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JUNE. 15 - JUNE. 28, 2021
NEWS
UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA ANCHORAGE
NEWS
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The Importance of Juneteenth: Celebrations in Anchorage
THENORTHERNLIGHT.ORG
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Alaska’s Spruce Beetle Epidemic
UAA Celebrates Pride Month 2021 By Jake Dye arts@thenorthernlight.org
June is National LGBTQ+ Pride Month, and though facilities are still slowly returning to normal operations, there are a few events going on around campus to celebrate. Pride Month is a celebration of all things lesbian, gay, bisexual, two-spirit, asexual, intersex, nonbinary, queer and more. Pride is held in June to commemorate the Stonewall Riots, which began Jun. 28, 1969. In America, Pride Month was first named a national event by President Bill Clinton, who in 1999 named June Gay & Lesbian Pride Month. President Barack Obama declared first June LGBT Pride Month in 2009, and on Jun. 1 of this year, President Joe Biden named June LGBTQ+ Pride Month. Earlier in the month was the Lavender Leaders lunch, where community advocates and leaders spoke during a zoom event. Last week kicked off the Rainbow Run, a virtual 5K that encourages participants to wear creative rainbow attire and race virtually to celebrate pride. This is the 22nd year of the race, and all proceeds will go to Identity Inc., a nonprofit LGBTQ+ clinic and community center in Anchorage. The Rainbow Run will run until Jun. 22. UAA also co-coordinated the Soldotna Pride Walk held on Jun. 12 alongside LGBT: An Alliance Group at Kenai Peninsula College. Festivities are only just beginning, however. Still to come this month is “Translating Transgender Identity Abroad,” an event featuring the Peace Corps, which will feature Peace Corps
PHOTO COURTESY OF UAA
members stories of identity and visibility during their service overseas. The event will be held online on Jun. 17, at 11am, registration is being held here. Pride Pour Over Art is being held by the Hugh McPeck Gallery in the Student Union Plaza on Jun 22. at 6pm. The event is open only to UAA faculty, staff, and students who are enrolled in summer courses. Attendees will create marble acrylic pour art using the colors of differ-
Pride events on campus are organized by UAA Student Activities.
ent pride flags. The 3rd annual Pride Block Party will be held at The Writer’s Block on Jun. 26, from 2-10pm. The event will be run by Queer Happenings Alaska, and will feature music, food and drinks. This event is family-friendly, and welcomes attendees who are under 18. Capping off UAA’s Pride month celebrations is the Sunshine and Sandwiches Walk. Attendees will walk a one-mile
trail around UAA campus to celebrate Pride, then enjoy some sandwiches from Snow City Cafe and ice cream sandwiches from Wild Scoops. All of these events with the exception of the Pride Block Party require registration. More information about Pride Month and the University of Alaska Anchorage’s diversity programs can be found here.
PHOTO COURTESY OF CAMILLE BOTELLO AND THE PENINSULA CLARION
The Soldotna Pride Walk, done in collaboration between UAA and the Kenai Peninsula College, drew quite a crowd Saturday, Jun. 12.
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NEWS
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The Importance of Juneteenth: Celebrations in Anchorage By David Harding news@thenorthernlight.org
If a holiday isn’t federally recognized, is its importance diminished in any regard? That is the important, culture shifting question surrounding the date of June 19, recognized as Juneteenth by some states and organizations, with lawmakers pushing legislature forward as recently as Feb 2021 to have it become a national holiday, given the same reverence as any other. Juneteenth marks an important moment in African American history, as on that day in 1861 the Emancipation Proclamation was recognized in Texas thanks to the arrival of Union general Gordon Granger to the defeated confederate state, emancipating the enslaved african american population contained within. While the Proclamation would be recognized at different times by different states, often marked by a “Jubilee” celebration by the formerly enslaved peoples, the emancipation celebrations in Texas would persist for decades to come, becoming tied to the civil rights and more recently the Black lives movements across the nation as well as in general african-american culture and identity. Texas would only officially recognize the date of Juneteenth as a state holiday in 1980, with other states only following suit throughout the 2000s, with the most recent states to bring official recognition being Virigina, New York, and New Jersey in 2020; who also marked it as a paid day of leave for state employees. The only states who haven’t yet officially recognized Juneteenth, state wide or even city wide, are Hawaii and the states of North and South Dakota. Alaska’s recognition and celebration
PHOTO COURTESY OF LOREN HOLMES AT ANCHORAGE DAILY NEWS
A performance from the Sankofa Dance Center at a Juneteenth Celebration in front of the Northway Mall on Saturday, June 13th, 2020.
of Juneteenth has grown in scale each year, especially in Anchorage thanks to the actions of the Juneteenth Anchorage Committee, which has partnered itself with the University of Alaska Anchorage for this year’s celebrations and events. On their website’s home page, Juneteenth Anchorage states that the holiday is a time “for reflection and rejoicing. It is a time for assessment, self reflection, and planning the future… In cities across the country, people of all races, nationalities and religions are
joining hands to truthfully acknowledge a period in our history that shaped and continues to influence our society today.” As part of the month long festivities, the UAA Student Body will be hosting a screening and panel of the 1991 drama, Boyz in the Hood, a film directed by the late black director John Singleton that depicts the grim realities of life for african-americans who grew up in the low income “ghetto” areas of Los Angeles, on June 17 at 7 p.m. The next day, on June 18, Xi Psi Omega will also host a poetry
slam. Then, on the date of Juneteenth, the Anchorage Museum will hold a “Free Museum Day”, which gives everyone a chance to see their Black Lives in Alaska Exhibit; a moving and educational display of the “richness and resilience” of Black lives in Alaska. Other events and information can be found on Juneteenth Anchorage’s website at https://info8533.wixsite.com/juneteenthanchorage. The Anchorage Museum’s Black Lives in Alaska Exhibit will be on view through February 13th, 2022.
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NEWS Alaska’s Spruce Beetle Epidemic
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By Kaden Kleinschmidt news3@thenorthernlight.org
Alaska’s forests have been waging a losing war against tree-killing spruce beetles for the sixth year in a row. Over 1.1 million acres of wooded area have been impacted by the spruce beetle in Alaska’s south central regions alone since 2015, with thirty thousand of those acres lying within the bounds of the Anchorage Municipality, according to the Alaska Division of Forestry. For the colossal damage they’ve caused, spruce beetles are deceivingly tiny, only measuring about a quarter inch long and an eighth inch wide. They spend the majority of their life cycle beneath the surface of a spruce tree’s bark, where they feed, mate and overwinter. When summer temperatures reach about 60 degrees, spruce beetles begin to emerge from infested trees to seek a new suitable host. Once a beetle has successfully infiltrated a tree, it releases a chemical signal in order to attract a mate.
Female beetles then bore holes vertically along the tree’s phloem layer, which is responsible for delivering the nutrients produced by photosynthesis throughout the tree, and proceed to lay their eggs along the sides of the chamber. When the larvae hatch, they feed on the sugary phloem material necessary to the tree’s survival, effectively cutting the tree off from its own energy supply. After a spruce tree becomes infested with a colony of beetles, it survives no longer than two years, in which its needles turn from their characteristic evergreen hue to a sickly reddish brown. In recent years, the frequency of “beetle-killed” spruce trees has erupted in what ecologists are calling a sort of epidemic among coniferous trees. Jason Moan of Alaska’s Division of Forestry says a slew of factors have given rise to the outbreak. “Spruce beetles typically favor
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For all the damage they do, the spruce beetle is only a quarter inch long!
large diameter, slow growing trees,” Moan said. “If we have strong winds or events like that where a large number of trees might be blown over, beetles tend to favor that material. They’re able to build up populations very rapidly.” Dr Matthew L. Carlson, a professor and director of the Biological Sciences Department at UAA, attributed this eruption to the average summer temperatures rising in recent years. When average summer temperatures reach 50.5 degrees or higher, female beetles become more active in seeking out and colonizing new trees, according to Carlson. Warmer summers also expedite the development of the beetle in its larval stage, allow-
ing the life cycle of the spruce beetle to potentially half from two years to only one. Ecologists and biologists like Carlson avoid applying terms such as good or bad to these sorts of natural ecological events. “There are outcomes that are good for some species, like as more dead trees fall in streams and rivers the large woody debris is good for salmon, and bad for others, like coniferous forest associated species like red squirrels and crossbills,” Carlson said. “But the large-scale disturbance does change the local plant and animal communities and it can take some time before spruce forests return.”
PHOTO COURTESY OF US FOREST SERVICE
Spruce beetles usually only affect trees that have recently fallen but are still alive, but unusual conditions will cause them to go after standing trees.
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Hitbox Review: Knockout City - Not one wrench to be found By Jake Dye arts@thenorthernlight.org
Release Date: May 21, 2021 Developer: Velan Studios Platform: Xbox Series S [Played], Nintendo Switch [Played], PlayStation 4 & 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Windows Dodgeball is one of the greats. Just about everyone remembers those days in middle school P.E. where the teacher would bring in that big bag of red balls, signaling the start of intense competition, when glory was won or lost by a single catch. “Knockout City” is exactly how I remember those days. Grabbing a ball as it rolls past, jumping in the air with a graceful pirouette and launching it with a curve, catching my foe’s return fire at the perfect moment, then curling up and becoming the ball myself so my teammates can use my body as the perfect weapon to clutch the win. “Knockout City” is bright and colorful, offering over-the-top dodgeball action. The game has some attitude too, with matches narrated by a goofy in-universe radio host, and a unique look that fuses a futuristic sci-fi city with a 1950s aesthetic. There’s not really a story or lore to be found, just a bunch of folks engaging in casual dodgeball games around town. Gameplay is centered around grabbing dodgeballs located around the map, which can be thrown at different speeds depending on how long the player charges the throw. Balls can be caught, which immediately charges them so they can be thrown very fast. This deceptively simple system allows for a lot of depth in throwing the ball at different speeds, trying to bait out opponents’ catches and engaging
in intense one-on-ones where the ball just keeps volleying back and forth, growing ever faster until someone slips up. Each player can take two hits before being eliminated. Players can also choose to roll into a ball themselves, which can be picked up by teammates and thrown. Players who are balls deal extra damage, capable of knocking out enemies with a single hit, but they risk landing far out of position if the throw misses, or finding their fate literally in the hands of the enemy if the ball is caught. There are also special balls like a bomb ball that explodes when it’s thrown and a cage that forces players into the ball form, but these didn’t really stand out besides as gimmicks. This is in part because it’s not always easy to tell if your opponent has a special ball, I would usually just get hit with an explosion and think “huh, guess that was a bomb ball.” There are a few different modes on offer, but all of them end with players hurling dodgeballs at each other. I spent most of my time in the standard gameplay mode where two teams of three clash, and I found a surprising amount of strategy available when teams managed to act as a unit. Overall, the gameplay accomplishes everything it needs to. Matches are quick and fun, with pretty good matchmaking that didn’t result in too many complete blowouts. The act of throwing a dodgeball is perfect, immensely satisfying, and they really nailed the impact sound effects. If the game can find a dedicated audience, I think it can stick around for a long time.
PHOTO COURTESY OF EA
Knockout City is definitely best played with friends, as uncoordinated teams will almost always get picked apart.
Post-launch content is expected to take the form of cosmetics, modes and maps, which is good because the game could definitely use more of all three. Cosmetics at launch felt especially lacking, with a daily rotating store that seems to have all the same items every day. I definitely wish there were more variety in the outfits. Maps and modes are in a better place right now, but the game will definitely need a steady flow of both to stay relevant. I played the game primarily on the Xbox Series S, which unsurprisingly ran the game extremely well, but I also checked it out on the much lower spec Nintendo Switch. Players on Switch have to choose between prioritizing graphical fidelity or frame-rate. I was stunned to see the game actually ran at 60 frames per second even in handheld mode. “Knockout City” is totally viable on the switch, especially since the dodgeballs don’t have to be aimed. I went into “Knockout City” without
any expectations, and it blew me away. The aesthetic, the gameplay, the inclusive options in the character creator, even the neat menu that keeps players in a small training area to mess around in between matches. My friends and I will definitely be checking back in throughout the year as new content drops. My only concern is whether developer Velan Studios will be able to churn out maps and cosmetics quickly enough to keep the audience engaged. Of course, the game has to build up an audience in the first place, and it’s got a long road ahead to contend with big dogs in the online competitive space like “Fortnite” and “Apex Legends.” As far as building an audience goes, the game has a hurdle on most platforms in the form of a $20 price tag. Most similar online competitive games are freeto-play these days. There is a free trial available to players on all consoles until they reach rank 25, and members of Xbox Game Pass can jump into the full game for free. I’d recommend anyone dip their toes in for the free trial.
PHOTO COURTESY OF EA
Gameplay is all about throwing and catching dodgeballs, which makes sense, but the satisfaction of hitting a perfect catch and launching the ball back to knockout an enemy is perfect.
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