A r t s & C u ltu r e
October 8, 2021
ARTS & CULTURE Established 1874
Volume 151, Number 1
OSCA Reopens, Hoping to Preserve Institutional Memory Lilyanna D’Amato Arts & Culture Editor After temporarily closing its doors during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Oberlin Student Cooperative Association has resumed its housing and dining operations. OSCA is a student-owned and run nonprofit organization that offers housing and dining services to almost a quarter of students on campus. While new OSCAns are being inducted into the co-op experience, veterans are taking on the responsibility of preserving the nonprofit’s traditions and institutional memory. While the organization is a separate entity from the College, OSCA was completely shut down in March 2020, and many of its housing and dining facilities were repurposed by Residential Education and Campus Dining Services. At the time, many students felt that the halt on all OSCA-related activities jeopardized its significant presence on campus. “Over COVID[-19], it felt like OSCA went completely silent, which makes complete sense because it was a global pandemic,” College fourth-year Izzy Halloran said. “But what I have been thinking about is how the first- and second-years may not be aware of the traditions, qualities, and characteristics of each co-op. It is a bit sad to think that those things will leave with the upperclassmen.” In the months before COVID-19 took hold in the United States, Halloran had been acting as head cook and serving as the missed-jobs coordinator at the Kosher-Halal Co-op, which is not under OSCA’s umbrella but followed the same structure. KHC was recently closed permanently following an executive decision by the college. “I’ve been waiting for the return of OSCA ever since it closed,” Halloran said. “I’m dining at Tank [Hall] this year, which is very exciting for me because, as someone who does not eat
meat or fish, I had a difficult time finding sources of protein during the spring and summer semesters.” For Halloran, an OSCA member since 2018, the co-op experience provides an intimate, close-knit community, and it has given her a new set of skills she feels will inform the rest of her life. “OSCA has also helped me and countless others find a more cost-effective dining plan, one that offers us increased agency over our food,” she said. To be able to know where our food comes from, to cook it ourselves, and to serve it to each other is an invaluable experience.” The idea of preserving the organization’s institutional memory seems to be on everyone’s minds as OSCA reopens its doors to residents and diners. “Preserving co-op traditions is the most important thing [to them] right now. In discussions and in house meetings, it seems like people are really dedicated to maintaining Hark[ness House]’s personality for the new members,” Harkness Housing Loose Ends Coordinator and College fourth-year Tal Clower said. “Recently, we were voting on the shower policy, because Harkness used to have group showers and when the pandemic happened ResEd put in dividers. A couple of the people who have never been in OSCA before were saying that it felt a little bit uncomfortable but that we should take them down in the interest of maintaining the co-op’s rituals.” Tasked with preserving OSCA’s institutional memory, many co-ops, including Harkness and Tank, have created historian positions. Responsibilities include recording, collecting, and presenting co-op histories in hopes of rebuilding the broader OSCA community and identity. Along with OSCA’s overarching historian — a position that remains to be filled — the co-op historians will document newsworthy events, take pictures and record oral histories, write
Above: Located just east of campus, Tank returns to co-op life in full swing. Photo by Kush Bulmer, News Editor Below: College fourth-years Katie Kunka and Noah Plotkin study on the sunny lawn of the newly reopened Hark co-op. Photo by Anisa Curry Vietze, Editor-in-Chief
See OSCA, page 11
The Fantastic Nightmare of Netflix’s Squid Game Michael Eddy Harvey
Squid Game, written and directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk, has been breaking streaming records across the country since its September release. In nine tense and exhilarating episodes, the show builds upon the popular dystopian genre as it follows a game designed to offer 456 debt-ridden people a chance to change their fortune. The show gives a nuanced view on what we would do in a kill-or-bekilled situation. While there have been movies similar to Squid Game such as The Hunger Games and Battle Royale, none have ever gone in quite the same direction. The participants have to play some simple games — such as red light, green light and tug of war — each with more dramatic and deadly twists than the last. If they win, they move on to the next round one step closer to an enormous cash prize and a way out
10
of their monetary nightmares; if they lose they are eliminated. The driving force in the show is money, and its capacity to corrupt and isolate. Even the characters whose drives towards wealth are underlined with good intentions ultimately find tha no amount of money can compensate for the ultimate price: their life. Though many of the show’s characters strive toward financial security through desperate means, the point is not to vilify the mechanisms of poverty; instead, the show holds a mirror to the underbelly of capitalism, serving to expose the determinants of economic inequality on the collective good of society. As the set changes from city to a fantastical and nightmarish life-sized arcade game, it’s hard to deny that Squid Game is beautifully shot, written, and acted. The vibrant colors and cheerful music contrast the dark, disturbing backdrop of the games,
creating a jarring eeriness. Just as the game begins, an unsettling feeling unfurls around the characters — a chill so tangible it strikes the viewer like a sudden winter gale. A haunting array of villains — either the faceless henchmen, the fatal rules of the games, or the unknown Front Man — undo and disembowel character after character, enthralling the viewer with a compelling cocktail of dread and anticipation. The show follows six main characters, each written with significant yet relatable flaws. Set during a dystopian present day, the world created in the show doesn’t feel too far off from our current reality, ushering viewers towards the uneasy realization that Squid Game’s universe isn’t too dissimilar from their own. As you try to figure out the rules of the next game or which character will crack under the mounting pressure, the show becomes increasingly ad-
dictive; it is nearly impossible to look away. Even when your predictions are proven false and tossed aside, you want to keep guessing anyway. The show’s quickfire tension compounds with the viewer’s bird’s-eye view over the deadly antics, and one begins to feel like they themselves are an alternative gamemaster as they beg the characters to follow their directions, to stay still when they need to stay still, and to run when they need to run. As soon as these pleas materialize in the brain, the answer comes, often in a fit of blood and despair so sudden it feels like an electric shock. As the show progresses, it becomes increasingly clear who will survive and who will not but that does not make watching the process any easier. In the sixth episode in particular, there are many heart-wrenching goodbyes and tough decisions. This is when even the most morally upright charSee Squid Game, page 12
