VOL. CLXXVI NO. 138
SNOWY HIGH 34 LOW 27
NEWS
PROFESSORS, NONPROFIT LEADERS RAISE CONCERNS ABOUT NEW EPA RULE PAGE 2
OPINION
HOLZER: HOLLYWOOD SO WHITE PAGE 4
ARTS
REVIEW: ‘BIRDS OF PREY’ CELEBRATES WOMANHOOD IN AN HONEST WAY PAGE 7
CIPX PROJECT EXPRESSES NATIVE AMERICAN IDENTITY AND HISTORY PAGE 8 FOLLOW US ON
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COPYRIGHT © 2020 THE DARTMOUTH, INC.
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE
Panel analyzes results Newly renovated building honors of presidential primary anonymous donors to Dartmouth B y CAITLIN MCCARtHY The Dartmouth
The votes have been counted, the student canvasser tables at Novack Cafe are empty and the 2020 New Hampshire primary election has passed. But what exactly should community members make of the results? That question was on the table at the Rockefeller Center for Public Policy and the Social Sciences on Thursday evening during a panel presentation titled
“The 2020 NH Presidential Primary Election: A Political Postmortem Discussion.” T he panelists included g ove r n m e n t p ro f e s s o r s Joseph Bafumi and Dean Lacy, and Rockefeller Center assistant director Ronald Shaiko moderated the event. Government professor Mia Costa was slated to appear on the panel but was sick and could not attend. Last Tuesday’s primary saw Sen. Bernie Sanders
SEE PRIMARY PAGE 3
Professors, former student author book on campus diversity B y EMILY LU
The Dartmouth Staff
In the midst of polarized opinions about diversity on college campuses, government professor and associate dean of faculty for the social sciences John Carey, government professor Yu s a k u H o r i u c h i a n d Stanford University Ph.D. student Katherine Clayton ’18 have published a book titled “Campus Diversity: The Hidden Consensus.”
Referencing a controversial 2018 op-ed in The Dartmouth and the subsequent campus debate, the authors found that despite some vocal pushback for policies such as affirmative action, there is still widespread for prodiversity policies. Published i n D e c e m b e r 2 0 1 9 by Cambridge University Press, the book used statistical methods to deter mine SEE DIVERSITY PAGE 2
JASON ROMERO/THE DARTMOUTH
Anonymous Hall houses the Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies and other departments.
B y AMBER BHUTTA The Dartmouth Staff
Funded primarily by the College’s ongoing “The Call to Lead” capital campaign, the newly renovated Anonymous Hall’s construction prioritizes sustainability and alumni recognition. The name of the building — originally Dana Biomedical Library — is intended to acknowledge the contributions of Dartmouth alumni and comes at the request of the anonymous lead donor for the project, who declined publicity. “We won’t be successful without widespread participation of alumni at every level: from young entrepreneurs committing
a portion of their future e a r n i n g s, t o s c o r e s o f women contributing to the renovation of Dartmouth Hall, to young alumni driving participation rates in the Dartmouth College Fund,” wrote Board of Trustees chair Laurel Richie ’81 in an email statement. “That we’ve been as successful as we have been to date is a testament to alumni commitment and passion for the place ... This gift, to reimagine and renovate Anonymous Hall, reflects the extraordinary generosity of one alum recognizing the generosity of all alums.” Originally built during the 1970s, Dana Biomedical Library was stripped down to its frame and foundation
before being renovated. The renovated building was designed by architects at Leers Weinzapfel Associates. “The College wanted to look at how efficiently they could reuse something, which is a sustainable thing and somewhat of a new thing for them,” said Leers Weinzapfel Associates principal architect Josiah Stevenson ’80. “I think before [the College] tended to want to demolish and rebuild.” According to Stevenson, sustainability was a primary consideration in much of the design and construction of Anonymous Hall. The Projected Energy Use Index SEE ANONYMOUS PAGE 5
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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
Professors, nonprofit leaders raise concerns about new EPA rule B y Jennifer Chen The Dartmouth
The Environmental Protection Agency’s Navigable Waters Protection Rule, which was finalized on Jan. 23, will likely create environmental issues both locally and broadly, according to Dartmouth professors and environmental nonprofit leaders. By loosening protections for waterways and wetlands not traditionally considered navigable or connected to navigable water, the changes can impact pollution to areas like Occom Pond, Mink Brook and small bodies of water on private property. “The water of the United States that needed the most amount of water protection are now getting the least amount of protection from the federal government or actually no protection from the federal government” because of the new rule, said environmental studies professor Ross Jones. According to Jones, a change in 2015 to the “Waters of the United States” rule by the Obama administration
tried to “both add more science into the definition and also to clarify the definition.” Jones said the rule ensured that wetlands and smaller tributaries not necessarily connected to a navigable water source could be regulated by the EPA, given that they were “15,000 feet within a navigable river.” However, the Trump administration has tried to repeal the rule since 2017. Geography professor Frank Magilligan said that all navigable waters in the United states are subject to federal regulation based on longstanding law. New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu (R) wrote a letter in support of the Trump rollback proposal when it was first proposed in 2017. The letter stated that “[n]arrowing the scope of the definition of ‘waters of the United States’” would benefit New Hampshire given that “costs of wetland alteration will be significantly reduced for New Hampshire businesses,” which would in turn “promote development within the state and stimulate New Hampshire’s economy.” Cathy Corkery, chapter director and
senior organizing representative of the New Hampshire Sierra Club, voiced concern for the new rule. “There are a lot of wetlands that would be affected by this change, and Sununu supported it,” Corkery said. “A lot of these rural communities that do not . . . have the structure for monitoring and protecting these places now.” Corkery said she believes that the places without resources “will just be forgotten, and the value of them being what they are will be lost as well.” Though the Connecticut River would most likely be protected under the new rule, tributaries like Mink Brook, bodies of water like Occom Pond or small water bodies on private property will most likely not be covered, according to Jones. Adair Mulligan, the executive director of the Hanover Conservancy said that the changes could have major implications. “Whatever we do here in the Connecticut River Valley affects Long Island Sound,” Mulligan said. “You don’t wanna be weakening nitrogen limits or
phosphorus pollution limits because they will affect somebody’s economy down stream, not just somebody’s ecology.” Jones noted that the unique political atmosphere in New Hampshire — which often values individual rights — might increase the harm of the new rules. “Telling people what they can do on their property is what many if not most politicians in New Hampshire will have a real hard time doing both personally and also politically if they want to get reelected,” Jones said. Jones also voiced concern about wetlands protections. “The amount of wetlands that have been destroyed over the last 200 years has been astronomical,” Jones said. Without protection, these wetlands can be polluted by fertilizer, manure and pesticides, which can eventually travel to navigable waters as well as be filled for farm or real estate development, according to Jones. “That’s sort of what I see as the big disaster there,” Jones said. With the rule change, Jones noted that
the question becomes whether the state is willing to invest the money or whether the state even has enough money and staff to actually monitor these waterways and wetlands. “No sort of regulation comes without a price tag,” he said. Ross voiced his concern about the accumulating effect of polluting in all these wetlands and small waterways, which will manifest in larger bodies of water like the Connecticut River. While the local and state issues are major concerns, geography department chair and professor Christopher Sneddon said that New Hampshire will not be the state most greatly impacted by the new rule. States with more hydraulic fracturing, mining or heavy industry are more likely to be affected by these new rules, he added. Magilligan said that the rules will bring with it many social costs which are widely distributed, and Sneddon said that organized interests such as fossil fuel companies, mines or big agricultural operations could reap the benefits of such a rollback.
Book finds that students support pro-diversity policies for colleges FROM DIVERSITY PAGE 1
that students generally support pro-diversity policies for both undergraduate admissions and faculty hiring. “We just had no idea what we were going to find when we started it,” Carey said. “It turns out what we found in the book is totally consistent with affirmative action policies as they’re currently practiced. We found really broad support for the consideration of race and ethnicity, g e n d e r, a n d s o c i o e c o n o m i c background in admissions and faculty recruitment.” The idea for the project began in 2015, when a series of student protests related to race and diversity
swept various colleges across the nation, including Dartmouth. According to Carey, he and Horiuchi were interested in finding out what students thought about affirmative action beyond the news headlines and protests. “If you just survey somebody and just ask them, ‘Do you support af fir mative action in college admissions or not?’ people have an answer to that, but it’s become super polarized and maps onto our partisan identities,” Carey said. As a result, the survey was specifically designed to avoid using the terms “affirmative action” and “diversity.” The professors also turned to a statistical method known as conjoint analysis. Horiuchi said
CORRECTIONS We welcome corrections. If you believe there is a factual error in a story, please email editor@thedartmouth.com.
that this method has long been used in marketing analysis, but has only recently been applied to political and social sciences. Conjoint analysis is fundamentally multidimensional and allows for various characteristics to be examined. According to Horiuchi, a key benefit of this method lies in its ability to mitigate social desirability bias or the tendency to respond to surveys in a way that’s perceived favorably by others. “We want people who engage in the campus diversity debate to understand the importance of applying scientific methods to elicit honest opinions about these issues,” Horiuchi said. The survey was first sent to Dartmouth students with the intent to publish the findings as a paper. The paper’s rejection led the professors to contact faculty at other
colleges to better generalize the survey results. Clayton, a sophomore at the time, began working with Horiuchi as a research assistant before committing to the project and becoming a co-author. The book features survey results from seven other colleges in the United States as well as the London School of Economics. “What we found is essentially consensus; students prefer increasing demographic diversity of students and also faculty members,” Horiuchi said. “We found virtually no case in which some students prefer particular types of undergraduate applicants or faculty candidates, and other students strongly disprefer. Essentially, we didn’t find any polarizations.” In the book’s opening chapter, the authors reference a guest column published in The Dartmouth in 2018 titled “You’re Not Tripping.”
The writer, Ryan Spector ’19 alleged that the Dartmouth Outing Club’s First-Year Trips Directorate was selected with an “obsession with diversity,” as 80 percent of the incoming directorate were women. Following the publication of the column, various campus organizations voiced support for the Trips directors, who are tasked with selecting the directorate, while also denouncing the guest columnist. Carey and Horiuchi responded with a guest column of their own in The Dartmouth, explaining that such criticism has “escalated the rhetoric further” and is “counterproductive.” According to Carey, he and Horiuchi received private emails from students thanking them for their piece. “We thought that was really telling because it was consistent with SEE DIVERSITY PAGE 3
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
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THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
Panelists analyze outcome of election Authors seek to add to affirmative action debate FROM PRIMARY PAGE 1
(I-VT) win New Hampshire’s Democratic presidential primary with 25.7 percent of the vote, with former South Bend, IN mayor Pete Buttigieg coming in second place with 24.4 percent of the vote. President Donald Trump handily won the Republican presidential primary, with 85.6 percent of the vote. The panelists drew attention to Sanders’ success in New Hampshire, with Bafumi saying that Sanders was the frontrunner in his opinion, as he won the popular vote in both Iowa and New Hampshire. Bafumi said that Sanders’ chances were good to win in the general election “if he can bring in new people to vote who typically don’t vote.” Lacy mentioned the preliminary results of a survey he and a student is currently administering to demonstrate Sanders’ electability. While the survey only garnered 302 responses when he last checked it, Lacy said that 85 percent of people who voted for Trump in 2016 planned to vote for him today, with their votes mainly going to Democrats including Sanders and Warren. He also noted that 40 percent of the 32 people who voted for a third-party candidate in 2016 planned to vote for Sanders, and none of them planned to vote for Trump. “I’ll tell you what the punchline is: Bernie Sanders can make a case for being electable,” Lacy said. The panelists also discussed Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), who came in fourth place in New Hampshire behind Sanders, Buttigieg and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) with 9.2 percent of the vote. Bafumi attributed this drop in support to Sanders’ success. “These two candidates have been vying for many of the same sets of voters — people on farther to the left of the Democratic party — and Sanders so far has won that contest,” Bafumi said. However, Lacy noted that he was not surprised by Warren’s poor performance. Despite Warren
coming from the neighboring state of Massachusetts, Lacy said the media from Massachusetts that actually reaches New Hampshire is much more moderate. He added that had almost a Sanders’ “homestate advantage” in New Hampshire, especially along the border with Vermont, which Warren needed to capture in order to do well. “She’s got to avoid being labeled as the disappointment,” Lacy said. Bafumi also mentioned former vice president Joe Biden’s gradual decline. Bafumi compared Biden, who finished fifth in New Hampshire with 8.4 percent of the vote, to former Florida governor Jeb Bush, who notably coasted with name recognition frontrunner status before dropping out of the Republican primary race in 2016. Klobuchar, who came in third place in New Hampshire with 19.8 percent of the vote, is “now among the top tier of candidates,” according to Bafumi, mentioning her strong debate performance in Manchester days before the primary. Lacy called attention to her growing success, which he felt she already deserved due to her effectiveness as a legislator. “She was a formidable candidate from the beginning,” Lacy remarked, commenting on her strength in conservative districts. “Iowa didn’t see it; New Hampshire validated it and put Amy Klobuchar where I think she probably should have been.” New Hampshire’s high number of swing voters and experience with regional politics helped Klobuchar get more support than she might have if other states such as South Carolina or Nevada had gone first, Lacy said. Both panelists also spoke on Buttigieg’s rising position after the Iowa caucuses. Bafumi explained that before the Iowa caucuses, Buttigieg’s support was dropping or, at best, staying the same. He said that one of the possible explanations for this new success was that Buttigieg picked up support from people who supported other candidates, namely Andrew Yang, but did not meet the 15 percent threshold for
any delegates to be assigned. This success, Bafumi said, could have given him momentum when going into the New Hampshire primary. Lacy also mentioned Buttigieg’s diverse ideological backing. He called attention to a graphic from the website FiveThirtyEight showing the distribution of votes in New Hampshire for each candidate, divided into very liberal, somewhat liberal, moderate and conservative voter ideologies. “Pete Buttigieg is drawing across the ideological spectrum. Amy Klobuchar is moderate to right,” Lacy said. “Bernie Sanders is picking up more [voters] from across the ideological spectrum than I expected.” Bafumi said that former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, who did not appear on the New Hampshire or Iowa ballots, is a “wild card candidate.” “Bloomberg got in because he saw, I think, he saw that there’s potential for a centrist candidate who’s very electable,” Bafumi said. He compared him to Klobuchar, guessing that Klobuchar or Bloomberg would probably be the centrist candidate in the election that would appeal to voters skeptical of Sanders. The primary lead to three c a n d i d at e s s u s p e n d i n g t h e i r campaigns — Yang and Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) on Tuesday, and former Massachusetts Senator Deval Patrick on Wednesday. Lacy argued for New Hampshire’s importance in hosting the first primary, calling attention to the state’s ability to “winnow out a lot of the inexperienced candidates,” naming Yang and Tom Steyer as candidates who had enthusiastic support and advertising money, respectively, but who did not receive much support in the primary. Aside from the specific candidates, the panelists also took time to reflect on the intricacies of the primaries, with Lacy arguing that today’s larger parties have less explicit control over the candidate who wins the primary. He pointed to the 2016 Republican primary as an example, noting that Trump was an outlier.
FROM DIVERSITY PAGE 2
our intuition; when you’re looking at one of these really controversial things, the public voices may not be all that reflective of the critical mass of student opinion,” Carey said. “The [project] was already well on our way when we decided to write the book but it reconfirmed our suspicion that we were onto something.” According to 2020 Trips director Kellen Appleton ’20, the directorate is selected with an emphasis on welcoming incoming students to Dartmouth, as First-Year Trips serves as a pre-orientation program. “We do think it’s important to have a variety of voices in the room when we make decisions about trips,” Appleton said. “It’s important to address concerns that could come up beforehand, like things that just wouldn’t occur to me to avoid that, in
my case, DOC white echo chamber.” The authors of the book also hope that their findings can add perspective to the recent debate between the nonprofit g roup Students for Fair Admissions and various universities. SFFA claims that Harvard University specifically discriminated ag ainst AsianAmerican applicants, challenging affir mative action policies but ultimately losing in court. “I hope it will be pretty helpful for informing a lot of these court cases on affirmative action that we have coming up right now,” Clayton said. “Our results say that across the board, we do see student support for considering diversity even though it’s hard to gauge that support when you just ask something like do you support affirmative action. That’s a loaded term — you might not actually get the results of students preferences.”
OC-COME ON OVER
JULIA LEVINE/THE DARTMOUTH
Occom Pond is a popular destination for winter ice skating.
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TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
THE DARTMOUTH OPINION
STAFF COLUMNIST EMORY HOLZER ’22
Hollywood So White
Don’t blame the Academy for the lack of diversity in film.
DEBORA HYEMIN HAN, Editor-in-Chief
AIDAN SHEINBERG, Publisher
ALEX FREDMAN, Executive Editor PETER CHARALAMBOUS, Managing Editor
PRODUCTION EDITORS TEDDY HILL-WELD & MATTHEW MAGANN, Opinion Editors KYLEE SIBILIA & NOVI ZHUKOVSKY, Mirror Editors ADDISON DICK & JUSTIN KRAMER & LILI STERN, Sports Editors LEX KANG & LUCY TURNIPSEED, Arts Editors NAINA BHALLA & LORRAINE LIU, Photo Editors SAMANTHA BURACK & BELLA JACOBY, Design Editors GRANT PINKSTON, Templating Editor JESS CAMPANILE, Multimedia Editor
ANTHONY ROBLES, Managing Editor
BUSINESS DIRECTORS JONNY FRIED & JASMINE FU Advertising & Finance Directors HIMADRI NARASIMHAMURTHY & KAI SHERWIN Business Development Directors ALBERT CHEN & ELEANOR NIEDERMAYER Strategy Directors VINAY REDDY & ERIC ZHANG Marketing, Analytics and Technology Directors
ELIZA JANE SCHAEFFER, Social Media Editor WILLIAM CHEN & AARON LEE, Data Visualization Editors
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.
Put complaints of an overlong ceremony, political speeches by out-of-touch celebrities and awards predictability aside. Today, the most significant issue with the Oscars is the lack of diversity. The solution, however, does not come through continued criticism of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The problem actually lies with Hollywood and the stories it chooses to fund — not which films the Academy decides to recognize. The nominees for the 2015 Oscars were announced to public outcry; there was not a single nonwhite acting nominee. When the same problem recurred in 2016, the Academy, fueled by activist April Reign’s #OscarsSoWhite campaign, made significant internal changes. It launched efforts to recruit diverse talent for Academy membership in order to reach its goals of doubling female and nonwhite representation in the voting body. These efforts proved at least somewhat successful, driving members of color from 8 percent to 16 percent and increasing the proportion of women from 25 percent to 32 percent. Of course, things are not perfect, but the Academy has made its intentions clear: the Academy’s leadership, led by President Cheryl Boone Isaacs, is dedicated to honoring quality filmmaking that portrays a wealth of diverse identities and perspectives. Nevertheless, the controversy and the #OscarsSoWhite movement have hardly quieted. If the Feb. 9 Academy Awards proved anything, though, it is that attacks should not be targeted at the Academy. While things did not look promising — Cynthia Erivo was the only person of color nominated for an Oscar in acting, and no female directors were nominated — the night ended up a positive one for representation. If you want proof that the Academy values diversity in film, look at the winners from this year’s ceremony. “Parasite,” the first South Korean feature film ever nominated for an Academy award, dominated the night, winning best picture and best original screenplay. Director Bong Joonho took home the award for best director. The film became the first non-English language film to win best picture. Today’s Academy has clearly shown a desire to award movies that portray diverse perspectives. From awarding best picture to “Moonlight” — an LGBTQ film with an all-black cast — over the industry darling “La La Land”; to including “Black Panther,” “BlacKkKlansman” and “Roma” in the 2019 nominees for best picture; to awarding this
year’s highest honor to a subtitled film without any American actors, the Academy has been eager to recognize filmmaking at the highest level that also expands representation in film. This does not mean that the Academy’s efforts to increase diversity are complete. But it does indicate that the Academy is willing and able to shift to a more inclusive and representative body. Continuing along the current path will unquestionably lead to recognition more of more “firsts” in film. The #OscarsSoWhite campaign shifts the target toward the Academy and away from where it should be set: Hollywood itself. #OscarsSoWhite holds the award-giving body accountable for a lack of diversity in the broader movie industry. But while the Academy has made efforts to recognize diversity, movie studios haven’t done so to nearly the same degree. In 2019, roughly 70 percent of the top 200 English-language films by global box office had predominantly white casts. Looking to a Hollywood Reporter article that made early projections for the 2020 Oscar race, 28 out of 40 films — or 70 percent — listed as having a shot at a nomination for best picture had all-white casts. Of the ultimate nominees, just two of nine movies — “Parasite” and “Little Women” — depicted stories not centered around white men, meaning that non-diverse films made up 78 percent of the nominees. These numbers form a single line: the amount of diverse filmmaking, the number of those movies that are recognized by critics and the ultimate number nominated for Best Picture are all around the same. The problem isn’t the Academy. The problem starts with the production of films themselves and propagates upward. The onus is on movie studios to green-light more projects that focus on diverse perspectives and experiences. For more diverse filmmaking to be recognized, more diverse films must be produced. Aside from a lack of racial diversity, another glaring problem for the film industry is the absence of women nominated for best director. But when one looks at the data, that problem also originates in Hollywood. In 2019, less than 10 percent of films were directed by women. Not only is it unfair to hold the Academy responsible for this problem, but it is also unproductive. Criticism must be targeted at studios, which are the source of the issue. Directing criticism toward film studios might convince them to hire more female directors and give more women and people of color the resources to create critically-acclaimed films. The Academy has set itself on the right course. It remains to be seen if Hollywood will do the same.
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
THE DARTMOUTH NEWS
PAGE 5
Building meets requirements for LEED Silver certification FROM ANONYMOUS PAGE 1
of Anonymous Hall — measured by the total projected energy use in one year divided by the area of the building — is currently 25 kilo British thermal units by square foot by year, but will be reduced to 9 kBtu/sf/y once the solar panels are installed, Stevenson said. “The average Dartmouth [pEUI] is well over a 100,” Stevenson said. “So this is almost a net-zero building. It’s really the almost net-zero that’s an accomplishment.” Stevenson said that in addition to the solar panels, the material and glass used for the exterior of the building all increase the energy efficiency of the building. Anonymous Hall currently meets the requirements for LEED Silver Certification, a rating from the U.S. Green Building Council that recognizes sustainable building strategies. Upon the building’s completion, Stevenson said that the College hopes to eventually attain LEED Gold Certification. In addition to sustainability, Stevenson explained that the architects needed to reconcile the traditional design of the campus with designing a modern building. “Most prog ressive colleges want to do buildings of the time,” Stevenson said. “I think that’s appropriate to have a campus of different periods of buildings. The challenge is to make it fit in with scale and material.” Stevenson said that in addition to the modern design, the terra cotta exterior of Anonymous Hall was chosen to match the traditional color scheme of other buildings on campus. Anonymous Hall currently houses Ramekin Cafe; the Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies; and the linguistics, Russian and part of the computer science departments. Once completed, the top floor will house a rooftop garden with a view of Baker Tower. “We’ve been in 37 Dewey Field, and it’s kind of out of the way,” said graduate and advanced studies dean Jon Kull ’88. “Being here, we
just feel like we’re a lot more central and on-campus. It’s a lot easier for graduate students.” Kull said that because many graduate students study in nearby buildings such as the Life Sciences Center, Anonymous Hall “is much more conveniently located.” He also highlighted the new Guarini common space located on the garden level of Anonymous Hall, adding that it provides graduate students with a place to study and socialize. “We just feel like we’re a lot more part of the campus, which is great because in a lot of ways, graduate students have kind of been invisible on campus,” Kull said. “This gives us a much better visible presence.” The construction of Anonymous Hall received funding from The Call to Lead, a $3 billion campaign that has funded campus projects such as the expansion of the Hood Museum of Art. “One of the overarching goals of The Call to Lead is to invest heavily in Dartmouth’s distinctive educational model as a fusion of a renowned liberal arts college and a robust research university,” Richie wrote. “Anonymous Hall exemplifies that fusion as it creates new classroom space for undergraduate teaching in close proximity to the Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies. It embodies the uncommon access our students have to faculty and the intergenerational community bonds that form at Dartmouth among our undergraduates, graduate students and faculty.” Richie wrote that The Call to Lead has currently raised $2.2 billion and is on track to close the campaign by 2022. Other construction projects funded by The Call to Lead include an indoor athletic practice facility to open this spring and buildings for the engineering and computer science departments as well as the Arthur L. Irving Institute for Energy and Society, both of which are scheduled to open in fall 2021. The for mal dedication for Anonymous Hall will tentatively take place on May 15 during the 220th session of the Alumni Council.
COURTESY OF JOSIAH STEVENSON
An artists’ rendering of a rooftop patio at Anonymous Hall.
PAGE 6
DARTMOUTHEVENTS
THE DARTMOUTH EVENTS
POLAR PLUNGE
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
DOMINIQUE MOBLEY ’22
TODAY
8:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m.
Exhibit: “The Ties that Bind: Slavery and Dartmouth.” Sponsored by the Library, Rauner Special Collections Library.
4:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.
Information Session: “Fellowship Advising Information Session.” Sponsored by Fellowship Advising, Paganucci Lounge, Class of ‘53 Commons.
4:30 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.
Talk: “Encounters between Modernity and Tradition: The Hybridization of the Culture of Maize,” with Tania Martínez. Sponsored by the Environmental Studies Program, Steele 006.
TOMORROW 12:30 p.m. – 1:30 p.m.
Tour: “Exhibition Tour: ‘Reconstitution,’” with Jessica Hong. Sponsored by the Hood Museum of Art.
3:30 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Talk: “Toward a Better Classification of Planar Optimization Problems,” with Hsien-Chih Chang. Sponsored by the Computer Science Department, Haldeman 41.
ADVERTISING For advertising infor mation, 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 0199-9931
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
THE DARTMOUTH ARTS
PAGE 7
Review: ‘Birds of Prey’ celebrates womanhood in an honest way B y Paulina Marinkovic The Dartmouth
After taking center-stage in the 2016 film “Suicide Squad” as the charming ex-psychiatrist-turnedsupervillain, Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) returns fiercer than ever as she introduces a new version of herself — one separate from the diminutive label of “the Joker’s girlfriend.” “ B i r d s o f P r ey : A n d t h e Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn,” directed by Cathy Yan and and written by Christina Hodson, is at its core a fun, humorous and action-packed comic book film which simultaneoulsy manages to explore present-day feminist issues (subtly tackling issues such as rape culture and toxic relationships) and dismantle the patriarchy with perfectly choreographed battle moves and lots of glitter grenades. Voiced by Harley herself in her distinctive, singsongy “New York” accent, “Birds of Prey” commences with a cartoon animated version of the film that narrates Harley’s past to the audience. While this sets the colorful and lively tone present throughout the movie, the prologue also provides insight to the protagonist’s complex origins and enables the audience to further understand Harley’s character development through the events of the storyline. After her abusive, on-again offagain relationship with the Joker comes to an end, Harley is left all alone. Drowned in her sorrows, Harley is first portrayed mourning her relationship through typical post-break-up behavior: eating an alarming amount of spray cheese, giving herself a new haircut and finally, blowing up a chemical plant to publicly update her relationship status. However, she soon learns that a lot of people roaming the streets of Gotham City want her dead. And once Harley accepts that the Joker is all gone, along with the immunity that came with being his faithful sidekick, she realizes that it is time to move on from her past
and form her own identity. It is clear from the very beginning that Yan’s vision is to delve deeper into Harley’s complexities and depart from her somewhat onesided portrayal as the obsessive and seductive girlfriend in “Suicide Squad.” The film unfolds Harley’s story in a way that allows the audience to see her through an entirely different lens. By having the Joker out of the picture, Yan fosters a space that allows many facets of Harley’s personality to shine. She reshapes this already previously iconic character into one that challenges the male gaze in media by proving her to be more than “Daddy’s Lil’ Monster”— while still owning one of her deadliest weapons: her “sex appeal.” We not only get to see Harley Quinn as vulnerable with herself — vacillating between sad and awe-inspiring as she deals with heartbreak — but also with the other female characters in the film as she navigates these newly-formed friendships. “Birds of Prey” isn’t just about Harley’s breakup with the Joker — it’s also about her journey to “emancipation” as she fights against the long list of enemies that have grievances against her — one of them being the new sadistic villain Black Mask (Ewan MacGregor). The film’s premise revolves around Harley helping Black Mask get access to a legendary family heirloom: a diamond that holds the secret to the Bertinelli family fortune. However, when young pickpocket Cassandra Cain (Ella Jay Basco) gets her hands on it first, Harley is forced to cross paths with the other players in this treasure hunt: detective Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez), Dinah “Black Canary” Lance (Jurnee Smollett-Bell) and Helena “Huntress” Bertinelli (Mary Elizabeth Winstead). Aside from the amazing performances of the actors and the usual chaotic energy found in superhero/supervillain movies, this intersection of differing storylines and the film’s nonlinear way of telling the story is what makes this movie entertaining to
watch. With its predominantly female cast (and the characters’ random compliments on how well they fight in high heels and tight pants), “Birds of Prey” is an anthem all about girl power. While all these strong women start their journeys on their own (showcasing their powerful and deadly combination of brains and combat skills), they find even more strength when they are obliged to join forces to save their own lives and that of Cassandra Cain. Yan and Hodson’s message about not needing a knight in shining armour to save the day is very clear. With their array of talents, each character portrays a unique version of femininity and her own idea of what it means to be a woman in this world. Yan offers an unseen take on superhero films by placing complex women of all
ages in the forefront of her story. She succeeds in unraveling Harley from her toxic past and from this creating an empowering narrative that unapologetically celebrates womanhood and women’s ability to help each other rise in power. This celebration of womanhood is not only seen through the characters on screen, but also in the “Birds of Prey” movie soundtrack. Harley’s world is brought to life by a female-led soundtrack, featuring tracks from artists such as Halsey, Doja Cat, N o r man i , L au ren Jauregui and Charlotte Lawrence. After the release of “Wonder Woman” in 2017, the DC universe left its audiences hungry for more female superhero representations in the media. “Birds of Prey” takes advantage of the lack of female superheroes in this testosteronedriven world and exploits it, but
in a nuanced manner rather than making it overly exaggerated. While Yan and Hodson could have taken the female empowerment storyline for granted and failed to portray Harley with all her imperfections, they are able to give her agency of her own story and prove that her abilities extend far beyond the titles given to her by association with the Joker. Their portrayal of the one and only Harleen Quinzel allows us to see her at her most liberated — after all it is called “the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn.” “Birds of Prey” portrays Harley Quinn and all the women in the film in a way that feels real, painting this twisted character from the DC Comics as a relatable character and her girl gang as somewhat of a feminist movement.
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THE DARTMOUTH ARTS
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2020
CIPX project expresses Native American identity and history
B y Mounisha anumolu The Dartmouth
Visitors to the Hood Museum can now view works from the CIPX Project. CIPX, the “Critical Indigenous Photographic Exchange,” was founded in August 2012 by photographer Will Wilson, who now collaborates on the works with photographer Kali Spitzer. The project is a direct response to staged portraits of Native Americans taken by Edward Curtis in the early 1900s. CIPX aims to help members of the Native American community reclaim their own representations. Curtis shaped his presentation of Native Americans in accordance with the popular but inaccurate images of them at the time — arranging his subjects into specific poses and urging them to wear the “traditional” Native clothing he brought to his photoshoots. CIPX hopes to do the exact opposite. With CIPX, the photographer and the subject work together to present genuine perspectives through tintype photography, where the subject picks their own pose, clothing and caption. “[Curtis] used these kinds of things as props to construct his idealized image of what Native people should look like,” said Jami Powell, the Hood’s associate curator of Native American art. “In response to that, Will and Kali invite people to wear whatever they feel most comfortable in. They certainly invite people, if they would like, to wear regalia, if they feel that’s what best represents them.” While many came and were photographed in extravagant clothing, some were simply content to be photographed in their favorite everyday wear — as evidenced by one individual who wore their Grateful Dead shirt to the shoot. Powell and Freeman helped bring CIPX to Dartmouth and helped
organize the display of the exhibit. Although she had been following the project for several years before, Powell said she first interacted with Wilson’s work in 2016, while she was working for Tufts University. When Wilson came to Tufts, Powell was able to have her photo taken as part of CIPX. “It was really a transformative experience for me as an indigenous person to sit for this portrait, using the same technology that my ancestors would have experienced,” Powell said. “I actually have a picture of my great-great-grandparents taken by the same type of camera. To see what that experience was like really transformed my understanding of a lot of these archival photographs. I wanted to bring that here.” CIPX involves members of the community by featuring them as subjects of the portraits being taken. At Dartmouth, some of these photos were taken by Wilson and Spitzer in the Hood Museum. “I wanted to do a project that really engaged the Dartmouth community in a different way,” Powell said. “I wanted to create the idea that museum spaces can be places where artists are creative, not simply where it’s displayed, and to show the work that artists are doing in a different context.” Wilson and Spitzer’s work specifically tried to feature the Native American community of Dartmouth as subjects, while also including other diverse perspectives on campus. In order to achieve this, Powell said that they sent invitations out to various Native American groups at Dartmouth, as well as the Museum Club and their interns. They also had a lottery for Friends of the Museum and invited lucky students who happened to pass by the shoot in the library to have their photo taken. The result is an eclectic assortment of subjects in the exhibit.
One of the students who happened to be invited to participate as a subject was Breanna Boland ’23. Although Breanna is not a member of the Native community, she said she learned about the project while in the library and wanted to get involved. “I was just walking through BakerBerry,” Boland said. “There was a tent setup and a table with some people who were giving students information. I thought it was really interesting, so I literally just walked up and asked what it was. That’s how it got started and how I signed up.” Participants were also encouraged to choose and create the captions for their portraits. When Boland went to get her portrait taken, she brought along the caption she had written about her outfit and hairstyle choices that day. This caption, which can be found alongside her portrait in the Hood Museum, reads, “My deep blue cashmere turtleneck represents the deep blue oceans that my enslaved African ancestors travelled across to reach Jamaica. My braids are also distinctive of African culture.”
“That morning, I looked in my wardrobe, and I thought a cashmere sweater would be nice,” Boland said. “I wanted to show the dichotomy of where my slave ancestors came from and the fairly elitist institution that I am at now, with cashmere.” Boland was one of 167 people photographed through CIPX Dartmouth. Ten of these portraits are currently featured at the Hood Museum. The curators worked with artists — Wilson and Spitzer — to pick the most moving portraits to display. Powell mentioned Boland’s portrait as one of the particularly powerful pieces. “Some of the works were just ones that, immediately, as soon as the plate was developed, we thought ‘Oh, this is incredible,’” Powell said. “I’m thinking of the one that Will did of Breanna Boland. The plate had this really interesting place where the collodion streaked, creating this interesting effect. The way that the process itself works is that the lens has a really shallow depth of field. You have to hold completely still once they get it focused to get the detail.
Boland’s was one where the focus is just really laser-centered on the individual’s eyes. It creates a really striking image.” Curatorial fellow Morgan Freeman, who first met Powell when she was a student at Tufts, also felt the selected portraits to be very engaging. “There are these moments where you’re face to face with an individual, and it feels like a very intimate moment,” Freeman said. “The person is allowing you to fully see them in a way that you don’t always get to, especially with the label that’s provided in their own words. That is an element to what you take away from this exhibition.” Freeman went on to note that the photographing process is much less of an extractive one like those where the photographer constructs the image of the subject that they want, and more of collaboration because the subject portrays themselves and recieves a tintype plate of their portrait once their done in exchange for sitting for the photo. The works of CIPX Dartmouth will be on display at the Hood Museum until March 27.
COURTESY OF ISADORA ITALIA
CIPX Dartmouth will be on display at the Hood Museum until March 27.