over the course of five innings, while striking out five batters.

With the season now over, the Judges will graduate seniors Lavallee, Kelley, outfielder Carly Schmand and second baseman Melissa Cagar, all of whom were captains for the Judges this season.

“It’ll be tough [to replace them],” Johnson said. “They’re my first recruiting class, so I’ve known them since they were seniors in high school, if not before that. They’ve brought a lot to the table in terms of leadership, commitment, dedication, you name it. It’s all been positive.”

For next season, Johnson has her eyes set on the team qualifying for the postseason and improving their play from this year.

“We set the bar every year that we’re going to make one postseason or the other and come out with a winning record,” she said. “I do think overall that we can play better ball than we played this year. I feel that we underachieved for the most part. So we need to regroup and get everyone back on track.”

YOSEF SCHAFFEL/the Justice

APPLYING THE TAG: Shortstop Sean O’Hare ’12 attempts to tag a runner out during the team’s 8-5 loss to Anna Maria College.

BASEBALL: Squad falls in a first-round upset CONTINUED FROM 16 After loading the bases on a walk, an error and a hit batter, Nicholson struck out the next batter before ceding the game-changing hit.

Sophomore third baseman Justin Hyland blasted a two-run double into the gap to give Anna Maria a 7-4 lead. Nicholson would give up another run on a wild pitch to keep the game at 8-4.

Outfielder Sean O’Hare ’12 added an RBI single in the bottom of the frame, but the Judges would get no closer.

“We just didn’t finish the way we wanted to,” Schwartz said of the team’s play down the stretch.

“We had a rough stretch at the end where I think we could’ve played better and that carried over to the ECAC game. We made some costly mistakes and didn’t capitalize when we had the chances.”

Following the loss, the team will lose this year’s crop of seniors, which includes Rosenberg, pitcher Rephael Stern, Nicholson (though he does have one more season of eligibility after missing last year

with Tommy John surgery), McGrath and shortstop/outfielder Tony Deshler. Though the team will certainly suffer from losing key members, Schwartz said the team’s future looks bright after a solid season.

“I think we can build off of this great season and have an even better one next year with a lot of talented incoming freshmen,” he said.

“Even though this season just ended, I’m already excited for the next one and eager to see what we’re capable of.”

TRACK: Selig, Capano to compete at NCAA Championship meet CONTINUED FROM 16

with a time of 17:53.77.

With the exceptions of Selig and Capano, ECACs was the team’s final meet of the season. Both the men’s and women’s squads will graduate several key members, including Paul Norton ’11, a 2009 All-American in cross country, and Selig, who holds the Brandeis record in both the 1,500-meter run and the mile.

Despite losing key members, Brown said that he was optimistic that the team will improve next year.

“We have lots of room for improvement,” he said. “I improved

a lot this season, and hopefully the sophomores can make a big jump next year as well. We have a big [incoming] freshman class next year, and hopefully a few of them will step up. As long as we keep working, we should get back to nationals.”

At Nationals, Selig will compete in both the 1,500-meter run, in which she is seeded eighth, and the 5,000 meter-run, in which she is seeded 15th. Capano will compete in the triple jump and heads into the competition seeded 19th out of 24 competitors.

SENIORS KICK THEIR WAY THROUGH SENIOR WEEK

BRIEF

Lit Cannons, We Back win IM softball championships The Intramural Softball season came to a close last Thursday with two thrilling championship games.

In the men’s division, the fifthseeded Lit Cannons took on the No. 3 seed and defending champions, Hu’s On First, in a high-scoring affair.

The game started on Wednesday night but had to be postponed after two innings due to heavy rain.

Both teams battled through the inclement weather to a 7-7 tie heading into the third inning on Thursday. When play resumed, it was a back-and-forth game with Hu’s On First emerging victorious by a 29-22 score. Ben Wiener ’11 and Matt Wiener ’13 each hit a pair of home runs for the champs. Captain Sean Petterson ’11 reached base in all five plate appearances, scoring each time. Lit Cannons got home runs from graduate students Nick Van Kley, Kevin Donnoly, Josh McGrath and Kyle Wiggins, but it was not enough to keep Hu’s On First from repeating as IM champs.

The women’s championship game was one of the most exciting in recent history, ending in dramatic fashion. Tiffany Pacheco ’11 made a game-ending leaping catch against the wall in the left-field

corner to leave the bases loaded as the second-seeded We Back held on for a 16-15 victory over three-time defending champion BWB. BWB came to bat in the bottom of the seventh trailing by six runs. They were down to their last out, still trailing by four runs, when they mounted a late rally. A walk and three-straight hits brought them within a run and loaded the bases for Amber Strodthoff ’11. Strodthoff hit a rocket down the left field line that Pacheco snared with a tremendous catch at the wall just inside fair territory. We Back got first-inning home runs from Mimi Theodore ’12 and Abby Blasco ’11. BWB’s Courtney Ness ’13 answered with a grand slam in the bottom of the inning. We Back’s Paige Blasco ’11 and BWB’s Janelle Rodriguez ’14 also hit two home runs each on the day.

In other softball news, Taylor Bracken ’11 defeated Ethan Davis ’11 by a score of 15-2 in the Men’s Home Run Derby finals. The women’s bracket was a sibling affair, as Abby Blasco bested sister Paige Blasco by a score of 2-0 in the finals.

—Courtesy of IM Sports staff

ROBYN SPECTOR/the Justice

Bronx Zoo Murdered a Panda wins kickball Anne Chiorazzi ’11 (left) throws the ball to a teammate during a Senior Week kickball game last week. Bronx Zoo Murdered a Panda defeated Booze on First in last Thursday’s final. Beta Than You grabbed third in the competition.

THE JUSTICE

ATHLETE OF THE WEEK Lucia Capano ’11

10

wins for softball pitcher Casey Ducinski ’13, a team high. It was Ducinski’s first year pitching for the Judges.

NATHANIEL FREEDMAN/Justice File Photo

her time on the team, and she will miss competing next year.

“I’m going to need to start training on my own rather than with the team— it’s going to be a big adjustment.”

When asked if that meant that she

was going to keep jumping, Capano laughed.

“My knees would kill me,” she said.

“I’ll probably just do some yoga.” ­—Jeffrey Boxer

UAA STANDINGS Baseball

Softball

UAA Conference Overall

W L W L T Pct. Emory 5 1 26 17 0 .605 Case 4 2 33 14 0 .702 WashU 3 3 29 17 0 .630 JUDGES 2 4 24 19 0 .558 Rochester 1 5 14 20 0 .412 Chicago 0 0 18 12 1 .597

UAA Conference

W L Emory 8 0 WashU 6 2 Rochester 3 5 JUDGES 3 5 Chicago 0 0 Case 0 8

Not including Monday’s games

Not including Monday’s games Overall W L T Pct. 41 4 1 .902 32 12 1 .722 26 15 0 .634 20 18 1 .526 23 11 0 .676 19 25 0 .432

TEAM LEADERS

24 2 17 84

wins for the baseball team this season, a 13win improvement on last season, when the team went 11-24.

nd year in a row that Grayce Selig ’11 will compete in the 1,500-meter run at the Outdoor Track and Field Division III Championships.

runs scored by softball first baseman Courtney Kelley ’11 during the team’s wins this season. She scored just twice during the team’s losses.

total bases for shortstop/outfielder Tony Deshler ’11 this season, which led the baseball team.

15

Cleveland Cavaliers win the NBA draft lottery, will pick first

ECAC Championships last week and will compete in the triple jump at the NCAA Division III Championships this weekend.

Judging numbers

TUESDAY, MAY 24, 2011

AP BRIEFS

■ The senior finished sixth at the

Lucia Capano ’11 has competed in numerous events during her time on the track and field team, rotating between sprints, hurdles and jumping. While Capano has experienced success in all of these events, she has soared highest in the triple jump, in which she will compete this weekend at the NCAA Division III Championships in Delaware, Ohio.

Capano finished sixth in the triple jump last weekend at the Eastern College Athletic Conference Championships, jumping a distance of 11.37 meters.

“It was a pretty good jump—a good average to have,” Capano said of her jump at ECACs. “It was a good jump, but it wasn’t as good as my jump that qualified me for nationals,” she added, referring to her distance of 11.64 meters at the Brown University Springtime Classic on May 1.

Capano, who found out that she qualified for NCAAs less than 24 hours after graduating, said that she was ecstatic to end her career at nationals.

“I’m really excited,” she said. “It’s an amazing way to end your career, and I’m really excited for the opportunity.”

Capano will head into the meet as the 19th seed out of 24 competitors, but she said that she hasn’t set very difficult goals for herself in the competition. “[My goal is] to not come in last,” she laughed, adding, “It should be really interesting and I’m really just excited to be there.”

Capano said that she has enjoyed

●

Baseball (batting average)

Softball (batting average)

Kenny Destremps ’12 led the team with a .373 batting average.

Marianne Specker ’12 led the team with a .368 batting average.

Player AVG Kenny Destremps .373 Nick Cortese .368 Pat Nicholson .346 Tony Deshler .339 Eric Rosenberg .333 Chris Ferro .321 Sean O’Hare .290

Player AVG Marianne Specker .368 Brittany Grimm .343 Melissa Nolan .338 Courtney Kelley .304 Maxie Hirschler .287 Danielle Lavallee .272 Samantha Gajewski .268

Baseball (earned run average)

Softball (runs batted in)

Pat Nicholson ’11 led the team with a 3.44 ERA this season.

Courtney Kelley ’11 led the team with 26 RBIs this season.

Player ERA Pat Nicholson 3.44 Mike Swerdloff 3.64 John McGrath 3.99 Dylan Britton 5.92 Alex Tynan 6.04 Colin Markel 6.69

Player RBIs Courtney Kelley 26 Brittany Grimm 21 Marianne Specker 21 Samantha Gajewski 18 Melissa Nolan 15 Carly Schmand 13

UPCOMING GAMES TO WATCH Track and Field Division III Championships Grayce Selig ’11 and Lucia Capano ’11 will compete in NCAAs this weekend Distance runner Grayce Selig ’11 and jumper Lucia Capano ’11 will represent the track and field team this weekend at the NCAA Division III Championships in Delaware, Ohio this weekend.

Selig will compete in the 1,500-meter run and the 5,000-meter run. Capano

will compete in the triple jump.

Selig competed at NCAAs last year as well, finishing fourth in the 1,500-meter run. It will be Capano’s first time at Nationals. Brandeis’ only other competitor at NCAAs last year was Suzanne Bernier ’10, who placed 11th in the high jump.

CLEVELAND (AP)–For nearly a year, Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert has tried in vain to move on from LeBron James and his infamous departure.

At last, Gilbert believes he can.

“Last night sort of put an end to any last lingering thoughts,” Gilbert said Wednesday.

Winning the NBA’s draft lottery was all it took. Now, Gilbert, his franchise and heartbroken Cleveland fans can finally focus forward.

James doesn’t matter quite as much anymore.

On Tuesday night, the Cavs won the No. 1 overall pick in next month’s draft, when they will almost certainly use the pick on Duke star point guard Kyrie Irving, a well-rounded player who can accelerate Cleveland’s post-LeBron reconstruction.

With a little extra luck, the Cavs, coming off a disastrous 63-loss season, also landed the No. 4 pick, a lucky daily double that left Gilbert feeling overwhelmed.

“Last night was a very special night for everybody,” Gilbert said. “It’s been a rough year. It’s been grueling and tiresome and painful. But having this lottery come out the way it did, with two big blocks to rebuild—when you combine that with players coming back and our coaching staff being around another year, the trade exception and whatever other tricks [General Manager] Chris Grant may have up his sleeve,” he said.

“It should be good times ahead for the Cavaliers,” Gilbert added.

The lottery could not have gone better for the Cavs or Gilbert. He was not nearly as visible this season in the aftermath of James’ ballyhooed departure. Gilbert drew criticism outside Cleveland for harsh comments he made about James, who led the Cavaliers to some of their greatest successes but didn’t deliver on a promise to end Cleveland’s title drought.

James, whose relationship with Gilbert and Cavaliers fans has soured since he left, said he was happy for the Cavs.

“I think it’s great for their team, great for the franchise and great for the fans,” he said following the Game 2 morning shootaround in Chicago. “That’s all I can really say about them. I got more to worry about right now than the lottery.”

“But you know, I think it’s a good step for them,” James added.

With Irving and perhaps a frontline player, the Cavs should be able to cut significant time off their plan to return to the postseason. Cleveland also has two second-round selections and a $14.5-million trade exception to aid the turnaround.

Gilbert met Irving and his father at the lottery and came away impressed.

New York Rangers forward Derek Boogaard dies from drug overdose MINNEAPOLIS (AP)—A medical examiner in Minnesota ruled that the death of New York Rangers forward Derek Boogaard was an accident due to mixing alcohol and oxycodone.

The Hennepin County Medical Examiner released Boogaard’s cause of death on Friday. The medical examiner said no other data will be released.

The 28-year-old Boogaard was found dead in his Minneapolis apartment last Friday, 5 months after he sustained a season-ending concussion with the New York Rangers.

The 6-foot-7, 265-pound enforcer became a fan favorite in his years with the Minnesota Wild. He played in 255 games with the Wild from 2005-10.

Oxycodone is a powerful painkiller that can be addictive and has been blamed in some overdose deaths.

Boogaard’s agent and a spokeswoman for the Boston University School of Medicine jointly said earlier this week that Boogaard’s brain will be examined for signs of a degenerative disease often found in athletes who sustain repeated hits to the head.

Boogaard was known as “The Boogeyman” and was one of the league’s most feared fighters. He agreed to a $6.5-million, 4-year deal with the Rangers in July and appeared in 22 games last season, finishing with a goal, an assist and 45 penalty minutes.

His final game was Dec. 9, 2010 at Ottawa when he fought Senators defenseman Matt Carkner and sustained a concussion and shoulder injury. That was the 70th fight of his NHL career.

He was out for the last 52 games of the regular season because of his injuries and did not play in the playoffs. He did not skate again until about 3 months after the concussion.

He was sent home to Minnesota late in the season to work on conditioning.

Born in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan in Canada, Boogaard was drafted by Minnesota in 2001 in the seventh round as the 202nd choice. He drew notice in 2007 when he and his brother Aaron ran a hockey-fighting class in Saskatchewan. Some voiced concern about such an endeavor.

Boogaard insisted he wasn’t teaching kids how to hurt each other, but rather how to protect themselves so they don’t get hurt on the ice.

This is the second death of a player in the Rangers organization in the past 3 years. Alexei Cherepanov, drafted in 2007 but never signed by New York, died at 19 in Chekhov, Russia in 2008 after collapsing on the bench during a game.

Roman Lyashenko, who briefly played with the Rangers several years ago, was found dead in a hotel in Turkey in 2003. His death was believed to be a suicide.

Earlier this year, Boston University revealed that former enforcer Bob Probert suffered from the degenerative brain disease chronic traumatic encephalopathy. Probert died of a heart attack last July at age 45. Reggie Fleming, a 1960s enforcer who played before helmets became mandatory, also had CTE. Minnesota fans held a memorial service for Boogaard last Sunday at the Xcel Energy Center. Family, friends and former teammates attended and remembered Boogaard as a rough-and-tumble guy on the rink, but a gentle giant when he wasn’t on the ice.

“He exuded this aura about him that made people want to be around him,” Wild general manager Chuck Fletcher said Sunday. “He just brought smiles to everyone’s faces all the time.”

just

Sports

Page 16

INTRAMURAL WRAP-UP Intramural softball and Senior Week kickball crowned new champions over the past 2 weeks, p. 13.

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Waltham, Mass.

TRACK AND FIELD

SWINGING FOR SILVER

Selig and Asante pace team at ECAC meeting ■ The men’s and women’s

track and field teams had several top finishes at the ECAC Championships last week in Bethelhem, Pa.

By JEFFREY BOXER JUSTICE EDITOR

run single to tie the game.

After an inning of scoreless action, Anna Maria regained control of the game in the fifth inning with back-to-back RBI singles, giving the AMCATS a 5-3 lead. Brandeis responded to cut the deficit in half in the bottom of the inning on another RBI by Rosenberg.

The game settled down until Anna Maria’s bats came alive in the eighth inning. After getting the Judges out of a jam in the top of the seventh inning, Pat Nicholson ’11 gave up three runs in the frame.

The men’s and women’s track and field teams both grabbed 20th place out of more than 50 schools at the Eastern College Athletic Conference Championships last week, despite fielding a combined six competitors. The men’s team was paced by a sixth-place finish from Vincent Asante ’14 in the 100-meter dash, while the women were paced by Grayce Selig’s ’11 silver medal in the 1,500-meter run.

Selig will be joined by Lucia Capano ’11 in representing the Judges at the NCAA Division III Championships in Delaware, Ohio this weekend.

On the men’s side, Asante’s finish in the 100 was the team’s best result of the day. The rookie finished eighth in preliminaries with a time of 11.38 seconds. His time barely qualified him for the final run, for which only the top eight finishers in preliminaries qualified.

In finals, Asante shaved more than 0.20 seconds off of his time, grabbing sixth with a time of 11.17 seconds. “[Asante] ran really well,” Chris Brown ’12 said of the rookie.

“He’s a freshman, so he’s got a lot of room for improvement, but he looked great out there,” Brown added.

Brown was the other competitor for the men’s team, finishing 28th in the 1,500-meter run with a time of 4 minutes, 2.48 seconds.

Selig paced the women’s team as she has for much of her career at Brandeis. Selig, who set the school record in the 1,500 with a time of 4:28.72 last year when she placed fourth at the 2010 NCAA Division III Championships, ran her best time this season at ECACs, finishing in 4:30.62.

“She looked pretty good and pretty strong out there,” Brown said of Selig’s race.

“It was a little rainy, so it wasn’t perfect weather, but it was an exciting race and it lowered her time for Nationals,” Capano added.

Capano had the next-best finish for the Judges, grabbing sixth in the triple jump with a distance of 11.37 meters.

“It was a pretty good jump—a good average to have,” Capano said of the jump.

Kim Farrington ’13 also competed in the triple jump, finishing 14th with a distance of 10.72 meters.

Brandeis’ final competitor was Kate Warwick ’12, who finished seventh in the 5,000-meter run

See BASEBALL, 13 ☛

See TRACK, 13 ☛

YOSEF SCHAFFEL/the Justice

TAKING A SWING AT IT: Softball third baseman Danielle Lavallee ’11 swings at a pitch during the team’s 9-1 win over Elms College in the ECAC Quarterfinals on May 11.

Softball earns second-place tie ■ The softball team went 2-1-

1 during ECAC play, earning a tie for second place with the University of New England.

By JOSH ASEN JUSTICE SENIOR WRITER

While soccer matches often end in ties, softball games rarely do. However, due to inclement weather, the softball team tied the University of New England 7-7 in the runner-up contest of the Eastern College Athletic Conference New England Division III Tournament on May 15.

“It was a fun game,” coach Jessica Johnson said. “It wasn’t the prettiest game, but it was a fun game

considering the conditions and everything. It was nice to see the battle back and forth and everything.

It was probably only fitting that it ended up in a tie.”

The Judges, who finished the season 20-18-1, lost to Keene State College 11-1 the day after defeating UNE 5-1 earlier the same day. They also defeated Elms College 9-1 in the quarterfinals on May 11.

In the tie against UNE, the Judges were up 6-4 going into the top of the seventh inning. However, the Nor’easters scored three runs with two outs off of left-hander Casey Ducinski ’13, who pitched a complete game for the Judges.

Despite the Judges giving up seven runs, only three of the runs allowed by Ducinski were earned.

The Judges committed four errors in the game.

Junior catcher Ashley Gott hit a two-run single and scored after shortstop Brittany Grimm ’12 overthrew the ball hit by sophomore first baseman Megan Gauger.

Despite being down one run, the Judges battled back in the bottom of the inning. Catcher Melissa Nolan ’14 singled to start the rally, and outfielder Lauren Porcaro ’12 pinch ran for Nolan and advanced to second base after a wild pitch. After right fielder Samantha Gajewski ’12 sacrificed Porcaro to third base and a walk by left fielder Maxie Hirschler ’12, third baseman Danielle Lavallee ’11 hit a sacrifice fly to right field that scored Porcaro.

On the play, Hirschler advanced

to third base on an overthrow. Although second baseman Leah McWiliams ’14 also walked and stole second base, designated player Marianne Specker ’12 flied out to center field to end the inning and the game.

Overall, Johnson thought the playing conditions played a huge role over the course of the game.

“It was unfortunate that the pitchers had to pitch in those conditions,” she said. “We were out cleaning their cleats every so often.

There was no footing whatsoever for the fielders or the batters or anybody. Kids were sliding to and past bases by 10 to 15 feet.”

Before earning the tie against UNE, the Judges surrendered two

See SOFTBALL, 13 ☛

BASEBALL

Judges fall in first round at ECACs

■ The baseball team was

upset during the first round of the ECAC Tournament last Wednesday, falling 8-5.

By ADAM RABINOWITZ JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

The second-seeded baseball team suffered a tough 8-5 upset loss in the first round of the Eastern College Athletic Conference Tournament to seventh-seeded Anna Maria College last Wednesday afternoon.

Despite an early exit from the postseason, Brandeis finished its season at a solid 24-19, a marked improvement from the previous season.

“I think we had a great season,” shortstop Dominic Schwartz ’14 said. “It was a real improvement from the last couple years, and we got noticeably better as the year went on.”

John McGrath ’11, recently named to the All-University Athletic Association baseball team as a first-team selection at pitcher, could not get the job done, sur-

rendering two earned runs while notching five strikeouts over six innings in his first loss of the season.

Catcher Chris Ferro ’13 started off the action in the second inning with a sacrifice fly to give the Judges a 1-0 lead. However, McGrath could not hold the lead for the Judges in the top of the third inning, giving up three unearned runs. In the bottom of the frame, Brandeis quickly responded with two more runs to even the score at 3-3. First baseman Eric Rosenberg ’11, who had three RBIs in a valiant effort to extend his career for another day, belted a two-

May 24, 2011

just

ARTS

Summer movie preview

p. 21

Photos: put that down/Flickr Creative Commons, Jaap Buitendijk/Warner Bros. Pictures. Design: Brian Blumenthal/the Justice.

18

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011 ● THE JUSTICE

POP CULTURE

INSIDE ON CAMPUS

19

■ Errol Morris event

19

Before documentary filmmaker Errol Morris accepted his honorary degree from Brandeis, he gave a special presentation titled “Investigating with the Camera.”

■ ‘Winter’s Bone’ screening

19

Debra Granik ’85, director of the Oscarnominated ‘Winter’s Bone,’ screened her film earlier this month and spoke about her filmmaking process.

OFF CAMPUS

20

■ ‘Something Borrowed’

20

■ Summer movie preview

21

The romantic comedy starring Kate Hudson and Ginnifer Goodwin fails to use its strong cast to its fullest potential.

For each of the next summer months, justArts offers the top movie that audiences should not miss. Drama, comedy, fantasy and other genres are represented.

■ Home brewing 101

23

■ BCMS concert review

23

To commemorate the final installment of justArts’ beer column, Innermost Brew, our beer expert gives college students and graduates alike tips for beginning their own home brewing setup.

The Boston Chamber Music Society performed works by Mendelssohn and others on May 15 at Harvard University’s Sanders Theatre. Martin Beaver, Ronald Thomas and Mihae Lee performed.

Ever wondered how the queen of pop, Lady Gaga, came to be the way she is today?

One of her most recent singles claims that she was “Born This Way,” but an upcoming special television event may beg to differ.

The documentary-style hour-long piece, titled “Lady Gaga: Inside The Outside,” will premiere Thursday at 9 p.m. on MTV. The singer, who has had three top-selling albums and 12 singles since 2008 including, “Just Dance,” “Poker Face” and “Paparazzi,” is clearly an international hit-making machine—as well as a prominent activist for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer community.

From dodging rumors of hermaphroditism to showing up to the 2010 Grammy Awards inside a larger-than-life egg, it seems like Gaga’s antics are always on everyone’s minds. But how much do we actually know about the superstar?

A sneak preview on MTV’s website promises viewers that Gaga will reveal the details of her upbringing as Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta. Growing up in New York City, she was bullied in high school, received Stevie Wonder’s “Signed, Sealed, Delivered” from her parents and was introducd to writing music.

So why is she speaking out now? “I think it took me to get to know my fans and to see similar struggles in them to access that wound in myself,” Gaga explains in her MTV special, according to Popeater.

One interesting aspect of the show will be finding out how much of Gaga is merely a persona and how much of the singer is natural eccentricity. “I’m really quite traditional actually, contrary to what some people might think about me,” Gaga said in a promotional cut of her interview with MTV. “I’m traditional in the family sense.” She speaks these words while sitting on a flamelit stage, sporting two-tone hair and black

SUMMER CALENDAR

Interview

Chatting with Errol Morris

by Emily Salloway

 JustArts spoke with Errol Morris, who directed films such as ‘The Fog of War’ and ‘The Thin Blue Line.’

UK_REPSOME/Flickr Creative Commons

BORN THIS WAY?: MTV will premiere an hourlong piece that delves into Lady Gaga’s past.

face paint. This outfit, however, is conservative compared to her usual found-art swag— think of the soda cans as hair accessories in her video for “Telephone” with Beyoncé.

None of the previews acknowledge her publicity stunts or her too-cool-for-school wardrobe, instead depicting her as your average, victimized adolescent back for revenge against her demons with her stardom.

Personally, I’m less interested in Lady Gaga’s high school social struggles and more interested in the thought process behind Haus of Gaga, her creative production team, and who her stylist is.

What’s happening in Arts in the Greater Boston area this summer

‘Richard III/Comedy of Errors’

The internationally acclaimed Propeller Theatre Company, which The New York Times called “absolutely exhilarating,” leaps from England onto the Boston stage for the first time in this duo production of Shakespeare repetoire. In Richard III, director Edward Hall and his British cast bring a great villain to unsparing life. The company will also show off its mischievous wit in The Comedy of Errors, Shakespeare’s satirical comedy. A rigorous approach to classic text mixes with dynamic physicality and modern flair in the all-male production.

Running until June 19 at the Boston Unversity Theatre Mainstage, located at 264 Huntington Avenue, Boston. Tickets are $25 for audience members under the age of 35.

FIGMENT Boston

FIGMENT Boston is a free public art event in which hundreds of musicians and artists fill the space with interactive art pieces including music, dance, sculpture, a maze, art bikes, art cars, scavenger hunt, huge domes and robots.

June 6 and 7 at The Rose Kennedy Greenway.

Free and open to the public.

Keren Ann concert

Ann is an Israeli singer-songwriter who grew up in France. Her songs are mostly about romance, tragedy and melancholy, but it is her unique melodies that make her a special musician. This concert, brought to Boston by World Music/CRASHarts, will promote the tour of her sixth solo album, titled 101.

June 9 at 8 pm, Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston, 100 Northern Avenue, Boston.

Tickets are $22 for general admission.

The Go-Go’s and The B-52s concert

The B-52s are known for new wave and ’60s rock music, and the Go-Go’s are famous for their all-female rock sound. These two groups are joining up to share the stage and peform their greatest hits this summer.

June 9 at 7:30 p.m. at the Bank of America Pavilion, 290 Northern Avenue, Boston. Tickets are $45 to $70.

‘West Side Story’

The national tour of the Broadway revival of the classic show, West Side Story. A more modern retelling of the story of star-crossed lovers Romeo and Juliet, West Side Story has something for everyone, whether it be music, dance, action or plotline.

June 14 through July 9 at the Colonial Theatre, 106 Boylston St., Boston. Ticket prices and times vary.

Boston Landmarks Orchestra

Christopher Wilkins is the group’s newly appointed music director after the passing of Charles Ansbacher, the orchestra’s founder, last fall. Every Wednesday night, Wilkins and the ensemble will play free music with a focus on Mozart and Tchaikovsky this year.

PHOTO COURTESY OF WORLD MUSIC/CRASHARTS

SONGS FROM ISRAEL: Israeli singer-songwriter Keren Ann will be performing a concert funded by World Music/CRASHarts featuring her inventive and original melodies. She will be playing at the ICA on June 9.

July 13 through August 31 at 7 p.m., Hatch Shell, Esplanade, 1 David G Mugar Way, Boston. Free admission.

‘All’s Well That Ends Well’

Shakespeare’s comedy is coming to Boston.

In a tale of unrequited love, Helena becomes enamored with the Count Bertram and attempts to gain his affection in return. This year is the 16th year that the Commonwealth Shakespeare Company will perform Shakespeare on the Common. A beautiful outdoor backdrop, the Boston Common is home to ponds, gardens and scenic views of the city.

July 27 through August 14, Parkman Bandstand, 147 Tremont St., Boston. Tickets and showtimes vary.

Boston Urban Music Festival

The second-annual festival will feature local and nationally acclaimed hip-hop artists.

Last year’s concert included performances by Wiz Kalifa, Slick Rick and M-Dot. August 6 at 5 p.m., City Hall Plaza, Boston.

Free admission.

Keith Urban concert

Urban, an Australian country music singer-songwriter who signed to Capitol Records Nashville in the early ’90s, has seven studio albums and counting. His performance this summer in Boston is part of his Get Closer tour, supporting his most recent album that was released on November 16.

July 8 at 7:30 p.m. at the TD Garden, 100 Legends Way, Boston. Ticket prices vary.

Massachusetts Dance Festival

The members of the Massachusetts Dance Festival believe that dance, as a major component of arts and culture, is essential to mean-

ingful lives and healthy communities. MDF seeks to revitalize dance- and arts-related professions by developing partnerships with businesses, corporations, institutions and communities.

Through annual, statewide education workshops and performance platforms, MDF employs dance performers, students, teachers, technicians, production workers, marketing professionals and cultural facilities employees. Each event will attract residents, college students and tourists, contributing to access, education and diversity of the arts, while stimulating employment.

Performers will include Monkeyhouse, Kinodance, the Boston Dance Company, SoSoma, Contrapose Dance and others.

The festival will take place August 13 and 14 at Boston University and August 27 and 28 at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Wiz Khalifa concert

Cameron Jibril Thomaz, better known by his stage name Wiz Khalifa, is a rapper based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His 2005 mixtape, Prince of the City: Welcome to Pistolvania, debuted with success, and later in 2006 he released a full-length street album titled Show and Prove. Other well-known works include How Fly with fellow rapper Curren$y and his debut album, Deal or No Deal, which reached No. 1 on the iTunes hip hop chart and then reached the top ten on iTunes’ overall album chart when it was released in November 2009.

He is also known for the album, First Flight.

This summer, his international tour will hit Boston’s Bank of America Pavilion in a fiery concert with fellow performers Big Sean and Chevy Woods. Any hip-hop or rap fan should get excited for this huge event.

July 30 at 7 p.m. in the Bank of America Pavilion, located at 290 Northern Avenue, Boston.

Tickets range in price.

Last Saturday, the day before he received an honorary degree from Brandeis at its 60th commencement ceremony, filmmaker Errol Morris spoke with students and alumni in a talk titled “Investigating with the Camera.” JustArts caught up with Morris before the event to speak about his occupational hazards and his fascination with human error. For full coverage of the event, see page 19.

JustArts: The topic today is “Investigating with the Camera.” How did you decide to talk about this?

Errol Morris: Prof. Alice Kelikian (HIST) asked me if I would be willing to do something in connection with graduation. I thought for a moment and I thought, “let’s do this.” It’s something I’ve thought about for years and years, but I’ve never put it into this form before. I hope it interests other people, it definitely interests me.

JA: Why? EM: Well, I used to be a private investigator.

JA: I didn’t know that.

EM: You would think that the way you discover new facts is through some kind of stealth or subterfuge. Why would you be able to find out anything new with a camera crew present? If there was a reason for people to be on their guard you would say, this is it. And yet, I discovered unexpected things while filming interviews.

JA: Has your interviewing style changed?

EM: My interviewing style has changed, I guess, but it’s still the basic idea that remains the same. If you know the answer to a question that you’re going to ask, then don’t ask it. You should expect to hear something unexpected. … It runs contrary to lot of what people imagine is the appropriate recipe for journalism.

JA: How do you find your characters for your films? Is mostly luck, or is it method?

EM: There’s no method. [Laughs] I am attracted to all kinds of different stories. It’s a mixed bag—Robert S. McNamara, Fred Leuchter, Rodney Brooks.

JA: Does something just hit you, and you think, “I want to make this into a film”?

EM: That is actually the correct way to describe it, I think. If there’s something about a story and I think there’s something there, what that is exactly, I don’t think I can really put my finger on it.

JA: What are the topics going around the world now that interest you?

EM: Everything. It’s kind of an exciting time for me. I’m planning to direct a dramatic feature, and we are in the process of casting that. And I’ve started other documentaries as well, and I’m writing too.

JA: What was going through your mind during your college graduation?

EM: I wasn’t interested in film, really. I was a History major at the University of WisconsinMadison. I spent a lot of time rock climbing. I graduated a little bit late because I spent a good part of my senior year in Yosemite Valley.

JA: I used to go to music camp at UWM all the time when I lived in Milwaukee.

EM: What do you play?

JA: The trumpet.

EM: That’s great! I play the cello.

JA: So when did you first get into film?

EM: I started getting interested in film when I went to [University of California,] Berkeley. I was about 24, 25 years old. I started going to movies.

Then I met a number of filmmakers like Werner Herzog. I worked for Herzog on a film, then I made my own film.

JA: So you really didn’t watch a lot of movies before you were 24?

EM: Not really. But then I went to three movies a day for maybe 3 years. What interested me in The Thin Blue Line is that I’m really fascinated by error. How people actually make mistakes. They convicted the wrong man and let this guy loose, this 16-year-old kid, who was a killer. This story [The Wilderness of Error] about the Green Beret doctor is also a story about a horrendous series of errors. It’s one of the themes that really interest me. Not how people learn the truth, but how people avoid, in many instances, learning the truth.

JA: How do you get people talking about making mistakes?

EM: I don’t know. That’s another great mystery. Interviewing is mysterious. I have all types of wacko theories about why I’m successful at it, but ultimately, I don’t really know. … I was interviewing Eddie Murphy for the beginning of the Academy Awards. I asked him, “Do you ever worry that someday you’ll wake up and you won’t be funny?” And he said, “All the time.” And so I asked him if he could try to be not funny for me. And in his effort to be not funny, he was, of course, really, really funny. If you’re good at something, and I’m supposed to be good at interviewing, and you don’t really know why you’re good at it, then there’s always the fear it might vanish. You might wake up on the wrong side of the bed someday.

JA: Could you conduct a bad interview if you tried?

EM: I’ve done bad interviews, but I have a high success rate, and I’d like to keep it that way if I can.

—Wei-Huan Chen

THE JUSTICE

●

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

19

ON CAMPUS film

Errol Morris unravels history with film ■ Before receiving his

honorary degree, filmmaker Errol Morris spoke on film techniques in “Investigating with the Camera.”

By wei-huan chen JUSTICE editor

Unexpected things can happen during the documentary filming process.

Since a director cannot predict how an interview or on-scene shot will turn out, the end product tends to be a surprise. What originally starts out as a film about an execution technology expert, for example, may turn into a discussion on Neo-Nazism—that’s what happened to filmmaker Errol Morris in his 1999 film Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr. In Morris’ most famous work, The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara, the director had no idea that the controversial former secretary of defense would go into detail about the “war crimes” committed by the United States while firebombing Japan in World War II. Through interviews in The Thin Blue Line—originally planned to be a documentary about prosecution psychiatrist Dr. James Grigson—Morris achieved what he said was “one of the best things I’ve ever done”: He helped release a man who was wrongfully convicted of murder and nabbed the confession of the person who actually did it.

Last Saturday, the day before he received an honorary degree from Brandeis at its 60th commencement ceremony, Morris showed clips of The Thin Blue Line, Standard Operating Procedure and The Fog of War in a presentation titled, “Investigating with the Camera.” A former private investigator, Morris’ interviewing style was an important element in explaining how these films—which all revealed something about their subject matters that no one else knew— came to be.

After University President Frederick Lawrence, a former attorney, introduced Morris, the filmmaker noted that his style of interviewing is the exact opposite of a lawyer’s. While an attorney’s mantra typically goes, “Never ask a question unless you know the answer,” Morris’ philosophy highlights the unexpected parts

ASHER KRELL/the Justice

QUESTIONING THE SUBJECT: Errol Morris spoke on instances in which his subjects revealed astonishing and unexpected evidence. of the interview: “If you know the answer to a question that you’re going to ask, why bother asking it in the first place?”

Prior to speaking with McNamara—who, after researching Morris, had originally refused the interview—Morris had no idea that General Curtis LeMay had employed

brutal tactics in the United States’ strategic bombing of the Pacific theater in 1945. McNamara, who was a lieutenant colonel working with LeMay at the time, discussed the reasoning behind LeMay’s decision to bomb Tokyo. The implications behind the decision, which resulted in over 100,000 civilian deaths, were astonish-

ing. Morris juxtaposed McNamara’s voice with images of the bombing and statistics of Japanese civilian deaths, which he found in national archives after the interview.

Morris did not expect to hear such surprising words coming out of McNamara’s mouth. The result was a film that changed audiences’ perspec-

tives on World War II, the Cuban Missile Crises and the Vietnam War. How did he do it? In terms of technology, he did it with an Interrotron.

Morris invented the Interrotron to achieve a true first-person experience between the audience and the interviewer. It is a camera that displays Morris on a monitor so that interviewees may look directly at the camera when answering his questions.

He has used this device in almost all of his films. What Morris has come to realize is that when filming a subject during an interview, people can end up saying extremely astonishing things.

“You would think that the way you discover new facts is through some kind of stealth or subterfuge. Why would you be able to find out anything new with a camera crew present?”

Morris said in an interview with the Justice. “If there was a reason for people to be on their guard, you would say this is it. And yet, I discovered unexpected things while filming interviews.”

For example, in Standard Operating Procedure, Morris discovered that Janis Karpinski did not really play the role that everyone thought she did in the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal. It is a famous photograph—there she was, bending over the corpse of a tortured prisoner of war, smiling and giving a thumbs up. The immediate reaction, understandably, was that Karpinski was somehow responsible for the killing of the man. But, as the film revealed, a photograph can only tell so much of a story. In fact, Karpinski had no idea where the victim came from, and as she speaks into the Interrotron, the audience realizes that the whole picture is much more complex.

“Interviewing is mysterious. I have all types of wacko theories about why I’m successful at it, but ultimately, I don’t really know,” Morris said.

When asked about when he knew that a film was completed, he suggested that he just stops filming when the producers start bugging him.

Morris’ upcoming works include Tabloid (opening July 15)—he screened the film at Brandeis last semester—which traces the journey of a beauty pageant winner who allegedly kidnaps and rapes a Mormon, and The Wilderness of Error, a book (yes, he writes too) about a “horrendous series of errors” surrounding a Green Beret doctor.

film

Debra Granik ’85 speaks about ‘Winter’s Bone’ ■ The Brandeis alumna

and director of the Oscarnominated film discusses her inspirations in a talk held at the University.

By AARON BERKE JUSTICE staff writer

“I feel like I was born asking questions,” director and Brandeis alumna Debra Granik ’85 noted thoughtfully.

“That’s how some people’s brains are formed.” Granik’s film Winter’s Bone addresses an important question: whether a single young girl can prevail against insurmountable odds.

Earlier this month at the Wasserman Cinematheque, Granik appeared at a special screening of her Oscar-nominated film. The event, presented by University President Frederick Lawrence and organized

by Prof. Alice Kelikian (HIST) in conjunction with the Film, Television and Interactive Media program, was followed by a question-and-answer session with Granik.

Winter’s Bone is the moody and harrowing tale of a young Ozark mountain girl named Ree (Jennifer Lawrence) who goes on a quest to find her drug-dealing father in an effort to prevent her home from being torn down and to keep her family from living on the streets. The film is a gripping depiction of Ozark life

that—judging from the film—few people would want to live.

The audience at the cinematheque was very receptive to the film and to Granik, who was greeted with a standing ovation when she rose to take her seat on stage for the Q-and-A with Kelikian. Granik put her heart and soul into telling this story, and she shared many of her experiences during the Q-and-A, the highlight of which was hearing about how she came to be interested in adapting Daniel Woodrell’s novel of the same name.

Responding to a question from an audience member, Granik said that one day she sat down on a park bench and read the entire book in that single sitting. She had many questions about the novel’s details: “Is this really contemporary America? Does she really live in a house like this? I felt clueless as to whether the material existence as described by [Woodrell] could be in any way accurate,” Granik explained. Her question over whether she could successfully depict a story about this region as an outsider became the challenge that drew her to make the film. Granik also found that she had a strong empathy with the character of Ree, saying, “[I was] very attracted to her as female protagonist. [I] felt she would be an enticing character to depict.”

The Q-and-A contained many fascinating moments, particularly Granik’s revelation that the young

JOSH SPIRO/the Justice

OSCAR NOMINEE: Debra Granik ’85 (left) speaks with Prof. Alice Kelikian (HIST). girl who played Ree’s sister, Ashlee (Ashlee Thompson), was an actual Ozark girl whose parents lived in the house which appeared in the film as Ree’s home. After the Q-and-A, Granik agreed to do a private interview with justArts, in which she revealed some interesting tidbits, beginning with her view on the social issue of drugs.

One of the subtexts of Winter’s Bone is drug use, specifically methamphetamine, and how it permeates and degrades the Ozark community.

“It scares me,” Granik said. “I try to avoid that subject, but in contemporary America I feel like it touches way too many lives. Different regions struggle with different substances, different people are vulnerable to

things that sweep through their community. I don’t feel like I look for [the topic of] drugs, I feel like drugs find me. I’m very interested in what it takes to get over an addiction or to protect your kids from one.”

Granik finds that her experiences at Brandeis helped to inspire a lifelong passion to ask questions. “You never leave the ‘why’ stage. When you come to a school where there is a tradition of people interrogating social conditions, [you wonder] what are the roads to social justice? What role can a student, faculty member, activist or a filmmaker play? [Brandeis] was a place in which many people got to ask that.”

On the subject of what she hopes audiences will take away from the film, Granik had a societal message to offer. “People take away many things,” she commented. “I would say everyone is driven by a house that has a lot of debris in it, and it’s easy to say, ‘I know who lives there.’ But what would happen if you actually sat down and talked to someone who lived in that house, and you found out where the debris came from? I would love for people to somehow have an affection for [Ree] and the life that she leads. To understand that in the lives of many ordinary Americans conditions are extremely hard. [I hope the audience can] somehow factor that in to their appraisal of how they assess the material conditions of her life and who they think she might be.”

20

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

THE JUSTICE

●

OFF CAMPUS film

‘Something Borrowed’ misses the point ■ The romantic comedy

win is in reality beautiful in a highfashion, quirky sort of way. Her lack of blonde highlights passes for plainness in the Hollywood-created world the characters inhabit.

Darcy is planning her wedding to Dex (Colin Egglesfield), Rachel’s law school classmate and apparently the only guy she’s ever loved, even though that was some years ago. While Rachel and Dex flirted constantly at New York University, neither of them was gutsy enough to make the first move. Then Darcy swooped in, and, the film would have you believe, snatched Dex into her evil clutches, dazzling him with her drunken charm and lack of emotional depth.

However, as the scene actually plays, Darcy dares Dex to ask Rachel out first. When Rachel, the insecure plain Jane that she is, tells Darcy that she and Dex are “just friends,” Darcy takes the opportunity to hit on Dex herself. This isn’t a situation of best friend betrayal; this is a situation of asking your friend’s permission before asking out a guy yourself. Rachel then digs herself deeper into the role of second fiddle by leaving the two alone together. Dex actually comes after her to make sure what is going on is kosher. Rachel gives the relationship her blessing, before bursting into tears as soon as Dex walks away. And Darcy is supposed to be the “man stealer”? I don’t think so.

This is an example of Something Borrowed’s many problems in character presentation. We are supposed to sympathize with Rachel and view Darcy as a demanding bitch—which, by the way, she totally is. But Darcy, as self-centered and unaware as she is, is never intentionally mean.

Yes, she makes everything about

does not utilize its actors’ strengths, instead weakening its appeal with a poor plot.

By ariel kay JUSTICE editor

I love going to movie theaters. The whole experience is somewhat reminiscent of the movie palaces that were erected back in the ’30s and ’40s to showcase moving pictures, and— I’d like to think—still retains a bit of mystique, a hint of glamour. Sitting in the darkened theater waiting for the show to begin is rather exciting.

Emerging out of the theater, back into the real world, squinting against the forgotten sun is the final element of the movie-going experience. Typically, I leave while still focusing on the film I just saw, contemplating the ending or reimagining the best moments. However, leaving the theater after viewing Something Borrowed, I had something else on my mind.

I was annoyed, even a little ticked off. Romantic comedies have never been my favorite genre, but normally I just view them as the bits of fluff and fun that they are. Something Borrowed, however, was worse than the average chick flick. It is probably the worst movie I have seen all year.

The movie stars “best friends” Darcy (Kate Hudson) and Rachel (Ginnifer Goodwin), women who have known each other since they were in pigtails and braces. Darcy is beautiful in a Barbie-esque, vapid sort of way, and Rachel is made to look like her “shlumpy” brunette counterpart—never mind that Good-

PHOTO COURTESY OF WARNER BROS. PICTURES

THE LAST SUPPER: Not even these seasoned actors could help ‘Something Borrowed.’ herself, even Rachel’s 30th birthday party. But that’s because Rachel never stands up and grabs some of the spotlight for herself. She allows Darcy to be the center of the attention because she doesn’t have the self-esteem to say no. Ultimately, Darcy is Rachel’s own creation—a Frankenstein monster she taught to demand everything because she’s never heard the word no. And is that really Darcy’s fault?

This is why, when Rachel and Dex finally reveal their true feelings to one another and begin an affair, I wasn’t impressed by the “love conquers all” reasoning that writer Jen-

nie Snyder uses to make infidelity as romantic as marriage. Rachel had her chance, and she did everything in her power not to take it. Now her best friend is about to be married, and she sees this as the time to take back what’s “hers.” The plot is only complicated by Dex’s inability to choose one woman over the other, though it is clear that Rachel is the better fit. He is just as pathetic as Rachel, stringing both women along as the wedding day looms closer and closer.

The only character who sees any of these romantic entanglements for the immoral messes they are is

Ethan (John Krasinski), Rachel and Darcy’s childhood friend. Darcy, for an unknown reason, now thinks she is too cool for Ethan, though he remains Rachel’s other best friend. In the movie’s one redeeming scene, Ethan tries to convince Rachel that both Dex and Darcy continually take advantage of her, and neither one of them is worth her time. Rachel refuses to see reason.

I won’t reveal the ending of Something Borrowed, though suffice to say that it is just as twisted and painful to watch as the rest of the film. What is particularly upsetting about the movie’s failure is how many talented people were involved in its creation. Yes, Hudson’s career has become a list of boring, forgettable chick flicks, but I still hold out hope that she’ll reemerge with a character like Penny Lane from the brilliant Almost Famous, the role that showcased what a force she can be in front of the camera. Likewise, Goodwin was wonderfully naïve in the HBO series Big Love, and she also had great moments in Walk the Line and A Single Man. Krasinski, otherwise known as The Office’s Jim, seems to have the beginnings of a promising film career—if he sticks to innovative, emotionally complex fair like Away We Go and It’s Complicated rather than License to Wed. Even director Luke Greenfield, who has less than 10 projects to his name, helmed the awesome sleaze-fest The Girl Next Door.

If audiences and critics alike demand more films that showcase what these individuals can do at their best rather than movies that merely show off their pretty faces, maybe we won’t have to sit through another Something Borrowed next summer.

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THE JUSTICE

Summer 2011 May:

Movie

Preview

Four months, four films— plus a bonus comedy

●

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

21

Tree of Life

Directed by Terrence Malick Starring Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, Jessica Chastain Malick’s film tells the story of Jack (portrayed as an adult by Penn), an 11-year-old Midwestern boy who grows up learning different ways of living from his mother (Chastain) and his father (Pitt). While his mother teaches him to “see with the eyes of his soul,” his father instructs him on how to protect himself from the hardships he will encounter in life, putting himself first. The narrative follows Jack’s journey from innocence to experience as he grapples with the contrasting approaches to life, which he has been shown.

From the trailer, it is obvious that Malick’s impressionistic style dominates the movie and, while the plot might seem a little bit melodramatic, the mere beauty of the cinematography itself is worth witnessing.

The movie, after its opening run at the Cannes Film Festival, will premiere in the United States. on May 27.

PHOTO COURTESY OF FOX SEARCHLIGHT

By Emily salloway JUSTICE editorial assistant

Summer is all about spending time outside in the (cross your fingers if you live in New England) beautiful, warm weather. A dark, quiet movie theater is the last place most people want to be when there’s laying out on the beach to be done.

However, I found some upcoming flicks that just might persuade you otherwise.

So here’s one film for each month of the summer that will make you want to sit back in the air-conditioned cinema with a nice bag of popcorn and watch.

June: Beginners

Directed by Mike Mills Starring Ewan McGregor, Melanie Laurent and Christopher Plummer Based on the true story of director Mills’ father, Oliver (McGregor) meets and falls in love with Anna (Laurent) right after the death of his father Hal (Plummer). Throughout the film, the new romance brings up memories of

his father who, shortly before his death, admitted he was gay after 44 years of marriage to Oliver’s mother. Hal’s honesty in his last days had brought Oliver closer to his father and he hopes to carry the lessons he’s learned into his new relationship with Anna.

The film presents a basic story in a fresh new way, using interesting storytelling techniques as well as humorous moments to create a memorable spin on the classic father-son relationship tale. Beginners is premiering on June 3.

LAURA FRANCES AGUIRRE/Flickr Creative Commons

July: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 Directed by David Yates and Steve Kloves Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint

The final installment in the Harry Potter film saga is finally coming. The second part of the film that premiered last fall, this segment covers all the filmic genres: drama, action/adventure, mystery, science fiction/fantasy, you name it. Harry, having clashed against Lord Voldemort and his minions since the murder of his parents, will finally face his greatest enemy in the ultimate showdown.

With the gorgeous cinematography of the previous Harry Potter installment, you can bet that Yates will be at it again, crafting a beautiful visual to accompany the finale to the story that has touched millions of readers and viewers worldwide. It all ends July 15.

PHOTO COURESTY OF WARNER BROS.

August:

Squeeze in one more laugh before going back to school:

Our Idiot Brother

One Day

Directed by Lone Scherfig Starring Anne Hathaway, Jim Sturgess and Romola Garai Emma (Hathaway) and Dexter (Sturgess) first meet in college at Edinburgh on the day of their graduation. Emma is a working-class girl bent on changing the world; Dexter is wealthy, spoiled and simply wants to have fun seeing the world. The film checks in with them once a year for 20 years on the anniversary of the day they met. Sometimes they are together romantically, sometimes they are not.

This is an interesting take on a love story, watching the love grow and fall apart again over time. Although Hathaway’s false Scottish accent from the trailer made me cringe, this film is unique enough to pique my interest. Coming to theaters August 19.

GILES KEYTE/Focus Features

Directed by Jesse Peretz Starring Paul Rudd, Emily Mortimer and Zooey Deschanel

This movie is a bit of a wild card: Rudd plays Ned, the titular “idiot brother.” After he makes a mess of his life, Ned seeks refuge in each of his three sisters’ homes. Once there, he continues to stir up trouble with his consistently upbeat, trusting and carefree attitude.

Although the trailer revealed that this film has its share of bathroom jokes, the overall plot seems not only comedic but also somewhat touching. Ned’s naïveté is somewhat endearing—presenting a loveably silly and inexperienced protagonist is a good way to keep viewers rooting for his or her success (think Brittany from Glee or Forrest from Forrest Gump). Catch this film August 26.

the

Justice

congratulates the Class of 2011!

Read

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online!

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THE JUSTICE

●

TUESDAY, may 24, 2011

23

food

A history and guide to home brew beer Douglas

MOORE Innermost brew

A good craft beer can be found in every part of the United States.

There are breweries in every major city, many small towns and even in the middle of nowhere. Any location can quite easily be turned into a brewery—from a barn in the Midwest to a small apartment in New York City to even a University Foster Mod. Home brewing allows you to get closer to the art and science of fermentation for very little money and a small amount of effort.

I started home brewing with friends at Brandeis through the school’s newly chartered Brewing Club 3 years ago. I served as president of the club and have made over a dozen batches of beer.

Home brewing was legalized in the ’70s, and the only requirements are that you do not produce for profit, you are of legal drinking age and you limit yourself to producing 100 gallons per year. It was this legal allowance that allowed people to fall in love with the craft and realize they could start their own breweries. Still today, many aspiring brewers get their start after brewing their first batch of home brew.

It all starts with your malt—malted barley. Malt is a grain that has been allowed to germinate briefly and is then quickly dried to stop the process. This opens up the husk to sugar extractions.

These grains are first crushed and added to water somewhere between 150 and 160 degrees Fahrenheit. Precise temperature is crucial, as the slightest change in temperature can completely change your finished product: if you go above acceptable ranges you will leach off tasting compounds, but going below will rob the beer of flavor and body.

For those starting out with limited space and time, there are syrups called malt extract that will leave this step out of the process. Most home brewers are extract brewers, but many move to an all-grain system once the brewing bug bites them. You can have more control and be more in touch with the entire process.

Next you bring your “prebeer,” called wort, up to a boil. You let this boil for an hour or so while adding in hops. The hops are added as preservative, and the longer they boil, the more they break down and become bitter. Those added later in the boil give flowery flavors, each flavor de-

CARMAARMYOFME2/Flickr Creative Commons

DON’T WORRY, HAVE A HOME BREW: Malt, one of the basic elements of beer, is a grain that has been allowed to germinate briefly and is then quickly dried to stop the process. pending on the variety of hop. Those added at the end contribute no flavor but impart a powerful aroma. This is what the bigger beer companies refer to when they say that their beer is “triple hops brewed.” The truth is that most beers have multiple hops at multiple times in the brew kettle.

After the boil, you cool down the liquid and put it in a fermenter with yeast, at which point the wort becomes beer. It ferments for several weeks and can be transferred to other fermenters along the way to get the beer away from some of the dead yeast and waste (called trub) that can result in off-tasting flavors.

From here, the brew is fed a little sugar, put into bottles and allowed to carbonate for 2 weeks, at which point the beer is ready to be enjoyed. The whole process can take anywhere from 3 weeks to 2 months depending on style of beer. But don’t worry—your beer will more likely be drinkable than not, provided you followed two simple rules.

The first rule is to keep everything sanitary. Beer is made from

live yeast converting sugar into alcohol, so the brewing environment is a breeding ground for bacteria.

The good news is that home brewing yeast is well suited for the process and is very forgiving; you truly have to try to contaminate a batch.

The second and more important rule is to relax. Home brewing is supposed to be fun and should not be stressful. Be sure to have a few beers as you go through the process. One of the most repeated phrases among expert brewers is RDWHAHB—Relax, Don’t Worry, Have A Home Brew.

I hope that some of you try brewing your own batch of beer based on this article. Furthermore, as this is my last contribution to Innermost Brew. I hope that some of you have been inspired to try different craft products due to this column. It’s been a lot of fun to write, and I hope it has been as fun to read. To finish, I’ll leave you with an old Czech proverb: “A fine beer may be judged with only one sip, but it’s better to be thoroughly sure.”

ANDERS ADERMARK/Flickr Creative Commons

BEER PRIDE: The finished product will range in color, bitterness and mouthfeel.

music

BCMS honors classics with exquisite artistry ■ The Boston Chamber Music

Society performed pieces

by Schubert, Brahms and other composers at Harvard University on May 15.

By felicia kuperwaser JUSTICE contributing writer

On May 15, the Boston Chamber Music Society concluded its season at Harvard University’s Sanders Theatre in Cambridge. Martin Beaver, violin; Ronald Thomas, cello; and Mihae Lee, piano, performed. Although BCMS comprises a wide variety of talented musicians, these three shared chemistry and cohesion, which made them more of a single, harmonious unit than three individual performers. Compared to the rest of the season, which had programs that included somewhat less-accessible pieces, this final concert provided euphonic pleasure that proved impossible not to enjoy.

The trio opened the evening with Schubert’s “Adagio in E-flat major, D. 897.” True to its name, the “Notturno” trio, the piece was reminiscent of a nocturne. It sustained a deliberate inertia and relaxed quality but told a dramatic narrative in its short time.

Unusually compact for a trio, the piece highlights Schubert’s ability to create pure harmonic beauty since it is unencumbered by textural and thematic variety. While larger classical works contain many different sections and motifs, this short piece focuses more on the many ways to express a little bit of thematic material. Continuous arpeggios accompany the melody in much of the piece, creating a sense of soothing repetition and contentment. The same resolute theme that begins the piece returns throughout, strengtened and nuanced with each iteration. The BCMS trio captured the piece’s character, playing indulgently and taking liberties with tempo and dynamics. The musicians played with ease, grace and a measured precision that both captured the music’s serene, ethereal quality and allowed them to create powerful, expansive musical statements. Beaver and Thomas played with such perfect unity that the piece became more of a dialogue between two instruments, piano and strings, than it was between three independent voices.

Mendelssohn’s “Piano Trio in D minor, Opus 49” concluded the first half of the performance. It is a dramatic and stormy piece, filled with conflict and tension. The trio played it at a sur-

prisingly fast tempo that gave it fluidity and emphasized the piece’s compelling overall narrative. However, they did so at the expense of some of the more elegant harmonic moments and delicate hairpin turns that characterize this work.

In the first movement, Thomas particularly stood out, creating a rich, sonorous sound in the cello’s themes, which the theater’s excellent acoustics showcased. The trio played with momentum and vitality, even in the more lyrical second movement. They played the scherzo—which means “joke” in Italian—quite literally, as a joke, and so fast that some details were lost. However, they departed from the piece’s character, as the scherzo should, and even elicited some chuckles from the audience.

After three dramatic, involved movements, the trio was still able to play a compelling final movement by pushing the tempo’s limit even further. In doing so, they showed the relationship between the movements and the cohesiveness of the piece itself, playing the whole work as if in a single breath. It really is a tribute to the music itself that it is so full of beautiful detail, but also wonderful on a larger scale. Similar to the Schubert, it was more a piece of dramatic narrative

than an exploration of different musical styles and textures.

The BCMS trio completed the program with “Brahms’ Piano Trio in B major, Op. 8.” In this uncommon and sunny key, Brahms transitions seamlessly between moments of yearning tension and beautiful, sumptuous melody. It is a diplomatically split piece, where each instrument plays an equal part, and the dialogue between the three instruments constitutes the narrative and provides momentum.

The BCMS trio played this complex piece with a seemingly effortless assurance and ease. They emphasized the latent connection between the scherzo and adagio, written as almost a continuation of one another, by waiting only for a moment in between movements and turning pages only after the adagio began. In the third movement, the trio relished each phrase and moments of resolute unison highlighted the beautiful tension and harmonies that arose out of them. The final movement, a perfect end to the evening, was expressive and passionate but perhaps ended a bit too chaotically. After accelerating the tempo so much, the trio should have taken the ending more deliberately and carefully.

The theater itself suited the performance. Full of dark wood panelling

with high Gothic ceilings, it has an austere beauty and grandeur. Its octagonal shape, and pews in place of individual seats, give it an intimacy that other theaters lack. The musicians themselves were actually somewhat distant and unengaging, rarely ever glancing at one another, but the coherence and unity of their performance made it clear that they must communicate while they perform. The one disappointing element of the evening was that the theater was only about half full, and those present largely had white hair and orthopedic shoes. In this vein, I will be one of the many to urge all students to take advantage of the many excellent cultural opportunities in the area.

In an area with such a rich musical culture, full of innovation and creative exploration, such a conventional program is somewhat of a rare find. It was a wonderful final performance for BCMS in that it focused simply on drama and beauty, which, after all, should always be present in music.

Rather than showing variety, they picked a musical idea and followed it through three great composers. In doing so, BCMS ended its season with a night of exquisite artistry that left everyone waiting eagerly for the next season.

24

TUESDAY, MAY 24, 2011 ● THE JUSTICE

TOP of the

ARTS ON VIEW

TRIVIA TIME 1. When did the Franco-Prussian War end?

2. What was the name of Robert Fulton’s first commercially successful steamboat?

3. Who is the patron saint of Wales?

4. What famous singer’s 1950s TV show featured the Vic Schoen Orchestra?

5. Who wrote the novel Rebecca?

6. In Greek mythology, who was Telemachus’ father?

7. What is “the beer that made Milwaukee famous”?

8. Where is Lake Maracaibo?

9. For what line of work was Fannie Merritt Farmer best known?

10. What system of government does the Fabian Society support?

1. 1871 2. Clermont 3. David 4. Dinah Shore 5. Daphne du Maurier 6. Odysseus 7. Schlitz 8. Venezuela 9. Culinary expert and cookbook author 10. Socialism

SHOWTIMES 5/24 – 5/25 Water for Elephants Mon-Wed: 2:20, 5:00, 8:00 Hesher Tues: 5:10, 8:20 Wed: 2:40, 5:10, 8:20 The Conspirator Mon-Wed: 2:10, 4:50, 7:40 Thor Mon-Wed: 2:30, 5:00, 8:10 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides Mon-Wed: 2:50, 7:30 Bridesmaids Mon-Wed: 2:00, 4:50, 7:50 Coming Soon: The Hangover Part II: 5/26 Midnight in Paris: 5/27 Submarine: 6/17 The Art of Getting By: 6/17 Buck: 7/1

For additional showtimes, call (781) 893-2500 or check online.

The Embassy is located at 18 Pine Street in Waltham

CHARTS Top 10s for the week ending May 20 BOX OFFICE

1. Thor 2. Bridesmaids 3. Fast Five 4. Priest 5. Rio 6. Jumping the Broom 7. Something Borrowed 8. Water for Elephants 9. Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Big Happy Family 10. Soul Surfer

NYT BESTSELLERS

TALI SMOOKLER/the Justice

UP IN THE AIR: Justice Photography Editor Tali Smookler ’13 took this photo of the sky’s beautiful colors from her window seat on the plane ride back from a high school class trip to New Mexico.

ACROSS 1. Writer Kingsley 5. Hot tub 8. Adam and Eve’s son 12. Dog owner’s chore 13. Work unit 14. Burning heap 15. High score in darts 17. Ogler’s look 18. Apportion 19. Kitchen rack fillers 21. “Memory” musical 24. Greek vowel 25. Hoist 28. Beams of light 30. Agree silently 33. Khan 34. “Likewise” 35. Rotation duration 36. Thither 37. Fine 38. Information unit 39. “— Kapital” 41. Christmas refrain 43. Father Time’s prop 46. Festive parties 50. Exile isle 51. Who Wants to Be a Millionaire lifeline chart 54. Gridiron terminus 55. Bikini half 56. Great Lake 57. Shrek is one 58. Stitch 59. Timetable, for short DOWN 1. “Mamma Mia” group 2. Manhandle 3. “— do for now” 4. Cheap merchandise 5. Witness 6. Crowbar 7. Census statistics 8. Gymnastic maneuver 9. Something superficially attractive 10. Genealogy chart 11. Divorce settlement portion 16. Depot (Abbr.)

20. Mexican money 22. “Star —” 23. Beelzebub

CROSSWORD

Fiction 1. Dead Reckoning – Charlaine Harris 2. Buried Prey – John Sandford 3. 10th Anniversary – James Patterson and Maxine Paetro 4. The Sixth Man – David Baldacci 5. The Land of Painted Caves – Jean M. Auel

Nonfiction 1. Lies That Chelsea Handler Told Me – Chelsea Handler, Glen Handler, Roy Handler and others 2. Does the Noise in My Head Bother You? – Steven Tyler 3. Bossypants – Tina Fey 4. In the Garden of Beasts – Erik Larson 5. Unbroken– Laura Hillenbrand

iTUNES

1. Adele – “Rolling in the Deep” 2. Pitbull feat. Ne-Yo, Afrojack and Nayer — “Give Me Everything” 3. Lady Gaga — “Hair” 4. LMFAO feat. Lauren Bennett and GoonRock — “Party Rock Anthem” 5. Bruno Mars — “The Lazy Song” 6. Katy Perry feat. Kanye West —“E.T.” 7. The Black Eyed Peas — “Just Can’t Get Enough” 8. Jennifer Lopez feat. Pitbull — “On the Floor” 9. Enrique Iglesias (with Usher) feat.

Lil Wayne — “Dirty Dancer” 10. Glee Cast — “Pure Imagination (Glee Cast Version)”

BILLBOARD

1. Adele – 21 2. Various Artists – Now 38 3. The Lonely Island – Turtleneck & Chain 4. Christina Perri – Lovestrong.

5. Tyler, the Creator – Goblin 6. Beastie Boys – Hot Sauce Committee Part Two 7. The Cars -- Move Like This 8. Fleet Foxes – Helplessness Blues 9. Jennifer Lopez — Love?

10. Jason Aldean -- My Kinda Party

25. Funny Leno 26. Back when 27. Wonka creation 29. Vacillate 31. Feedbag morsel 32. Coloring agent 34. Slam-dance 38. Trumpet sounds 40. — of Two Cities 42. Early bird?

43. Lily variety 44. Stop up 45. Recedes 47. Caprice 48. “... baked in—” 49. Molt 52. Exist 53. Uncivilized

Solution to last week’s crossword

STRANGE BUT TRUE  The next time you’re annoyed by a bad case of the hiccups, consider poor Charles Osborne. In 1922, when he was 28 years old, Mr. Osborne got the hiccups. For the next 68 years, he continued to hiccup, finally stopping in 1990, 1 year before his death at the age of 97.  Those who study such things claim that an average bank robber in the United States nets about $4,000 for every heist. There is no information at hand to reveal how the researches acquired their data.  If you’re planning a trip to the United Kingdom in the near future, you might want to be sure Windsor Castle, located in the county of Berkshire, is on your itinerary. Built in the 11th century, it is both the longest-occupied palace in Europe and, with more than 500 people living and working there, the world’s larg-

STAFF PLAYLIST

“Sophomore Year”

King Crossword Copyright 2011 King Features Synd, Inc.

 It was 20th-century Belgian writer and philosopher Raoul Vaneigem who made the following sage observation: “There are more truths in 24 hours of a man’s life than in all the philosophies.”

Album information provided by Billboard Magazine. Box office information provided

by Fandango. iTunes top sellers provided by Apple.com. Bestellers list provided by The New York Times.

est inhabited castle. As a bonus, through April of 2012 you’ll be able to view a special exhibit on royal cakes.

Yes, cakes. Amazingly, included in the exhibit are two pieces of cake from the wedding of Queen Victoria to Prince Albert, which took place on February 10, 1840.  Stephen Spielberg, who has earned two Academy Awards for Best Director and has set box-office records with three of his films, was rejected—twice—when he applied to the film program of the University of Southern California.  Amazon ants (red ants found in the western U.S.) steal the larvae of other ants to keep as slaves. The slave ants build homes for and feed the Amazon ants, who cannot do anything but fight. They depend completely on their slaves for survival.

Thought for the Day: “Every man possesses three characters: that which he exhibits, that which he really has and that which he believes he has.”

—Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr

By ERICA COOPERBERG JUSTICE STAFF WRITER

These are a few songs that remind me of fun times, late nights and amazing friends. I always crack a smile when I hear one—how can you not?

THE LIST 1. “Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)”— Shakira 2. “The Show Goes On” — Lupe Fiasco 3. “Yeah 3x” — Chris Brown 4. “Quelqu’un m’a dit” — Carla Bruni 5. “F--- You” — Cee Lo Green 6. “God Damn You’re Beautiful” — Chester See 7. “Little Lies” — Dave Barnes 8. “Sometime Around Midnight” — The Airborne Toxic Event 9. “Rikud Romanti” — Ishay Levi 10. “Just Can’t Get Enough” — Black Eyed Peas