INSIDE
Editor discusses tattoo experience
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Swimming and Diving dominates
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Movies to see in March
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How to prepare for a marathon
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MONDAY
FEBRUARY 23, 2015 MONDAY High 30, Low 27 TUESDAY High 39, Low 34
VOLUME 100 ISSUE 61 FIRST COPY FREE, ADDITIONAL COPIES 50 CENTS
CELEBRATING 100 YEARS 1915 - 2015
NEWS Briefs World JOHANNESBURG — A video purported to be by Somalia’s al-Qaida-linked rebel group al-Shabab urged Muslims to attack shopping malls in the U.S., Canada, Britain and other Western countries. KIEV, Ukraine— A bomb blast killed two at a march in east Ukraine on Sunday on the first anniversary of the ouster of the country’s Russiafriendly president, a gruesome counterpoint to the hopes spawned by a cease-fire agreement more than a week ago.
National GASDEN, Ala.— A prosecutor calls Joyce Hardin Garrard the “drill sergeant from hell,” a woman so mean she made her 9-year-old granddaughter run until the girl collapsed and died, all as punishment for lying about candy. SCHENECTADY, N.Y.— An upstate New York teen — who had a burst of fame last fall over his senior portrait depicting him, his cat and lasers — has died. Draven Rodriguez’s parents tell the TimesUnion of Albany their son committed suicide Thursday at their Schenectady home. He was 17.
Texas RAYMONDVILLE — Officers regained control of a South Texas prison where inmates had set fires and caused significant damage after taking over part of the facility, according to the private contractor operating the prison. About 300 of the 2,800 inmates were moved Sunday from the Willacy County Correctional Center to other federal facilities, said Issa Arnita, a spokesman for Management & Training Corp., the Utah-based company that runs the prison.
Skip the chocolate Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month isn’t sweet natalie yezbick Contributing Writer nyezbick@smu.edu February brings to mind love, chocolates, and bouquets of roses, making it the most romantic month of the year. But this month also stands as a time for possibly life-saving education about the dangers of dating. February is Teen Dating Violence Awareness and Prevention month, commonly referred to as Teen DV month, and it’s the college-age population that is often at risk. It’s hard to imagine anything as ugly as domestic violence occurring in the picturesque homes that surround campus, but domestic violence knows no racial, financial,
or geographic bounds. Just a few streets away from SMU, a mother was strangled to death with a lamp cord during a domestic violence dispute less than two decades ago. Stories like that are often told by teens, too. One in three young people will experience some form of dating violence, according to Break the Cycle. Break the Cycle works with the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office to educate people on the prevalence of this specific type of violence. Schools have worked hard to take care of teens who have been victims of dating violence, but TeenDVmonth.org reports that more than 80 percent of school counselors said they were unprepared to handle stories of
abuse from students. This past month, SMUin-Plano hosted a Family Violence Symposium featuring writer Victor Rivas Rivers. He focused on men’s role in domestic violence. That role was ingratiated into the minds of students who went on an Alternative Breaks trip that helped domestic violence survivors. “For little boys, having a negative influence of a dad can often push them down the wrong roads themselves,” Junior Jayce Miller said. Dallas has led the country in starting the discussion on how men can stop the cycle of domestic violence. Mayor Mike Rawlings played a large role in creating Dallas
Courtesy of teendvmonth.org
Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month is February.
Men Against Abuse. As a part of the program, men can pledge to not only not partake in violence, but also to report others who may be hurting their families and to teach young people about the horrors of abuse.
WOMEN
Miller said this trip made him realize that abuse can happen to anyone and that mentoring kids makes a difference. “We can give them goals to strive for the creating of a better tomorrow for everyone, especially victims,” said Miller.
ME ADOWS
Vagina Monologues returns to SMU GENEVIEVE EDGELL SMU Live Contributor gedgell@smu.edu This year’s Vagina Monologues consisted of attention grabbing cleavage, a sex worker’s thigh slapping moans, and vulvas made of tissue paper that lined Hughes Trigg’s Theater. On Friday, Feb. 20, a woman in an “I Heart Vaginas” t-shirt shouted over a crowded room, “Peter, put up the vaginas” before the annual performance began at 8 p.m. Val Erwin, Program Adviser of the Women’s and LGBT Center, stood at the door sporting her bold t-shirt while selling tickets to about 80 attendees. The performance started with select students who took turns acting out a scripted monologue about someone’s experience with their vagina. All true, these stories came from interviews with women from all over the world – from New York City to Bosnia. The word vagina was spoken 89 times during the entire performance. Moving quickly from one script to the next, student Kara Synhorst walked up to the mic and boldly unzipped the front of her fitted leather dress. Her cleavage exposed the c-word written vertically in black marker. Her piece consisted of reclaiming the c-word. Next, another student walked up to the mic, squatted down and seductively slapped her hands on her fish-netted thighs, standing up as her piece spoke about a women’s life as a sex worker who “love[s] making women come.”
Courtesy of Jeremiah Jensen
Cast members of “The Sparrow” make a mad dash for ammo in the impending dodgeball fight.
Courtesy of Genevieve Edgell
Vulvas in pink, red and purple tissue paper lined the front of the stage.
She then acted out the different types of orgasms. One of which was the “college orgasm” that she expressed through moaning loudly while intermittently shouting, “oh I should be studying, oh oh I should be studying.” Although kept light-hearted, the event highlighted sexual violence. In between humorous stories (like how a woman first discovered how to orgasm at 72-yearsold after taking over an hour because of her arthritis) performers listed off disheartening statistics. “Those who are transgender experience
MONOLOGUES page 3
Courtesy of Genevieve Edgell
SMU first year Grace Cury performs a monologue about a woman’s first orgasm at 72 years old.
Behind the curtain Look behind the scenes at SMU’s production, ‘The Sparrow’ Jeremiah jensen Contributing Writer jejensen@smu.edu This story behind a story begins with a scene set in early February, Meadows School of the Arts, room B349. A troupe of actors gathers, not to rehearse, but to play, to make believe. On this night, the troupe is working out one of the musical numbers in their play “The Sparrow,” to be performed Feb. 25 through the first of March. Using everything from a guitar to a glockenspiel, the members of the troupe feel out a sprawling arrangement of Frank Sinatra’s song, “I’ve Got the World on a String.” In one corner of the room, a group splits off to practice the structure of the song. Two other members stand behind a table in the middle of the room, picking out a melody on their ukuleles. Three more, armed with pencils, tap away at a table, learning the percussion break for the piece. As each group of players and singers practices its part of the composition, the director does a gleeful jig in tandem with the music. The atmosphere is light and surprisingly free of stress. “There’s so much energy,” said Ariana Howell, the actress who plays the main character.
“The Sparrow” is a piece written, directed, and set by SMU students and alums, it is an SMU thoroughbred of a play. It mixes themes of grief and isolation with splashes of humor to tell the story of a young woman and a community scarred by a tragic accident. For every main-stage production, for every movie we watch, from Broadway to Bollywood, there is a saga behind the production we see. It is a well-known fact that the production of our entertainment is far from effortless. Directors and actors and crews work for months on end to perfect their piece. Rarely do we stop to appreciate the inner workings of the production. “I was just talking to our set designer, Darren Diggle,” said director Molly Beach Murphy, “and I asked him, ‘how many hours do you think we’ve spent talking about this play?’ and he said, ‘easily over a hundred.’” Murphy, a graduate of SMU’s department, and Juliana Dellasanta, a sophomore theater major, are collectively putting countless hours into the production of the show, coordinating creative desires and corralling schedules. The atmosphere they have created together is one of the defining parts of this play. The freedom Murphy promotes
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