The Official Campus Newspaper of Swarthmore College Since 1881 VOL. 137, ISSUE 5
The Phoenix THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 2013
TODAY: Partly cloudy, with a 10% chance of rain. High 37, Low 24. TOMORROW: Partly cloudy. Some sleet. Chance of PM snow: 30%. High 41, Low 33.
SWARTHMOREPHOENIX.COM
“I’m a Barbie Girl”? By COURTNEY DICKENS Living & Arts Writer
COURTESY OF JULI RIGELL/ THE PHOENIX
Students Protest Keystone XL Pipeline at White House
Pictured above, Ali Roseberry-Polier ’14 , Laura Rigell ’16, and a Brown University student carry a banner as part of last Sunday’s protest in Washington D.C.
By TIFFANY KIM News Writer
A group of 62 Swarthmore students aboard two charter buses made their way down to Washington D.C. this past Sunday, joining more than 40,000 protesters in a rally decrying the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. Organized by 350.org and the Sierra Club, the Forward on Climate Rally drew demonstrators from across the country and Canada to the nation’s capital. The event, which was the largest climate rally in United States history, saw protesters gather in front of the Washington Monument and march to the White House. Students left campus at 8 on Sunday morning and traveled for over two hours to participate in the rally and the subsequent march. Transportation was free, courtesy of President Rebecca Chopp and Vice President for Community and College Relations Maurice Eldridge ’61. P Chopp, through the President’s Office, offered funding to send all those who wanted to attend the rally to Washington D.C. for the protest. As interns to the sustainability committee at the Lang Center for Civic and Social Responsibility, Laura Rigell ’16 and Patrick Ammerman ’14 helped organize student participation in the rally. Rigell greatly appreciated the support from President Chopp and the President’s Office. “It was really kind of her. She agreed, of her own accord – this was her idea, we didn’t ask [her] to fund buses to take students down to this protest,” Rigell said. Rigell and Ammerman began advertising work for the rally two weeks before the event, using social media and word of mouth to spread awareness. After tabling in Sharples and putting out advertisements in the Reserved Student Digest, the
two signed up dozens of interested participants. Temperatures hovered just above 30° Fahrenheit when the rally began at noon, but the crowd remained enthusiastic as leaders of environmental activism groups gave impassioned speeches on the dangers of the proposed pipeline. Participants also heard from leaders of frontline communities, groups whose standards of living are being damaged by the work of large fossil fuel companies. The Keystone XL pipeline would provide a link between the tar sands oil of Alberta, Canada and the coastline of Texas in the Gulf of Mexico. It puts dozens of communities at risk for health and safety concerns arising from fossil fuel extraction. Though he understands the importance of the cause, Ammerman expressed astonishment at the sheer number of protestors present at the rally. “I thought it was just incredible seeing that many people in one place. It was hard even to get a sense of what 50,000 people looked like.” Demonstrators were not limited to fresh-faced college students — the crowds included activists of all ages and all walks of life, with a surprising diversity of interests, ranging from species conservation to the dangers of fracking. One participant from Maine, Beverly Mann, said of the rally, “[I’m] loving it. Everyone’s a friend, everyone’s friendly, we’re all supporting one another, couldn’t be better.”
Ammerman agreed that the unity was key to the effectiveness of the rally. “Everyone was there for all different reasons but could get behind a single cause. It was telling of the range of interests people had and the range of activism that people are engaging in around the country, not just at Swat,” he said. Swarthmore students clearly feel strongly about the issue of climate change, as evidenced by the dozens who rose at seven in the morning to stand and march with unflagging energy in freezing temperatures. A first-time rally attendee, Elaine Zhou ’16 took a sort of pride in the perseverance of the demonstrators in the face of the weather. “Everyone expected it to be small because of the cold and it was like, wow, 40,000 people stood out in the cold, freezing. It’s actually a monument to our persistence,” she said. Dakota Pekerti ’16 viewed the cause of the protest as being wholly necessary and found the proposed pipeline to be disturbing. “It’s just too much land, it’s too much nature to be destroyed — it’s not worth it,” Pekerti said. Another participant, Rachel Berger ’16, who also works as a compost assistant for the college, asserted that the participation of Swarthmore students in the rally was essential. “I think that it’s important for the college to make a very strong statement about environmental issues. This has kind of become a symbol of the larger environmental movement so I think it’s important
“[I’m] loving it. Everyone’s a friend, everyone’s friendly, we’re all supporting one another, couldn’t be better” Beverly Mann
“I’m a Barbie girl, in a Barbie world. Life is plastic”...is not so fantastic. Or at least this is what Jane Comfort suggests in her work Beauty (2012), a dance/theatre work that “explores the American notion of female beauty through the lens of Barbie.” Concerned with “push[ing] the intersection of movement and language to a new form of theatre” that is “socially conscious,” Comfort choreographed the dazzling spectacles of her two works, Beauty (2012) and Underground River (1998). Both works blend choreography, voice-overs and moments of interaction with the audience. This interdisciplinary approach, when paired with the expressiveness of the dancers and the subtleness of their movements, takes all viewers on an intimate journey of self-discovery. This self-discovery is only achieved by exposing the inner biases and beliefs her audience subconsciously holds. In “Beauty,” her dancers, as Barbies, are manifestations of the danger of feeding into a white, anorexic, blonde, happy-go-lucky concept of beauty. Eerily, her Barbies come to life on stage. The bright lights reflect off of the sequined leotards. Their skin-tone tights make their legs look like plastic. They have huge boobs, smiles that are almost grimaces, high heels, long ponytails, and stiff movements. Their arms are bent at the elbows and their feet fixed in an arched position — to fit their heels of course. In a particularly unforgettable scene, Comfort makes a spectacle of this rigidity, choreographing Ken and Barbie making love. This encounter is anything but sensual or even enjoyable (in a voyeuristic sense); both dancers bend only in ways Barbies could. It was breathtaking to see Comfort’s negotiation of the rigidity of a Barbie’s body and the fluidity of a sexual encounter. For Jumatatu Poe ’04, modern dance professor and mentor in the “Making Moves” Project at Swarthmore, this moment was one of true choreographic genius. Being most interested in “movement investigation,” — namely, imagining “new ways of moving beyond codified, recognized vocabularies [of movement]” — Jumatatu found himself questioning, “what can this Barbie really do? What can this Ken do?” For Juma, the abnormality of the movement, coupled with the integrity it maintained to the anatomy of Barbie, was a bit uncomfortable. In creepily showing what happens when “beauty becomes a paralysis,” Juma was struck by the tension established between being close in proximity but not being able to “experience closeness.” In the course of the 45 minute piece, Comfort covers the many sources of female insecurity (and the ways in which women feed into it), staging extreme workouts and dieting, a provocative clubbing scene where the dancers are scantily clad and shaking their backsides, a live photoshopping of a dancer’s picture, and even a live and disturbing marking of a dancer’s body by a “surgeon” who plans to nip and tuck any problem areas. Arguably, what makes Comfort’s construction of the female experience so riveting is her juxtaposition of her choreography with another dancer, who sits on the side of the
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INSIDE THIS ISSUE
NEWS
LIVING
OPINIONS
SPORTS
A panel of profesors and President Rebecca Chopp dicussed intellectual property, framed around the question of idea ownership, in a round table discussion hosted by the Writing Associates Program.
This week Dorm Dive takes a look inside a Willets quad with Estefania BrambilaOlmedo ’15, Tamsin True-Alcala ’15, Kate Wiseman ’15, and Eve DiMagno ’15.
In an Op-Ed, Living & Arts columnist Dave Toland reflects on his experiences both in the army and as a civilian and what they taught him about deadly weapons.
The Garnet stun Franklin and Marshall, then crush Haverford to end the season on a winning streak and earn a season sweep of the Fords.
College Debates Intellectual Propery
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Dorm Dive: Willets Second Quad
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You Can’t Stop the Violence
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Basketball Sends Seniors Out in Style
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