11/8 Phoenix

The Official Campus Newspaper of Swarthmore College Since 1881 VOL. 136, ISSUE 10

The Phoenix THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

FOUR MORE YEARS

TODAY: Party cloudy. Intervals of clouds and sunshine. High 45, Low 31.

TOMORROW: Chance of rain, wind.

High 51, Low 38.

SWARTHMOREPHOENIX.COM

Sandy Devastates Swattie’s Homes

Students Unite Across Campus Tuesday Evening to Watch Election Coverage

NY and NJ Students’ Families Affected By Hurricane

By SARAH COE-ODESS News Writer

Most Americans and people worldwide have depended on devastating photos, videos, and news stories to know the details of last week’s Hurricane Sandy. Many Swarthmore students have used the campus’ 18-hour power outage and the anomaly of twoday class cancellation as proof that the hurricane affected the College. For several unfortunate students, though, the effects of Hurricane Sandy extend beyond its impact on campus.

Nicole Vanchieri ’13, a New York resident from the Rockaways, is among the students whose families were hurt significantly by the hurricane.

“The hurricane hit everybody in my neighborhood very hard,” she said. “Our house, like every other house in the neighborhood, had the entire basement flooded to the point where everything will need to be removed and thrown out. Our sliding glass door and front door blew into the house early on in the storm, which resulted in a lot of debris and broken glass to fill the first floor.”

Vanchieri’s parents did not evacuate, although they were fully prepared with clothes and documents in case of an emergency.

Despite the damage done to her house, Vanchieri’s family was lucky compared to the majority of her neighborhood; several houses only a block away from hers burned down.

Michaela Shuchman ’16, whose family lives in Philadelphia but has a house in Longport, New Jersey, also experienced the physical effects of Hurricane Sandy. While her house in Philadelphia incurred similar inconveniences to what Swarthmore experienced, the ocean water ruined her shore house’s deck and furniture. Shuchman predicts it will be years before the town fully recovers from the hurricane.

“I didn’t think that seeing pictures of a house pretty much destroyed that I had grown up in would affect me very much, but then I remember the memories and how it won’t ever look like that again,” she said. “This summer definitely will not be the same as other summers. Some of our friends’ houses are wrecks so we probably won’t see them down there for a while, and the whole ‘look’ of the town is different. It’s unclear whether we’ll even be able to live in the house, if there still is a house, this summer.”

Continued on Page 4

Alumni Join MJ Efforts

By CHI ZHANG News Writer

As of today, about 100 alumni of varying class years have signed the Alumni Petition for Fossil Fuel Divestment. Started by Swarthmore Mountain Justice, a student organization working on ending various forms of fossil fuel extraction, especially mountaintop removal coal mining, the petition aims to persuade the College to divest from the fossil fuel industry, a goal that the group pursued for the last two years.

This is the first time Mountain Justice has reached out to alumni, but they believe that the “Alumni Petition is a simple, but powerful way for Swarthmore alumni to show that they care about how Swarthmore’s endowment is invested, and that they would like to see that money supporting environmentally responsible causes,” said Patrick Walsh ’14, a member of the group. The petition started on September 5 of this year and is still welcoming Swarthmore alumni to sign it.

ADRIANA OBIOLS/PHOENIX STAFF

Students streamed election coverage from their dorms Tuesday night (above), while others watched the results from a campus location, such as the third floor of Trotter Hall (below).

Continued on Page 3

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

NEWS EARLY DECISION JUST A WEEK AWAY

LIVING & ARTS ‘WHY WRITE’ ... AND WHY ATTEND LECTURES?

OPINIONS OBAMA WINS REELCTION

CLOSE

SPORTS VOLLEYBALL ADVANCES TO ECAC TOURNAMENT

The Admissions Office is preparing for the November 15th Early Decision deadline, which will bring several hundred college applications of students whose first choice is Swarthmore. Page 3

Zadie Smith’s lecture is just one of many offered in the Tri-Co featuring renowned authors, poets, and essayists. So why did “Why Write” draw the largest crowd last night?

Page 9

Tyler mourns Governor Romney’s failure to win the Presidency and expresses concern that the 2012 campaign season set a new standard for negative campaigning and divisiveness. Page 15

After a loss in the Centennial semifinals to Johns Hopkins on Saturday, volleyball earns a place and third seed in the eight-team ECAC South Region tournament — their fourth consecutive time. Page 17

PAGE 2

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix MARCUS MELLO, Editor in Chief MENGHAN JIN, Managing Editor The News Section KOBY LEVIN, Editor AMANDA EPSTEIN, Assistant Editor News Writers NEHMAT KAUR CHI ZHANG

DANIEL BLOCK SARAH COE-ODESS ANNA GONZALES

The Living & Arts Section STEVEN HAZEL, Editor ALLI SHULTES, Assistant Editor GABRIELA CAMPOVERDE, Columnist AKURE IMES, Columnist DEBORAH KRIEGER, Columnist BRAD LENOX, Columnist VIANCA MASUCCI, Columnist KIERAN REICHERT, Columnist LANIE SCHLESSINGER, Columnist DAVID TOLAND, Columnist ZOE WRAY, Columnist SAM ZHANG, Columnist ELIZABETH KRAMER, Artist RENU NADKARNI, Artist PRESTON COOPER, Puzzlemaster Living & Arts Writers TAYLOR HODGES AXEL KODAT

JEANNETTE LEOPOLD MAYRA TENORIO

ZHENGLONG ZHOU/PHOENIX STAFF

The Opinions Section PRESTON COOPER, Editor PATRICK AMMERMAN, Columnist TYLER BECKER, Columnist SEAN BRYANT, Columnist DANIELLE CHARETTE, Columnist AARON KROEBER, Columnist HARSHIL SAHAI, Columnist The Sports Section DANIEL DUNCAN, Editor ROY GREIM, Writer JENNI LU, Writer SCOOP RUXIN, Columniar JAMES IVEY, Columnist

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Swimming Makes Big Splash in Season Opener | Page 16

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News

Institute for the Liberal Arts: Swarthmore Secures Funding For The Institute’s First Two Years

Almost a year after the strategic plan to implement an Institute for the Liberal Arts was announced, Swarthmore has secured two years’ worth of funding for the project. PAGE 5

Living & Arts The Dramaturg and the Director: Inside “The Intense Fragility” and “The Importance of Being Earnest” Theater guru Jeanette Leopold previews this weekend’s student performances written by Oscar Wilde and Kari Olmon ’13, respectively. PAGE 7

Tom Uttech: Art without An Artist

Arts columnist Deborah Kriegar reviews exhibitions at the List Gallery and McCabe by Tom Uttech, an photographer and painter who claims that he’s not an artist. PAGE 8

A Letter To A Friend

Columnist Vianca Masucci writes to X with words of

support after leaving an abusive relationship. PAGE 10

Dear Nestor

Nestor responds to a reader who feels to compelled to cheat on her romantic partners. How do you get others’ forgiveness when you can’t seem to forgive yourself? PAGE 10

Bibliobabble: Pulitzer Prize 2010

Literature lover Lanie Schlessinger disagrees with the committee’s decision to award “Tinkers” the accolade two years ago. PAGE 12

Can You Dig It?: Tattoo Talk

EVS Technician David Toland reminds students that “there’s fun to be had” and that the best moment for living your bucket list is now. PAGE 12

Opinons Staff Editorial

President Obama narrowly but decisively wins reelection; the Phoenix offers him recommendations for how to approach his second term. PAGE 14

Tuesday Night a Victory for Individual Liberty

Aaron Kroeber commends voters in states across the nation for approving ballot initiatives to legalize

marijuana and same-sex marriage, arguing that these are important steps toward greater individual liberty.

PAGE 15

Sports Being A Fan About More Than Winning Championships

Jamie Ivey doesn’t get why supporting a smaller team means you are a hipster; if anything, it’s better than being a fairweather fan attracted by championships.

PAGE 18

Men’s Soccer Stumbles in Conference Final

Swarthmore advanced to the Centennial final with a chance for an NCAA tournament spot, but earned an at-large bid despite its loss. PAGE 19

Field Hockey Earns Surprise Playoff Berth

The Garnet make the ECAC South Region tournament despite a 9-8 regular season record, falling to Stevens in the opening round. PAGE 20

News

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

PAGE 3

The Phoenix

Early Decision a Week Away

Admissions Office Prepares to Receive Hundreds of Applications

By DAN BLOCK News Writer

One week from today, several hundred high school students from across the globe who are set on Swarthmore will click “submit” on the Common Application. They will begin this year’s admissions process at Swarthmore as the college’s first round of early decision applicants.

For those who have forgotten, Swarthmore College, like most small, selective, liberal arts colleges, offers two ways for potential students to apply: early decision or regular decision. Early decision is recommended for students who feel that Swarthmore is their clear first choice. It binds a student to attend if admitted (barring financial reasons), but also statistically increases the likelihood that they will get in.

Jim Bock, the dean of admissions, explained that having early decision is helpful to both the college and students. “We compete with some really great schools, and we want to give students the advantage of having a first choice. But, if they have that, we want them to commit to Swarthmore,” he said, adding that it gives the college a competitive advantage, especially considering that as an applicant pool, the students who apply early decision are often the strongest applicants the college receives. “Early decision works in the college’s favor,” Bock said. “It helps us build a class.”

While the Admissions Office is not yet sure how many students will submit early applications at the end of next week, they do not expect any major changes from past years. “Hopefully, we’ll get several hundred, which is what we normally get,” Bock said.

Swarthmore, like most peer institutions, has two rounds of early decision. Students who want to be in the first, and larger pool must submit their application by November 15th, while those applying through winter early decision must apply by January 1st, along with regular decision applicants.

Bock said that the reason the school has two rounds of early decision is that some people who have selected Swarthmore as their first choice may not feel ready or be able to apply by November 15th.

“It’s an access question,” he said. “Many students who might find us as a first choice college may or may not have the ability to

Dean of Admissions Jim Bock reviews paperwork in his office.

get together an application by November 15th, or to put their best foot forward, so it is better to submit by January 1st.” There are students who use early decision two as a means of furthering their admissions odds after getting rejected from another school early decision one, something Bock says the office is aware of. But Bock says that does not affect the admissions calculus.

“We have no way of knowing that,” he said.

Still, more November early decision applicants are admitted than those applying for the second round. “Typically, we take more than a third fall early decision applicants and roughly 20% of our winter early decision candidates,” said Bock. This compared to the approximately 13% admitted regular decision for the class of 2016, which yielded an overall admit rate of fourteen percent. But Bock credits the difference in part to the relative strength of the applicant pools, especially when accounting for the the discrepancy between the Fall and January early decision rates. “Our fall early decision pool is typically quantitatively stronger,” said Bock. “There is no disadvantage

‘Alums Join MJ’, continued from page 1 As of today, about 100 alumni of varying class years have signed the Alumni Petition for Fossil Fuel Divestment. Started by Swarthmore Mountain Justice, a student organization working on ending various forms of fossil fuel extraction, especially mountaintop removal coal mining, the petition aims to persuade the College to divest from the fossil fuel industry, a goal that the group pursued for the last two years.

This is the first time Mountain Justice has reached out to alumni, but they believe that the “Alumni Petition is a simple, but powerful way for Swarthmore alumni to show that they care about how Swarthmore’s endowment is invested, and that they would like to see that money supporting environmentally responsible causes,” said Patrick Walsh ’14, a member of the group. The petition started on September 5 of this year and is still welcoming Swarthmore alumni to sign it.

Swarthmore has invested in a list of “Sordid Sixteen” domestic fossil fuel companies including ExxonMobil, Chevron, Arch Coal, Halliburton, Patriot Coal and others.

“We would like the college to take its money out of sixteen of the worst coal, oil and gas extraction companies,” Walsh said.

“A mass divestment movement can both harm these corporations’ bottom lines, and delegitimize them in the court of public opinion, aiding local communities’ efforts to reclaim their land, health, and economies,” reads the petition.

“These investments are unconscionable,” Ken Hechler ‘35, who served nine terms in Congress, four terms as Secretary of State of West Virginia, and is a leader in the antimountaintop removal movement, wrote in a supporting letter, “One just has to look at the damage of hydrofracking in Western Pennsylvania, mountaintop removal mining in Southern West Virginia and the oil spill in the Gulf. Some of these areas are home to Swarthmore students and their

RAISA REYES/PHOENIX STAFF

to applying Fall early or Winter early. It’s just a different deadline,” he emphasized.

This year, as a result of Hurricane Sandy, many schools have pushed back their early decision deadline. Swarthmore, however, has opted not to. As Bock explained, most of the schools who have pushed back their early decision deadline originally had it on November 1st, not November 15th, which the admissions office felt gave students enough time without an extension.

“I don’t want to encourage people not to meet the deadline,” Bock added. He did say, however, that the school would work on a case-by-case basis with students who are having difficulty meeting the deadline as a result of the storm.

Some schools, unlike Swarthmore, have early action applications in place of early decision. Early action, like early decision, allows students to get an early response from the college. But unlike early decision, it is nonbinding.

Patrick Trainor ’16, applied to Swarthmore early decision and early action to the University of Chicago. “Chicago and

families.”

In the letter, Hechler urges the College to take actions.

“I am writing to tell you it cannot be the sole job of students to advocate for the common good,” Hechler wrote, “To truly be a social justice institution, Swarthmore must practice what it preaches: it is time for President Chopp and the Board of Managers to live up to Swarthmore’s founding ideals and historic principles by ending its investments in unjust and harmful fossil fuel companies.”

“We have a number of supporters who would write similar letters,” said Hannah Jones ’12, a former member of Mountain Justice. According to the petition, the divestment movement can “both harm these corporations’ bottom lines, and delegitimize them in the court of public opinion, aiding local communities’ efforts to reclaim their land, health, and economies.”

“As a member of the community, and as a potential donor to the college, I want to make sure that my donation is not getting invested in companies that are poisoning our air and water, fueling climate change, and corrupting our political system,” said Jones.

Mountain Justice plans to reach out to alumni who have signed the petition and figure out other ways for them to support this divestment campaign. One possible option, according to Walsh, is “to have interested alumni writing personal letters to President Chopp.”

Jones hopes the petition can demonstrate to the administration that it’s not just students, but a range of people from the Swarthmore community that worry about this issue. “I am hoping that alumni voices will be particularly powerful because it is they that supply much of the money in the first place. They should have a say in how that money is invested,” Jones said.

“The fossil fuel industry’s stranglehold on politicians will not yield unless we speak with our dollars,” said Jones.

“We have the hottest summer on record, a devastating hurricane, and Greenland is melting away.” However, the presidential race, during which climate change was barely mentioned, makes Jones feel that “nothing will happen to

Swarthmore were my top two,” Trainor explained. I really wanted to know if I could get into Chicago, and I wanted to know right away if Swat didn’t work out.”

Trainor was admitted to both, an experience that he found, at first, frustrating. “I was upset because I had already made a decision,” he said. But eventually, he decided applying early decision was the right move.

“After I rationalized a little bit, I realized I was happy with Swat, and I would have picked it over Chicago again.”

“I really want to know who is committed to Swarthmore early, so I make it a binding commitment,” said Bock, explaining why Swarthmore has early decision and not early action. “You’re finding out early, but it’s creating a lot of applications from folks who may not truly be interested.”

In addition, it is a size trend. “Most small schools have early decision. Most large schools have early action,” he said.

The early decision process attracts candidates with a variety of different extracurricular activities and skills. But athletic recruits are among the applicants who most frequently take advantage of Swarthmore’s early decision process. Adam Hertz, the director of athletics, estimated that roughly half of recruits apply early. “I’d say right now it’s an even split,” he said.

Bock agreed, although he added that it “depends on the year.” He cited coaches as the reason that recruits are more likely than others to apply early. “They have an advocate in the system,” he said.

Hertz said that, provided a student has decided that Swarthmore is their first choice, the athletic department might encourage them to apply early. “We let them know the early decision option might be something they want to consider.”

But he added that early decision was not used as a means of tying down potential athletes. “I don’t think we want to put pressure on anybody who hasn’t decided they want to be here.”

Regardless of being recruited, Hertz added, athletes applying to Swarthmore do it for more than sports-related reasons.

“Students want to come to Swarthmore because of its academic reputation and their intellectual curiosity.”

Bock agreed, and felt that is true for all applicants. “Most people don’t apply to Swarthmore on a whim, and I think that’s doubly true with early decision.”

combat climate change in the political sphere unless we demonstrate that we have financial pull.”

The Alumni Petition is just one of the many parts of Mountain Justice’s efforts to encourage the College’s divestment from the fossil fuel industry. There is a student petition, which received over 700 signatures this spring, still open to students. Next Sunday, November 17, the group will be speaking at an event in Philadelphia and Swarthmore students can attend at no cost. At the event, Bill McKibben, an environmentalist, author and journalist, will talk about the environmental movement and the need for colleges like Swarthmore to divest.

The group also brought many powerful voices to campus, including speakers such as the late Larry Gibson, who opposes mountaintop removal coal mining (MTR) in Appalachia, and a panel discussion about divestment that included Ellen Dorsey, the executive director of the Wallace Global Fund, whose mission is to promote socially responsible actions to protect the environment.

Recently, Mountain Justice held a “Speak-Out” rally with other three Swarthmore student organizations: Students for Peace and Justice in Palestine, Swarthmore Labor Action Project, and Swatties for a DREAM. “Students can do a lot to promote divestment,” said Walsh, “One very simple thing students can do is to talk to their friends about fossil fuel divestment, and to spread the word.”

Walsh suggested students can also write letters to President Chopp or members of the Board of Managers and talk to their parents about divestment and encourage them to write letters to the College as well. “If students are uncomfortable with emailing the group as a whole, I encourage people to talk individually to a member of Mountain Justice they know, or if you don’t know any of them, email or talk to me,” said Walsh.

Jones is currently helping other schools in the area start their own divestment campaigns. “The more colleges that join, the more powerful this movement will be,” said Jones, “There are already 50 schools pushing for divestment, and this is just the beginning.”

PAGE 4

‘Hurricane Sandy,’ continued from page 1

News

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

An aerial view of the Rockaways in New York, where a fire destroyed dozens of houses in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. High winds and flooding damaged the home of Michaela Shuchman ‘16.

“Fortunately, though we lost a few trees Long Island resident Ian Lukaszewicz ’15 is another student whose memories will be af- that damaged some property, my family was fected by the destruction of Hurricane Sandy. generally prepared for the storm because of With no chimney, one room ruined, and a di- Irene [and] the snowstorm last year,” Madasheveled backyard, his house still lacks power rasz said. “We had gotten all our dead trees and, consequently, heat. This made it difficult removed since there was so much damage for him to contact his family directly after the during those last two storms.”

Although Madarasz’s house was not drasstorm. It could be several more days before his family regains power. Similar to Vanch- tically affected, Hurricane Sandy still impacts ieri’s home, Lukaszewicz’s house did not en- her family; her two younger sisters have been out of school for counter as much over a week, and damage as many her parents canpeople he knew not go to work who lived close by. because of poor “It’s weird to I feel so blessed that none of conditions. see pictures of my family or any of my friends road Rizzo’s younger my friend’s house sister, too, has and know that down there were in the town been out of school I’ve been there a during the storm ... Houses, for a week. Three lot,” he said. “One blocks adjacent to of my friends lost streets and foliage can be the Rizzos’ vacahis backyard, and replaced, but people cannot. tion house were that’s where we evacuated, but hang out every Michaela Shuchman ’16 their block was summer.” not. While Rizzo’s Dominic Rizzo family did not see ’15 and Emma the worst of the Madarasz ’15, both New Jersey residents whose families hurricane, the natural disaster still impacted were lucky enough not to experience any seri- him emotionally.

“The destruction my family described has ous hurricane effects, are still without power been unfathomable,” he said. “I didn’t realand heat as well.

ize how bad the storm was at first because we weren’t really affected here at Swat. The horror stories of children being swept out of the arms of their mothers by the water and entire neighborhoods being obliterated obviously hit hard anytime, but have a special impact when the tragedy happens close to home.”

Rizzo is not the only student who was affected emotionally.

“I feel so blessed that none of my family or any of my friends down there were in the town during the storm, but just thinking about ‘what if ’ is scary,” Shuchman said.

“Houses, streets and foliage can be replaced, but people cannot.”

In response to the hurricane, Vanchieri decided to take action. She has collected clothes, cleaning supplies, batteries, and other

TCNJ | Leads the Way It’s your move.

www.tcnj.edu/gs Or call 609.771.2300

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materials, which she plans to donate to those in need. She spent this past weekend in New York, giving supplies to friends who lost their homes.

“I was motivated to collect donations because every single house and family I know from my neighborhood has sustained extreme damages,” she said. “Each person must get rid of their entire basement. People are in great need now, and I feel a personal responsibility to give back to the community that gave me such a wonderful childhood.”

Although Vanchieri is grateful to everyone who has already helped her, she still encourages everyone to help and donate supplies and money to charities such as the American Red Cross. Visit http://www.redcross.org/pa/ philadelphia/donate to contribute.

Graduate Studies

Find out more by visiting

A closeup of fire damage in the Rockaways.

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News

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

PAGE 5

The Phoenix

Week in Pictures

Institute For The Liberal Arts Secures Funding

By NEHMAT KAUR News Writer

SwaTango hosted its first milonga of the year in Upper Tarble.

Swatties head to Sharples for the Halloween party last Saturday in full costume.

YENNY CHEUNG/PHOENIX STAFF

ZHENGLONG ZHOU/PHOENIX STAFF

SADIE RITTMAN/PHOENIX STAFF

Dancer Kyle Abraham offered a master class to Swatties Tuesday afternoon in the LPAC Troy Dance Studio.

Phoenix staffers being creative with newspapers, as usual.

CHRISTOPHER CAPRON FOR THE PHOENIX

In keeping with its reputation as a leading liberal arts college, Swarthmore announced its intention to create a new Institute for the Liberal Arts in its strategic plan, which came out in December 2011. Barely a year later, the college has secured a grant of $250,000 from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations to see the Institute through its first two years.

One of the three stated goals of the Institute shows its aim is to keep the liberal arts education relevant and expand it at Swarthmore, in the United States and around the world in general. Philip Jefferson, Centennial Professor of Economics and a Committee Member of the Institute spoke about the need for such an institute, saying “The Institute will meet the need of having an advocate for the liberal arts.

In recent years there has been a stress on instrumental learning and the role of liberal learning has been called into question.

Having a place that will allow Swarthmore to project the values of a liberal arts education is extremely important.”

Jefferson spoke about the process of going from having a stated goal to actually procuring the grant. President Rebecca Chopp spoke to the Foundation and invited representatives to spend a day on campus, where they met and interacted with faculty and administrators alike. The visit included a dinner, during which attendees discussed the College and Foundation’s plans for the Institute’s future. Among the attendees were the Institute’s Committee members.

Jefferson also added that President Chopp deserved a great deal of credit for identifying the grant as a potential resource and acting on the opportunity quickly; he also commended the excellence of the college community that induced the Foundation to provide the grant.

As the Institute is starting up, it’s firing up the faculty and students with new offerings.

Jefferson described the experiences of the faculty: “It’s a very exciting venture which promises to enthuse the faculty in discussions that go across disciplinary boundaries. We’ve already started workshops and reading groups and there’s an energy that’s invigorating the community.

The expectation is that this energy will continue to grow.” He expects the faculty’s experiences to inform the way that professors structure and teach their courses, directly impacting student life at Swarthmore.

The economics professor outlined the intended and expected impact on students.

Besides providing more ways for students to work more closely with alumni, the Institution will allow for more non-traditional interactions with faculty, including extended opportunities for research and internships. He added that student learning would expand beyond the classroom and facilitate a way of learning that will be more suited to how people learn in the real world.

As part of this, the Institute has already hosted the Second Student Science Cafe, a symposium about Jonathan Haidt’s “The Righteous Mind,” and interdisciplinary research on the financial crisis of 2008, among other initiatives.

Craig Earley ’16, who attended the second installment of the symposium this past Sunday, shared his thoughts about the Institute and the symposium. “The way I’ve always understood it, a liberal arts education is about genuinely learning rather than just consuming. The symposium this week helped to explore the ideas of Haidt’s book rather than just take them in. It gave me an idea of how to think about ideas critically, so that we can understand them and their broader context. The subject was fascinating enough, and hearing the panelists’ perspective on it was quite enlightening to me.”

On a concluding note, Jefferson voiced his and the other Committee members’ hopes for the new Institute, saying it will lead to new ways of learning, thinking and serving.

PAGE 6

Living & Arts

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

Campaign Coverage:

Post-Election, America Confronted By the Unknown As media analysts from Karl Rove to James Fallows predicted, the outcome of Tuesday’s election has already had a profound impact on the American economy.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics has reported one of the sharpest spikes in unemployment in history, with the overall unemployment rate jumping from 7.9 percent on election day to more than 9 percent two days later. A spokesperson suggested that the increase, the largest two-day spike since the federal government began collecting data, has come from the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs in the media industry.

“What do we even talk about anymore?” said David Brooks, a former columnist for the STEVEN New York Times.

HAZEL “I wrote articles about liking moderThe Squashed ate Mitt Romney, I Tomato wrote articles about disliking an ultraconservative Romney, and I wrote articles about writing articles about the election — what can possibly be more fascinating?”

“Is it too soon to cover Clinton 2016?” added Brooks.

On Wednesday evening, President Obama announced a new stimulus package that will disperse around $2 billion over the next year to those hardest hit by the post-election recession: pundits and journalists.

“In 2009, I tried a $825 billion stimulus that seemed to work but nobody really liked,” said a tired-sounding Obama. “This year, [Mitt Romney and I] collectively spent less than 1 percent of that, but everyone in the country has been talking about Tuesday’s election for months.”

“I’m hereby asking Congress to pass the 2012 Election Relief Act, which will mandate a general election each

November, every year, by law,” said the President, who added that, “This definitely isn’t a bribe.”

Meanwhile, former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney issued a statement declaring that, “President Obama continues to pursue unsound economic policies that run-up the deficit and ship pundits’ jobs to China.”

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a Romney campaign staffer noted that, “if we’re forced to have an election every year instead of every four, Mitt’s going to run out of money a lot sooner than we thought.”

At Swarthmore, the aftermath of what was for many their first time voting left many students feeling listless about what the future holds.

Sources suggest that the end of election season has already taken its toll on social life at Swarthmore.

At Sharples, students reported having to think of new topics of conversation. “It’s not as easy to get everyone at the table to agree with you just by saying that Romney scares you,” said a junior.

“It’s not even cool to casually reference [statistician] Nate Silver’s ‘538’ blog anymore,” she added.

The Phoenix and the Daily Gazette have not been immune to the pundit recession sweeping the nation as a whole.

A Phoenix news story that attempted to connect a complaint that Swatties had to wait “for at least five minutes” at the polls to national issues of voter disenfranchisement was ignored by editors in favor of a column imagining the inner lives of cats, while an opinion piece that predicted a radical shift in the Republican party failed even to attract the interest of the writer’s parents.

As this paper went to press, the latest reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicate that political satirists are among those hardest hit by the election recession. To make a donation or to suggest fresh material, please visit www.

HURRICANE SANDY: COMIC BY RENU NADKARNI

OUTSIDE the BUBBLE

By CAMI RYDER

First Person Arts Festival

Now–November 17 Various locations in Philadelphia First Person Arts continues its mission of empowering the storyteller within everyone. In its 11th year, the festival, which runs from Nov. 7–17 showcases personal stories and the power of sto- rytelling through theater, writing, film, visual art, dance, stand-up storytelling and more.

Through interactive arts programs and workshops, the public is able to hear and perform art.

First Person Arts will host StorySlams, modeled after poetry slams, and writing workshops, as well as events with art celebrities.

Philadelphia’s Poet Laureate Sonia Sanchez will host COURTESY OF BLOGS.PHILADELPHIAWEEKLY.COM a memoir writing workshop for women on Sunday Nov. 11.

For a full list of events, as well as ticket prices, please visit http://www.firstpersonarts.org.

Philadelphia Asian American Film Festival Now–November 17 Various locations in Philadelphia

The Philadelphia Asian American Film & Filmmakers organization is hosting their fifth annual film festival, present a rich array of films and short films that “celebrate and elevate the Asian American experience.” Founded in 2008, the PAAFF aims at highlighting Asian American filmmakers, actors and artists, as well as exposing the Philadelphia area to the art and culture about Asian Americans. From Nov. 7–17, PAAFF will be featuring over 20 films, documentaries and short films, as well as events and parties. This Saturday, Nov. 10 is the Asian Americans in Hollywood event, hosted at the International House of Philadelphia. The free event features a panel discussion with Asian American filmmaers and actors working in the industry, including Booboo Stewart (“Twilight Saga”), Sarovar COURTESY OF DGUIDES.COM Banka (“A Decent Arrangement”) and BD Wong (“Law & Order: SVU”). Wong will also be honored at the event. For a full list of films, descriptions, ticket and location information, visit http://www.phillyasianfilmfest.org.

“Beyond Crossover” Performance by David Krakauer November 9 at 8 p.m.

Thomas Great Hall, Bryn Mawr College

Clarinetist David Krakauer will perform for Bryn Mawr’s Performing Arts Series this Friday, Nov. 9 at 8 p.m. Krakauer will be joined by pianist Kathleen Tagg and accordionist Will Holshouser in a performance of “Beyond Crossover,” a recital that will features compositions by classical composers Leos Janácek, Johannes Brahms, Olivier Messiaen, Steve Reich and Claude Debussy. Kraukauer will also perform traditional klezmer music (musical tradition of dance and instrumental pieces of Ashkenazic Jews), including “Doina,” “Der Gasn Nign,” and “Der Heyser Bulgar.” Tickets are $10 for stu.COM dents and $20 for general admission.

MICMUSIC OF ABRAHA SY TE UR CO The performance will be held in the Thomas Great Hall.

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

Living & Arts

PAGE 7

The Phoenix

The Director

Patrick Ross on “The Importance of Being Earnest”

The Dramaturg Kari Olmon on “The Intense Fragility”

By JEANNETTE LEOPOLD Living & Arts Writer

Senior Kari Olmon’s dramaturgy thesis project, a staged reading of her original play, “The Intense Fragility,” will be performed Friday, November 9 and Saturday, November 10 at 7 p.m. in the LPAC Frear.

COURTESY OF PATRICK ROSS

Caroline Batten, Cole Turner, Sasha Rojavin, Michelle Johnson, Allison McKinnon and Preston Cooper rehearse in Bond Hall.

By JEANNETTE LEOPOLD Living & Arts Writer Patrick Ross is directing “The Importance of Being Earnest,” by Oscar Wilde; the play will be performed this Saturday, November 10 at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. and at 2 p.m. on Sunday in Bond.

Jeannette Leopold: Patrick, could you summarize “The Importance of Being Earnest?”

Patrick Ross: The play is about Jack Worthing (Caroline Batten ’14) and his struggle with identity, which is demonstrated literally in his confusion with his name. Everyone is under the impression that his name is Ernest, hence the title, and all of the comedy is derived from that.

JL: So, it’s a comedy, then?

PR: Definitely. Yesterday I found myself laughing so loudly that I had to leave the room while I was directing. I’ve been working with it for a couple of months, so the fact that I still find it that funny is a testament to the playwright.

JL: Is there any meaning in the play aside from humor? Not that there has to be.

PR: The short answer is — yes. If there is meaning to be derived from any theater, and of course there is. Mostly it’s a lot of self-discovery, but it’s done in a hilarious,

farcical way. So that you don’t know that it’s profound.

JL: Why did you decide to do the show in Bond?

PR: Lots of it was logistics. What space could we get that we didn’t have to share.

The aesthetics of it are also very appropriate to the show, which is set in Victorian England.

JL: You mentioned that Caroline Batten is playing Jack Worthing. Why did you choose to cross-gender cast?

PR: Mostly, it was that there were three ladies who I really wanted to play Cecily and Gwendolen, the female leads, and I didn’t know how to compromise that. I didn’t want to exclude any of them because they auditioned extremely well. I picked Caroline because I knew she could do it, and because I knew it would be a fun challenge. Plus, since the play is about identity, it adds another layer to this man not knowing who he is.

JL: Has she risen to the challenge?

PR: Absolutely. She needs man pants to do it — that’s what we call them. They’re just shorts. I’m very pleased.

JL: Other than the reasons you’ve mentioned, why will Swarthmore students enjoy this production?

PR: There are two gay make-outs and a 6’6” guy in a maid’s outfit.

Jeannette Leopold: Kari, would you give a synopsis of your play?

Kari Olmon: I’ll give you my Facebook summary: In January of 1919, celebrated Russian dancer Vaslav Nijinsky gives his final ballet performance and begins the diary that will chronicle his descent into madness. In 1936 St. Louis, Rose Williams — beloved sister to renowned playwright Tennessee Williams — discovers Nijinsky’s diary and dreams of escaping into his world. Separated by every possible spatial, temporal and social barrier, the virtuosic dancer and the secluded sister have one thing in common: both are suspected of a peculiar and precocious dementia that terrifies and repulses their families who will do anything — anything — to contain them. A play about desire, madness, and the legacy of art, “The Intense Fragility” imagines an encounter outside the slipstream of history that brings two people together in the realm of the subjunctive where anything is possible and fantasy becomes reality.

JL: So, what is dramaturgy?

KO: I consider the dramaturg sort of the interpreter of the play, the person who is a go-between for the director and the playwright. The dramaturg’s primary task is to do the text the greatest possible justice while assisting the director in achieving his or her vision to the greatest possible extent.

JL: How does a dramaturgy thesis work?

KO: In the case of this particular project, I needed to adapt a non-theatrical text into a theatrical text.

JL: How is a dramaturgy thesis different from a playwriting or directing

thesis?

KO: The genesis is different from a playwriting thesis in that I had to start with a non-theatrical text. However, the result should appear similar in that my goal was to create a text that stands alone, guided by research but not dependant on it. In contrast to a directing or acting thesis, the production elements in a dramaturgy thesis are downplayed, because the emphasis is supposed to be on the words. My goal is for the words to be heard and understood as clearly as possible, whereas in a directing thesis the aim is a unified whole that privileges other jobs, such as design and acting, just as much as the writing.

JL: Why did you choose Williams and Nijinsky?

KO: Honestly, it was sort of an accident. I was scoping out a wide range of potential course texts, and I stumbled across a bizarre one-act by Williams. It was a play that dramatized an encounter between a disturbed young woman and the apparition of Nijinsky. With a little research, I discovered many similarities that the young woman had to Williams’ sister.

JL: How many hours do you think you’ve put into this project?

KO: I’ve been working on it for a little under a year now. I started research last winter break, then spent all of the spring semester writing a first draft.

Over the summer and through the fall rehearsal process I’ve been working on that draft. I’m currently on my eighth draft, and there will be a new one by Friday. I can’t estimate how many hours exactly — a lot.

JL: Why should students come to see this?

KO: It’s an exciting opportunity to be part of the process of developing new theater. Even though this is the final component of my thesis work, I expect to keep revising it after this benchmark. The audience can look at this as a laboratory environment where any feedback will help me develop my work for the future.

COSTUME CONTEST Submit your photos to the Phoenix’s First Annual Halloween Costume Contest!

Alternatively, embarass your friends by submitting their photos. We’ll publish our top three picks in next wEek’s issue. Applicants will be evaluated on their creativity, facial symmetry and intoxication level. Please blot out any and all open beverage containers.

ALL PHOTOS BY ZHENGLONG ZHOU/PHOENIX STAFF

PAGE 8

Living & Arts

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

Relationship Reflections: Columnists Answer All Confidential To A Friend Rebuilding Confidence, Self-Love After an Abusive Relationship

I was very upset when I received your letter this week, X. I had no idea that this was what you’ve been going through for the last two years. I apologize for not being a more attentive friend; I truly was clueless.

But, now that you’ve ended this volatile relationship, I want to assure you that you are doing the right thing.

You were dating an emotionally abusive guy. The way he isolated you from your friends and constantly degraded and belittled you is indicative of that. His intention was to make you emotionally dependent on him and ruin your self-esteem. Why did he do it? Because he was afraid you would leave him and he wanted you to feel like you could never do that. Because you are a wonderful person who everyone loves/wants/ wants to be and it made him insecure about himself. Because he wanted to make you just as vulnerable as he is. Because he’s a dick.

Whatever his reasons VIANCA are, they were his own MASUCCI and they had nothing to do with you. In fact, Missing Parts his insecurity was developed long before he met you and he’ll probably carry it long after you.

No one should ever say the things he’s said to you or do the things he’s done to you. No one should ever scream at you, threaten you, or intimidate you with demonstrations of his physical strength. He may have never physically harmed you but he has caused you some severe psychological damage with this behavior. He’s made you question your abilities, doubt your beauty, and lose faith in yourself. This is one of highest forms of betrayal from a lover. We live in a society in which fat cats profit from the insecurities of women with their multibillion dollar industries that sell us a whole bunch of shit that promises to make us better. More desirable, more physically appealing, closer to a ridiculous standard of beauty. You lover should be your salvation from all these things. He should make you feel beautiful, should reinforce your strengths, and encourage you to overcome your insecurities. If he doesn’t, you are much better alone. We women have enough people trying to put us down, tell us what to be, look like, what to want. You sure as hell don’t need to have the ‘closest person to our heart’ do the same.

X, you are undoubtedly one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met. When I’m around you, I can’t help but smile because you are happiness incarnate. I’m envious of how amazingly intelligent and talented you are. I love your creative eye because you imagine the world in such a fanciful way. I aspire to be as “I don’t give a shit” as you. I heart your clothes. And most of all, I fancy the way that you can make a sincere connection with everyone you talk to—like that random guy at subway station that had a following of cats. Remember? You have the ability of arousing the loveliest of feelings from people because your heart is good and your intentions are always pure.

People feel that positive energy radiating from you and the generosity of your soul.

Basically, you’re the bee’s knees and anyone who says otherwise sucks at life. No, sucks at existence.

It’s a good thing that you’ve dumped that moronic tool. Trust me. You may feel as though you ‘sunk’ two years into this relationship and nothing has come of it.

However, realize that you’ve gained very valuable experience from this. You were able to notice this behavior pattern of his that was harmful and free yourself from it.

Many people in your position blame them-

selves—this type of treatment conditions them to do that—and don’t leave a relationship like this until every shred of selfesteem they have is gone. Your inclination to ‘make it work’ because of the amount of time you’ve put into the relationship and the fact that you ‘love him’ is normal. In fact, many researchers have proven that romantic love has similar effects on the brain as a drug addiction. This is what’s causing your desire to give it another try. Kick the habit and ignore these feelings. I know, easier said than done. The best thing you can do is distract yourself as much as possible. Do anything that you like, that makes you smile, that you’re somewhat interested in. And, in those times when you can’t help but think about it, talk to someone. Get it out of your head and bounce your ideas off of someone. This will be useful in two ways. Firstly, it will help you get everything off of your chest. Nothing is worse than internalizing the negative and, most likely, self-harming thoughts that you are having.

Secondly, it will give you a second person’s perspective on the situation which is something that I think you really need right now.

I know you said that you’re ‘ashamed’ to talk to your friends. Know that you can always talk to me or find some campus resources that are a little less close to home.

You could always go to CAPS, talk to a student from Speak to Swatties, or get everything out in a journal. However, I don’t want you to feel ashamed. I want you to understand that this situation of yours is

We live in a society in which fat cats profit from the insecurities of women with their multi-billion dollar industries that sell us a whole bunch of shit that promises to make us better... Your lover should be your salvation from all these things. one that many others have faced as well.

What you’ve experienced for the past two years is, unfortunately, not uncommon and I wanted to print this for you so that you know that you’re not having experiencing this in isolation. I want you to be able to casually ask someone what they thought of this article or overhear someone talking about it. Just listen to what that person has to say. I assure you it will make you feel loads better to listen to their rant about how much of a bitchface-jerk they think the guy in this situation is. At the very least, you’ll see just how many people would defend you in this situation or can empathize with what is happening to you. As one of my professors said in class the other day, a lot college relationships a bit twisted. It’s hard to find yourself and date at the same time.

Hell, these things are individually difficult, nevermind together.

Be strong now and realize that you are making the best damned decision you can right now. As our hero Elly says, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” Don’t give it to him, love. Know that you are beautiful, courageous, and a lot better off without him.

Dear Nestor “Cheating Chester” Wants to Change

Dear Nestor, I’m a perpetual cheater. The first time it happened, I thought it was a one-time thing, but I keep finding myself in the same situation. It’s not that I’m unhappy with the people I’m with, it’s just that with that happiness is still a wanting and a sadness. I think it might have something to do with the perfect relationships we read about and see on TV: real life just doesn’t seem satisfying.

The problem is, beyond the obvious cheating itself, is that I honestly dislike who I am as a person because of it. In my head, I’m unbreakable -- I’ve been hurt before, as we all have, and I don’t fear feeling that same hurt again. In my head I’m immune to feelings of guilt and regret. In reality, I have difficulty even feeling worthy of liking someone, and the thought of being open about my past is incomprehensible.

I have trouble considering myself a good person anymore, and this distinction has always defined me. I feel lost and undeserving, but also used and undesirable. I want to be able to move past this and feel ready to form relationships with people, whether platonic or romantic, but keeping such a big part of my past a secret dissuades me from attempting honesty at all. I feel guarded, probably because I’m guarding these secrets, and probably because despite our typical perceptions of cheaters and their agency in relationships, I’ve been hurt badly by the people I’ve been with and people I’ve trusted with my past. I’m also afraid of the cycle repeating.

How do I move on from all of it and learn to like myself again?

Cheating Chester Dear Chester: Thank you for this personal anecdote.

At first, I was thinking about responding and analyzing your behavior, but then it dawned on me: “Why should we continue to tread up the past?”

The analogy that keeps popping through my head right now is a pair of knotted earphones. Sometimes, they can be so absolutely frustrating to untangle. But if we really want to listen to our music, we have to untangle it: whether it is for the quality of the sound, the length of the chord, or simply for aesthetics. I don’t think I am in the minority in thinking: “Wouldn’t it be great to just throw these earphones away, and magically have a new set of untangled earphones appear?” Unfortunately, most of the time we don’t have the ability to do so, with money and/or time constraints to get a new pair. However, the beauty about our behavior is that we can completely change how we conduct ourselves. We can say goodbye to our past behavior and say hello to the new “earphones.”

I say start afresh! From this moment on, all of that is behind you. Now what you have to do is to find ways to overcome new hurdles in our life, I always believe that people can start anew, no matter how many times they screwed up.

There are three foreseeable hurdles that I see reoccurring in starting anew, but I now think you can take them on.

1. Even though you will change your behavior, unfortunately people will still remember how you treated them in the past. In this case, I would suggest you apologize for the pain you have caused them, and assure them that you no longer act in such ways. You may want to go in depth about your road to changing, perhaps what you felt after hurting those around you. This is totally up to you. Trust takes time build. So no matter what, you will have to assume that it will take time for their wounds to heal.

2. You have to first accept the fact that people will hurt you, whether it is a significant other or friend. It is how you deal with that pain that matters.

You have no control over how the people around you will treat us. What you do have control over is yourself. Depending on how they have hurt you, you will have to decide whether they deserve to have a place in your life. You are a human, and deserve to be treated with the utmost respect. Do not tolerate any behavior that will bring you down. Oftentimes, their actions are more of a reflection on them, rather than yourself. Ultimately, we all go through hardship and pain. Remember, what it feels like, and ask yourself: “Would I want to put that onto someone else?”

3. You have to accept yourself: trust yourself, allow yourself to make mistakes, and praise yourself for all your positive attributes (most of us don’t do this, and it is actually incredibly important). One thing that I would just like to compliment you on is your self-awareness. You really appear to know yourself well. This will be very rewarding in the future.

I also want to comment on your use of “good.” Oftentimes, I hear people being called “good or bad.” It seems as if society chooses to place individuals in these artificial boxes. However, we are people, not objects. And even if something or someone were to be considered “bad,” it is so subjective. No one is “good or bad.” There may be actions that are considered to be “bad,” but by using that word you are putting a label on not only your actions, but also yourself.

And we are not labels; we are people composed of many different emotions, thoughts, feelings, and capabilities. You are you!

Ultimately, don’t be afraid to share your past with future friends and significant others. We all have made mistakes. If they judge, it is again more of a reflection on them. If anything, a sharing of your flaws will strengthen your ties.

While breaking this cycle may be hard, in doing so, you will be embarking on a new path. People will begin to appreciate your change, and you will see it in their behavior. Therefore, you will begin to feel better about yourself. And upwards the cycle goes…..

Hope this helps!

Best, Nestor

Living & Arts

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

PAGE 9

The Phoenix

ZHENGLONG ZHOU/ PHOENIX STAFF

Author Zadie Smith spoke to a crowded LPAC yesterday evening.

Why Write? ... And Why Read?

Acclaimed Novelist Zadie Smith Explores the Evolving Drive to Write

By ALI SHULTES Assistant Living & Arts Editor Zadie Smith had her audience pegged from her first moment at the podium in Lang Performing Arts Center at last night’s lecture, “Why Write?” The acclaimed novelist, whose works largely center on themes of identity, had no trouble in relating to the Swarthmore students filling the seats and blocking the upper aisles: written for her own “schizophrenic” students, she sought to deliver a lecture which answered her selfposed question without superficial grandeur or undue humility.

The large attendance at Smith’s lecture is not always the rule at literary events sponsored by this small-but-vibrant branch of the English Literature Department. Fiction writer Daniel Torday, Director of Bryn Mawr’s Creative Writing Program, greeted roughly twenty bodies in the Scheurer Room for his reading last Thursday, of whom professors and Bryn Mawr students contributed a notable volume.

Perhaps this discrepancy in attendance is best explained by the profound identification Smith described people developing with the title “writer.” Perhaps it is explained by Smith’s observations that less people seem to identify with the role of “reader” than they do with “author,” “poet” and “artist.” If, indeed, we are a generation of egocentric individuals standing on street corners, throwing our own claims to literary prowess into an ever-growing cacophony of “I am a writer! I am a writer!” positioning oneself within a community of readership may mark a step away from that strident individualism and creative capacity.

However, the question “why write?” cannot be removed entirely from the question of “why read?”, both within the context of Smith’s lecture and larger logical paradigms that necessitate an audience for the multitudes vying for authorial recognition.

If a novelist is not an artist, but an artisan, and a novel not a novel, but a functional object like a chair, then it seems critical that someone exist to sit in it.

Smith’s discussion of reading, while tangential to her larger focus, paints a rather dismal picture of college-aged textual consumers. Her graduate students forget words in the essays they submit to her because they fail to read their drafts. Students in general are forced to barrel through a novel a week — half as long a time as Smith claims it takes to read a work of the novel’s com-

plexity — in order to keep up with classroom syllabi. “Do they know how to read?”

Smith (jokingly?) admitted to inquiring of her students.

Attendance at Smith’s lecture seems to imply that yes, we do still retain basic literacy skills and an interest in the genre of the novel. Then again, if her initial profile of LPAC’s audience resonates as true — which, based on the delighted laughter that greeted each of her previous descriptions of writers’ lectures (the assessment of the volume of notes, the staring at patterns in the floor titles) seems to be at least partly the case — then one can’t assume that the students filling the seats and aisles of the not-so-drafty room have ever read her work, or read a work, of literature. “You’re a writer, I’m a writer,” she ventriloquized the crowd. And that’s why we all sat in attendance.

Based on interest in the English Department’s spring creative writing workshops, Smith’s supposition that we all strive to embody the “culture figure of excellence” that the author and the poet symbolize appears to hold true for students on Swarthmore’s campus. This year’s submissions to Frost’s fiction-writing workshop have doubled from last year, at approximately 40 students.

Applications to the poetry workshops saw an increase as well.

This increasing population of writers actively underscores the importance of reading, both in the development of one’s own practice and for our society as a whole. “I don’t believe in the death of the novel,” Professor of English Literature Peter Schmidt said in his introduction to Smith’s lecture.

“It’s the dearth of novel-readers that ought to worry us.”

If the size of our community of readers can be evaluated based on attendance at fiction and poetry readings, both on campus and in the Tri-Co, the right word, as Smith hunted for it in relation to one’s sitting down before a computer screen to begin a novel, is not “despair,” or “pointlessness,” but rather, “tolerable.” Or perhaps a phrase: “could be better,” “desiring improvement,” or a mere letter: “B” (no, anywhere else it wouldn’t be an A).

For writers in particular, readings — and their subsequent Q&A sessions — offer important insights into the processes underlying composition, and can inform their own entrance into the field of literature.

“It’s good to ask questions about how a writer arrived at elements of or a complete finished story,” Frost said. “We’re presented with a finished story, but we’re not seeing

anything in there of the process that the writer had to go through to create the story. [We don’t know] how many drafts they went through, how many times they got it wrong … how they found their characters and their story — so I think [Q&A’s are] really useful, precisely to ask those questions.”

Readings themselves seem to produce more mixed feelings. Whereas commentary on process exists outside the realm of the written work, the oration of a story, poem or novel that readers have already experienced in their own internal voices can intrude on individualized interpretations of fiction. As Smith posited individuality as one of the central features of the modern movement to write, this subjugation to authorial intent may underlay resistance to readings.

“Poets read poems and novelists read novels where they almost completely change the meaning of the way I’d read it at first,” Professor of English Literature Rachel Buurma said. “Just from the section of the novel they focus on ... and how they emphasize sentences, you can get a different reading.”

“Some authors perform them,” Buurma added, on the way writers “act out” their selections, “and others, you wish they hadn’t.”

Buurma sees a more central feature of the public reading as collecting a community of readers around an author whose work connects them in ways they may not otherwise experience. In the same way that much of the audience identified as “writers” at last night’s lecture, readers of a particular work — be it “Harry Potter” or “White Teeth” — come to see themselves as part of a larger amalgam of individuals who share the same reading interests.

“Even though reading is [imagined to be] a private activity, it’s never really private,” she said. “You know when holding a printed book — at least, [one written] in this historical moment — that lots of other people have it ... in its material form, it gives a message about the community that’s reading [it] and [that it is] written for. Readings help make that community or reanimate it in a different way — they give a cross-section of a bigger community of readers.”

It was a reliance on a community of readers that allowed Smith to structure her lecture around three writers that have contributed their own answers to the question of “why write?” From Alexander Pope’s assertion that one writes because one is, innately, a writer to George Orwell’s four listed motivations for writing (egoism, aesthetic enthusiasm, historical impulse and

political purpose), Smith presents and critiques theories of past authors to generate her own conclusion: that we write to see things as they are, to reconcile or explore the ambiguity central to the human experience.

In the world she describes, the need to write — as a way to understand, to capture the specificity of human experience in a society so globalized that an omniscient narrator is no longer possible — heralds a return to a smaller scaling, a reclaiming of agency lost in the delegation of the tasks of everyday life to third parties. Writing, under Smith’s description, becomes a hold on individuality in a society content to lump the public together under the umbrella heading of “consumer.”

“Writing looks like freedom,” she said, toeing the line of an earlier promise to restrain from grand and “unnecessary truths” in discussing writing. “[It’s the] freedom not to express, but to escape from the partial, subjective reality in which I live.”

The features of our current age that modern writers must struggle against — the advent of the Internet, the crumbling of copyright laws, and the gradual breakdown of the publishing industry — creates an opportunity for artists to connect with audiences without the go-between of thirdparty mediators, according to Smith, and the multiplicity of described human experience offers opportunities to connect to characters that may not “look” like readers.

Posing a series of statements and questions — “this is how I see the world: do you?” — she models the relation between reader and writer as an individualized and intimate exchange.

For Kieran Reichert ‘13, Smith’s lecture inspired “a shift away from thinking about writing the next Great American Novel” to fulfilling his own artistic goals. “[I want to focus on] making my writing compelling and relatable, and not focused on any arbiter of literary worth,” he said.

Her lecture — intricate, thoughtful and witty — resonated with students who described themselves as artists and those who didn’t.

“I think her talk was incredibly relevant to me — to anyone who makes anything, really,” Sarah Diamond ’13, an artist, said.

“Mostly, [the main thing I took from it was] it’s always good to be reminded that you’re not alone, not only so you feel comforted, but [because it humbles] you ... it’s a pretty universal feeling — even if don’t identify as an artist.”

PAGE 10

Living & Arts

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

Tom Uttech: Art Without an Artist Paintings in List Gallery, Photographs in McCabe

Tom Uttech’s collection “Adisokewini” at the List Gallery from November 1st to December 16th explores Woodlands in Wisconsin and Ontario.

For the next month and a half, Swarthmore College will be taken over by the nature-loving imagination of Tom Uttech, whose paintings and photographs are exhibited concurrently in the List Gallery and in the atrium of McCabe Library. The former show is titled “Adisokewini” and features his recent oil paintings, and the McCabe show exhibits some of Uttech’s photographic work. “Adisokewini” runs from Nov., 1 to Dec., 16, as does his photographic exhibit, and the lively opening on the 1st was preceded by a truly fascinating and humorous talk given by the artist himself in LPAC Cinema wherein he discussed his background and the ideas behind some of his works, accompanied by truly radiant, glittering slides of his paintings.

DEBORAH Uttech, when speaking, warned KRIEGER the audience that he tends to ramble, I on the Arts yet he was a joy to listen to. He was refreshingly plain and human when speaking about his work. He is a rare breed: the humble intellectual. He didn’t try to insist upon some grand deep meaning behind his work, and throughout the talk, he wryly insisted that he was not an artist.

Throughout his career, he reminded the audience, he did not consider himself an artist, since he did not subscribe to the popular artistic movements of the time. Thus, if he wanted to paint nature at a time when the art world was simply gaga for conceptual art, so be it.

Uttech seemed almost amused when several audience members asked him if there was some deeper meaning behind the almost ubiquitous bear who often features in his nature scenes. They wondered: was he the bear? Uttech demurred, saying that if the viewer wanted him to be the bear, then he was the bear. Later in the talk, though,

Uttech demonstrated his own profound self-insights. He asked to bear with him (no pun intended) as he thought aloud about the intellectual side of his works, and then self-deprecatingly called his own self-analysis “bullshit”, to the protest of the audience. Uttech, evidently, does not want to be put into some high art intellectual box. He has extremely perceptive insight into his own work, but is grounded and wonderfully down-to-earth about his own abilities and his themes of choice.

His photographic exhibit, located in McCabe, features black-and-white nature shots that are a joy to behold. His love for the outdoors is apparent in the skill and detail with which he addresses his subject. They are a truly love-

[Tom Uttech] is a rare breed: the humble intellectual. He didn’t try to insist upon some grand deep meaning behind his work, and throughout the talk, he wryly insisted that he was not an artist. ly addition to the library and provide an interesting visual complement to all the books and gray stone of McCabe.

Each of Uttech’s paintings is a little world. His painting exhibit, located in the List Gallery, features oil paintings of various size and scale that are notable for their use

JULIA CARLETON /PHOENIX STAFF

of color as well as each work’s carefully chosen unique frame. His works also reveal themselves to be a veritable menagerie, populated not only by trees and plants and other flora but by birds of all species (all accurate for the location, of course), and squirrels, raccoons, and of course, the bear. The paintings seem naturalistic and realistic from a distance, but when upon closer inspection, the chaos and spontaneity of his works are apparent.

These works range from vigorous and energetic to more calm and meditative, and are suffused with Uttech’s love of his subject.

Overall both exhibits are excellent and complement one another well. My one quibble with the exhibits is with the lighting of the painting exhibit. During the artist’s presentation, I was completely blown away with the luminosity of the works he displayed on the screen. The paintings seemed to glimmer and glow from within, like stained glass. Shortly after, when I went to see the works in person in the gallery, they seemed flatter under the brighter lights in the room, their limpid colors dried out slightly. Perhaps an overall dimmer lighting with more direct lighting on the works themselves might have allowed the overall exhibit to maintain the wonder I felt looking at Uttech’s works during the presentation. This issue seems more related to the venue itself than to the actual quality of works. However, people who see the exhibit with fresh eyes will probably have a different experience than those people who first saw the works as slides in the darkened LPAC Cinema.

Overall, the two exhibits should not be missed. For many Swatties, the McCabe exhibit is near impossible to miss, but those art lovers among us should take the trip down to LPAC to see “Adisokewini.”

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

Living & Arts

PAGE 11

The Phoenix

TAYLOR HODGES / THE PHOENIX

ELECTRONICALLY SONIC (Above) Ean Golden, founder of the website DJ Tech Tools, moves the dance floor with a technically dizzying set of house and techno. (Bottom Right) Techno luminary Richie Hawtin closes the night with a set of his trademark minimal techno. (Bottom Left) An energetic crowd takes over the floor at Philly’s Electric Factory.

Techno Legend Lights Up Electric Factory

By TAYLOR HODGES Living & Arts Writer

When Richie Hawtin stepped up to the decks at 1 a.m., the ebullient crowd at Philadelphia’s Electric Factory concert hall did not restrain itself. The Berlin-based techno DJ is one of the most celebrated figures in the history of electronic music, but he wasn’t there to promote himself. Throughout the day leading up to his Philadelphia performance, Hawtin maintained his light manner, preceding most sentences with a delicate brush of his bangs and his easy grin, but he knows there’s a lot of pressure on him these days and that untold eyes around the world are watching his every move.

Between his DJ sets, his revered techno label Minus, and his innovative live shows under his alias, Plastikman, Hawtin’s every move has been chronicled intensely for over a decade now, but he’s recently put himself under a more intense gaze than ever by launching CNTRL, a month-long series of daytime lectures and late-night concerts in college cities across the U.S. and Canada.

This Friday brought Hawtin and his CNTRL crew to Philadelphia for a 5 p.m. panel at Drexel University’s main auditorium followed by a 9 p.m. to 2 a.m. concert at the Electric Factory.

The tour was created in order to reach America’s puerile EDM generation – a set that looks to electronic music only for neon-colored synth anthems and dubstep’s barrages of distorted sub-bass

frequencies – and expand the culture’s narrow definition of electronic music.

“We’re not here to try and get people into a certain kind of music,” Hawtin said during Friday’s panel discussion at Drexel, “but to show how wide and varied the electronic music field is. For many of us, we’ve waited for this moment in North America to accept what we do, but now we are concerned by the direction that the music is taking.”

Richie Hawtin is no stranger to North America. He was raised in Ontario, right across the border from Detroit, the birthplace of techno, before mov ing to Berlin less than a decade ago. Hawtin made frequent trips into Detroit, where he discovered electronic music and began going to underground concerts.

Years later, he established himself in the nineties as an unequaled producer of minimal techno and became a prominent part of the vibrant Detroit scene.

As a producer, his musical project has always seemed to be an experiment that asks how many elements can be removed while still producing a track that moves people both emotionally and on the dance floor.

The result is a bare bones form of techno that’s not as muscular or industrial as the kind being exported en masse from Berlin today, but one that feels more cerebral. In the 90s, Hawitn’s innovative tracks gained him a large international following and his career has grown from there.

These days, Hawtin is a legend in

electronic music circles. For the past four years, he’s fallen within the top three spots of Resident Advisor’s Top 100 DJs list, coming in at number one in 2009. This year MixMag named him the number six dance artist of all time and last year the publication crowned Hawtin the number two DJ of all time, coming in second to mainstream favorite Tiësto.

It’d be easy for Hawtin to rest on his laurels and tour the world until his retirement, but instead he’s still pushing. The challenge now is to bring underground music culture to mainstream America.

As with everything he does, he’s putting all his energy into his CNTRL tour.

“We want to represent our culture and show what we are doing,” Hawtin said at that day’s lecture. “The best way to do that is just to show what we do.”

Friday night, Hawtin and the tour’s other core DJs, Loco Dice and Ean Golden, each took their turn at the decks, spinning for an hour each. They were joined by Philadelphia native Josh Wink, who earned worldwide attention as a rave DJ in the nineties, and local DJ Rob Paine.

Each set was only an hour – a short time for a house or techno DJ to spin – but this allowed each of the artists to show the audience what they do and move on. By the time Hawtin stepped to the decks at 1 a.m. and dropped Gitech’s “What Is House What Is Techno,” the audience should have had a pretty good idea how to answer the question.

But then again, most in the audence seemed pretty familiar with the genres’ underground incarnations.

“I’ve seen Hawtin three times before,” a 20-year-old student told me when I asked if he was familiar with the DJ. “He’s amazing.”

Most others told me they were already familiar with Hawtin and were fans of his music.

However, there were many who admitted that friends who knew the music had brought them along.

“I usually don’t listen to this kind of thing,” said a Temple University student in a short black dress and dangling gold earrings, “but this is pretty good.”

The set wasn’t one of Hawtin’s best, but certainly showcased his minimal style of simple synthesized arpeggios and booming bass accompanied by the snare rolls that punctuate his DJ sets.

“I haven’t listened to a lot of stuff like that before,” an EDM fan wearing neon sunglasses told me, “but that was awesome.”

At the end of the night, Hawtin stepped back from the decks and walked into the audience. He shook hands and signed merchandise. At this point, you’d expect him to leave, but he’s still at it. He’s talking to fans, asking them questions.

“I don’t think this tour is about converting people,” Hawtin said at that afternoon’s panel discussion, “but just bridging the divide between our cultures, one person at a time.”

TAYLOR HODGES / THE PHOENIX

Living & Arts

PAGE 12

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

2010 Pulitzer: ‘Tinkers’ Fails to Impress A Poor Year for Submissions? Finalists Miss the Mark

whole. He faces the same issue with his imagery, which is intense and often trying to read. Many critics have lauded Harding for painting a picture in the reader’s mind, but he does so at the expense of the reading experience. His lengthy, twisting descriptions of sights and sounds are boring. Though they provide detailed looks at every scene, I feel that the reader would be better off with a slightly less detailed scene and more substance in exchange.

Relying too heavily upon technique—not having enough faith in the story alone—is a common error among first novels, but I believe it prevents Tinkers from being a reasonable candidate for the 2010 Pulitzer.

The other novels were also flawed. After reading them, I have to wonder whether the committee valued obscurity over talent. I am curious what other novels were in the pile of submissions. It is hard for me to imagine that none of those novels were more worthy of finalist nominations than the three the committee chose.

Love in Infant Monkeys, though interesting, struck me as cute. It didn’t seem like the important piece of work one might hope would be nominated for this award.

The collection revolves around humananimal interactions, and strives to make the point that we are too far removed from the animal world. But just like Harding, Lydia Millet, the author of Love in Infant Monkeys, goes too far to establish a sense

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experience growing up with an epileptic father. His father was a traveling salesman and repairman, and despite his moderate professional success, George remembers most clearly his weakest moments. He describes sounds ringing and sights whirling and writes, “This was his aura, a cold halo of chemical electricity that encircled him immediately before he was struck by a full seizure.” It is clear that George could observe his father’s aura. He knew when a seizure was coming and needed only wait for the moment at which his father fell to the disease. As George suffers from kidney failure, he reverberates between life and death, and his reflections in the space between those two worlds—between the world and no world—are fascinating.

Though the layout of the novel is interesting, it suffers from fatal downfalls.

Most importantly, in my opinion, Tinkers depends far too heavily on two of Harding’s literary techniques: metaphors and imagery. Beginning with metaphors, the clocks that flitter throughout the story are heavy-handed symbols for George’s way of life: watching the second hand tick, creating a web of gears that sustain each other to advance the system, breaking down over time and needing to be repaired. I appreciate the artful usage of metaphor, but it feels like Harding is hitting the reader over the head with a clock-shaped iron skillet. He relies far too heavily upon this symbol, and that cheapens the novel as a

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The finalists for the 2010 Pulitzer award were all unorthodox books. The winner of the 2010 Fiction Pulitzer was Tinkers by Paul Harding, with the other two finalists being Love in Infant Monkeys by Lydia Millet, and In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniyal Mueenuddin.

Tinkers is Harding’s first novel, and it largely slipped under the radar of the literary review world. It is one of the more obscure titles to win the Pulitzer. Love in Infant Monkeys is actually a collection of short stories revolving around the interactions between human beings and other animals. In Other Rooms, Other Wonders is also a collecLANIE tion of eight linked SCHLESSINGER stories that revolve around one family and Bibliobabble the many with whom it interacts. It is clear from these selections that the 2010 fiction committee was intrigued by obscurity and sought to praise the unique qualities of the literature they came across.

Though Tinkers won, I am not convinced that it deserves the award. The novel revolves around the protagonist, George Washington Crosby, a dying clock repairman. As he attempts to face his imminent death, he obsessively looks to the past and analyzes his personal history in the detail one would expect of a clock repairman. George reflects on his

of fraternity between human beings and other animals. At one point, Millet writes, “A pigeon might seem serene, but that was a trick of the feathers. The feathers were soft, but beneath them it was bloody.

That was beauty, said Tesla: the raw veins, the gray-purple meat beneath the down.”

This is a good representation of Millet’s primary downfall. She desperately tries to establish this relationship at the expense of being realistic. She hits her reader over the head with her thesis rather than artfully weaving it throughout her prose.

And finally, there is In Other Rooms, Other Wonders, which is likely the finalist I would have chosen. This collection of eight short stories revolves around the Harouni family and their sphere of life, which is rather large given their rich, powerful status in their Pakistani district. It is intricate and well-written, and the author, Mueenuddin, seems to effortlessly swap points of view and story lines. In fact, Mueenuddin does this so well that the reader is almost unaware of the fractures in the story.

Overall, I would choose In Other Rooms, Other Wonders from these three finalists, but even that excellent book did not strike me as Pulitzer-worthy. Perhaps this was a year of weak submissions, but it is difficult for me to imagine that these were the best three from the piles, and it is particularly perplexing to me that Tinkers was chosen as the best among them.

There Is Fun To Be Done: Forget Your Bucket List EVS Technician David Toland Knows How to Live in the Moment

David Toland is an EVS Technician whose new column, Can You Dig It?, details his experiences at Swarthmore, in the US Army, and with his three children: a daughter, Hunter, 11; and two sons, Noah, 13, and David, 12. Driven by an enjoyment of poetry and digital story-telling fostered in Learning for Life, David is writing to share his life experiences with the Swarthmore community.

Someone once said, “Life is not a journey to the grave with the intentions of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadDAVID side, thoroughly used TOLAND up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming …

Can You Dig It? WOW! What a ride!” I am pretty sure that Helen Keller did not have a bucket list when she said, “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all.” Do not get me wrong; in the back of everyone’s mind I think there is a “bucket list” of sorts. I feel that the first

thing on everyone’s list should be to get a college education. In this day and age, a college education is a necessity to achieve your dreams.

When opportunities come your way to do the things you have in the back of your mind or your “bucket list,” do not hesitate.

There is no time for regrets. There are a million different things to which people say, “I want to do that, or I wish I did that.”

Just do it. There is fun to be done.

I know the one thing that I always wanted to do was the Polar Bear Plunge.

This is a yearly event in which people take a “plunge” into the ocean in the wintertime. I am participating in the Polar Bear Plunge with my two sons, Noah and David, and several of my friends this January.

The event is to raise money for The Special Olympics.

Some of the common things that are on people’s so called “bucket lists” are: traveling, skydiving, white water rafting, seeing natural wonders of the world, visiting mu-

seums, getting a tattoo and finding the love of your life. The list goes on and on. I am one of those people that like to say, “I did it, done it, and got the t-shirt.” If we are talking about traveling, I have been to many different places. One of the most beautiful places I have visited was the Azores for Cinco de Mayo. The Azores are composed of nine volcanic islands situated in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean about 930 miles west of Lisbon, Spain. The islands form the autonomous region of the Azores, which is one of the two autonomous regions of Portugal. I would highly recommend visiting the Azores. I have also been to Germany for Oktoberfest, a sixteen-day festival celebrating beer. Oktoberfest runs from late September to the first weekend in October.

More than six million people from around the world attend this event every year. I had a great time and I highly recommend checking it out.

As for the adventurous things, I have jumped out of many planes, fast- roped

out of a helicopter, repelled down a mountain and went cliff diving. I also did a lot of stupid things that I look back and say, “What was I thinking? Going 145 mph on a motorcycle?” Another thing on a lot of people’s so called “bucket list” is getting a tattoo. It is off my list because I am covered with them. This brings me to my so called “bucket list.” When all three of my children are out of college, I am going to travel to Thailand and get a spiritual tattoo by a Buddhist monk. I am going to get it done with a traditional tattoo tool which is a long bamboo stick with a split sharpened point called a Mai Sak. After the tattoo, I will finish off the event by drinking cobra’s blood. It is the final part of the spiritual ritual in the tattoo process.

I hope you all get to do everything in life you want to do. But more importantly, live your “bucket list” everyday, because there is fun to be done. Life is too short to let it pass you by. You only have one shot and then it’s gone.

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

Living & Arts

PAGE 13

The Phoenix

Blast from the Past: The Phoenix Remembers A Junior Delivers the Credit/No Credit Scoop

This week, the Phoenix would like to inaugurate what we hope will become a regular, bi-weekly feature in the Living and Arts section. When going back and reading old copies of the Phoenix, we’ve been struck by some consistent threads that connect life at Swarthmore today with life decades ago. In the 50’s, students may have written differently, but they wrote about many of the same things. Swatties that are now our grandparents’ age complained about inadequate food at Sharples, argued over the merits of athletics and PE programs, and examined what one 1959 writer called the “fraternity-ML” split in social life, all topics that have appeared within the pages of the Phoenix in 2012. We are also struck by the differences in what was considered publishable or even politically correct — articles on the admissions process are particularly shocking, as opinion writers debated the merits of quotas for Jews, Catholics, and African-Americans.

With “Blast from the Past” we aspire to challenge readers’ assumptions about Swarthmore’s past while generating debate about how the College’s future should be different. This week, we chose a comedic piece on freshman year written by a junior opinions writer done for the September 14th, 1990 issue of the Phoenix. Not much has changed in the last two decades.

If you like this piece and want to learn more, check out the archived copies of the Phoenix on the second floor of McCabe.

Week ten: Begin double ringing friends. Learn to play guitar.

Make out in Crum or in map room.

Week eleven: Think PASS/FAIL, no sweat.

Week twelve: Watch first movie at Video Desk. Fall asleep in McCabe. Realize you really do spend eight hours a day in library. Break up with high school sweetheart over Thanksgiving Break. Berate parents for not recycling.

Week fourteen: *If from west coast, interrupt class and yell, It’s Snowing! Spend three days traying. *If from east

coast, feel superior, act nonchalant.

Week fifteen: Think PASS/FAIL, sweat. Go to eight-thirty every morning, remind teacher who you are.

Finals: Try to smuggle a large container of coke out of dining hall. Go to math clinic. Forget to check mail.

Call former sweetheart. Listen to upperclassmen tell you not to panic because you’re pass/fail. Panic. Sleep through final fire drill of your first semester in college and realize you did learn something this term after all.

With questions, comments, or requests for other topics you’d like to see, email living@swarthmorephoenix.com.

Food Truckathon: Comic by Elizabeth Kramer

A Junior Delivers the Credit/ No Credit Scoop Week one: Exit building for first fire drill at college. Fail swim test. Decorate room with art posters. Notice the little glow star stickers on the ceiling. Answer hall phone whenever it rings. Learn to say “women”.

Week two: Exit building after putting in contacts and brushing hair for second fire drill at college. Order first student special of Swarthmore career. Give all laundry pink tint.

Week three: Meet someone interesting. Receive letter from high school sweetheart and feel guilty. Make another long distance call. Sleep through first eight-thirty.

Week four: Receive first long distance bill. Get drunk.

Week five: Venture into small room. Notice people look the same as people in the big room. Return to dorm and re-read Lisa Birnbach’s description of Swarthmore.

Week six: Get together with the interesting someone. Have first fight with high school sweetheart over October break.

Week eight: Make marshmallow treats for the first time in Sharples using the marshmallows from hot chocolate bins.

Stop answering hall phones. Wear prom clothes to fall formal. Observe that everyone else is wearing black.

Week nine: Get no mail for a week, except letter mandating that you must take aquatics class because you failed your swim test. Finally write back high school friends.

Winter Is Coming ACROSS 1. ___ up (admit to) 5. Parakeet and leash emporium 10. Swine sound 11. Ringo of the Beatles 12. Advance Notice of Intent (abbrev.)

13. Swamp 14. Musical invocation when hoping for school closing?

17. Wanna hear a sodium joke? ___ 18. Long period 19. Creamy winter beverage 21. Eternity (math abbrev.)

24. Fruity winter beverage 28. Madrid meals 29. Desert plateau 30. Fluid sac 31. Pig place DOWN 1. Baby horse 2. Feminine singular, in German 3. Nosy fluid 4. Winter activity 5. Additions, after the end of a letter 6. __ tu, Brute?

7. Forbidden 8. Royal headgear 9. Like com or net 15. Most sun-baked 16. Pos. or ___

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President Aydelotte with Albert Einstein, Commencement 1938.

20. Tiny fish 21. 15th of the month 22. Avian home 23. Battle 24. In, on, or ___

25. Word with “super” or “man” 26. First word of Nevada city 27. Chat online

BY PRESTON COOPER

For the solution to this week’s puzzle, see The Phoenix’s online edition at www.swarthmorephoenix.com under Multimedia.

Opinions

PAGE 14

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

Recommendations for the Reelected Administration President Obama Wins Another Term, But He Must Look Ahead

Staff Editorial The 2012 election is over, and President Obama is the decisive victor after winning most of the battleground states by narrow but clear margins. After a lengthy reelection battle, voters have given the President the go-ahead to continue leading the country for another four years. The fight, however, is not over for President Obama; the challenge of effectively governing the country for the rest of his time in office remains. A divided Congress still poses a challenge, and there is always the threat of troubles arising within the administration. Mr. Obama, there are several courses of action you ought to pursue if your last four years are to be a success.

1. Rethink your economic team. Though your appointees to fiscal positions did not frequently come up as a campaign issue this time around, conservatives and liberals alike both criticize certain players in your Administration, namely Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, for what they perceive as over-friendliness to Wall Street and the financial sector. Now that your reelection is secured, it’s time to make some changes to your economic team and bring in some fresh voices. Polls show that the American people overwhelmingly rated economic issues as their top priorities, and your victory in this election means they trust you to revive a still-sluggish economy. But you will not be able to achieve this in a second term without a credible economic team. After all, your Council of Economic Advisors will help you craft the plan that you have to sell to the American people — and to Congress.

2. Recognize that progress depends on a functioning Congress. Voters gave Democrats a resounding victory in the Senate, but the House remains under Republican control, which means that Congress will be divided in much the same way that it was before the election. Thus the potential for a continuation of partisan gridlock is high. The importance of a functioning Congress is impossible to stress enough. Indeed, blame for the dysfunction in Washington rests on everyone. But as President, you will have to take on the role of the leader; you must craft — and advocate — solutions agreeable to both parties. And in order to win the cooperation of the legislature, you must also stay on good terms with them. This means that you must stay above the Washington blame game and refrain from pointing fingers at the other side when negotiations break down, because that won’t win you any friends in Congress.

The key to a productive second term rests on your legislative relations.

3. Be aware of potential scandals. Second terms are famous for them. From Monica Lewinsky to Scooter Libby, every recent two-term President has had some sort of embarrassment. Keep an eye out for brewing scandals within your administration, as they could undermine your legitimacy in the eyes of Congress. One particular thing to watch out for is the State Department’s handling of the Benghazi affair, and the recent release of cables from Am-

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bassador Christopher Stevens, who was killed in an act of terror at the American consulate there this past September. In the cables, which have received extensive scrutiny from the GOP, Stevens asked for additional security at the Benghazi consulate, citing concerns of terrorist plots. The security was apparently never provided. Look into this issue and come clean with the American people if there was a failing on the part of your administration. Should a scandal surrounding this affair break in the first couple months of your second term, it could considerably damage your efforts to win over Congress and the public.

4. Come up with a concrete economic plan. During the campaign, both you and your opponent offered goals for the next four years (more jobs, smaller deficit, etc.), but shed very little light on how you would accomplish these objectives. When the 113th Congress convenes in 2013, you should have a plan ready to present to them. This plan

LETTER, OP-ED & COMMENT POLICY

must combine Republican and Democratic proposals and find points of agreement if it is to have any chance of passing Congress.

5. Don’t concern yourself too much with the 2014 midterms. Undoubtedly, senior Democrats are already planning out a strategy to win the House and bolster their majority in the Senate, while Republicans reevaluate their priorities in hopes of making up for losses this time around.

Worrying too much about the next election constantly creates problems, as politicians pursue courses of action to bolster their reelection campaigns and those of their peers.

This sort of behavior was one of the main causes of the gridlock that strangled the previous Congress. In advance of the 2014 midterms, you must stay above the fray as any strong leader should. Concern yourself with people, not with politics. Perhaps some members of Congress will follow your example.

2012 Election Results: Swarthmore, PA As of Wed. 6 p.m. ET

Letters, opinion pieces and online comments represent the views of their writers and not those of The Phoenix staff or Editorial Board. The Phoenix reserves the right to edit all pieces submitted for print publication for content, length and clarity. The Phoenix also reserves the right to withhold any letters, op-eds or comments from publication.

All comments posted online and all op-eds and letters must be signed and should include the writer’s full name.

Letters are a minimum of 250 words and may not exceed 500 words. Opeds are a minimum of 500 words and may not exceed 750. Letters and opeds must be submitted by 10 p.m. on Monday, and The Phoenix reserves the right to withhold letters and opeds received after that time from publication.

Letters may be signed by a maximum of five individuals. Op-eds may be signed by a maximum of two individuals. The Phoenix will not accept pieces exclusively attributed to groups, although individual writers

may request that their group affiliation be included.

While The Phoenix does not accept anonymous submissions, letters and op-eds may be published without the writer’s name in exceptional circumstances and at the sole discretion of the Editorial Board.

U.S. Senator

Robert Casey (D): 53.6% Tom Smith (R): 44.6%

U.S. House Bob Brady (D): 85.1% John Featherman (R): 15.0%

An editorial represents the opinions of the members of the Opinions Board: Marcus Mello, Menghan Jin and Preston Cooper.

Pennsylvania State House

Please submit letters to: letters@swarthmorephoenix.com or

Pennsylvania Attorney General

Joe Hackett (R): 52.9% Larry DeMarco (D): 47.1% Kathleen Kane (D): 56.1% David Freed (R): 41.6%

The Phoenix Swarthmore College 500 College Avenue Swarthmore, PA 19081

Pennsylvania Treasurer

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Rob McCord (D): 52.6% Diana I. Vaughan (R): 44.0%

Letters, corrections and news tips may also be submitted online to the paper by clicking “Contact” on the Phoenix website.

Pennsylvania Auditor General Eugene DePasquale (D): 49.7% John Maher (R): 46.5%

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

Opinions

PAGE 15

The Phoenix

Obama Wins Close Reelection

Tuesday Night a Victory for Individual Liberty

Governor Romney’s loss Tuesday night gave me time to step back and think about why I care so much about politics. I was devastated by Romney’s loss, and my state of disbelief clouded my more rational senses. I came to see politics as some sort of irrational obsession of mine, rather than as an institution that has real implications for America.

When I regained my senses, I realized why elections are so important. Elections are No matter what the Republican talking heads are saying, Tuesday was an excellent the most effective way to make change in a constitutional republic. When you lose, the night for liberty. In three states, same-sex marriage was recognized, and in two recreopposing side is able to enact the policies you so adamantly oppose, and can harm the ational marijuana was legalized. Minnesota defeated a voter ID law, and pro-life extremcountry. When you win, you gain or retain control. A loss is a loss, and a win is a win, ists Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock were defeated in Missouri and Indiana. All of these are questions of liberty, and all of them have one thing in common: the Republican no matter the margin.

Party was on the wrong side.

It is when a win can be translated into a mandate that the election takes on a cerThe Republican Party’s talk of liberty is a sham. If it wasn’t clear tain power that impacts the extent to which policies can be changed or continued. In before, it is now. Taking control of a woman’s body away from the 2008, President Obama’s election could be interpreted as a mandate to alter the course woman herself is not protecting liberty. Limiting marriage based on AARON of American policy. Ultimately in 2010, this mandate was reversed, and a Democratic gender is not protecting liberty. Opposing the use of drugs, where senate and Republican house effectively ended Obama’s mandate.

KROEBER the effect, negative or otherwise, is limited to the user themselves, President Obama’s victory on Tuesday certainly does not come is not protecting liberty. Restricting immigration is not protecting The Civil with the mandate it did four years ago. Obama used a campaign TYLER Libertarian liberty. What happened to personal responsibility? How can a party meant to divide the country, and won a narrow margin of victory in that wants government to be out of people’s lives when it comes to the swing states and nationally. When presidents normally win reBECKER health care, or retirement, or schools want government to be involved when it comes to election, they garner more electoral votes and a higher popular vote The Swarthmore sex and drugs? percentage than in their first election. Obama lost votes around the Conservative Republicans claim superior devotion to economic liberty, but I see little evidence to country. support this. Booms and busts have occurred under Republicans and Democrats alike.

But Obama won. All the horrendous regulations of Dodd-Frank Obama has added trillions to the deficit? So did Bush. The size of government is increasand the terrible healthcare mandate are now here to stay. Obama’s most unpopular ing readily, as it has been for years, due to Democrats and Republicans both. If you’re policies will now be enacted. The President will have a full two terms in office, despite a looking for a limited government of absolute liberty, neither side really wants that. mediocre first term that included the aforementioned legislation. Divided government It’s about time we admit something to ourselves: there is no party of limited govwill continue, as Republicans gained seats in the House and Democrats still control the ernment. Democrats want an expansion of welfare, Republicans want to force pseudoSenate. The President will likely continue legislating through executive order, bypassing Biblical morality, and both want an exa system set up by our Constitution. travagant military and a brutish foreign The next four years are going to be a policy. Let’s not pretend that there are continuation of the status quo. Obama huge differences when it comes to many did not run a campaign trying to appeal economic issues. Glass-Steagall was reto a broad spectrum of independents pealed under Clinton, and Obama has like in 2008. With the economy experibeen less regulatory than Bush. When encing sluggish growth rates, millions it comes to liberties, the differences beof Americans unable to find work, and tween the parties are civil and social. gridlock in Washington, Obama ran a During this election cycle, I’ve lost campaign based on winning by the slimcount of the number of old, white, Remest of margins. Obama did manage to publican men who have made unbelievwin most of the swing states he won in ably offensive remarks about rape. They 2008, but with far fewer votes. His camwant to take a woman’s right to have paign was about winning and maintaincontrol over her body, and to justify, it ing power, with its consequences for must engage in a peculiar brand of vicgoverning completely out of the picture. tim blaming. The right to abortion is a While I am severely concerned about liberty, one which more than any other the direction of the country, I am also is the epitome of ‘personal responsibilconcerned about the path of our politics. ity.’ The same is true for drug laws. Drug Over the next few weeks and months, use is a victimless crime; the only person pundits will debate how this election was who stands to be harmed is the user himwon and lost. Obama’s campaign will be self. I’m not claiming that Democrats are seen as one of the most negative in hisparticularly ahead on this issue, especialtory. Obama’s strategy to divide America ly considering the behavior of the DEA based on gender, race, and class will be and DOJ under President Obama, but shown to have worked. Is this the party the most vocal opponents of state ballot message Democrats will carry through measures to legalize marijuana were Reto 2014 and, more importantly, in 2016? publicans. In Washington state, 16 state Probably, yes. legislators support marijuana legalizaObama has created a new Democratic tion, and not one of them Republican. party that goes beyond just promising I am not a Democratic partisan, but you everything but the kitchen sink. on questions of liberty, of how free each Obama’s campaign knew Obama had COURTESY OF BLOGS.ORLANDOSENTINEL.COM of us can be, Democrats are miles ahead. not delivered over the past four years, Republicans ask us to forget these issues as evidenced by the high unemployment and instead focus on their dubious ecorate. Instead, they labeled Mitt Romney nomic claims, which they claim are truly and the GOP as extremists opposed to fair, free, and libertarian. But how can contraception and denying women their we forget their social positions? Who rights to win the women’s vote. They in the mid-20th century would vote for argued Romney was “anti-immigrant” a segregationist and defend that vote by and wanted to deport all the illegal aliens appealing to their economic policies? currently in the country to win the HisThere needs to be a discussion about panic vote. And, they painted Romney economic liberty, but that discussion is as a Wall Street tycoon that doesn’t care being silenced by the Republican devoabout the average person to appeal to tion to bigotry. white liberal suburbanites, the poor, and My hope is that sometime soon Reanyone in the middle class who would publicans realize that they can’t continue listen. their current line of hypocrisy and reThe Republican Party will be forced form themselves into a more libertarto look at how to counteract this new ian party. Drop the anti-liberty social Democratic strategy of making Repubpositions, and embrace demographic licans sound like extremists outside the changes. The constituency of old, white mainstream of American civil society. men is not enough to base a party on. It’s And, Republicans will have to educate unlikely that this will happen after this candidates on how to discuss social iselection, but I hope, for all our sakes, that sues in an appropriate, non-Todd Akin it comes someday soon. Liberty is barely manner. Republican social issues need a defended at all by our political parties, messaging makeover, not a policy makewe need both to make an effort. over.

I frequently worry that we will stand There is no doubt I am still grueling by and watch as the government eats over Governor Romney’s loss on Tuesaway at our individual liberties, that we day. But, I am not ready to give up on will forget to defend them. Those fears politics. The next four years will not inwere crushed, for the time being, on clude the change I so desired in WashTuesday. America chose liberty and libington, but I think they will allow Amererty this week in numerous states, and ica to see its mistake and right its wrong. reelected a president that won’t bend to COURTESY OF STATENEWS.COM The election is over, but the battle over the radical religious right. I’d call that a Citizens across the country celebrated President Barack Obama’s victory over Mitt Romney last night.

America’s future lives on. win.

Sports

PAGE 16

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

Swimming Makes Big Splash in Season Opener Races Past McDaniel for First Conference Win

The Garnet and Green Terror women dive in for the start of the 50 freestyle in this season’s first meet against McDaniel last Friday night. Sophomore Kate Wiseman won in a time of 25.05.

By JENNI LU Sports Writer

In their first meet of the season on Nov. 2, the men and women’s swim teams pulled out huge wins over McDaniel, easing by with room to spare with scores of 119-86 and 112-93, respectively.

Both the men and women’s 200-yard medley relay teams opened the meet with strong performances; Stan Le ’14, Daniel Duncan ’13, Charlie Hepper ’13 and Roger Chin ’13 teamed up to finish in first in 1:41.96, while Nikkia Miller ’16, Pooja Kumar ’15, Supriya Davis ’15 and Kate Wiseman ’15 touched in 1:54.12 — a full three seconds ahead of McDaniel. Despite the early dominance, Head Coach Sue Davis knew the meets would be closer in the end. “McDaniel swam absolutely fantastically — better than I expected,” she emphasized.

McDaniel swam so well, in fact, that early on in the meet Brad Brooks smashed the pool record in the 1000 freestyle by four seconds, touching first in a time of 9:37.34, nearly a full minute ahead of a solid performance

by Josh Turek-Herman ’16.

The Garnet, however, matched the Green Terror by swimming at a level not often seen this early in the season, from Duncan’s win in the 200 freestyle (1:46.78) to Eva Winter ’16 and Nikkia Miller ’16’s 1-2 finish in the 200 individual medley (2:19.50 and 2:19.83, respectively) to Chin’s win in the 100 backstroke (56.53).

From the start, Chin was confident about his team’s ability to deliver the win. “Having swum together through many meets and practices, we know each other’s personalities and motivations,” he said. Likewise, Davis knew her team was prepared to face any challenge the opponent may have presented. “Every member of our team [was] prepared to step up and race hard,” she said.

While the returners played a vital role in both teams’ success, the new freshmen have added valuable depth and support. “The freshman are a great addition to the women’s team,” said Davis, as they took three individual events on Saturday. Winter and Jessica Seigel ’16 accounted for three individual wins, as Winter won the 100 breaststroke by four seconds to go with her win in the 200 individual medley, while Seigel won the 500 freestyle runnng away.

Despite the wins, Winter admitted to nerves going into her first swim meet at Swarthmore. “I was definitely nervous since it was our first official meet.” However, she managed to exceed even her own expectations. “I didn’t expect to swim as fast as I did,” she said.

Meanwhile, on the men’s team, four freshmen finished in the top three spots for three individual races.

“The freshmen were a great contribution to the meet with their energy and their excitement,” Chin said. Riley Collins ’16, who took second place in the 100 breaststroke, was pleased with both his own performance, as well as the team’s. “We seem to be at a good starting point for the rest of our season,” he said.

The Garnet kept things rolling with a meet last night against Widener. Against the overmatched and outnumbered Pride, the men thundered to a 108-59 win, while the women delivered a 112-84 statement. As with the meet against McDaniel, Swarthmore started the evening with definitive wins in the medley relays, pulling away on the butterfly legs of each to win by a comfortable margin.

On Saturday at 1 p.m., Swarthmore takes on perhaps its biggest rival in Franklin & Marshall in the comforts of Ware Pool. Fueled by their confidence coming out of their

AKSHAJ KUCHIBHOTLA/PHOENIX STAFF

successful wins against McDaniel and Widener and led by a strong group of upperclassmen leaders, every swimmer is ready to work hard to shave seconds off their times. Collins said all of the upperclassmen are involved. “Our captains do a great job of keeping us on task, while Nick Sohn ‘13, Fred Toohey ‘14, Zach Gavin ‘14, and Cyrus Nasseri ‘14 lead us in team-building exercises every weekend.”

Furthermore, he said, Duncan and Jake Benveniste ‘14 are “catalysts” for the team in practice.

When asked what the team’s goals were for the upcoming meets, Chin said, “We prepare for each meet with intensity and focus, regardless of the opponent.” Similarly, Supriya Davis answered when asked the same question, “We plan to race hard at every meet, and bring it on at conferences.” Winter summed up the teams’ target in one simple statement: “Swim just as well and even faster.”

Dan Duncan is the Sports Editor for The Phoenix. He was not involved in the production of this article.

Senior Nathaniel Lo fights through the breaststroke leg of the 200 individual medley. He finished 7th with a time of 2:36.11.

AKSHAJ KUCHIBHOTLA/PHOENIX STAFF

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

Sports

PAGE 17

The Phoenix

Volleyball Advances into ECAC Tournament Seniors Coleman and Montemurro Reflect on a Successful Four Years

By SCOOP RUXIN Sports Writer

The Swarthmore College volleyball team earned its fourth consecutive ECAC Tournament berth on Monday.

In a testament to their successful season, the Garnet (206, 8-2 Centennial Conference) earned the third seed in the eight-team tournament, and played host to sixth-seeded Delaware Valley (17-9) on Wednesday night, shutting them down with a 3-0 win. The volleyball team will join field hockey and both men’s and women’s soccer in the postseason, an achievement that speaks to the growing strength of Swarthmore’s athletic teams.

Swarthmore enters the tournament looking to end their season on a positive note after Johns Hopkins ended the team’s hopes of a Conference championship by beating the Garnet 3-0 on Saturday. Though the Blue Jays overmatched Swarthmore for the second time this season, head coach Harleigh Chwastyk was impressed by her team’s tenacity.

Despite acknowledging that Hopkins is “a very strong offensive team,” Chwastyk emphasized the continued effort throughout a difficult match, calling her team “relentless.”

A similarly relentless, fearless attitude has characterized a young Garnet team throughout a record-setting season.

The team earned its best finish (third place) and conference record (8-2) in program history. With a win on Wednesday night, the team would achieve the program’s third straight 20-win season.

The fact that this year’s team managed to overcome the loss of several key players from last season is partially a result of the impressive play of several underclassmen. In particular, captain Allie Coleman ’13 spoke about the play of setter Sam Dubois ’16 and libero Madison Heppe ’16, praising the duo for “having bought in to the program” from the start.

Due especially to the team’s youth, the leadership from lone seniors on the team, Coleman and fellow captain Kat Montemurro ’13, has been critical. Both seniors have been preparing for their roles this year since their freshman year. Chwastyk lauded the two for being “leaders since they stepped on campus” and for being “driven, intense people, who knew what they wanted to do since they came here.”

Montemurro cited the intimate team atmosphere as being crucial to her development during her four years in the program, saying that, “it’s been an amazing experience to be part of the team that turned the program around. Coach [Chwastyk] always says that you are part of the Swarthmore Volleyball family for life, so this has been an incredible experience in the way of building new and lasting friendships.

I’ll miss competing at this level and playing for my team and the school.”

The duo has been a part of a program that has had a historic improvement over the past four years. For the first time ever, the Swarthmore volleyball made four consecutive conference playoffs, and it is no coincidence that Coleman and Montemurro have been a part of this turnaround. The two play complementary positions — Coleman is a setter and Montemurro an outside hitter — and have developed “a very unique chemistry as a pair,” according to their coach.

When Coleman set the career assist record in the Hopkins match, she was quick to share the credit with her teammates, pointing out that her individual success would have been impossible if it was not matched with wins. “The assists are a good reflection on the team,” she said. “It means we have good passing, lots of kills and most importantly lots of wins. I am really happy to be a part of that.”

As the two seniors enter their final week as studentathletes, they took an opportunity to reflect on some of the highlights of what has been an extraordinarily accomplished four years. In particular, Coleman used the rivalry with Haverford as a benchmark to exemplify the team’s improvement. In 2009, Haverford was a conference power, and a young Swarthmore team was so happy to win just one set against the Fords that it was “one of the highlights of our season,” according to Coleman. In 2012, however, Swarthmore refused to be satisfied with winning just one set. Instead, they dominated the Fords, winning 3-1 and finishing one game ahead of their archrivals in the Conference standings.

With its two leaders moving on, the team will once again need to transition seamlessly into a new season if it wishes to continue its success. In order to do so, next year’s senior leaders, Danielle Sullivan ’14, Brone Lobichusky ’14 and Maggie Duszyk ’14, will shoulder the responsibility of building on the legacy left by previous teams. Chwastyk expects her team to continue to improve, saying that the team’s “alumni have established a certain level [of play] and the expectation stays the same.” To describe her expectations for the team, Chwastyk uses a word familiar to the Swarthmore College community: “sustainability.”

Through the sustainability of the team’s leadership, next year’s Swarthmore volleyball team will look to build on its successes this year by winning the Centennial Conference championship and advancing to the NCAA Tournament.

Though Montemurro and Coleman will not be players on that team, their influence in shaping the team over the past for years will nevertheless be a critical component of the team’s continued success.

The team is heading to Bethany College in West Virginia this Saturday for the last leg of the ECAC tournament.

ALL PHOTOS BY KATY MONTOYA/PHOENIX STAFF

On Wednesday night, Garnet volleyball handed an upset to No. 6 Delaware Valley College, clinching the quarterfinal game in straight sets with a 3-0 win, and securing a berth in the semi-finals against Moravian College in the ECAC Division III South Region Tournament.

Sports

PAGE 18

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

There’s More to Being a Fan Than Winning

Jamie Says You Should Support a Team for More Than Recent Success Why can’t people support smaller clubs abroad?

I don’t want anyone to be annoyed by this article. Don’t be annoyed. But why does everyone who watches any football automatically choose a team from the top six of the Premier League or, less so, the top four in Italy, Bayern Munich/Borussia Dortmund or Barca/Madrid. I understand that they get to compete for the title at home and abroad. I understand that they make bigger signings and have more money, larger crowds, and more merchanJAMES dising power across IVEY the globe. But don’t you ever get bored Out of Left Field asking someone, “Who do you support?” and hearing the same 5 teams over and over again?

I could rant on about this for ages until the little voice in my head becomes hoarse so can I just focus on the question that bugs me more than anything, how is supporting Arsenal meant to be hipster? I have heard both sides of the argument: people who support Arsenal and people questioning why those people support Arsenal. It seems to come back to the same thing: Arsenal is a hipster team. But they aren’t.

What is hipster about them? Just because they haven’t won anything since 2005 does not make them hipster. That they may play like a less effective Barcelona does not make them hipster; both Fulham and Swansea play passing football too. They have a stadium that can fit 60,000 people so plainly that they have a substantial fan base in London; and they can get a match day crowd larger than Liverpool, Manchester City, Tottenham or Chelsea.

So are they more hipster teams to support because fewer people attend their matches? Why are Arsenal and only Arsenal considered to be hipster? If you want a team that is hipster and will play in the Premier League for the foreseeable future there are plenty of teams to choose between: Everton have never been relegated, Aston Villa are one of the oldest clubs in the country and Fulham have the oldest ground in the league. There are other teams that have rich histories but these three have been in the top division for at least the past 12 years — surely, that provides you with enough security to support them.

One great advantage of supporting a smaller club is that you set your sights much lower for the season and you begin

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Chelsea and Real Madrid fans show their pride. Below, Liverpool fans rally behind their team.

to enjoy the smaller things in football. So many football followers spend their time complaining that Arsenal could only draw with a team or win 1-0 against QPR. They fear that Arsenal won’t qualify for the Champions League directly and will have to go through qualification or that they will never win a trophy until there is a management change.

But surely those are smaller issues. As a Fulham fan I focus more on the good points of the season than the bad. We may have been knocked out of the League Cup in the second round by Sheffield last Wednesday, but that isn’t a huge worry. The main focus is to get into the top half of the table and to play nice attacking football, two things that are possible this season. Though Fulham haven’t played in many finals (two in total: FA Cup final 1975 and the Europa League Final 2010), this makes the average Fulham supporter really appreciate any cup run or venture into Europe. Rather than being spoiled by constant European football, it is something to be treasured and enjoyed while it lasts. When you don’t have very much, you begin to appreciate what you have even more. Plus, we now have Dimitar Berbatov so life is very good, he may be lazy but he is forever forgiven at Fulham because he is “our precious”.

Supporting a team should be about identifying with it either through their history, location or style of play. Just because they win a lot of trophies is not a reason to support them. That is simply jumping on the bandwagon rather than partaking in the building of the wagon in the first place.

The amount of Manchester City fans that have emerged in the past two or three years is phenomenal. They could just be emerging into the light from the darkness of their shame and lost hopes or they could be attracted to the rising of the blue moon.

Either way, there are a lot more City supporters since the money started flowing out of the coffers.

So instead of being magpies, look for a team that attracts you for other reasons than its shiny. For a college that believes in diversity, there is a shocking lack of diversity in the teams that are supported. I don’t care who you support (as long as you give me a good answer that involves historical facts and statistics), but I would like to see more teams represented by the student body. Let’s have a Southampton supporters group or a Stoke section of the school.

Just please, look at teams other than the ones that flash money in your faces in exchange for your support.

GARNET ATHLETE OF THE WEEK

ALLIE COLEMAN SR., VOLLEYBALL, PALO ALTO, CA.

What She’s Done: Set the volleyball program’s career assists record during the Centennial Conference tournament, with 3,210 and counting going into the Garnet’s Wednesday night ECAC matchup against Delaware Valley.

Favorite Career Moment: One that stands out is when we beat Haverford my sophomore year in playoffs. We lost to them in the regular season, and then beat them in the semi-finals in five sets. It was amazing because they were the top seed and the reigning conference champs for the past four years.

Post-Volleyball Plans: I know that volleyball will continue to remain an important part of my life, whether I’m playing or coaching or just watching games … It’s a sport that I will always stay connected to.

What Bird Could Carry a Volleyball?: I bet a red-tailed hawk could carry a volleyball if it wanted to.

DAN DUNCAN/PHOENIX STAFF

Favorite Breakfast Cereal: I love Life.

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THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

Sports

PAGE 19

The Phoenix

JULIA CARLETON/PHOENIX STAFF

Forward Joe Keedy fights to get free from a Haverford defender in a moment of physical play in this past Sunday’s championship game.

Men’s Soccer Stumbles in Conference Final Fall to Haverford, But Still Earn NCAA Tournament Spot

By DAN DUNCAN Sports Editor

The #15/19 men’s soccer team may have just finished the best Centennial Conference season in program history, going unbeaten with an 8-0-1 record, but records don’t matter when you reach tournament play. And in the Centennial final, the men faltered when it mattered most, falling to rival Haverford 1-0 with the conference’s automatic NCAA tournament bid on the line. It was the first time in Centennial Conference history that the archrivals met with such high stakes.

As the #1 seed, the Garnet played host to the tournament semifinals and final. In Saturday’s first semifinal, #3 seed Haverford took down #2 seed Dickinson 1-0, striking first with a goal from Ford Bohrmann and hanging on defensively for the win.

In the nightcap, Swarthmore handled #4 seed Johns Hopkins 3-0, effectively ending the Blue Jays’ season. Much like the previous match-up between the teams, the game was much more evenly played than the score would indicate for the majority of the match. Within a period of just 10 minutes, though, the Garnet turned a close match into a blowout.

Between the 37th and 47th minutes, the Garnet struck three times in quick succession. Jack Momeyer ‘14 got things rolling with a goal off a pass from David Geschwind ‘16. After that, Wyatt McCall ‘16 took over, scoring two goals off passes from Momeyer and Noah Sterngold ‘14. McCall’s career game tripled his career goal total, and more importantly, put the game completely out of reach.

The defense held strong, recording the team’s third consecutive shutout. In goal, Peter Maxted ‘14 made two saves to keep the Blue Jays off the scoreboard.

Even if the score was similar, the intensity of the game was not. McCall said, “The conference tournament games were played with much more intensity than any of our regular season games. The stakes were much higher, and we stepped up our effort for both of the games. We have been training all season to make it to the conference

title, so when it all mattered the entire team gave their best efforts to win those games.”

The next day, the Garnet and Fords met for the Centennial championship. The match was nothing like the first match between the two, in which Swarthmore jumped out to an early lead and outplayed Haverford for the whole match. This time, the match was a gritty, physical match in which no team really performed much better than the other for most of the time. McCall said the physicality of the match was to be expected. “When the conference title is on the line, the game is bound to become physical on both sides of the ball.”

Someone had to advance, though, and Haverford super sub Bohrmann came through again for the Fords, scoring a stunning goal with just a minute left in the first half. From 20 yards out, Bohrmann thundered a curling shot directly into the far top corner of the net that Maxted had no shot at stopping.

After the goal, the Garnet frantically pushed throughout the second half, but were unable to piece together many scoring opportunities. As the clock ran out, the Fords celebrated their first NCAA bid since 1980, while Swarthmore was left out in the cold.

Sophomore Mike Stewart shakes his defender to go on a run.

AKSHAJ KUCHIBHOTLA/PHOENIX STAFF

According to Geli Carabases ‘14, the change in game style reflected less on the Fords than on the Garnet. “The first time we played Haverford we played our style of soccer. We out possessed them and stayed patient. After they scored in the first half we became impatient and got away from what we do best, knock the ball around until we find an opportunity to exploit and attack.”

McCall agreed, saying that “Both [tournament] games were physically and mentally demanding, but I would say that going down a goal late in the first half of the Haverford game made the second half a much more frantic battle. At times it was sloppier than the Hopkins game.”

Despite the loss, the Garnet were in no danger of missing out on further playoff action. Thanks to a strong schedule, excellent record, and high national ranking, Swarthmore received an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament on Monday. While the automatic bid would have meant fewer nerves going into Monday’s bracket announcement, the Garnet were more or less assured of a spot all along, with no real bad losses (as much as losing to Haverford may sting) to blemish their record.

As one of the higher seeds in the tournament, Swarthmore will host first and second matches of the tournament for the fourth time in five years. On Saturday, the Garnet will host Albertus Magnus, champions of the GNAC, at 5 p.m. At 7:30 p.m., Rensselaer Polytechnic, winners of the Liberty League tourney, will play Christopher Newport, an at-large bid from the USA South conference. The winners of the two matches will face each other on Sunday at 5 p.m.

Players disagreed on how important it was to be seeded as a host. While Carabases said, “ We love playing at home. We love Clothier and our fans. Playing at home in November is always a goal of ours, and luckily our play this season put us in a position to host this weekend. We are looking forward to launching our run into the tournament at home,” Sterngold pointed out, “We’ve been excellent all year on the road.”

Regardless of the importance, one cannot deny the allure of sleeping in one’s own bed during the tournament.

Sports

PAGE 20

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2012

The Phoenix

Field Hockey Earns Surprise Playoff Berth ECAC Game Wednesday Night Was First Postseason Game Since 1997

By DAN DUNCAN Sports Editor

After a 9-8 regular season that ended in a heartbreaking 4-3 loss to then-No.16 Haverford, one would have thought the field hockey team’s season was over. As a testament to the strength of the Centennial Conference and a solid non-conference record, though, the team received a surprise bid to the ECAC South Region tournament. The bid is Swarthmore’s first postseason field hockey tournament since winning the ECAC tournament in 1997.

Despite a 4-6 losing record in conference play, the Garnet were buoyed by a 5-2 nonconference record. Although this may raise questions about the quality of the nonconference schedule, Head Coach Lauren Fuchs believed the schedule works, saying, “We play some top teams each year.” Indeed, it would be difficult to find nonconference opponents that could adequately prepare the team for the national powers like No. 4 Franklin and Marshall that the Centennial Conference boasts. Evidently, the ECAC selection committee agreed, considering Swarthmore’s bid.

As the No. 6 seed, the Garnet played host to No. 3 seed Stevens yesterday afternoon. closely played, the Ducks pulled away in the end to win 5-2, Aarti Rao ’14 started the scoring off with an unassisted goal in the third minute, but the Ducks responded ten minutes later, pushing the lead to 3-1 by the end of the first half. Sophia Agathis ’13 scored again late in the second half, but it was too little, too late for the stymied Garnet offense.

The Garnet finish the season with a 9-9 record, their first non-losing season in recent memory. It was a season of great improvement, as Swarthmore recorded its most wins in at least as long, and was in contention for the Centennial Conference playoffs until the final minutes of the regular season.

According to Coach Fuchs, the team “had a lot of bright moments, more so then in the past. The opportunity was there for us to make conference playoffs, which I wanted so much for our seniors to experience.” She added that it is due to the seniors that the program has improved so much recently. “They started all the positive trends that we have now. They have done the little extra it takes to be successful and have taught that to the younger players.”

With the season finally over, the Garnet look ahead to next year, with the goal of qualifying for the Centennial tournament and other postseason tourneys. Although the team graduates its catalysts for improvement, there is a strong foundation for fall 2013, with returning players like Capone, Erin Gluck ’16, and Nia Jones ’14. The upcoming schedule will be released sometime in the somewhat distant future.

Nia Jones (above) and Catie Meador (below) field the ball in the Garnet’s 4-3 to the Haverford Fords two Saturdays ago.

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JULIA CARLETON/PHOENIX STAFF

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