VOL. CLXXII NO. 20
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2015
HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE
Local businesses react to Hanlon’s hard alcohol ban
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By LAUREN BUDD The Dartmouth Staff
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Dartmouth’s new hard alcohol ban, announced by College President Phil Hanlon on Thursday, will likely lead to an increase in sales for some local businesses, while others are unlikely to see changes, local business owners and town officials said. Hanover town manager Julia Griffin said that businesses that sell beer and wine, such as Stinson’s Village Store and CVS Pharmacy, will likely experience increases in sales, while establishments such as Pine, Molly’s Restaurant,
The hard alcohol ban will likely affect some Hanover businesses more than others.
SEE BUSINESSES PAGE 2
V-February panelists discuss intersectionality
B y JASMINE SACHAR
The Dartmouth Senior Staff
Four students shared their experiences with intersectionality at the first of a four panel series hosted by V-February on Sunday afternoon. An annual campaign sponsored by the Center for Gender and Student engagement, V-February is aimed at promoting gender equality and ending violence against women through performance and discussion. Intersectionality is the study of
how oppressive powers such as racism and sexism are interconnected and cannot be addressed individually. Kalie Marsicano ’17, one of the event’s organizers, said that it was necessary to host a panel on intersectionality because it touches on themes that are important but not necessarily broached in V-February’s two central events, a production of “The Vagina Monologues” and the “Voices” performance. “We can’t really help what comes out of ‘Voices’ and what they write,
and so it tends to reflect the demographic of the Dartmouth student body, but this is a very intentional move to shift the focus and bring intersectionality into the spotlight to start the month of February and to have that in mind throughout,” Marsicano said. The panelists — Adria Brown ’15, CJ Jones ’16 , Rachael Rhee ’16 and Yomalis Rosario ’15 — spent around 30 minutes delivering prepared remarks, then took questions from the organizers and the audience. About
National media outlets cover Moving Dartmouth Forward B y LAURA WEISS
The Dartmouth Senior Staff
The College entered the national media spotlight again last week as College President Phil Hanlon announced his Moving Dartmouth Forward plan, with most coverage focusing on the decision to ban hard alcohol on campus. The slew of coverage comes after Dartmouth made headlines for a series of protests last spring and for allegations of hazing and Title IX and Clery Act
22 students were in attendance. Rhee spoke about her experiences as a woman of color in Dartmouth’s army ROTC program and in the Greek system. “At first I wondered if I joined ROTC [and] if I rushed because I wanted to erase my identity as an Asian American woman at Dartmouth,” she said. “Was I trying to erase my race somehow by being all American? Maybe, perhaps, yes in SEE V-FEBRUARY PAGE 3
THE BRADY BUNCH
investigations. Media outlets from the Associated Press, CBS and NPR to MTV and Jezebel reported on Hanlon’s plan after his announcement last Thursday morning. Some associated the ban on hard alcohol with the elimination of pledge terms in the fall, while others put the ban in context of recent concerns over sexual assault related to drinking and Greek life. The Washington Post highlighted KATELYN JONES/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
SEE MEDIA PAGE 5
Students dress in the jerseys of their favorite Super Bowl football team.
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
PAGE 2
DAily debriefing Andrew Lohse ’12, who has entered the national spotlight in recent years after he provided information for a Rolling Stone article about hazing at the College, will return to Dartmouth to take classes this spring, he announced on his Facebook page on Friday. His memoir “Confessions of an Ivy League Frat Boy,” which detailed his time as a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, was published last August. Since the Rolling Stone article, he has become an advocate of abolishing Greek systems across the country. The state of Vermont wants to build a permanent 14-bed psychiatric facility in Middlesex, the VTDigger reported Sunday. This facility would replace the temporary Middlesex Therapeutic Residence, which opened in June 2013 to house patients after tropical storm Irene damaged the Waterbury Vermont State Hospital. The replacement building, which would be twice as large as the seven-bed temporary residence, would cost about $11.4 million and aims to open spaces within the Vermont mental health system, Commissioner Paul Dupre said. In response to tropical storm Irene, the Vermont Department of Health opened additional centers to accommodate the new decentralized mental health system. The secure new facility in Middlesex would not only seclude and restrain dangerous forensics patients, but also be a low-cost alternative for patients who cannot re-enter society. The Concord Monitor reported last Friday that 14 nonprofit organizations have applied to open medical marijuana programs in New Hampshire. The director of contracts and procurement Eric Borrin said that the Department of Health and Human Services has divided the state into four distinct regions and will only license one center per region. The chosen centers will take at least six months to become operational, division director Mary Castelli said in a therapeutic cannabis advisory council meeting. A bill that is currently undergoing evaluation in the Department of Health and Human services could allow the alternative treatment centers to open in multiple “satellite locations.” The Concord Monitor reported last Friday that New Hampshire Technical Institute and Southern New Hampshire University have partnered to facilitate a dual-enrollment agreement that will allow graduate students at NHTI to transfer to SNHU to earn bachelor’s degrees. Alan Blake, NHTI’s director of communications said that the agreement is effective immediately. Although NHTI credits were always transferrable, students were forced to apply and get accepted to other programs before finding out how many credits were applicable for transfer. As a clause of this agreement, students of NHTI must obtain an associate’s degree with a minimum GPA of 2.0 and remain in good standing with the institute.
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2015
Ban will have effects on businesses FROM BUSINESSES PAGE 1
Murphy’s on the Green and the Salt Hill Pub will likely see increased patronage. Pine restaurant in the Hanover Inn will continue serving hard alcohol, despite the fact that it is owned by the College, Griffin confirmed. Local bars will have to be more vigilant to ensure that fake IDs are not used, Griffin said, as more underage drinkers may attempt to use them to purchase hard alcohol. The two state liquor stores in Lebanon and West Lebanon will also experience less bulk purchases by Dartmouth students, Griffin said. She went on to say that in the past, when penalties for providing hard alcohol to underage students were less severe, the state liquor stores would frequently see Dartmouth students buying entire shopping carts full of alcohol, ostensibly to distribute to underage friends. More severe penalties will likely discourage such large purchases, however, and though students of age will still buy from state liquor outlets, the amount purchased at one particular time would likely be smaller, Griffin said. Griffin said she did not believe that the ban would have a negative impact on any local businesses. Another issue that could emerge as a concern for business owners and workers is over-serving patrons of any age, Griffin said. “The last thing you want to do from a restaurant or bar’s perspective is assume any liability with a DWI that might occur because
somebody got ahold of too much alcohol served by a liquor-serving establishment,” Griffin said. “Those are the nightmares on the part of bars and restaurants that serve hard alcohol.” Murphy’s owner Nigel Leeming said that business at Murphy’s would not be affected by the ban. “It won’t affect us in the slightest,” Leeming said “I think life will go on as normal.” Only a third of Dartmouth students are of age at any given time, Leeming said, and therefore the proportion of students obtaining hard alcohol at Murphy’s will remain constant because they closely monitor their servers to ensure that underage customers are not served alcohol. “Are people going to stop drinking hard alcohol in the dorms and start coming downtown?” Leeming asked. “I don’t think so.” As for the use of fake IDs, Leeming said Murphy’s staff can properly distinguish between an authentic ID and a fake one, and it is unlikely that any fake IDs would make it past them. “Somebody uses a fake ID here, I call the cops and they get arrested, I don’t care,” Leeming said. “We get a reputation here that you have to follow the rules, and therefore people do follow the rules because we enforce them.” Leeming said that as long as downtown businesses enforce the rules surrounding alcohol consumption, there would not be problems. He went on to say that local businesses have licenses and employees to protect, and have a
legal and moral responsibility to uphold their standards surrounding serving alcohol to patrons. “It’s difficult to compare what goes on at the College and what goes on here because we have different viewpoints on what this all means,” Leeming said. Dartmouth students almost never cause problems at Murphy’s, Leeming said, saying that student groups and students visiting with parents were respectful and lawabiding. Stinson’s owner Jack Stinson said that he anticipates more students coming into his store to buy beer and wine, and that other sanctioned but formerly less popular drinks, such as hard cider, will likely see an increase in sales. “We are the number one provider of hard cider, which is sweet, and liquor is sweet but if students can’t drink that maybe they’ll be drinking more hard cider,” Stinson said. Banning hard alcohol may cause the College’s campus culture to return to that of the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s, Stinson said. “There wasn’t as much hard alcohol on campus,” he said. “There was beer, a ton of beer. They drank a lot more beer than students drink now by far. By Wednesday night, the whole campus drank beer all week. Maybe what’s happening is they’re moving back to that.” Representatives from Pine, CVS and the Salt Hill Pub declined to comment. Representatives from the Canoe Club and Molly’s Restaurant could not be reached for comment.
NO TOUCHDOWN ON MY WATCH
— compiled by ericA buonanno
Corrections We welcome corrections. If you believe there is a factual error in a story, please email editor@thedartmouth.com. The initial version of the Jan. 30 article “Student and faculty reactions to ‘Moving Dartmouth Forward’ are mixed” mistakenly quoted Ashneil Jain ’15 as saying the purpose of the student forum was for students to work with administrators to change parts of the Moving Dartmouth Forward plan with which they do not agree. He said the forum’s purpose was instead to foster dialogue among the students and generate questions so that administrators could clarify confusion and misunderstandings around the policies, their implementation and their effects on the College. The Dartmouth regrets the error.
KATELYN JONES/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
Collis Governing Board hosted a Super Bowl watch party in One Wheelock last night.
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2015
PAGE 3
Panelists talk self-awareness, intersectionality for V-February FROM V-FEBRUARY PAGE 1
the beginning, but not anymore.” Jones said that compartmentalizing was part of the process of getting to know herself at Dartmouth, but that this became difficult when she was figuring out who she was in some communities that “didn’t know what to do with me.” “I think through being a part of those spaces, and feeling like I had to give my all to those spaces, give all of my emotional energy but not being able to offer a complete sense of myself when I was talking about things in those spaces was really devastating,” she said. “Not being able to talk about being a woman, being a victim of violence, being queer. Those things weren’t acceptable. It wasn’t part of the discussion. And so through all that I figured out that a large part of intersectionality is making it a part of your individual care.” Brown, who identified as a member of the Chickasaw Nation, recalled a flustered moment when she was filling out a question on the Stanford University application which asked “describe your identity in five words.” “It made me feel in that moment totally divided,” Brown said.
“Then I got here and I felt more that way in the communities that are here. I often felt that I am inhabiting one identity as I walk into a space without all of the parts of me. It does often start with individual care and coming to the realization that you are a whole person living with all of these intricate webs. It’s impossible to be your full person in spaces that try to diminish yourself to one thing.” Speaking about the importance of being self-critical, Rosario spoke about how even communities of color on campus, while “trying to be a community here in a place that’s hostile to us” are guilty of excluding some groups, for being poor or for being trans. “Being conscious of intersectionality helps me be self-critical,” Rosario said. “I’m always open to critique because I understand I’m not going to get it right all the time. Of course we mess up.” The panelists also spoke about their opinions regarding new social policy changes announced in College President Phil Hanlon’s Moving Dartmouth Forward plan last Thursday. Brown said that the new policies do nothing to mitigate exclusivity and said she felt annoyed that the most preva-
lent critique from students has been about the hard alcohol ban. Rhee added that students should
“Being conscious of intersectionality helps me be selfcritical. I’m always open to critique because I understand I’m not going to get it right all the time. Of course we mess up.”
people who struggle with depression and anxiety,” she said. Audience member Amara Ihionu ’17 said that having other women get together and share their experiences was reaffirming to her. She said that she agreed with the critique that some communities of color on campus have room for improvement when it comes to the issues of intersectionality. “I think it’s very valid, and I don’t think we think about these things enough,” Ihionu said. “I guess we’re just so caught up in having these communities and
trying to be there for each other that we don’t critically engage and we are slow to criticize ourselves out of pride and fear.” Three other panel discussions are scheduled in the next four weeks. On Feb. 12, the panel will focus on issues of body and mental health, which will include the staff nutritionist at Dick’s House. A Feb. 22 panel will discuss gendered spaces and a concluding panel on March 1 will revolve around women and careers. Marsicano is a member of The Dartmouth staff.
— YOMALIS ROSARIO ’15, V-FEBRUARY INTERSECTIONALITY PANELIST
question what the ban means for gender dynamics on campus. Rosario said she was also concerned about the plan’s emphasis on increasing academic rigor. “This is such an ableist campus and it will just make it harder on
HOW TO SLAY YOUR DRAGON
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Students attend the “To Slay a Dragon” performance at the Hopkins Center this weekend.
Charli fool bear-Vetter ‘15 Dan Calano ‘15 Grace Carney ‘17 David Clossey ‘16 audrey Djiya ‘17 Yasmeen erritouni ‘17 Chris Gallerani ‘15 sally Glowiak ‘17 tara Joshi ‘18 erukana kazibwe ‘15 Jessica kocan ‘18 annie medina ‘18 Jamie mercado ‘15
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THE DARTMOUTH OPINION
PAGE 4
GUEST Columnist BEN PACKER ’17
Staff Columnist JON VANDERMAUSE ’16
Safety is a Variable
A Steering Success
Dartmouth is a rational institution with selected values. Although administrators have framed Dartmouth’s policies in terms of student safety, this is not the bottom line for the College. They calculate their decisions in the interests of the institution itself. I assume most readers already have an understanding of some of these interests, centered on things like institutional financial stability and college rankings. Last April, then-Dean of the College Charlotte Johnson responded to the criticism of College President Phil Hanlon during the Freedom Budget protests by characterizing the his primary responsibility as fundraising. Despite Hanlon’s newfound passion for student affairs, we have no reason to believe that his priorities have changed in the past few months. As a result of the rational perspective of the institution, all inconspicuous campus issues are simply not a problem as long as they remain inconspicuous. The events that lead President Hanlon to decide the “Moving Dartmouth Forward” process was necessary were not the problems themselves, but their increased publicity. I don’t mean to imply that Dartmouth administrators do not care about the well-being of the students on a personal level, but rather that their positions require them to consider those concerns within the institutional framework. The lack of transparency in this process has been criticized extensively, but an understanding of the disconnect between the goals of the process and the rhetorical goals allows us to comprehend the motivations for its secrecy. In President Hanlon’s speech on Thursday morning, for example, he said that the committee reached a researched conclusion that the eliminating Greek life would not reduce the identified problems. The necessary data to support this research, however, was not present in the “Moving Dartmouth Forward” presidential steering committee’s report. Consider a hypothetical situation in which administrators, based on data, predicted that abolishing the Greek system would stop a certain number of sexual assaults a year. Administrators then consider the value of that reduction in sexual assault. Since the bottom line is the interests of the institution, I would anticipate that for the institution, these sexual assaults are only
negative if they contribute negatively to the College’s image. I expect that administrators would then have to compare that cost versus the likely reduction in alumni donations and the potential drop in applicants attracted to the Greek scene. This perspective treats the situation much like an equation, in which the probability of a public case of sexual assault or major protest is weighed against the decline of alumni support. As long as that equation favors alumni support, the Greek system will continue to exist. Since I think the College views sexual assault as negative only in its publicity, this creates the perverse incentive to reduce the probability that it enters the public sphere, allowing more sexual assaults to happen before it becomes in their interest to accept the financial consequences of abandoning the Greek system. After such a decision, what do you imagine administrators would tell the public? If their perspective saw sexual assault as an equation, what would they do with their initial data? This hypothetical situation designed to make you uncomfortable with the institutionalization of caring reveals when the need for secrecy may arise. As a result, I suggest that we not accept the claims of the administration, particularly President Hanlon’s claim that the identified problems persist at colleges “regardless of the history and intensity of the Greek scene.” Supporting such a strong claim would require some transparent scholarship, which the committee did not provide. To affiliated students at Dartmouth who quietly believe that their organizations are the source of our woes but are waiting for change to come from above, don’t treat the results of the steering committee as reassurance that you are not the problem. In the debate about whether the Greek system should continue, the data-less suggestions of an institution whose ulterior motives are take precedence should not assuage your guilt. Finally, I hope that students do not accept the status of their well-being as a variable and allow publicity stunts to substitute for progress on issues they regularly confront. To students who continue to assert that Dartmouth does not have any problems, please step up and let everyone know that you don’t want to “move Dartmouth forward.”
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The steering committee’s recommendations will move Dartmouth forward. College President Phil Hanlon’s decision their tripees after freshman year. They form to eliminate hard alcohol on campus has deep friendships with their freshman floor dominated the conversation surrounding but are flung across campus come sophomore Thursday’s speech. Some observers have ral- fall. Under the new residential house system, lied around what they consider a bold way of house affiliation will last all four years and curbing underage drinking. Many students the enrollment will be organized around have instead rallied Trips, allowing tripees around their Captain and their leaders to be “The student who spends Morgan handles, laughof the same his Friday mornings offering members ing off the ban as a house. Perhaps equally quaint throwback to the thoughtful comments in an effective, though less honors seminar is often the publicized, is the comProhibition era. It’s a shame that same student who spends mittee’s proposed overso much attention has his Friday nights hitting haul of the current Dbeen showered on hard ping-pong balls into cups Plan. If implemented, alcohol, as the final of Keystone with a severed the new D-Plan will report of Hanlon’s paddle.” give students the option presidential steering of having a traditional committee — a 72academic calendar. page beast that can barely be bound with a Equally exciting are the committee’s staple — is overflowing with thoughtful and proposals on inclusivity. They found that thoroughly researched ideas about how to Dartmouth, as an institution, is inclusive only improve student life at Dartmouth. to those in the highest income brackets, not As the committee correctly observes in ing that 59 percent of Dartmouth students its report, many Dartmouth students split come from families in the top six percent of their lives in two. The student who spends the national income distribution. To correct his Friday mornings offering thoughtful this, the steering committee proposed several comments in an honors seminar is often hard-hitting measures, including a capital the same student who spends his Friday campaign for financial aid, a redirected nights hitting ping-pong balls into cups of admissions pipeline that targets low- and Keystone with a severed paddle. middle-income students and a new admis The committee hopes to bridge this rift sions policy that gives these students a boost between social life and academic life by in the admissions process. These proposals swapping the “work hard, play hard” mantra offer hope that, in the future, our college so common among students with a superior will welcome all high-achieving students alternative. Through the new house system, regardless of their parents’ income. undergraduates will no longer be left to While these reforms are just a fraction of fend for themselves in the dorms. Gradu- what is in the full report, the report’s riches ate and postdoctoral students, along with do not refute concerns about the liquor ban. faculty members, will join the residential Students and professors alike have expressed communities. Thanks to the committee, concern that banning liquor will drive its we can expect a massive uptick in funding consumption underground. I asked the chair for student programming and social spaces, of the steering committee, English professupplementing the monotony of pong in sor Barbara Will, about this concern. In fraternity basements. her view, the numbers just don’t support it. Further buried beShe wrote in an email neath the publicity sur- “We must continue to that other schools that rounding the liquor ban discuss and debate the have instituted a hard are the committee’s proliquor ban have seen proposed changes. Now posals to improve student significant decreases well-being. Through the that the steering committee in hospital transports. Dartmouth Thrive pro- has laid out their opinions, This correlation, she gram, the committee it is time for the Dartmouth wrote, was a compelhopes to extend Dart- community to carry on the ling reason for this mouth’s educational mis- work they began. ” recommendation. sion to include a holistic As the report approach to student notes, the committee’s development, encompassing the body proposals alone cannot transform campus. and the mind as well as the intellect. The While President Hanlon’s plan will mark a program will promote mindfulness, well- series of new changes for the College and ness and student health. If the details of its future, his announcement on Thursday Dartmouth Thrive are properly fleshed out, morning is not the final step in moving it may represent the College’s most serious Dartmouth forward. As Will said in her effort at promoting mental well-being among email, Hanlon’s announcement marks a students. new beginning for Dartmouth. We must The committee has also made a serious continue to discuss and debate the proposed effort at addressing one of the biggest set- changes. Now that the steering committee backs to strong community at Dartmouth has laid out their opinions, it is time for the — a lack of continuity. Under the current Dartmouth community to carry on the work system, students form tight bonds during they began. DOC First-Year Trips but often rarely see Let’s roll up our sleeves and get started.
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2015
PAGE 5
National media coverage focuses on hard alcohol ban FROM MEDIA PAGE 1
both the hard alcohol ban and residential communities, and associated the plan as a whole with reviews at the University of Virginia, which has gained national attention recently after Rolling Stone magazine published a story on a sexual assault at UVA. The story noted that Hanlon’s plan goes further than recent alcohol policy changes for fraternity parties at UVA, which allow hard alcohol consumption if an outside bartender is hired or a sober fraternity member regulates smaller bottles of hard alcohol at smaller events. The Wall Street Journal focused on the ban, as well as calls for reform from the Greek system and the plan’s attempt to curb a “party culture” that is associated with sexual assault. The report drew parallels with recent reforms at Brown University, UVA and Swarthmore College. The New York Times reported on the ban and Hanlon’s drawing on student misconduct as the impetus for change. The Times highlighted Dartmouth’s “string of embarrassments” related to binge drinking,
but contextualized them with recent instances of binge drinking, hazing and sexual assault on campuses across the country. The report noted that the College’s new policy on hard alcohol goes beyond what the majority of other colleges have instituted, and reported that experts expect few other institutions to follow the College’s lead. Bloomberg News reported the College was considering a hard alcohol ban leading up to the announcement Thursday morning, then reported on the student life and academic aspects of the plan. The Atlantic ran coverage of the ban on hard alcohol and other Moving Dartmouth Forward initiatives under the headline “No One Knows How to Stop Campus Alcohol Abuse,” writing that it is “hard to put much faith” in the College’s ban. The report called a hard alcohol ban more symbolic than likely to show actual success, writing that it might lead to less knowledge on hard alcohol consumption or push drinking hard alcohol off campus, making it more difficult to regulate. Comparing the changes with the
dictate by national organizations of UVA sororities for members to not attend fraternity parties during rush week, the report deemed this “no solution at all” and called Dartmouth’s plan “equally invalid” for other reasons, but concluded that there seem to be no other valid ideas for dealing with concerns like binge
“I think that they’re focusing too much on the alcohol part of [the policy changes], but I think it’s more multi-faceted.” - Marcella Saboe ’18 drinking and its relationship to sexual assault. In an editorial published Sunday the Valley News compared Hanlon with Nixon’s opening China in 1972. Problems with alcohol consumption as well as sexual assault had to be addressed, the editorial stated, as
WEIJIA TANG/THE DARTMOUTH STAFF
College President Phil Hanlon announced a slew of changes as a part of Moving Dartmouth Forward.
“turmoil” on campus and bad publicity had “tarnished” the College’s reputation, even before Hanlon took office. The editorial expressed approval of Hanlon’s confrontation of such issues on campus, drawing contrast with former College President Jim Yong Kim’s treatment of such concerns. College Director of Media Relations Diana Lawrence wrote in an email that Moving Dartmouth Forward has drawn media attention because it is unprecedented amongst colleges, pointing to coverage in the Washington Post that noted that Dartmouth was among few others in addressing high-risk behavior on campus in a bold and thorough manner. Hanlon is taking the issues addressed in Moving Dartmouth Forward seriously, and that type of leadership gains media attention, she wrote. Fifteen students interviewed by The Dartmouth overwhelmingly expressed they felt that national media coverage focused heavily on the hard alcohol ban, while neglecting other important elements of the plan. “I think that they’re focusing too much on the alcohol part of it, but I think it’s more multi-faceted,” Marcella Saboe ’18 said. “I think the changes in residential life are more significant and they’re not paying attention to these as much.” Savannah Liu ’18 said she felt national media attention made it seem as if issues addressed in Moving Dartmouth Forward are limited to the College, while she said it is not only Dartmouth that grapples with such issues. Kahlil D’Souza ’17 said he found it unfortunate that national media coverage of the plan was fixated on the hard alcohol ban, though he believes it shows the College is committed to being a progressive
institution. He hopes it will lead to serious discussion over the role of alcohol on other college campuses, he said. Subur Khan ’17 said from the coverage she read, articles seemed to disproportionately focus on the hard alcohol ban, though she said she does not believe problems with alcohol consumption at the College are any worse than at other schools. She noted that national media seemed to give little coverage to residential life and academic changes, which are major elements of Moving Dartmouth Forward. Nick Moolenijzer ’17 said he believes coverage of Moving Dartmouth Forward will help the College’s national reputation because it makes the institution seem as if it is doing a lot to address such issues, though he said it depicts Dartmouth students in a bad light, seemingly placing blame on the student body. He cited the New York Times’ headline, which said the College was banning hard alcohol in response to student misconduct. Jon Li ’16 said that he believes it is realistic to expect bad press and reactionary pieces from the Moving Dartmouth Forward announcement. “Whether it’s seen in a positive light among our institutional peers remains to be seen,” he said. Bronwyn Lloyd ’17 said the Moving Dartmouth Forward plan was designed to look good in media coverage rather than to help solve issues. Breanna McHugh ’17 said she felt national media coverage makes it seem as if the College has made more progress than it has in actuality made. Parker Richards, Noah Goldstein, Katie Rafter, Erin Lee, Erica Buonanno, Steffen Erikson and Annie Ma contributed reporting.
PAGE 6
DARTMOUTH EVENTS
THE DARTMOUTH COMICS
“Another One Bites The Dust”
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2015
Matthew Goldstein ’18
TODAY 4:00 p.m. “Microbiology/Immunology” lecture with Melissa B. Lodoen of the University of California at Irvine, Borwell Research Facility, 658W
4:30 p.m. “What Is The Book Arts Workshop?,” short tour and introduction of the studios and equipment, Baker Library, Room 21
7:00 p.m. “Few of us” (1996), weekly film screening for Sonic Landscapes, Black Family Visual Arts Center, Screening Room 001
TOMORROW 7:00 p.m. “Dartmouth Idol Semi-Finals 2015,” student singing competition, Hopkins Center for the Arts, Spaulding Auditorium,
7:30 p.m. “10-Minute Play Festival,” an evening of short student-written plays, Hopkins Center for the Arts, Bentley Theater
7:30 p.m. “Argentine Tango Course and Practica,” for beginners and intermediate, Sarner Underground
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THE DARTMOUTH ARTS
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2015
PAGE 7
Nelson ’01 to perform Mozart at the Lincoln Center
B y amelia rosch
The Dartmouth Senior Staff
Fro m s i n g i n g w i t h t h e Dodecaphonics to producing a mini-opera in Italian for her major thesis, Sarah Nelson Craft ’01 surrounded herself with music during her time at the College, though she did not decide to go into music professionally until midway through. Since then, Craft has sung in Paris and China and has been on “This American Life.” In March, Craft will perform a solo at Lincoln Center. What was your time at the College like? SC: Academically, I did a modified major — Italian modified with music. It was perfect for me. I was able to combine the two of them for my senior project. I produced a mini-opera that was about an hour long. It only had two singing parts. A really good friend was the other lead and there was one nonspeaking part, which a professor of mine played. I translated it for the Italian section. I had to raise money for it and hire musicians for it. I also had to write a big long paper in Italian as well for the other part of my major. When did you decide to go into music professionally? SC: I don’t think there was an exact moment. Music was pretty much the main thing to me, even though it was mostly extracurricular. I did take several music classes for my major. I spent most of my time singing. Evenings would be two hours of chamber singers and
two hours of Dodecs three times a week. I think for a long time I just thought it was an unrealistic thing to want to be, when I was younger. It still is — that hasn’t changed. It still is unrealistic. It still is kind of crazy. It’s still challenging, but at some point I figured that I just loved it too much to not pursue it.
“I don’t think there was an exact moment. Music was pretty much the main thing to me...I think for a long time I just thought it was an unrealistic thing to want to be, when I was younger. It still is — that hasn’t changed. It still is unrealistic. It still is kind of crazy.” How did you start your music career? SC: I took a little bit of an unconventional path. After college, I took a couple of years off. I did a summer program at Oberlin [College], where I met a conductor who conducted a well regarded a cappella group in New York, and he asked if I wanted to come and sing for him. For two years after college, I sang with this group, which was not at all full time. I was in several concerts a year. On the side, I was taking lessons and getting better
and auditioning. And then, after two years off, I went back to get my masters. The typical path is to do a young artists program with opera companies and, from there, eventually send a manager and get sent to auditions. That’s easier said than done. I didn’t get into a lot of programs at first. I’m still trying to make it work. Just through contacts in the concert world, people who liked my singing, people I auditioned for, I put together enough of a regular schedule to say that I have a singing career, but it’s tricky. It’s hard to distill it into a complete thing. It’s very nebulous, this whole singing career thing. I do have a manager now. Some is through him, but most of it I’ve gotten on my own through people I know or who recommend me or contacts I’ve made. It sounds like you sing in a lot of different styles. What has that been like? SC: I’ve stubbornly stuck to trying to keep it varied because I just love too many styles of things to choose. A lot of times, it’s a bit divided, like you are an opera person or a choral singer. I’m determined not to choose just one of those things. As my technique improves, I can sing all the styles, while I could not say that a few years ago. It sort of depends what gigs I get, which styles I am singing any given month. I might have a choral performance and then a few weeks later an opera and then a gig where I’m singing solo with an orchestra. I like doing it all, and I like to juggle it all.
W hat’s been the biggest challenge? SC: I have two children, so the biggest challenge is balancing the
“I can’t tell people not to [sing professionally] because if you have the music in you, nothing going to stop you. You’re always going to be working hard. It’s as much about the drive and dedication to always getting better and being the best you can as it is about raw talent. The people who make it really work really hard. You’ve got to be nice to people. The people who make it are also a pleasure to work with.” career and my non-singing life. That can be really hard because you need such focus. Having a singing career and making it is so difficult. So many people are trying to do it. To improve, you always have to be bettering yourself, bettering your singing. It can be
hard to take that focus away, which I have to do a lot because I have kids. It’s difficult to go between mom mode and singing mode, for sure. What advice would you give students who want to go into singing professionally? SC: It’s tricky. I’m almost inclined to tell people to steer clear because it’s such a challenge. There are so many more people trying to do it than can. At the same time, I can’t tell people not to because if you have music in you, nothing is going to stop you. You’re always going to be working hard. It’s as much about the drive and dedication to always getting better and being the best you can as it is about raw talent. The people who make it really work really hard. You’ve got to be nice to people. The people who make it are also a pleasure to work with. A side note, I will tell anybody to keep other options in their back pocket. [For] the majority of people going into music careers, it doesn’t feel the way you think it will. A lot of people I know are performing part of the time and teaching part of the time. When you’re a student, it sounds like that’s not what I wanted to do, but then reality picks up and you end up finding you love using music in another way. That’s not a failure at all. It’s not a failure for your career not to turn out as you imagined when younger because it rarely does. This interview has been edited and condensed.
“Whiplash” makes a possession out of percussion
B y Andrew kingsley The Dartmouth Staff
What does possession look like? Does it entail crawling up walls, becoming a vessel for Satan and vomiting up green slime as in “The Exorcist” (1973)? Or is it subtler, with glazed, absent eyes, isolation and monomania? If “The Exorcist” were set at the Juilliard School, the result would be “Whiplash” (2014). Director Damien Chazelle wrote the screenplay to “The Last Exorcism Part II” (2013), and brings his demonic expertise to this compact gem of perfection. Andrew Niemann (Miles Teller) haunts every scene in the film, possessed by ambition, his drum kit and the devil of band directors — Terrence Fletcher (J. K. Simmons) — who demands students sell their souls for greatness. A nervous freshman at the fictional Shaffer
Conservatory in Manhattan, the nation’s top musical college, Andrew opens the film framed insignificantly at the end of a long hallway, tapping away at a snare drum. He’s a member of the school’s “JV” jazz orchestra, where music plays as an afterthought and success is equated with cafes and nightclubs. In barges Fletcher, the bald, austerely dressed drill sergeant of Shaffer, who sustains himself by emotionally gutting students hopeful to enter his top jazz orchestra. Like the tornado in Oz, F letcher makes quick work of this uninspired, dreary band, taking only Andrew onto the dazzling, colorful pedestal of Schaffer. Simmons has surely come a long way from Farmers Insurance commercials .Reveling in vitriolic violence, Simmons delivers his magnum opus and is a shoe-in for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar,
for which he has already earned a nomination. The film has garnered the nickname “Full Metal Juilliard” due to Simmons’ similar role to the abusive, tyrannical drill instructor in Stanley Kubrick’s “Full Metal Jacket” (1987). There’s a sadistic pleasure in watching him snap aspirant psyches like twigs with the flick of a wrist or curt one-liners like: “There are no two words in the English language more harmful than good job,” and “Nieman, you earned the part. Alternates, will you clean the blood off my drum set?” We all have a Fletcher lurking deep inside us, rattling its cage of suppression hoping to annihilate an enemy. Just look at Fletcher’s students: all of them mimic his abusive explosiveness, creating a band of dictatorial minions. An anthropomorphization of selfloathing, obsession and insecurity, Fletcher will go down as one of this decade’s most memorable
performances. Enter Andrew into this fray, the new kid with daddy problems who all too willingly submits himself to this torture. A case study in masochism, Andrew descends into madness, physically ravaged by Fletcher’s demands for perfection as his hands spray blood onto his worn drum kit. Gaunt, calloused and with a thousand-yard stare, Andrew becomes possessed by the demon of possible fame, cutting all ties with humanity to become Fletcher’s ideal. A near-fatal car accident before a show is just a flesh wound for Andrew; the strive for perfection does not stop for broken bones. What is so remarkable is the film’s ability to translate the performance anxiety of its star to the audience, as the whole crowd hushes in nervous anticipation for Fletcher to begin with a “5, 6, 7 and...” Their dance macabre culminates
in this year’s best scene, in which Fletcher and Nieman duel to the death at a Lincoln Center performance. A masterpiece in editing, rhythm and lighting, Andrew’s nine-minute drum solo gives new meaning to the term “grand finale.” An exorcism of sorts, Andrew purges himself of his failures, spraying blood and sweat onto the cymbals, as Fletcher, his priest, raises his arms in supplication to the musical rapture of his pupil. The last shot is a close-up of Andrew, filling the frame in ecstasy, no longer that anonymous student drumming away at the end of a hallway. Rating: 10/10 “Whiplash” is nominated for five Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (J.K. Simmons), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Film Editing and Best Sound Mixing.
THE DARTMOUTH ARTS
PAGE 8
ARTS
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 2015
“About Face” exhibit explores self-portraits in modern art
B y AMELIA ROSCH
The Dartmouth Senior Staff
Faces stare out from the walls of the Hood Museum of Art, from a grotesquely elongated and detailed blue face to a woman shooting a water gun directly at the viewer to a series of people mimicking riding a bus, all of whom are portrayed by the same woman. The one thing that connects all the pieces, which come from 18 different artists, is that they are self-portraits, part of the Hood’s “About Face: SelfPortraiture in Contemporary Art” exhibit, which opened at this weekend. “About Face” includes self -portraits by a variety of wellknown contemporary artists, including Chuck Close, Nikki S. Lee and Cindy Sherman. Hood Museum intern Laura Dorn ’15, who helped to organize the show, said that director of the Hood Museum and curator for the show Michael Taylor had chosen the pieces used in the exhibit before the fall. She said that the planning for these types of shows happens months before the shows begin. Dorn said that her role in the exhibit was to help make labels for the pieces and determine where they would be physically located in the gallery. “What was really cool was when [Taylor] had all the works in the gallery space and trying to decide how to group pieces together ,which ones worked well together on the wall, which ones fit in what room,” she said. “I got to be a part of that process.”
She said that when she and Taylor were laying out the show, they considered things like the size and medium of the pieces, as well as how pieces physically fit into the gallery space. “Certain pieces that relate to each other really well and had similar themes that have a nice dialogue with each other, we put them on the wall together,” Dorn said.
“In terms of contemporary art, there’s not a huge amount of scholarship. We were talking about what we saw, responding to it, trying to relate it to our lives and life at Dartmouth to make it more accessible.” -Elissa Watters ’15, Hood Museum Intern Dorn said that she enjoyed the layout of the back room of the exhibit, which included photographic series by Sherman, Wendy Red Star and Martín Gutierrez. The pieces by Sherman come from her collection “Bus Riders” and show her modeling as various people that she saw riding a local bus, including the
COURTESY OF THE HOOD MUSEUM OF ART
Jeff Wahl’s “Double Self-Portrait” is one of featured pieces in the exhibit.
bus driver and a man carrying a large object. The Red Star series, “Four Seasons,” shows the artist staring straight at the viewer, as she mocks traditional museum dioramas on Native Americans. Gutierrez’s pieces, part of his “Real Doll” collection, shows him dressed up as four different sex dolls, all of whom have distinct names and personas, in a series of poses that range from sexually provocative to haunting. Dorn and eight other students wrote labels for the exhibition. Elissa Watters ’15, a curatorial intern for the Hood who wrote a label for the Susanna Coffey piece “Intake,” said that the labels were more about the students’ reactions to the pieces they chose than research. “In terms of contemporary art, there’s not a huge amount of scholarship,” she said. “We were talking about what we saw, responding to it, trying to relate it to our lives and life at Dartmouth to make it more accessible.” Dorn said that she enjoyed that the labels were not written like traditional museum labels focusing on research because it gave her an opportunity to connect the art more to her experiences and the present day.
Malika Khurana ’15, who wrote the label for Kiki Smith’s “My Blue Lake,” said that her favorite part of the label writing experience was the chance to see the piece in storage in person with Taylor. Khurana said that she chose to write the “My Blue Lake” label because she enjoyed the technical aspects of the creation of the portrait and because it was different than traditional self-portraits. Watters, who had not had experience with Coffey’s work before writing the label for “Intake” said she chose the piece because the way it was painted with an ambiguous divide between foreground and background. “ I t h o u g h t i t w a s re a l l y interesting the way the figure fades into and emerges out of the background,” she said. Khurana said that she also enjoyed how Coffey used the blending of strong geographic shapes in her self-portrait. Dor n wrote the labels for two pieces, including Jeff Wall’s “Double Self-Portrait” and Rineke Dijkstra’s “Self Portrait.” Dorn said that because she had no previous experience with photography she enjoyed working with photographs instead of paintings.
She said she enjoyed the Dijkstra portrait, which shows the artist standing alone in a locker room in a bathing suit a few months after she was in a bicycle accident. Dijkstra has said that the portrait marked the start of her artistic awakening. “There’s a lot of emotion — raw emotion — in that photograph,” Dorn said. “It really just spoke to me.” Dorn said that she also enjoyed the piece “Poet” by studio art professor Enrico Riley because she was able to talk to Riley about the piece. In addition to the exhibit, Dorn helped curate a show on student self-portraiture called “About Dartmouth Face,” which is on display in the student gallery in the Black Family Visual Arts Center and is meant to help connect the Hood show with student artists at the College. The exhibit will run until Aug. 30. On Wednesday, the Hood will hold a workshop on the exhibition that includes the creation of participant’s self-portraits. On Feb. 21, Taylor and Dorn will hold a special tour of the exhibit. Three of the artists featured in the exhibit — Gutierrez, Red Star and Reneé Stout — will speak in a panel at the College on May 7.
COURTESY OF THE HOOD MUSEUM OF ART
Wendy Red Star’s “The Four Seasons” series fills the back wall of the Hood Museum of Art’s “About Face” exhibit.