VOL. CLXXIII NO.90
SUNNY
THURSDAY, MAY 26, 2016
HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE
AACE files civil rights complaint
DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE
HIGH 86 LOW 58
By JOYCE LEE
The Dartmouth Staff
SAPHFIRE BROWN/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
ARTS
FILM REVIEW: ‘ZOOTOPIA’ (2016) PAGE 8
Students enjoy the English department’s “Alice in Wonderland”- themed tea party.
Forum discuss diversity By SONIA QIN
The Dartmouth Staff
OPINION
QU: RESPONSIBILITY OF SPEECH PAGE 6
CHIN: VERSATILE ARTS PAGE 7
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On Tuesday, the two last community forums were held to discuss the community study and diversity working groups, the reports of which were released earlier this month. Issues raised included the recent
“Blue Lives Matter” bulletin board controversy and challenges faced by faculty, staff and students of color. These forums served as the final opportunities for community feedback before the executive committee report is released at the end of the week. The executive commit-
Free food group reaches 1,000
By JOSEPH REGAN
The Dartmouth Staff
The food options at Dartmouth College are many, but what happens to the leftovers? The “FREE FOOD @NOW” GroupMe’s 1,062 members stand as an answer to that question. The group message was started this April by Jessica Link ’17 with the same eight members from a GroupMe comprised of her freshmen year friends.
“I started the GroupMe because I was always noticing free food everywhere,” Link said. “Also, as most Dartmouth students have experienced, DBA tends to run out toward the end of a term.” The GroupMe quickly grew to over 100 members in the weeks following its formation on April 11. Soon after, growth exploded and the membership reached SEE FREE FOOD PAGE 3
tee that will be issuing this report consists of College President Phil Hanlon, executive vice president Rick Mills and vice president for Institutional Diversity and Equity Evelynn Ellis. Hanlon, Mills and vice provost for academic iniSEE FORUM PAGE 5
The Asian American Coalition for Education, a group consisting of more than 130 Asian American organizations, announced the filing of civil rights violation complaints against Dartmouth College, Yale University and Brown University on Monday. AACE requested that the Department of Education and the Department of Justice investigate the admission practices of the three colleges in light of allegedly discriminatory practices against Asian-American applicants, including the use of racial quotas, racially-differentiated admission standards, racial stereotypes and other unlawful admissions criteria. The coalition’s 37-page letter of complaint against the three colleges says that Asian-American applicants “with exemplary educational records and awards and leadership positions” have been rejected from the three colleges while applicants of different ethnicities but similar records have been admitted to the institutions. The letter said that “the Ivy League Colleges impose racial quotas and caps to maintain what they believe are ideal racial
balances,” despite the dramatic increase of qualified AsianAmerican applicants in recent years. AACE president Yukong Zhao said that the coalition’s main objective is to eliminate racial discrimination against Asian-Americans in the college admissions process that is in violation of existing law. He said that the coalition was specifically calling for the same requirements for all racial groups, with no higher standards imposed on Asian-Americans, as well as the elimination of racial stereotyping during the admissions process. Michele Hernandez, a former admissions officer at the College, wrote in a Huffington Post article that the “so-called ‘holistic process’ can discriminate against Asian students.” She said that high-scoring Asian applicants are often seen as “passive,” “robotic,” and “just another violin/piano playing standout” with “lack of spark.” Emily Kong ’16 said that as an Asian-American student, she SEE AACE PAGE 2
Tong Fei starts as new sexologist
By ALYSAA MEHRA
The Dartmouth Staff
Tong Fei has just started her position as the healthy relationships and sexual health specialist, a new role created within the Health and Wellness Center. In the position, she will take over the Sexperts, a sexual health peer education program on campus, and develop programs encouraging healthy relationships, assistant director for violence prevention Amanda Childress said. The Sexperts program is currently inactive because the students on campus that have
been trained already do not have a full time advisor, Childress said. One of Fei’s goals is to restart up the program in the fall. Fei is currently writing the curriculum for the training program, and the center hopes to start recruiting students in the summer to be trained. Fei will be working to make sure that people are not only thinking about sex and sexuality, but also about how they can have other healthy relationships with friends or family, Thriving Together intern Deidra Nesbeth ’16 said. Thriving Together is a peer advising and support group run by the
Health and Wellness Center. Fei is listed as a private resource for students and will be available for counseling, but it will not be her major focus. “If her full focus is just responding to concerns as opposed to developing more of a landscape around prevention and holistic wellness areas, then she’s just going to be responding, and we’re never going get ahead of the game,” Childress said. The position was created in hopes of bringing the positive side of healthy relationships SEE REALTIONSHIPS PAGE 2
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
PAGE 2
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2016
Fei’s work to emphasize AACE filing claims discrimination communication FROM AACE PAGE 1
Instead it’s a reaction,” Nesbeth said. Fei noted that Dartmouth’s D-plan and sexual health information to brings up the issue of how to deal with long term and long distance relationcampus, Fei said. “We are trying to make my position ships. “We need to start this conversation for the larger community,” Fei said. Fei added that she wants to help stu- and normalize it to make it more hudents gain communication skills that man,” Fei said. will help them navigate their college Fei grew up in China where she life and encourage a campus culture says there was very limited sexual where people are having healthy education. She then moved to the United States in order to complete relationships. “Because I was a student not her undergraduate education at the University of Mistoo long ago, souri at Columbia. I want to provide and “She’s super intentional After graduating, contribute my about the way in which she attended WashUniversity in skills to this she uses language which ington St. Louis to receive campus and help create a is super important her masters in social more healthy in order to make a work. Nesbeth said that campus in general by us- lot of people feel besides how knowlFei is, her ing my expercomfortable and sharing edgeable relatability makes tise,” Fei said. a great fit for the Communi- information.” position because she cations skills, will be working with such as understudents often. standing the -DEIDRA NESBETH ’16, “She’s super indefinition of THRIVING TOGETHER tentional about the consent, are INTERN way in which she imperative uses language which for the social is super important wellbeing of college students and are often not in order to make a lot of people feel comfortable and sharing informataught in the classroom, Fei said. “Having someone whose whole tion,” Nesbeth said. focus is on having a way to talk about Nesbeth said Fei is invested in unhealthy sexuality, rather than just derstanding student culture, especially talk about sexuality and the way we as she was recently a student herself. react as something that’s responsive, “Fresh out of graduate school, I got is necessary to shift a culture towards my dream job. It’s especially exciting a culture where healthy relationships because its such a specific field,” Fei said. is the norm,” Nesbeth said. Before Fei, there was a position The Health and Wellness Center within the Health and Wellness was looking for someone who had a Center that focused on general well- strong background in sexual health ness in addition to sexual health and and healthy relationships, as well as healthy relationships. The new posi- background knowledge in the research tion was created to specifically focus and evidence relating to the work hapon healthy relationships and sexual pening on campus relating to sexual health because of the conversations assault. They also wanted someone surrounding violence prevention in who had good personal skills who could work with a campus community, the last year, Childress said. Nesbeth added that Fei wants to as most of the work would mostly include other resources on campus involve students, Childress said. when talking about wellness. The posi- “The office in the student wellness tion will focus on not just prevention center focuses a lot on putting theory and response work but also defining into practice,” Childress said. “If stuwhat a healthy relationship looks like, dents are struggling with a relationship, that plays a huge role in their ability Nesbeth said. “There is a conflation of healthy to feel successful in the classroom relationships and sexual violence and and to be able to function and learn. the ways we talk about these things and We’re looking at not just their physical that means that we’re not necessarily wellness, but their emotional, their talking about healthy relationships intellectual, their social, their spiritual before we get to negative situations. wellness.” FROM RELATIONSHIPS PAGE 1
CORRECTIONS We welcome corrections. If you believe there is a factual error in a story, please email editor@thedartmouth.com.
remembered hearing from her college counselors that she would need higher test scores because of her ethnicity. She also said that she often felt pressure to stand out instead of fitting into a generic “Asian” box, with activities such as playing the piano that would “check off all the boxes.” She said that she felt Asian-American applicants might be grouped together due to their common ethnicity, with certain activities being “devalued” and seen as a standard for Asian-American applicants, who would then be expected to display further qualities or activities in addition to such activities. Vice president for communications Justin Anderson wrote in an email that the admissions process considers the whole person, and that all applicants, including Asian-American applicants, are evaluated under the same criteria. Ninteen percent of Dartmouth’s class of 2019 identified themselves as Asian-American, compared to 21.8 percent at Yale and 20 percent at Brown. This was an increase from the previous two years, with 15 percent of Dartmouth’s class of 2018 identifying themselves as Asian-American, and 18 percent from Dartmouth’s class of 2017. Zhao said that these complaints are
not new — similar federal complaints have been filed against selective colleges such as Princeton University, but the Department of Education did not find in their investigations signs of deliberate discrimination against Asian-American applicants. He said that he was disappointed by the Office of Civil Rights because the office rejected the organization’s complaints and mishandled the investigation of Princeton. Because of this, Zhao said that during this investigation, he sees a need to establish an oversight committee that would include delegates representing Asian-American interests. Zhao also said that the AACE will also strongly urge the U.S. Supreme Court to issue a total ban on racial discrimination in college admissions in its upcoming ruling of Fisher v. University of Texas, a case about affirmative action college admissions policies. He said that he felt an affirmative action process based on socioeconomic status rather than race would be a more fair way to admit disadvantaged students into selective institutions. These complaints come to the College directly after controversy about faculty of color and tenure. Through the use of hashtags #fight4facultyofcolor and #dontdoDartmouth along
with petitions and public forums, students have expressed disappointment and frustration over faculty of color tenure decisions, especially in the case of English professor Aimee Bahng, who was not granted tenure. Kong, who is a member of the Dartmouth student activist group Asian Americans For Action, said that she felt there is a relation between the tenure decision and the complaints about bias against Asian-Americans because of a systematic bias that affects all minorities on campus. She said that she felt there was a lack of support from the administration for individuals of color, from admissions to maintaining faculty of color in tenure tracks. Kong said she believes support for students of color will increase significantly at Dartmouth if faculty of color receive tenure. “Admissions is one way that this investigation could help with, but once students come in, they need support from the administration and from faculty who aren’t actually available at the moment,” Kong said. “Even if this investigation does prove Dartmouth is guilty of bias in admissions, that doesn’t solve the problem that once [students] get here, there’s still a lack of support. Just because numbers go up, it doesn’t mean Asian-American experiences will improve.”
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2016
PAGE 3
GroupMe reveals where to find food
CHECKMATE
FROM FREE FOOD PAGE 1
500, and finally 1000 after only a few more weeks had passed. The limit for a GroupMe is set by the company at 200. The Free Food GroupMe has been able to continue to grow
“In [King Arthur Flour] just a few days ago a member of the GroupMe posted about free baked goods and within five minutes over 30 students had swarmed in and cleared it all out.” -JESSICA LINK ’17, FREE FOOD GROUPME FOUNDER SAPHFIRE BROWN/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
Students taking advantage of the warm weather play giant chess outside.
past that point because Link has emailed the company four times to increase the limit of the group. Link also expressed surprise and pleasure at how the GroupMe has remained well-behaved relative to its size. “People who are temporarily exercising impaired judgement sometimes start deleting people at random,” she said. “Then I have to delete those people in order to get it to stop. It is difficult though because
their friends will just add them back and GroupMe doesn’t have a feature that bans users permanently.” Link said that the problem of people causing havoc by deleting others at random is a relatively minor one, as is the issue of users posting about events unrelated to free food currently available on campus. “In [King Arthur Flour] just a few days ago a member of the GroupMe posted about free baked goods and within five minutes over 30 students had swarmed in and cleared it all out,” Link said. Asha Pollydore ’17 was an original member of the GroupMe and had her doubts early on about its viability. “When she first made it, it had the same people as were in another GroupMe so I thought that we didn’t need two GroupMe’s to post free food in. Also, I thought that this would be something that was useful week eight and onwards, but not so much earlier in the term when students still have a lot of DBA,” Pollydore said. Pollydore said she changed her mind when the GroupMe reached 100 members and was surprised by the sheer amount of free food available on campus as the free food GroupMe became more active. Referring to the GroupMe as the “People’s Food Liberation Front,” Taylor Watson ‘16 said he believes most students at Dartmouth find their meal plans do not last for a full term. Watson stressed the importance of the GroupMe’s focus on posting about food available in the present, rather than the blitzes that
go out about free food at upcoming events. In one instance, a member posted that free food would be available at a barbecue the following day. Another responded, “It’s called free food @ now, not @tomorrow.” The offending member was swiftly removed. However, Watson also said the GroupMe has, by increasing the awareness of free food on campus, made him more aware of the diverse set of events that take place at the College in addition to the food they offer. Watson echoed Link’s sentiments concerning the GroupMe’s experience with trouble over Green Key weekend. After a group of individuals changed their usernames to variations on Link’s name, there were mass deletions of members. This required an appropriate response,
“It is a really inclusive group — all we want to do is make people aware of free food. I don’t know what will happen in the future.” -JESSICA LINK ’17, FREE FOOD GROUPME FOUNDER one that Link said has made her, as the administrator, a disclipinarian of the group. “I’ve become a sort of dictator — I’m not sure if that is good or bad,” said Link. Watson has also taken part in deleting members who have abused the group’s large set of members. “I have had to delete some of my own trippees, which was devastating,” said Watson. Clifton Jeffery ’19 is a part of the GroupMe, but has never actually used it to get food before. Nevertheless, Jeffery said that just being a member has been a positive experience. This was Link’s original intention, to at the very least make people more aware of just how much free food there is on any given day at Dartmouth. It is also why Link is concerned the GroupMe may decrease in membership over sophomore summer. “It is a really inclusive group — all we want to do is make people aware of free food,” said Link. “I don’t know what will happen in the future.” Currently, group membership is oscillating between 950 to 1050 members.
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THE DARTMOUTH EVENTS
THURSDAY MAY 26, 2016
DARTMOUTHEVENTS TODAY 12:15 p.m. - 1:00 p.m.
“Social Brain Sciences” talk, professor Emily Falk, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania, Moore Hall
4:30 p.m. - 6:00 p.m.
“How to Build It So They Come (and Stay),” professor Susan Schreibman, National University of Ireland, Maynooth, Haldeman 41
4:30 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
25th Annual Karen E. Wetterhahn Science Symposium, Oopik Auditorium, Life Sciences Center
TOMORROW All Day
Fall term course change period opens and will last until May 31
3:30 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
“Epilepsy Surgery and Research,” Charles C. Jones Seminar, Dr. Hai Sun, Louisiana State University Health Science Center, Spanos Auditorium, Cummings Hall
3:30 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
“Controlling and Quantum World in Ultracold Atomic Spins,” professor Ivan Deutsch, University of New Mexico, Wilder 104
ADVERTISING For advertising information, please call (603) 646-2600 or email info@thedartmouth. com. The advertising deadline is noon, two days before publication. We reserve the right to refuse any advertisement. Opinions expressed in advertisements do not necessarily reflect those of The Dartmouth, Inc. or its officers, employees and agents. The Dartmouth, Inc. is a nonprofit corporation chartered in the state of New Hampshire. USPS 148-540 ISSN 01999931
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2016
PAGE 5
Hanlon responds to questions about Collis Center displays FROM FORUM PAGE 1
tiatives Denise Anthony were in attendance at the first forum held at 8 a.m., while Anthony, Mills, Provost Carolyn Dever and vice provost for student affairs Inge-Lise Ameer were present at the 1 p.m. forum. Each of the two events had about 150 attendees. In the morning forum, Anthony began by explaining the “what, how and why” of the community study and presented many of the initial, high-level findings. “Lack of a sense of belonging” was one of the main reasons that respondents to the survey who said they have considered leaving the College in the past gave. Rankin and Associates said this reason does not usually come up in the top five reasons at other institutions. Mills said that the three diversity and inclusive excellence working groups created in the winter had a “remarkable, but perhaps unsurprising, confluence of recommendations.” “Dartmouth has been talking about this for decades and there have been more than 40 reports prior about things that Dartmouth could do,” he said. “The role of the inclusive excellence effort is to move from decades of reports to immediate action.” A female student asked Hanlon why he cancelled office hours for students and faculty for the remainder of the term, to which he replied that on Friday, he hosted faculty and staff office hours, while the prior Tuesday, he met with people he had not gotten a chance to speak to the week before. Art history professor Mary Coffey said that because of efforts to have gender equity in College faculty committees, “the percentages of women and men in our faculty are so skewed that there are people who are consistently serving on committees over and over again, while a huge percentage of male faculty do almost no committee work.” Coffey said that she would recommend sensitivity and bias training not just for searches and members of the CAP, but “across the board, including upper administration,” adding that administration is “probably worse than faculty when it comes to diversity statistics.” She also said that she has seen several cases of faculty and students being disrespectful to staff members on campus and that staff members are often working 60-hour weeks on a 30-hour paycheck. “The staff compensation budget is so small that they barely get a nominal raise,” Coffey said, adding that the imbalance between the work that staff do and the compensation they receive may have contributed to the large number of staff who responded to the campus climate survey. However, Coffey said that many
staff members are afraid to speak out and feel unsafe expressing their views. There needs to be a mechanism for staff to raise their concerns without worrying that they will be fired or reallocated in some way, she said. Coffey also said that the administration should begin generating transparent statistics about retention and promotion, broken down into several metrics that separate each individual into categories such as U.S. national, international and under-represented minority. “It’s not just about tracking how many we have in each category, but what is the rate of promotion, because that is a piece of information that at least I can’t find,” she said. Hanlon said that workload balance is one of the key challenges facing faculty that the College needs to address and that he agreed with the need to make statistics available to the public. “The word ‘transparency’ is easy to say and hard to follow up on, but true transparency delivered to this community would be incredibly powerful,” Mills said, adding that the executive committee hopes to use transparent methods to hold itself accountable to the College. Hanlon added that the many staff cuts following the 2008 recession were in part caused by the College’s unpreparedness, but that since then, the institution has been making efforts to ensure that it will be ready to face the next recession. A female student in the audience asked how the College’s budget will be restructured to prioritize diversity and inclusion. Mills said that this information will be included in the executive committee report. A male member of the audience said that the College is a racist institution. “Dartmouth administration is racist and Dartmouth is built on racism,” he said. “People of color are not statistics, we’re people and our voices should be heard, but our voices are not being heard.” He said that Hanlon once asked a black woman in his office hours to “educate him,” but that is the responsibility of the institution, not of the students. He then asked when the College will start valuing students, faculty and staff of color for their voices, experiences and presence on campus, rather than just being statistics in a report. “You created these working groups to respond to the findings of the survey, but out of all three working groups there is no Asian-American student representation,” the student said. “We make up 20 percent of the student body and not a single student represented.” He added that he personally knows of many students who nominated themselves to be a part of
the working groups but were not ultimately chosen. Mills and Anthony said that the community study was not intended to portray people as statistics. Anthony said the study was conducted in a systematic way across campus that provided evidence of issues that need to be addressed, she said. “We don’t think we’re dismissing voices, but we understand that there’s pain out there and there’s voices that don’t feel like they’re being heard, and we’re working on that,” Mills said. Hanlon did not give additional responses to the student’s question, other than re-iterating that he does value the voices of everyone. A female student suggested that instead of a quantitative study, a qualitative one should be conducted, one in which “74 percent of the participants are not white,” referring to the fact that 74 percent of the community study respondents identified as white. She then asked about the College’s response to the Blue Lives Matter incident last week, where a board put up at Collis by the College Republicans was taken down and replaced by members of the Black Lives Matter group on campus. Hanlon and Dever sent out an email following the incident threatening disciplinary action against any individual involved in the vandalism. “Why did you choose that moment to release that statement and threaten disciplinary actions against the students involved, but in the fall, [when the Black Lives Matter display was vandalized], you didn’t use the term ‘Black Lives Matter’ in the e-mail and you didn’t threaten disciplinary action?” the student asked. Hanlon said that having displays is a form of free speech that needs to be protected on campus, to which the student responded that she did not feel her freedom of speech was being protected and questioned whose freedom of speech was actually being protected. Mills said that freedom of speech applies to everyone. “The challenge of free speech is to allow the speech and engage the speech, that is all; it’s not to be disrespectful,” Anthony said. In response, the student said that it was not her ideas or her feelings that felt threatened, but rather her existence on campus. African and African-American studies professor Reena Goldthree said that the “magnet of Dartmouth” often repels, rather than attracts, faculty and staff of color. More than three dozen faculty of color, and even more staff of color, have left the College in the past decade, she said, adding that this trend hinders the educational experience of students and weakens the College’s academic reputation. “This mass exodus of faculty and
staff of color has resulted in the fact that we are now dead last in the Ivy League in terms of faculty of color and trail almost every other major research institution in the country,” Goldthree said. She directed her question to Hanlon, asking what he plans on doing to ensure that the College will thrive as a magnet. In response, Hanlon said that the executive committee report will present a number of things that will address this issue. The College has already put in incentives to make it more attractive to hire faculty and staff of color, he said. History professor Annelise Orleck said that in her 25 years at the College, there have been many initiatives to increase diversity, but the lack of results is partly a result of “a lack of real will to change structural inequality on campus.” She said that faculty of color who have received tenure and subsequently left the College often cited bullying by other faculty as a reason for their departure. Orleck also addressed what she called the “current tenure crisis,” describing the denial of tenure to English professor Aimee Bahng as “unjust and inequitable.” She then asked the administration to define recurring terms that constantly appear in the conversation, such as excellence, inclusivity, consistency and transparency. “For purposes of tenure, tenure is a faculty process,” Hanlon said. “The terms productivity and excellence are laid out in the faculty handbook.” Inclusivity implies not just having
categories or representation, but is instead being able to engage fully in the community in all ways, Anthony said. As time was running out at the morning forum, a female student asked the last question, directed toward Hanlon regarding his refusal to publicly denounce white supremacy last term. “Please President Hanlon, can you define white supremacy and tell us whether you are against it?” the student asked. Hanlon said that racial supremacy is whenever a set of rules, laws, traditions and structures elevates one group at the expense of another, and that he has already expressed that he is against racial supremacy, no matter which racial group is oppressed. At the afternoon forum, a male student asked why the administration was not publically denouncing Hanlon, who the student said was actively harming students of color. In response, Mills said that the College’s diversity problem has not been a recent issue, but has been present for over 40 years. “It’s not a Hanlon problem, it’s a Dartmouth problem,” he added. A female student said that in the fall, when the Black Lives Matter display was vandalized, Safety and Security officers did not understand why this constituted a racist act. The College does not care about students of color, as these very individuals are receiving death threats, the student said. Both Mills and Ameer said that death threats are not tolerated at the College.
A BLOODY AFFAIR
SAPHFIRE BROWN/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
Students donate blood during the Red Cross Blood Drive.
THE DARTMOUTH OPINION
PAGE 6
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
STAFF COLUMNIST DOROTHY QU ‘19
Voces Clamantium
Responsibility of Speech
Letters to the Editor about language learning and the value of quality. In Praise of Language Learning It is easy to be depressed by recent news from the College, especially as I have been associated with Dartmouth for 50 years. Perhaps it is time to celebrate one of Dartmouth’s great achievements: the language requirement and the unparalleled quality of language instruction. Knowing other languages, like knowing music, enables one to think differently about the world and human experience. How shameful it is that neither Trump, Clinton nor Sanders speak a second language, although it rumored that Sanders knows some Yiddish. During my years on the faculty, I took Spanish and Russian introductory courses along with the undergraduates. It made my life richer. -Jon Appleton, Arthur R. Virgin Professor of Music, Emeritus Less Primacy, More Creativity I want to express my admiration for Carter Brace’s fair and thorough reporting on the controversy over professor Aimee Bahng’s tenure denial in his May 19 article, “Students and faculty react to Bahng’s denial of tenure.” However, I also want to correct one of my quoted statements in the piece. In our discussion, I referred to Bahng’s involvement in an anonymously authored book, calling her one of the “primary authors” of that text. While I did not identify the publication by its title, Brace, doing his job as an investigative reporter, did name it as “Speculate This!” I wanted to correct the impression my poor choice of words gave and note that Bahng does not claim to be the primary author of this book, but rather stands behind the ethical stakes of the project by insisting on the collectivity of its authorship by uncertain commons. One of the many troubling outcomes of Bahng’s denial is that those of us who wish to defend her against claims that she was “not productive enough” have found ourselves capitulating to the very logics this book attempts
to unsettle. Upon reflection, I realize that I resorted to the language of primacy in an attempt to assert the value of her uncredited labor. In a system that prizes primacy over creativity, risk and experimentation, one can lose sight of those very values. In part, “Speculate This!” argues against the pressures we all feel to quantify our value, to game the systems by which that value is calculated and to place that calculation ahead of scholarly integrity. We need a system of evaluation that takes a more qualitative approach to the value of our work, our teaching and our contributions to the Dartmouth community.
“In a system that prizes primacy over creativity, risk and experimentation, one can lose sight of those very values.” We should not be put in a situation in which we are forced to trade our ethical commitment to critiquing the values of speculative capitalism for tenure. Sadly, not only has Bahng’s anonymity been breached in our efforts to rally her cause, but perhaps just as upsetting, I succumbed to the very terms of quantification that her work decries. This is but one of the many insights I have gleaned from her work, both on the page and in the classroom — and it is why I stand so firmly in my defense of her value and the merits of her case. Just as the collective of uncertain commons challenges us to embrace uncertainty, change and meaningful diversity, I too am embracing “creative speculation” in fighting for an alternative future at Dartmouth. -Mary K. Coffey, Art History professor and art history department chair
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ISSUE
THURSDAY, MAY 26, 2016
NEWS EDITOR: Erin Lee, LAYOUT MANAGER: Maya Poddar, TEMPLATING EDITOR: Jaclyn Eagle.
SUBMISSIONS: We welcome letters and guest columns. All submissions must include the author’s name and affiliation with Dartmouth College, and should not exceed 250 words for letters or 700 words for columns. The Dartmouth reserves the right to edit all material before publication. All material submitted becomes property of The Dartmouth. Please email submissions to editor@thedartmouth.com.
If you value intellect, you should think before you speak or act. We here in the United States pride want to have an intellectual debate, you ourselves on our freedom of speech, an need the research. Responders also have invaluable right and great power that this freedom of speech, and they will dethe Constitution gifts us. And, as we all cide how to react to intellectual ignorance, know very well from a popular superhero whether it be calling you out or supporting franchise, with great power comes great your claims. responsibility. Here’s the thing: if you want Now, on political correctness. I unto be rude, you have the right to be rude. derstand the idea some people have that If you want to be ignorant, failing to back political correctness is stifling. But many up your claims with any evidence, again, have forgotten the golden rule: don’t do — you have the right to do that. However, if or say — something to another person that you consider yourself someone who values you wouldn’t want someone to do to you. discourse, education, creative thought and There is a fine line between stating somekindness in general, you have to think bething relevant but “not PC” and simply fore you speak. Otherwise, you don’t really being rude or ___-ist. It’s difficult to define value knowledge or empathy — and, in a that line, because the golden rule doesn’t way, humanity. really apply if you can’t imagine being in This column is not a direct response to someone else’s shoes, and it is important any one event that has happened at Dartthat we continuously strive to do so. mouth recently. Rather, I am responding It would be very easy for me to simto the growing ignorance and widespread ply say “just don’t be rude” and “just be complaints about what has been dubbed considerate” about this matter. But, again, “PC culture.” there is a fine line. And many people cross I have endeavored to not discuss Donald that line and protest “PC culture” for Trump in my columns, but I am now stifling their own ignorance. But there are caving in. In Rutgers Unialso some who may have versity’s 2016 commencebeen wrongfully subdued “But many have ment speech two weeks in the name of “PC ago, President Barack forgotten the golden culture.” This is why I Obama stated, “In politics disdain the term political rule: don’t do — or and in life, ignorance is correctness. There is no not a virtue.” Obama say — something to all-seeing professor who is was indirectly referring to your metaphorianother person that grading Trump and many of his cal political paper on its you wouldn’t want baseless and contradic“correctness,” but rather tory statements. Trump’s real, living people judging someone to do to response? “This is a priwhether what you said mary reason that Obama you.” was considerate or not. is the worst president in There are ways to have U.S. history!” open and engaging discussions, and you In an attempt to be the devil’s advocate can’t prevent everyone’s feelings from being while also generously giving Trump the hurt — but you cannot and should not use benefit of the doubt, I would understand that fact as an excuse to deliberately be Trump’s response if Obama had referred obnoxious or offensive just to exercise your to “ignorance” as simply anything that did freedom of speech. There are civil ways to not agree with his own beliefs. However, engage with others. Also, if someone thinks that was not the definition of ignorance something is discourteous or hurtful to the that Obama was referring to. In another people that they care about, they will repart of his speech, he says, “It’s not cool to frain from doing it. If you’re the one judgnot know what you’re talking about. That’s ing them for doing that because you think not keeping it real, or telling it like it is. they are “just being PC,” I recommend that That’s not challenging political correctness. you take a good, long look at yourself. That’s just not knowing what you’re talking Personally, I believe that every argument about. And yet we’ve become confused needs a healthy amount of politeness and about this.” empathy. You already filter yourself when I personally was very heavily involved speaking with people you care about. If with the sciences throughout high school. you said every thought that popped into Although I am a potential government your head, there’s a good chance you may major now, I have kept my devotion to the not have as many friends as you do now, scientific method with me. Because of this, and this same concept extends to political I find it very difficult to feel comfortable de- discussions. You have to grasp that other fending or even confidently having a stance people may have experienced different and on any issue unless I have spent innumermore difficult hardships that you may not able hours researching and discussing the have faced yet, or maybe never will. Say topic. This then makes intelligent discourse what you want, anywhere you want! But easier and effective. A dialogue involves empathy is what makes us human, and if more than one party; if you don’t absorb you, whether you’re politically far left or far or believe the credulity of what the other right, are not ready to doubt yourself and person is saying, then is it really any difyour beliefs, then you cannot call yourself ferent from talking to a brick? Remember an advocate of intellectual discussion and — you may say what you want, but if you introspection.
THE DARTMOUTH OPINION
THURSDAY, MAY 26, 2016
PAGE 7
STAFF COLUMNIST CLARA CHIN ‘19
SENIOR STAFF COLUMNIST SARAH PEREZ ‘17
Versatile Arts
Selfies and Smelling Flowers
Even today, the liberal arts remain both relevant and applicable. Artists are considered dreamers, idealists and romantics, but rarely are they considered intellectuals, hard-workers or pragmatists. And, more generally, dreaming is seen as akin to dwelling in nostalgia, and idealism to false hope. Romanticism is illogical. Art, one may conclude, is about lingering in a world of the past — taking one’s time to stop in nature and write a poem, capturing a landscape slowly with oil paints, playing a slow piano tune in a salon. Due to the ongoing technological boom, today everything is all about maximizing efficiency. No one has time for art anymore. I began thinking about the devaluation of art when I came across Vinod Khosla’s widely shared and fairly controversial blog post, “Is Majoring in Liberal Arts a Mistake for Students?” He argues that the arts and humanities are outdated; colleges should move towards a liberal sciences degree instead of a liberal arts degree. After reading the piece, I contemplated what it meant for me. I spent my childhood dancing, drawing and playing the piano, and I am currently considering double majoring in two humanities fields. Two beliefs seem to be responsible for the lack of appreciation for art — firstly, that art and the humanities are nothing but emotions and the expression of feelings, and secondly, that such emotions are somehow unproductive or devoid of value. Art allows us to step back from a world in which everything has to have monetary or productive value. Watching a really good movie, hearing an impressive violin concerto or enjoying a modern dance performance has the power to move one to tears, feeling a heightened sense of emotion. To this argument, a friend told me, “But why do you want to make yourself feel sad? What’s the point?” It’s not necessarily about feeling sad. Allowing oneself to be moved by a performance or a piece of art is to let oneself partake in a shared experience. Art transcends cultural, economic and other barriers between people. It is a feat to be able to produce something powerful enough to bring together people and enhance our ability to empathize with one another. To say that the liberal arts or the arts are a mistake for student is to say that the ability to move people in this way is unimportant, perhaps even easy. The thought process behind artistic creativity can also be applied to the sciences. In J. Bradford Hipps’ May 21 New York Times article, “To Write Better Code, Read Virginia Woolf,” he asserts the increasing prioritization of science, technology, engineering and math — otherwise collectively known as STEM — over the humanities. He continues, “Software powers the world, ergo, the only rational education is one built on STEM.” The article disputes this widely held belief by providing examples of non-STEM majors — including the author himself — who have achieved success in STEM by applying their experience and ability to think like a humanities major. Even in STEM careers, it is important to look towards the humanities because they break the pattern of STEM groupthink and set a precedent for creativity and innovation. But while many think creativity is just an
outpouring of natural imagination, the arts and humanities are difficult fields that warrant just as much merit as STEM. The reality is, while creating powerful art is valuable, it is also grueling and often requires a shutdown of emotion. For example, a poet who merely expresses one’s own unfiltered feelings may produce poetry that seems like a middle school student’s journal entries. To produce “good” poetry, sometimes one has to take a step back and consider theory and mechanics — such as, what metaphors will allow me to portray a particular mood? What word will best portray a particular sound? Similarly, Beethoven’s extremely powerful “Symphony No. 5” is not just an explosion of sound; the chord progressions, melodies and dynamics put together are a product of almost scientific theory. In his blog post, Khosla claims that humanities people are subject to “emotion and biases-based distortions.” It is actually quite the opposite. While it is true that a pianist must evoke feeling and literature enthusiasts must be able to empathize with characters, emotion like this is productive because it may help to develop sensitivity and compassion, both of which are important human qualities. Moreover, it is also true that the humanities and fine arts are far from unanalytical and undisciplined. Like many sciences, literature and music, just to name a few, are grounded in theory. Playing the piano involves much technique and, in fact, often first requires the shutting off of emotions. The subtitle of Khosla’s post reads, “Critical thinking and the sciences first — humanities later.” But who’s to say that arts and humanities do not require critical thinking and hard work? Surely, applying Julia Kristeva’s theory of abjection to a literary text like Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” or using knowledge of jazz harmonies and chord structures to compose a piece require critical thinking — applying theoretical concepts to practice, interpreting language and sound, and creating something from essentially nothing. Non-STEM disciplines may seem like all fun and games, being both effortless and expressive, but I know from sitting hours on end at a piano that art is not as soft as people think it is. To achieve the ability to move people with art, it is necessary to spend long, rather dull hours eliminating technical difficulties to allow the music to ‘speak.’ It can be a completely unexpressive process. Khosla writes, “Though Jane Austen and Shakespeare might be important, they are far less important than many other things that are more relevant to make an intelligent, continuously learning citizen, and a more adaptable human being in our increasingly more complex, diverse and dynamic world.” This is far from the truth. An audience to a performance or a reader of a text might only see the feelings or ideas conveyed, but the creator of the artwork or text must, to some degree, be methodical and apply theory and technique in order to produce the desired effects. Instead of discounting the work of artists, we should acknowledge the difficulty of being an artist and appreciate all they do, much the same way we appreciate the work of innovative scientists.
Selfie culture detracts from our consideration and appreciation.
If I had a dollar for every “political selfie” The rare La Plata dolphin later perished of that has graced my Facebook newsfeed this dehydration and was left in the mud. election cycle, I could probably purchase While the pointless loss of animal life is a selfie stick for everyone on campus. The tragic in and of itself, these stories aren’t just likely Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, billboards for People for the Ethical Treatmade her way to Hanover last July with ment of Animals. What about when selfies challenger Bernie Sanders following closely incur a human cost? While this may seem far behind. To this day, I am neither “Ready for beyond the realm of imagination, it really Hillary” nor “Feeling the Bern,” although shouldn’t be. Last September, 18-year old my social media accounts back then may Christal McGee of Hampton, Georgia was have suggested otherwise. For weeks on end driving with three friends at around 10 p.m. after their visits, I scrolled through a deluge when she allegedly plowed her Mercedes of political selfies featuring the two candiinto the back of Georgia resident Wentworth dates. This is not to excuse GOP candidates Maynard’s Mitsubishi. In this case, investifrom the same behavior, as I soon discovered gators only have a handful of he said, she that those across the partisan aisle are also said accounts to go on — and some selfies. suckers for a selfie. Albeit less frequently, the McGee is now being sued by Maynard, who smiling faces of Rand Paul and John Kasich claims to have suffered a traumatic brain also popped up on my feeds more than I injury from the accident. According to his would like to admit. Despite recent revelalawyer, a reconstruction of the accident tions that Facebook and other social media revealed that McGee had been driving at platforms might be less than neutral, that 107 m.p.h. — and sharing it all on Snapchat. is not the direction I would like to take this Among its many features, Snapchat has a piece. Instead, I would like to take a few mofilter that clocks the speed at which users are ments to hash out our generation’s brand of moving and captures it in a photo. Although high art: the selfie. many have called on Snapchat to eliminate Here at Dartmouth, we are all old enough the speed filter for incentivizing reckless drivto remember the emergence of the selfie. We ing, there have been no changes to the app can recall a time when awkward self-taken thus far. Maynard is also suing the creators headshots were not a mainstay of popular of Snapchat for negligence. culture. To go one step That being said, Mcfurther, we probably had a Gee’s 107 m.p.h selfie was direct hand in the creation “Why do we insist on not the only one snapped of this art form. We were memorializing every that evening. Strapped true trailblazers in middle into a gurney and sporting moment, no matter school, snapping pictures a gash on her forehead, of ourselves on grainy flip- how insignificant, with McGee took another selfie phone cameras and texting moments after the crash. them to friends or posting a selfie?” Apparently, one just wasn’t them online for the world enough. She shared it with to see. With this in mind, her friends on Snapchat it’s only natural that our with the message, “Lucky proclivity for taking selfies has followed us to be alive.” into our college years. After all, we did grow People often say that a picture is worth a up with them, right? thousand words. Yet, this is a gross underThat being said, we are not alone. statement. Had things taken a turn for the Everyone from my almost 80-year old worst that September night, a single selfie grandmother to President Barack Obama could have cost a great deal more than a seems well-versed in the art of the selfie. But thousand words. It could have cost four lives Beethoven’s “Symphony No. 5” or Dante’s — not to mention thousands, if not millions, “Divine Comedy?” Maybe not so much. of words left unsaid. Earlier this month, tourists at Yellowstone Each morning before I left for preschool, National Park in Wyoming snapped a selfie my grandmother and I would walk around with an adorably fuzzy bison calf as they her front yard and smell the flowers in her loaded the scared animal into the back of garden. Aside from being the best cook I their S.U.V. Although a woman was tossed know, my grandmother has a green thumb by a bison after a failed attempt at a so-called that could rival Martha Stewart’s. As my “#bisonselfie” just last July, clearly these mom strapped me into the backseat of our people missed the memo on keeping a safe family’s station wagon, she would call to me distance from wildlife in the park. Upon from the porch, “Smell the flowers!” Almost delivering the calf to a ranger station, the twenty years later, she continues reminding tourists expressed that they were trying to me to do so. This odd little phrase is one of protect it from colder weather. Last Monthe best pieces of advice I’ve ever gotten, and day, the calf was euthanized; habituated to so I feel compelled to share it. Why do we humans and rejected by its herd. Accordinsist on memorializing every moment, no ing to the National Park Service, the calf matter how insignificant, with a selfie? Why began routinely “approaching people and have we become so beholden to the standard cars along the roadway.” A similar incident of “pics or it didn’t happen”? Why aren’t we, occurred last February in Argentina when instead, living each and every second to the beachgoers plucked a baby dolphin from the fullest and smelling the flowers? Hint: The water and began passing it around for selfies. answer won’t be in your Snapchat story.
THE DARTMOUTH ARTS
THURSDAY, MAY 26, 2016
PAGE 8
Students work with local children on autism spectrum for project By KIRA MIKÉS The Dartmouth
Twelve young artists took over the Hopkins Center’s Garage studio space on Monday night for the opening of their gallery show created in collaboration with students enrolled in “Autism: Science, Story, and Experience.” The exhibit is part of a project designed by course instructors Sara Chaney, a writing professor for the Institute of Writing and Rhetoric, and psychology professor Bill Hudenko. After teaching the science behind Autism Spectrum Disorder, a group of developmental disorders that affect an individual’s ability to interact in social situations or communicate effectively, and the rhetoric behind ASD, Chaney and Hudenko paired the students with local autistic children for a collaborative, creative project that would serve as a culminating experience for the course. Chaney said she and Hudenko wanted students to interact with people on the autism spectrum so they could develop a complete understanding of ASD that included an experiential element, This year, the project was entitled, “What Is Normal?: Artists on the Autism Spectrum Reflect On Neurotypicality.” Chaney defined the concept of neurotypical as what types of cognitive,
social and communicative behavior people consider socially normal. “Very often, people on the autism spectrum find themselves to be the object of other people’s attention rather than being able to reflect their own perspective on the so-called neurotypical culture,” she explained. The professors and the students encouraged the artists to create and express themselves freely in whichever medium they found fitting. Some were inspired by the theme, while others chose to go in different directions. “The theme, while interesting, might not be something that all of the participants [related] to,” Chaney said. “We were very aware that they may or may not really think about themselves in terms of normal or abnormal, and we didn’t want to force that perspective, either.” Hudenko said the intention was to facilitate personal expression, not to constrict the artists into having a certain kind of expression. “It helps people to feel really validated in their thoughts and their ideas,” he said. At Monday’s reception, the artists and the students shared a range of media such as paintings, drawings, films and sculptures for viewers, which included the artists’ families and local educators. Chaney said the breadth of medium
reflected the importance of providing an array of options to communicate and express oneself for individuals with communication styles that differ from what is considered to be the norm. Psychology major Lauren Schulte ’16 said she had a great experience working with her collaborator, a child from the Hartford Autism Regional Program in White River Junction. “I’m interested in working with kids and possibly going into school psychology, so this was perfect,” she said. Schulte chose to step back and let the artist express herself, acting as a facilitator in the child’s creative process. Chaney encouraged many of the students to take this sort of approach to let the individuals’ creative visions unfold. “One of the things we wanted to do with this project is create a forum in which the students are basically assisting people on the autism spectrum to represent themselves,” Chaney said. After picking a topic that the child enjoyed, Schulte said she could tell the girl was really happy and excited when the project was complete. The participating artists ranged from 11 to 20 years old and came from throughout New Hampshire and Vermont. Sarah Ogren ’16, an economics major and public policy minor, also worked with a child from HARP. She
KATE HERRINGTON/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF
Students admire local children’s artwork displayed in the Hop Garage.
saw him enjoy artistic creation and find a sense of confidence in his work. “He had a chance to express himself and to know that his art was going to be put in a gallery at Dartmouth,” Ogren said. Hudenko said the highly interdisciplinary nature of the course and this collaboration allowed students in the course to experience strong epiphanies and engage with the topic in a meaningful way. The story aspect of the course focused on how people’s ideas about autism shape the way they interact with
autistic people in real life, Chaney said. “We really wanted [the students] to think about what [it means] to live [a] life framed by these diagnostic categories and these social realities,” she added. Hudenko echoed these sentiments by noting ASD people may be stigmatized and marginalized. By helping others recognize this problem, social change can occur, he said. The exhibition remained open to the public until Wednesday. “Autism: Science, Story, and Experience” will be offered again next year and is open to students of all class years.
‘Zootopia’ (2016) brings Disney to another level By ANDREW KINGSLEY The Dartmouth Staff
Disney returns to the successful world of anthropomorphic animals (“Robin Hood” (1973) and “Chicken Run” (2000)) with their 55th animated feature film, “Zootopia” (2016). Like the best animated films, “Zootopia” creates a world all its own, where half the pleasure and drive of the film is exploring the wondrous corners of the creative universe. Since English brims with animal analogies — slow as a sloth, memory of an elephant, clever as a fox — Disney had particular fun shaping this mammalian metropolis which feels uncannily close to home. Like “Finding Nemo” (2003) on land with a police twist, “Zootopia” centers on Officer Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin), a spunky rabbit looking to make it big in the epic, eponymous city and track down a criminal mastermind. Judy starts out
on her family’s farm, dreaming of cops and robbers more than carrots. Like a leporine Mulan, Judy leaves her comfortable idyll and infiltrates the all-guys club of the police academy, only to quickly become their top recruit. Brimming with anticipation and promise, Judy enters the shimmering wonderland of Zootopia, where predators and prey live in complete harmony. Similar to San Fransokyo, the setting of “Big Hero 6” (2014), Disney indulges in the colorful, kaleidoscopic spectacle that is Zootopia, with Judy’s wide-eyed entrance through its deserts, rain forest and arctic sectors rivaling our own. But reality quickly sinks in when she’s assigned meter maid duty and forced to bear the unrelenting vitriol of her victims. After being hustled by the cunning fox, Nick Wilde (Jason Bateman), Judy returns the favor and enlists his guile and dry wit to help unravel the city’s crisis, in which predators are
becoming savage killers again. A few notes made the film stand out from typical Disney fare. There was a particular patience to the film’s humor that rarely exists in PG films. Just watch the trailer; it’s one joke dragged out for three minutes — that’s incredibly risky for your film’s draw. Certain gags are just given a little more time to set up, the frame left empty for just a split second longer to build anticipation. Also, despite the immensity of Zootopia’s space, the diegesis felt incredibly tight, with bit characters weaving in and out at the right moments to spark humor. Finally, the writers milk this mammalian world for all its potential. From literally calling out the elephant in the room to the sloth-run DMV, the film revels in human parallels and word play. The film has particular relevance to graduating seniors. Always the pragmatists, Judy’s parents dole out
the sage advice, “It’s good to have dreams just so long as you don’t believe too much of them.” The humble rabbit destined to be a carrot farmer like her 200-some siblings decides to enter the force. Her apartment, a parody of the freshman nightmare, finds her alone, eating microwave dinners to the dulcet tones of her fratty neighbors. While most of us won’t bring down a corrupt government within four days of entering campus, the film appeals to all ages and rivals the universality of some Pixar favorites. I also found the film particularly analogous to current events. Amid a culture of excessive police violence and “Blue Lives Matter” countercampaigns, Disney attempts to be a mediator, indoctrinating the new generations of officers and citizens with its utopian vision. In a time when the prejudicial fears of police have killed innocent African Americans, “Zootopia” frames the police as
instigators of racial difference and panic. Mothers move their children from the tiger on the subway while protesters argue for the lives of the predators. After the Michael Brown and Freddie Gray shootings, our country became chaotic, the media a zoo, in which people fought for the basic human right of not being shot down like animals. Behind an anthropomorphic, buddy cop veil, Disney has produced a fairly socially relevant film. It’s like Black Lives Matter-lite for children. While it packs in the usual bumper sticker sentimentality, “Zootopia” transcends traditional moralism and Disney’s industrial complex to make a highly socially conscious film. Bring the kids for the mammals, but make sure to stay for the message. Rating: 10/10 “Zootopia” is playing at the Nugget Theaters today at 4:30 p.m. and 6:50 p.m.