November 15, 2019

The Oberlin Review November 15, 2019

Established 1874

Volume 148, Number 9

Title IX Policy Undergoes Significant Revisions Anisa Curry Vietze News Editor

Editor’s Note: This article contains mention of sexual harassment and assault.

Several Democratic candidates seek to challenge Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan in the 2020 Ohio 4th Congressional District race and are gearing up for the March primary election.

Photo courtesy of NBC News

Democratic Candidates Look to Defeat Rep. Jordan in 4th Congressional District Ella Moxley Senior Staff Writer Katie Lucey News Editor Several Democrats have filed paperwork to challenge Republican Jim Jordan in the 2020 Ohio 4th District Congressional election, a seat he has held since 2007.

Democrats Shannon Freshour, Jeffrey Sites, and Mike Larsen have announced their candidacy for the position ahead of the Dec. 18 filing deadline.

Representative Jim Jordan is a founder of the far-right House Freedom Caucus. He also serves on the Committee on the Judiciary and Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Previous attempts to unseat Jordan have been unsuccessful; Democratic candidate Janet Garrett opposed Jordan in the last three election cycles and lost by approximately a two-thirds margin.

Last spring, Garrett announced she would not run again. Instead she is focusing her efforts on recruiting and supporting other candidates running against Jordan through her PAC called The Jordan Watch.

“We’re doing a lot of behind the scenes work with The Jordan Watch,” Garrett said. “We are going to be organizing some debates around the district so that people can come and hear the candidates and judge for themselves.”

Shannon Freshour, a litigation paralegal from Marysville, OH, is also a vocal critic of Jordan, and has centered her campaign on condemning him. Her Twitter bio states “help me Defeat and Unseat GymBro jordan.”

Her condemnation of Jordan propelled #GymBro to trend on Twitter last Friday.

Sites, a resident of Lima, OH, labels himself as a moderate Democrat similar to current Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown. Although previous congressional races prove that defeating Jordan will be difficult, Sites believes that he is the kind of Democrat that could win.

“There’s no guarantee that any Democrat can crack the gerrymandered, Ohio congressional districts. It is an uphill task, to say the least,” Sites said. “But with the current environment, I think the time has come to reach out to independents, college students, and the rural environment to say we’ve had enough of everything that’s going on in D.C.” Larsen, who announced his candidacy on Oct. 24, previously worked for Garrett as a communications director. He was inspired to run for office after experiencing continued frustration over gerrymandering and a lack of progressive political action in the district.

“Ohio is basically a 50-50 state,” Larsen said. “Yet there

are 12 Republican Congress people and four Democrats.”

Larsen is vehemently opposed to Jordan’s approach to political issues, and has hinged his campaign on his commitment to undoing Jordan’s legacy.

“If [Jordan] was going to Congress to fight even for very right wing things, fighting for whatever, overturning Roe v. Wade, whatever that thing is, at least I would have some respect that he was representing his voters,” Larsen said.

“But he doesn’t, he’s only there to be on Fox News and to fight these partisan fights. I just have no respect for that.”

Oberlin College students who have previously participated in local politics and worked on Garrett’s campaign likewise disagree with Jordan’s politics.

“My main priority with other students is that they feel engaged and they feel heard,” said College fourth-year and Oberlin College Democrats member Monica Dix. “I think that we could have a conservative Congressperson who we feel is receptive to us and [would] take our calls and listen to us. But I just don’t think that Jim is it. … He’s just one of the most extreme members of the Republican party in the House right now, and has consistently led initiatives that I think are antithetical to what a lot of Oberlin students believe in.”

Larsen suggested that nontraditional candidates — such as Maplewood, OH farmer Christopher Gibbs — might soon throw their hats in the ring. Gibbs voted for President Donald Trump in 2016, but has since criticized the president’s ongoing trade war policy with China.

“This election is very different for this seat than it has been in the past,” Larsen said. “Democrats routinely get near 40 percent, either a little below or a little above 40 percent in every election. And of course that’s not enough to win the two person race. But this year, there’s this very prominent Republican farmer who has been going around and saying that he is going to run as an independent … If that materializes, it’s a whole new ballgame. Suddenly 40 percent is a really good number in a three person race.”

Although Democrats are sharpening their strategy for winning the upcoming primary against Jordan, Garrett argues that candidates must uphold a strong commitment to their values and run a issue-focused campaign rather than an ad hominem one.

“You need to examine why are you running and what is it you want to accomplish,” Garrett said. “And a lot of times if you have really good reasons for the position that you have, people will forgive you even if they don’t agree with you, if you have a good solid foundation in your values.”

The Ohio Primary will take place on March 17, 2020 ahead of the House race on Nov. 3. The Review reached out to Shannon Freshour’s campaign for comment but did not receive a response.

After a two year review process by the Title IX Policy Committee, the updated version of Oberlin’s Sexual Misconduct Policy was approved via a vote by the General Faculty Council on Oct. 16. The edits include changes to how the College holds live hearings and additional options for mediation and restorative justice when parties do not want to go through a formal hearing, among other things.

The committee also edited the policy to clarify language and remove repetitions — making the 70page document more readable.

The Sexual Misconduct Policy is reviewed every year but not necessarily edited every year. The edits that just went into effect last month began in 2017 by a team of faculty, staff, and students lead

by Director for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion and Title IX Coordinator Rebecca Mosely. A year into that process, the U.S. Department of Education, led by Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, proposed changes to Title IX regulations that would affect how colleges and universities respond to accusations of sexual harassment and sexual assault on campus.

“We originally started editing the policy in the 2017–2018 academic year,” Mosely said. “We had an idea of how we wanted to edit it, and then the stuff that was coming out from the federal government was leaked and we knew that what we were pushing forward wasn’t going to meet the requirements of the federal government or the sixth circuit ruling. So we had to go back and redo.”

Because it is unknown exactly what changes the Department of Education will end up mandating or when they will go into effect, many feel the process moving forward is uncertain.

“Unfortunately or fortunately, we have to be in compliance with federal law on things like Title IX,” said Raavi Asdar, a College second-year on the Title IX Policy Committee. “I think myself and a few others were expecting the recommendations to come down over the summer and then having to kind of kick things into gear as soon as this semester started, but they’ve yet to come down.”

Some of the edits to Oberlin’s policy were made in preparation to get the College aligned with what these governmental mandates might be. One of the new additions to Oberlin’s policy is that large edits can be made without approval if they are necessary to keep the College up to date with federal law.

“As an institution, we’re going to do what we need to do to be in compliance with the law because we have to, so we changed the language and make that clear,” Mosely said. “And if changes come out next week, I’m going to make those changes when I have to make them and then we’ll figure out with folks how we can make them in the best way.”

Other edits to Oberlin’s specific policy included adding clarification to let students with disabilities know about their right to request accommodations while going through a Title IX process, as well as adding a policy for amnesty for alcohol and drug use for both parties involved in a sexual misconduct report. Previously, amnesty was only See Sexual, page 4

CONTENTS NEWS

OPINIONS

THIS WEEK

ARTS & CULTURE

SPORTS

02 Africana Studies Program Celebrates 50th Anniversary

05 Ohio Remains a Swing State

08–09 Behind the Scenes of the Mary Church Terrell Main Library

10 All-Female Waiting for Gadot Cancellation Sparks Collective Rage

15 Women’s Swimming and Diving Win Against Tiffin University

04 Off The Cuff with Sebastiaan Faber

07 Ohio Legislature Gun Control Debate Reveals Poor Priorities

The Oberlin Review | November 15, 2019

11

Diwali: A Photo Essay

16 Yeomen Fall to Yale, Defeat NYU

oberlinreview.org facebook.com/oberlinreview TWITTER @oberlinreview INSTAGRAM @ocreview

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REFLECTING ON 50 YEARS OF AFRICANA STUDIES

Protesters raise their fists during “Bloody Tuesday” protests at San Francisco State College. The San Francisco Express Times ran this image on the front page of its December 4, 1968 issue.

Courtesy of San Francisco State College

President Robert W. Fuller speaks with Black students in the early 1970s. During his tenure, Fuller tripled POC enrollment at Oberlin.

Courtesy of the Oberlin College Archives

Africana Studies Program Created Against Backdrop of National Activism Nathan Carpenter Editor-in-Chief In the fall of 1969, Oberlin College launched an Afro-American Studies program, following significant student activism inspired in part by students at San Francisco State University; the University of California, Berkeley; and elsewhere.

In creating the program, Oberlin joined a wave of more than 500 colleges and universities across the country that instituted similar academic departments or programs from 1968–1971.

The movement to establish what were then widely called Black Studies programs began with a November 1968 student strike at SFSU — the longest student strike in U.S. history. The strike was led by SFSU’s Black Student Union, which demanded that the university create a Black Studies program.

“Our thing was not simply to understand the world,” said Jimmy Garrett, one of the key SFSU student organizers, in a 2010 interview with SFGate. “Our duty was to change it. Everybody on the campus who identified themselves as a Black person, whether they were a student, faculty, worked in the yards, you were a member of the Black Student Union by definition.”

Garrett and Jerry Varnado are the two students widely credited with envisioning and launching the strike, which, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education, was supported by approximately 80 percent of students (“The Beginnings of Black Studies,” Feb. 10, 2006).

According to the same Chronicle article, written

by Noliwe Rooks, now a professor at Cornell University’s Africana Studies & Research Center, solidarity between different identity-based student organizations was a key element of sustaining the SFSU strike. This solidarity led to the creation of the Third World Liberation Front, a multiracial coalition of student organizers that began at SFSU and expanded to other campuses in California.

While specific to California, the TWLF’s work became the impetus for the creation of ethnic studies programs at colleges and universities across the country — one of the places its legacy lives on is as the namesake of Oberlin’s Third

The Oberlin r eview Nov. 15, 2019 Volume 148, Number 9 (ISSN 297–256) Published by the students of Oberlin College every Friday during the fall and spring semesters, except holidays and examination periods. Advertising rates: $18 per column inch.

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World House and Third World Co-Op. Within a year of establishing SFSU’s Black Studies program, some estimate that more than 200 similar programs launched at colleges and universities across the country.

Many of these programs were supported by the Ford Foundation, which supplied grants that, some felt, were in the spirit of controlling, rather than supporting, student activism.

“The concern of the foundation was that the field would grow too much, too soon,” Rooks wrote. “[A] handful of program officers responsible for making decisions about the first round of grants were afraid that, if not properly guided, black studies would be destroyed by the sometimes conflicting aims behind it — black militancy and racial inclusion.”

Rooks goes on to argue that the foundation prioritized funding for institutions that sought to diversify white departments rather than create more black-centered ones.

“Not one of the applications for help setting up an autonomous department or program in black studies was awarded a grant,” she wrote. “For Ford, black studies was not to become a base for radical change: it was a way to foster necessary but incremental integration.”

While the Review’s archives can’t confirm whether Oberlin’s Afro-American Studies program was funded by the Ford Foundation, an issue published on June 8, 1968, does reveal that the College was “one of the 61 colleges to receive a grant from the Ford Foundation under its new program to assist humanities at the four-year liberal arts level.”

Of a total pool of $2.7 million, Oberlin received a $50,000 grant over a four-year period. The school’s intended uses for the money, as listed in the article, did not include supporting the Afro-American Studies program which would be founded that fall.

The SFSU activism inspired a similar strike at fellow California school, UC Berkeley. However, according to a 1990 study published in American Studies, consensus was much more difficult to reach at Berkeley than Garrett remembers it being at SFSU. “Minority faculty members generally supported the idea of [a black studies program] … [but] most

Editors-in-Chief

Nathan Carpenter Katherine MacPhail Managing Editor Ananya Gupta News Editors Anisa Curry Vietze Katie Lucey Opinions Editor Jackie Brant This Week Editor Lily Jones Arts Editors Kate Fishman Aly Fogel Sports Editor Jane Agler Cont. Sports Editors Khalid McCalla Zoë Martin del Campo Photo Editors Mallika Pandey Chris Schmucki Senior Staff Writers Imani Badillo Ella Moxley

Layout Editors

refused to participate directly in the ensuing strike, which began on January 22, 1969,” wrote Karen Miller, now a history professor at Boston College.

“Increasingly strained relations developed between black student activists and the rest of Berkeley’s black academic community. Activists labeled them ‘cowards, fair-weather opportunists, and middle class bourgeoise [sic] pigs.’”

The strike was organized by the UC Berkeley chapter of the TWLF, which had presented the university’s administration with 14 “nonnegotiable” demands — several of which centered around the creation of a Black Studies department.

When the university did not initially meet the demands, students launched a strike on Jan. 22 that lasted for three months.

While Berkeley administrators eventually did agree to create an Afro-American Studies program under the auspices of its Ethnic Studies department, the implementation was so rocky that students launched a boycott of the program in 1972, protesting what they viewed to be a flawed vision for the program’s future.

While Berkeley’s program survived, many others didn’t. According to Miller, many of the Black Studies programs launched during the flurry of 1968–1971 dissolved in the late ’70s and into the early’80s. To Miller, this turbulence speaks to the ways that different constituent groups — students, university leaders, and outside funders, to name a few — viewed the role of Black Studies programs in the broader landscape of higher education.

“At best, Black Studies was represented as a panacea for higher education’s racial problematic,” Miller wrote. “At worst, Black Studies became a piece of turf on which competing political interests vied for control.”

It was against this background of student activism at SFSU, UC Berkeley, and elsewhere — in addition to significant anti-war and pro-Black Panther activism at Oberlin — that Oberlin’s Afro-American Studies program was born. While Oberlin students, like students around the country, certainly drew inspiration from their peers, campus activism here took on a unique bent, as did the Afro-American Studies program that it created.

Emma Jane Haas Lila Michaels Parker Shatkin Nico Vickers Ads Manager Jabree Hason Web Manager Sheng Kao Production Manager Devyn Malouf Production Staff Gigi Ewing Christo Hays Jimmy Holland Olive Hwang Kushagra Kar Allison Schmitt Ivy Fernandez Smith Jaimie Yue

Corrections: In “Proposal for Journalism Concentration Passes” published on Nov. 8, 2019 Professor and Chair of Hispanic Studies Sebastiaan Faber was quoted as saying that students have been denied individualized majors in journalism. This was an incorrect attribution, and the Review regrets the error.

To submit a correction, email managingeditor@ oberlinreview.org.

Africana Studies and A-House Established Alice Koeninger

During the Civil Rights era, Oberlin College worked to maintain its image of diversity by actively undertaking large-scale efforts to recruit Black students. These efforts were spearheaded by President Robert K. Carr, who served as president from 1960 to 1970. When Black students came to Oberlin, they had trouble finding spaces where they felt comfortable. They also did not recognize themselves in the fields of study taught at Oberlin. So, in 1967, the students took charge.

“Thinking about that time, the momentum; just building off that movement was the mindset of a lot of students coming in,” said Afrikan Heritage House Historian and College second-year Deverrick McAllister. “They were just revolutionary, inspired by the movement, and the institution was also ready to accept some of these changes. It was really a student-led movement. They demanded that we have the creation of not only the house but also the department which focused on these students.”

The Oberlin College Alliance for Black Culture was formed in 1967. In a May 1968 Review article, OCABC demanded faculty develop “a relevant educational experience for the black student on this campus” (“Black Alliance Makes Educational Demands,” The Oberlin Review, May 10, 1968).

OBABC stated its goals for the organization in the same issue.

“Revamping the new educational

Thursday, Nov. 7, 2019

The construction of Lord-Saunders house in South Bowl during 1968.

Courtesy of the Oberlin College Archives

system on this campus that will function as a double-pronged thrust at the white racist society,” members wrote. “We intend to place the black man in his proper perspective so that the black man can achieve his goal to become an educated BLACK man and so that an und90oo90erstanding of the black race can lead to better race relations between blacks and whites.”

OCABC wanted the administration to re-evaluate its commitment to racial tolerance, and add Afro-American Studies courses and an interdisciplinary major to the College curriculum, in hopes that that eventually an Afro-American Studies major and department could be created.

OCABC also wanted AfroAmerican courses such as “The Urban Black Man” to be added to the Sociology department, as well as courses on Afro-American literature and drama to be taught in the English department. Finally, they requested that a “vigorous search” be initiated by the College to recruit Black professors.

“It was really significant, the thought that Black people are worth studying, that this is something a pinnacle of higher education is

going to say — that this is something valuable and worthy and you can have a degree in this,” McAllister said.

In the fall of 1968, the College approved the establishment of an Afro-American Studies program, now known as the Africana Studies program. Plans to build an Afrikan Heritage House, Lord-Saunders, were also put into effect. Until the dorm was built, places in Talcott Hall were allotted for those interested in creating a living space centered around their African heritage.

OCABC was also instrumental in the implementation of extracurricular events sponsored by the Africana Studies program, including Black Culture Week in February. A-House has a long tradition of hosting events such as Soul Sessions, art shows, poetry readings, and the Kuumba festival.

“I can talk to members of the Africana community about things that may be going on around campus, internships, family, or even about the latest song that might have come out,” wrote A-House Resident Assistant and College second-year Iesha Philips in an email to the Review.

“This close-knit community and family is something that I cherish.”

Africana Studies Legacy Reverberates Today

Residents of Afrikan Heritage House relax in South Bowl during the 1970s.

Courtesy of the Oberlin College Archives

Drew Dansby The history of Africana Studies at Oberlin is one of powerful activism, resilience, and solidarity. On the department’s 50th anniversary, members of the Oberlin community consider what this legacy means to them today.

“The 50th anniversary is a time for celebration, reflection, and planning for the future,” wrote Director and Faculty-in-Residence of Afrikan Heritage House Candice Raynor in an email to the Review. “[We are] celebrating and reflecting on our journey, the impact the House and department have on the students we serve as well as the greater Oberlin community, and discussing how to best move forward into the next 50 years of Africana Studies at Oberlin.”

The department’s journey is marked by studentled demands. One of the key demands in the original document by the Oberlin College Alliance for Black Culture stipulated the establishment of Afro-American House in close partnership with the academic department.

The House, since renamed Afrikan Heritage House, has become a bastion of student life, featuring a campus dining hall, a library, and a resident faculty member.

“This is a place of community, fellowship, home, family, and a resource for Black students on campus,” said Deverrick McAllister, College second-year and historian-in-residence of Afrikan Heritage House. “I really appreciate the anniversary for highlighting that this is something worth celebrating.”

But the strengths of the House go beyond academic The Oberlin Review | November 15, 2019

Security Notebook

resources. For many Black students, the House has always offered a space to feel secure and explore their identities.

“It was initially instituted as a place where people didn’t have to explain themselves, somewhere they can be comfortable,” McAllister said. “It was just born out of that need to have a place where you not only fit in and are understood in your Blackness, but you’re growing in that Blackness, you have faith in that Blackness, and learning to understand its implications beyond you. I’m not really sure you could understand it if you didn’t live here.”

Students and faculty believe the opportunities for learning and solidarity the department provides have positively impacted the broader Oberlin community.

“Drawing students from all disciplines to take a course, the department is alive and poppin’,” Iesha Phillips, College second-year and A-House Resident Assistant, wrote in an email to the Review. “Its focus is to educate students about the Africana Diaspora while preparing them for the world using important skills like critical thinking.”

The anniversary is prompting members of the Africana Studies community to reflect on what future directions the department might take.

“In the future, I hope to see more collaborations with other cultural programs,” Phillips wrote. “I know we have been doing more Afro-Latinx events, so that makes me happy. I also want to see more funding going into the house for things like a basketball net and pool table because Afrikan Heritage House is the hub of Black life on campus.

It’s not only a safe place, but a place that values community.

McAllister says he wants to see Oberlin administrators make the Africana community on campus more visible.

“I’d really love to see an African language taught here at the College, or even something like Portuguese that’s used in Brazil,” he said. “I’d [also] love to see tours. Tours don’t come down [to A-House]. Like even just to walk down and say, ‘it means this to students here, and you have a place here.’”

To celebrate the anniversary, Professor Raynor is hosting a few special events at A-House this academic year, including two panel discussions during Black History Month and a festival in the spring. Raynor also writes that she will plan annual programming on a grander scale this year. Some upcoming programming includes Kuumba Week starting on Monday, Kwanzaa in December, and Black History Month in February.

11:38 a.m. A resident of a Union Street Housing Unit reported that their headphones were stolen from their backpack in their room. The headphones are Beats, Studio3 Skyline edition, dark gray and gold in color, and valued at $350.

12:00 p.m. Campus Safety officers and the Oberlin Fire Department responded to a fire alarm at South Hall. Smoke from adding butter to a hot pan activated the smoke detector. The area was cleared of smoke and the alarm was reset.

4:13 p.m. A resident of Langston Hall reported a strong odor of burnt tobacco on the second floor.

Officers located the room that the odor originated from and spoke with the occupant, who denied smoking. Rolling papers, tobacco, filters, and tobacco residue were observed on a table in plain view. The student was advised of the campus smoking policy.

Friday, Nov. 8, 2019 1:19 a.m. A student reported being approached by an older male subject asking for money in North Quad. When the student said that they could not help him, he walked away. Officers checked the area, and the individual could not be located.

1:45 p.m. A student reported that they lost their purse in the Clarence Ward Art Building or Wilder Hall area. An officer responded and searched the spaces with no results. The purse is small, brown in color, made of leather, and contains a credit card and miscellaneous items. The student was advised to cancel the credit card.

3:15 p.m. A student reported observing a suspicious individual in South Hall on two different occasions: at 2 a.m. on Thursday morning and again around noon on Friday. Officers checked the area but did not locate the individual. The incident is under investigation.

Sunday, Nov. 10, 2019 12:29 a.m. Officers and the Oberlin Fire Department responded to a fire alarm in the secondfloor lounge area of Langston Hall. Smoke from a burnt pastry in the microwave activated the alarm.

The area was cleared and the alarm was reset.

7:15 p.m. Officers were requested to assist with a student who had fainted in Tappan Square. Upon arrival, the student was conscious, and appeared pale and dazed. The student was transported to Mercy Allen Hospital for treatment.

10:42 p.m. An officer conducting routine patrol at Kahn Hall was approached by a resident who reported broken ceiling tiles in the game room and holes poked in others. A work order was filed for repair.

Monday, Nov. 11, 2019 9:39 a.m. A student reported the theft of their skateboard from outside of Asia House sometime between 6 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. the previous day. The longboard is approximately 3 feet long, tan in color, and has tan wheels. There is a picture of a wave and a mountain on the underside of the board.

2:37 p.m. Officers were requested to assist staff in South Hall with confiscating drug paraphernalia.

A multicolored grinder containing a substance consistent with marijuana and a black glass tube containing residue consistent with burnt marijuana were confiscated. The items were turned over to the Oberlin Police Department for disposal.

Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2019 8:54 p.m. A student reported their wallet missing from their room in South Hall. The wallet is pink and contained a credit/debit card and other miscellaneous items.

Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2019 12:00 a.m. A student reported the theft of their bicycle from the south side of Langston Hall. The bicycle is a Schwinn folding bike with small tires, valued between $140 and $180. The bicycle was not locked at the time of the theft.

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Sebastiaan Faber, Professor and Chair of Hispanic Studies

Sebastiaan Faber

Professor and Chair of Hispanic Studies Sebastiaan Faber has taught at Oberlin since 1999 and is fluent in English, Spanish, and Dutch. Recently, he coordinated with other faculty members to propose an integrative journalism concentration, which the College Faculty Committee passed with 49 out of 51 members’ approval on Nov. 6, 2019. In addition to writing for a variety of English and Spanish publications, Faber regularly contributes articles to The Nation, covering topics such as Catalan independence and right-wing influence in Dutch politics.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Christo Hays Production Editor Were there any roadblocks to getting the journalism concentration approved?

No, not at all, as far as I know. … I think that most faculty see this as a no brainer.

We see it in the sense that — although Oberlin produces great journalists, as Jan Cooper said in the meeting — this is a time in history when good journalism is more necessary than ever in whatever medium it comes these days.

A rigorous, broad liberal arts education is a great way to train journalists. The skills that journalists need — critical thinking, good communication, getting quickly up to speed about any topic, asking probing questions — and then Oberlin’s own ethos of changing the world and questioning authority, and holding the powers that be accountable. So all that stuff comes together nicely, which is why we have such a good track record of producing journalists.

The big question that has always been

Photo courtesy of Sebastiaan Faber

around is: Does it make sense to formalize this in a path? All the grads who are journalists and have often been skeptical about that whole idea said, “No, no, no, the idea is exactly that you study whatever it is — English, or Politics, or something — you come to be knowledgeable about a field, and then you end up in journalism.

And those journalistic skills you gain organically on the way.” And we agree with that, but that’s also why the whole idea of the concentration is that it doesn’t replace a major. It’s an add-on to a major and it just gives a tiny little extra push, or just a couple of signposts, for students who are interested and don’t quite know where to start; or need help figuring out when they can do their internship; or what courses are on the catalog that will help them develop these skills; [it makes] it a tiny bit easier for students who are interested to find that pathway that many students have found on their own over the years.

There’s a lot of pressure on traditional journalism right now. What are you most concerned about? What trends do you see?

I completely agree with you. The field is threatened from a number of directions. Economically, of course, it’s still recovering from the big shift in the flow of advertising. With the disappearance of print ads — from wanted ads all the way to big corporate ads — newspapers are still struggling to find a replacement income for that stream. Even a paper like the Times struggles with that, let alone local papers.

So, economically, finding just the right model to finance properly compensated journalism or media that can afford to fund long-term investigative reporting, that’s a real challenge that the industry hasn’t quite solved yet.

On the other hand, the clear threat

that I see is from state structures, from governments. So, whether it’s the Trump administration or the Bolsonaro administration in Brazil or what’s going on in Hungary or in Poland or in Italy, the combined pressure of governments and administrations who refuse to understand what journalistic freedom and the freedom of press is about and then apply pressure through restrictive government policy, intimidation of journalists, and corporate pressure. If you look at Italy, it’s the combination of the state restricting journalistic freedom and the state having control over corporate structures or media conglomerates that through their internal policies can restrict journalistic freedom.

The same is true in Spain. So those threats combined with that economic challenge I mentioned earlier make it really tough for journalism to thrive.

At the same time, you see all kinds of new approaches to journalism appear all over the world. And in that sense the advent of the internet and the drop in cost of media production — whether it’s layout, using images, or video — has made it possible for citizen journalism, or what some call committed journalism or civic journalism, to rise up. So I think the most interesting media that we see are exploring new funds and revenue. For example, the whole idea of the newspaper or the magazine as a nonprofit, combined with these new types of citizen journalism, I think are producing great news. It’s not properly compensated news, so it’s hard to make a living out of it, but just for the future of journalism, I think this is really interesting and important.

I’m curious whether the concentration is malleable enough for students who want to explore different forms of journalism — whether that be in online, visual, or auditory mediums.

Completely. In the proposal we defined journalism super broadly as any kind of nonfiction accounting. It was really, really broad. We absolutely think of journalism in really broad terms, which is why the concentration includes cinema studies, creative writing, several of us in the languages, science journalism. So I think absolutely, especially because it’s a concentration. It’s been really, really open and I’m sure that the faculty that’ll end up making decisions over what counts and what doesn’t count will be very amenable and very open to students’ arguments and why particular things should count. So it’s going to be the opposite of restrictive in that way.

What’s it like writing for The Nation?

And what’s a key to succeeding in journalism that you can give to students?

Well, The Nation is a really great magazine for people like me to write in because even though it pays very badly — because The Nation never has had much money, it’s always operated on a shoestring budget — it allows a fair amount of freedom to its writers, especially since it’s really transitioned to an online format.

They come out in print, obviously, and the print edition is great, but I think they publish four times as much online as appears in print every week. So that means that space is not a huge concern. So they’re fairly flexible when it comes to the length, which is great.

And on the other hand, they embody the best of American journalistic traditions, so they are really sharp. They have great authors and excellent fact-checking. They have a great editorial staff. They have great designers. So in that sense, it’s great to work with a long-standing magazine with such a strong tradition like The Nation. I have to say that as an academic, it’s extremely rewarding to try to write for a broader audience. I’ve long felt that one of the drawbacks of academic writing is that you end up often writing for very small groups of people in formats and languages that are not really understandable or interesting or attractive to anyone beyond that small circle. So the challenge for an academic to switch gears and to write for a broader audience is really terrific.

In addition to The Nation, I write a fair amount for the Spanish media in Spanish.

I write for a Spanish weekly magazine that comes out online. And for them, I write one or two pieces a month. Then I have another couple of Spanish papers I write for. And then I write for the Dutch media once in a while too, in Dutch ... So for me, journalism has been a great way for me to find new challenges in a fairly advanced stage of my academic career.

I’ve been at Oberlin for 20 years.

I’ve got tenure, I’m a full professor, and all that, so becoming a journalist — or playing a journalist, in a way, because I’m not really a journalist — has been a great way to connect with new audiences and to challenge myself, to find new formats to work in and new timelines, too. In academia, you write something and it can be one or two years before it finally comes out, whereas if you write in journalism, it’s a matter of days or sometimes hours between filing and appearing.

Sexual Misconduct Policy Updated for Federal Compliance, Student Need Continued from page 1

granted for the reporting party, which some worried would created unequal treatment.

Some felt that the Department of Education’s mandates forced Oberlin into making edits that they would not have otherwise made.

“Personally, I’m not a fan of the live hearing and panel-style of investigation as mandated by the government, since it requires parties who have

experienced trauma to participate heavily in the process regardless of whether they feel comfortable doing so,” wrote Bhairavi Mehra, a College thirdyear on the Title IX Policy Committee, in an email to the Review.

Oberlin hopes to mitigate this problem by holding these live hearings with parties in separate rooms when necessary. In addition, the committee has worked to create better resources for students that work within the Department of Education’s

potential new changes.

“However, I do believe that there was a silver lining to this,” Mehra wrote. “Given that the new official process is less ideal, we’ve been working with Rebecca Mosely to develop informal restorative justice-style processes that are oriented towards addressing harm and healing, rather than being purely punitive. ... I look forward to the different policies Oberlin develops to address harm and ensure the safety of its students.”

Ohio Legislative Update Senate Bill 18 The Ohio Senate unanimously passed a proposal to ban the use of solitary confinement or physical restraint with pregnant inmates. According to the current text of Senate Bill 18, sponsored by Senators Nickie Antonio (D-Lakewood) and Peggy Lehner (R-Kettering), passing of the bill would “prohibit restraining or confining a woman or child who is a charged, convicted, or adjudicated criminal offender or delinquent child at certain points during pregnancy or postpartum recovery.” The bill will be sent to the House and assigned to a committee.

4

House Bill 164 Ohio representatives passed House Bill 164, which concerns protecting the religious expression of students in schools last Wednesday. The bill, known as the “Ohio Student Religious Liberties Act of 2019,” passed by a 61-31 vote. Representative Tim Ginter (R-Salem) sponsored the bill, which will be sent to the Ohio Senate for approval.

Senate Bill 119 The Ohio Sunshine Protection Act, introduced

by Senators Kristina Roegner (R-Hudson) and Bob Peterson (R-Sabina) last Wednesday, is intended to exempt Ohio from daylight saving time. Senate Bill 119 would require Ohio residents to observe permanent daylight saving time starting in March. This is not currently permitted by federal law. “Turning back the clock” happens twice a year; this year, daylight saving time occurred on March 10 and Nov. 3.

OPINIONS November 15, 2019

Established 1874

Volume 148, Number 9

lEttErS tO thE EdItOrS

EdItOrIal BOard

Oberlin, Gibson’s Should Forgive and Forget

MaNagINg EdItOr

Legally, there will be one winner and one loser in the lawsuit filed by Gibson’s Bakery against Oberlin College. But on all other levels — reputation, emotional, historical — Gibson’s, the College, and the City of Oberlin will suffer from the devastating effects for generations to come. Are there no prayers or people capable of getting the two sides and their reinforced, high-powered lawyers to settle their differences privately?

The answer some may give is “no.” The bridge for a settlement has crumbled. As the dispute heads to an appellate court, to hope for a miracle is similar to asking that a long-anticipated Super Bowl game not be played and opting instead for a coin-flip to determine the winner. Arguments against some kind of settlement this far into the fight are powerful, but so are those prayers and special people — powerful.

– Booker C. Peek Professor Emeritus of Africana Studies

What Can We Do About Foreign ISIL Fighters?

Leo Hochberg Columnist After eight years of bloody conflict in Syria, numerous brutal and horrific urban battles, and the slaughter of thousands of members of Iraq and Syria’s religious and ethnic minorities, the infamously brutal Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant finally appears to be subdued. The terrorist group once controlled territory spanning from the rich oil fields of Northern Iraq to the urban and rural heartlands of Eastern Syria. Now, most of ISIL’s living fighters sit captive in holding camps throughout the Syrian northeast — an area that’s controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces — and in the prison cells of the Iraqi judicial system.

Now that major campaigns against the terrorist organization have concluded, ISIL’s victims are demanding accountability. However, the judicial process is complicated by the fact that ISIL’s members have deeply diverse origins. They hail from dozens of different nations and speak countless languages between them. While it remains unclear exactly how many captured ISIL fighters are not of Iraqi or Syrian origin, estimates show that in Syria’s largest ISIL holding camp, Al-Hol, where about 70,000 people are imprisoned, approximately 15 percent traveled internationally to join ISIL’s ranks.

The development of this situation raises difficult and politically divisive questions for the governments of the captives’ home nations. Are foreign states obligated to leave their defected citizens to the whims of the Iraqi and Kurdish judicial systems, where they may cause further instability and face weak standards of justice? Or should these fighters be extradited to their countries of origin to face due process at home courts?

The question has become a substantial political headache for some EuSee Nations, page 7 SUBMISSIONS POLICY

The Oberlin Review appreciates and welcomes letters to the editors and op-ed submissions. All submissions are printed at the discretion of the Editorial Board. All submissions must be received by Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. at opinions@oberlinreview.org or Wilder Box 90 for inclusion in that week’s issue. Letters may not exceed 600 words and op-eds may not exceed 800 words, except with consent of the Editorial Board. All submissions must include contact information, with full names and any relevant titles, for all signers. All writers must individually confirm authorship on electronic submissions. The Review reserves the right to edit all submissions for clarity, length, grammar, accuracy, strength of argument and in consultation with Review style. Editors will work with contributors to edit pieces and will clear major edits with the authors prior to publication. Editors will contact authors of letters to the editors in the event of edits for anything other than style and grammar. Headlines are printed at the discretion of the Editorial Board. Opinions expressed in editorials, letters, op-eds, columns, cartoons or other Opinions pieces do not necessarily reflect those of the staff of the Review. The Review will not print advertisements on its Opinions pages. The Review defines an advertisement as any submission that has the main intent of bringing direct monetary gain to a contributor.

The Oberlin Review | November 15, 2019

EdItOrS-IN-ChIEf

Nathan Carpenter

Katherine MacPhail

Ananya Gupta

OPINIONS EdItOr Jackie Brant

Ohio Remains a Swing State This weekend marks exactly four months before the Democratic presidential primary election in Ohio. The fate of the 2020 presidential election hinges partly on the outcome of swing states, such as Ohio, so it is crucial for the Democratic Party to swing this state in their favor this time around.

In the 2016 presidential election, Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton by eight points in Ohio. However, the final tally does not tell the whole story, as the race was extremely close or skewed toward Clinton in several counties across the state. In Lorain County, Clinton won by only a tenth of a percent, but in Cuyahoga County — Cleveland’s home county — she won with 65 percent of the vote. Despite winning all the major city districts in the 2016 presidential election, Clinton did not end up a competitive candidate in Ohio.

This resounding defeat led many to question Ohio’s status as a purple state. Only 22 out of Ohio’s 88 counties were even remotely competitive, and only 8 counties went Democrat. However, despite their past, these 88 counties are ones that Democrats must once again turn their attention toward in 2020. These are the counties with a high potential to become energized and excited about a truly progressive candidate in 2020.

Following the election, some liberal-leaning political operatives and think tanks wrote Ohio off as solidly red for the near future. Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown and his campaign manager Justin Barasky have made several comments recently discussing the difficulties that Democrats may face in Ohio during the course of the 2020 election. Barasky himself remarked that “Ohio is no longer the swing states [sic] that Michigan or Wisconsin or Pennsylvania or Florida is.” Mike Dawson of The Washington Post — the creator of ohioelectionresults.com and the leading expert on Ohio election results and statistics — wrote an article called “Ohio is Now a Red State. Can Democrats Ever Take It Back?.”

In the article, he gives an account of the rise of a “firewall” of conservatism in Ohio and explains why it is unlikely that Ohio will go anything but red in any election in the near future. Finally, the Democratic chairman in Mahoning County — which encompasses Youngstown — remarked in an interview, “I don’t know how you can call [Ohio] anything but red.”

On one level, this impulse is understandable. In recent years, too much of our national political discourse has focused on winning rural white voters in Rust Belt states like Ohio — often at the expense of prioritizing and respecting other communities, specifically urban communities and communities of color. This has often resulted in candidates sugar-coating policies or prevented candidates from coming out too strongly in favor of policies such as Medicare for All, public school reform, or policies that might combat police brutality against people of color.

It’s true that all politicians — especially Democrats — need to hold themselves more accountable to urban communities and communities of color across the nation. However, promoting this kind of accountability does not render a state like Ohio unwinnable for Democrats — as journalists who have covered state politics, we believe quite the opposite.

Make no mistake: if Democrats bring the same energy, outlook, and moderate policies that defined the Clinton campaign of 2016, it is likely that Democrats will lose Ohio again in 2020. But if Dems seriously heed what they are hearing from voters — health care, climate change, and other issues that really matter to voters, especially young ones — and promote a progressive, inclusive platform, they will have an excellent shot at both Ohio and the White House.

Voters in Ohio are fired up and ready to go, especially progressive voters. Ohio progressives are tired of right-wing assaults on civil liberties. In the past four years, we have endured the Heartbeat Bill, voter suppression, obscene gerrymandering, several publicized instances of police brutality against people of color, and a lack of gun control reform following a mass shooting.

Ohio residents have been through a lot since the 2016 presidential election, but we are ready to mobilize for the 2020 election and energized about many of the potential candidates that the Democratic Party has to offer. Despite being told that Ohio is no longer a swing state, students in Ohio — including at Oberlin — believe otherwise, and we will continue “knocking on doors, making phone calls, encouraging folks to make donations and to do everything we can to get as many Ohioans to vote as possible,” as Lili Sandler, founder of Lorain County Rising, said to the Review earlier this month. (“Democratic Debate Propels Ohio to Center Stage,” Nov. 1, 2019). In many ways, we are fighting for our future.

Democrats — don’t forget about us. We’re here, still fighting. Meet us where we are, advocate for the progressive policies that we need in order to attain a sustainable, livable future, and step up to the plate in the fight against the Trump administration, the Republican Party, and their attempts to strip away our rights and future. Together, we can forge a bold future.

Editorials are the responsibility of the Review Editorial Board — the Editors-in-Chief, Managing Editor, and Opinions Editor — and do not necessarily reflect the views of the staff of the Review.

5

Opi n ions

Mathisson’s Course Registration Criticisms Lack Appreciation for Liberal Arts Education Benefits Kushagra Kar Production Editor I am both a first-year and an international student, which means that I am constantly wondering about the value of my Oberlin education. The value to my personal development, academic goals, co-curricular interests, and — most importantly — to my parents’ wallets.

Course selection is, therefore, of the utmost importance, because the first metric in my understanding of the benefit I gain from attending Oberlin is my satisfaction with the classes I attend.

Last week, Student Senator and College second-year David Mathisson wrote about his “multifaceted policy package to fix course selection,” in an article titled “Course Registration Issues Remain Unaddressed” (The Oberlin Review, Nov. 8, 2019) and I couldn’t help but wonder: Why? I wasn’t just puzzled by the relevance of the article – considering the publication of a nearly identical piece this past April (“We Need to Fix Course Registration — Here’s How,” The Oberlin Review, April 12, 2019) — but more importantly, I was perplexed by the concepts it identifies as problematic.

Course selection is a crucial aspect of a college student’s life — the only higher priority is actually putting your maximum effort into getting the most out of your classes. Essentially, dedicating a significant amount of time to planning and determining your classes before registration is not only a necessity, but advantageous in the long run. Now, I’ve only been through the course registration process twice at Oberlin, but I can say that setting aside the time to research, meet professors, and discuss the class well ahead of time greatly reduces the anxiety associated with registration. The crux of the matter is that meticulous planning is essential. It is important to identify the academic goals you would like to achieve in the semester in conjunction with the graduation requirements. A breakdown of individ-

ual requirements is easily accessible on the Degree Works for Students portal through OberView.

Making the effort to plan ahead before registration begins actually allows students to use consent to their advantage. The process of getting consent to take a course represents two things: asserting your genuine interest in the course based on prior meetings with the instructor and your advisor, and guaranteeing your spot in the class. If you’ve never met the professor — or even made the effort to find out their office hours — and resort exclusively to an email, the professor likely will not reciprocate with as much urgency as you would like.

However, planning ahead of time and building rapport with the professor over an in-person meeting can greatly benefit your experience through registration and add-drop. Not only can you clarify any doubts or concerns you may have about the course, but you could also get access to the syllabus. Consent offers professors the opportunity to design academic environments suited to their own and the students’ strengths, ensuring maximum benefit for all. The process may seem tedious, but by the end of it, can genuinely help curb certain anxieties about classes and the semester ahead of you.

Even in situations where consent isn’t required, interacting directly with your professors prior to registration can be helpful. You can gain insight into the professor you plan to spend an entire semester with, while simultaneously acquainting them with the level of zeal you could bring to the classroom. As a habit, emailing your professors before classes start can be a great segue into your classroom interactions, inevitably creating a more comfortable space for both of you.

Further, your academic advisor provides a significant support system throughout course registration. If your first advising meeting regarding course selection is preceded by significant effort on your part, the next steps become

easier. The system isn’t broken; it just needs to be worked with in the way it was designed to be.

Therefore, the premise of David’s article is already flawed. Consent can be beneficial when navigated properly, and placing an ultimatum on professors to “accept and consent students in before the first course selection time opens or guarantee every applicant a spot,” would be counterproductive and detrimental to the academic environment Oberlin holds so dear.

The proposed alternative is replacing consent with “broad and inclusive” prerequisites. Ignoring the oxymoronic nature of Mathisson’s definition of prerequisites, getting rid of them altogether would give rise to a new and arguably more problematic situation. Prerequisites serve as barriers to entry, which means that students who lack definitive experience but want to challenge themselves in a rational way would be excluded from that opportunity. Most classes at the 400-level inherently require prerequisites, so those barriers are intuitive and logical. However, while many 200- and some 300-level courses may not require the same exclusivity, they could stand to benefit from a specialized base of interests. According to The Oberlin College Strategic Plan 2016—2021, the College is dedicated to “institutional transformation through an inclusive approach to academic and musical excellence.” This form of pedagogy could give students the opportunity to engage with classes they don’t necessarily meet the requirements for, and is a crucial aspect of the wholesome development of a student.

Not to mention that logistically, verifying each student’s qualifications for a particular course before registration begins would be far more tedious than systematically gauging their level of interest, and would therefore take longer and add another level of bureaucracy to the system Mathisson is criticizing for already being too drawn out.

The third point in Mathisson’s policy

calls for either the removal or reduction of general graduation and major requirements. It is difficult to attribute any gravity to this argument for two reasons: That people continue to graduate each year having met the requirements is proof of their feasibility, and the thoroughness of Oberlin’s curriculum is its greatest strength.

Replacing a deep, meaningful range of academic experiences with convenience would be antithetical to the purpose of higher education. Already, some classes fill three or more institutional requirements, in addition to Oberlin-specific benefits such as not having to take general education requirements like Writing 100 or Chemistry 101.

Further, to address the contention regarding attribution of Natural Sciences and Mathematics credits for Economics courses — each course in the Economics department already fulfills equally-important Quantitative and Formal Reasoning and Social Science requirements.

The characterization of the institution as one that doesn’t trust its students is both unfounded and too illogical to be taken seriously. The idea that our agency is compromised by a system designed to push us to experience a range of intellectual stimuli is entirely absurd, not to mention childish in its understanding of agency and liberal arts.

One of our top priorities as college students is having access to a high quality education that equips us with the tools necessary for intellectual and professional growth. The rigor that goes with that need cannot be substituted for a more convenient path. I find comfort in knowing that Oberlin aims to facilitate a challenging academic environment with the intent of providing a holistic college experience. My request to Mathisson would be to stop pushing a package that wrongfully characterizes that approach to pedagogy, and that inflates its own importance by offering solutions to a perfectly functional and equitable status quo.

Review Time Capsule: Images from the Archives

Jules Feiffer, cartoonist. This comic was originally printed in the March 12, 1968 issue of The Oberlin Review.

6

Nations Must Bring Home Foreign Fighters Continued from page 5

ropean governments especially, which face a rising tide of racism and anti-immigrant fervor that could rhave a negative reaction to nations’ decisions to import terrorists from a foreign war using taxpayer dollars. For example, Great Britain has been among those most staunchly opposed to bringing fighters home.

“I’m not putting at risk British people’s lives to go looking for terrorists or former terrorists in a failed state,” British Foreign Minister Ben Wallace remarked earlier in 2019.

Shemima Begum, a former British student of Bangladeshi descent, recently became the face of this controversy. She left Britain several years ago at only age 15 with two friends, and they planned to join the Islamic State. Now alone in a detention camp in Northern Syria, Begum has requested to return to her parents in Britain. However the British government has responded by stripping her of her British citizenship, claiming that leaving her stateless is legal under international law because she is also entitled to Bangladeshi citizenship. Bangladesh has denied that she is entitled to Bangladesh citizenship, leaving her with no citizenship or recourse. Proponents of Begum’s case have claimed that as a minor, she deserves the right to return to her parents, especially because she claims to have not committed any violent crimes during her time with ISIL. With few exceptions, most governments have adopted Britain’s logic and indicated that they do not intend to take back their foreign fighters, citing complex security risks and the difficulty of producing court-admissible proof of crimes committed abroad. In response, Swedish diplomats have recently begun circling a new potential solution to the problem: an internationally-sponsored tribunal for ISIL criminals in Baghdad, Iraq.

At first glance, this appears to solve a number of critical issues. An internationally-brokered tribunal would ensure that the courts would administer fair and legitimate standards of justice, and such a tribunal would benefit from easy, in-country access to evidence and witness testimonies from those who were harmed by ISIL. However, some critics claim that an international tribunal does more harm than good and ultimately provides little more than an opportunity for foreign governments to offload their political problems. Meanwhile, establishing a tribunal to try only ISIL criminals in Iraq would set the precedent that the international community is

The Oberlin Review | November 15, 2019

only interested in bringing terrorist groups to justice, while other groups involved in Syria’s civil war — such as the Syrian government and Syrian Kurdish militias — would escape accountability for the violence they have perpetrated in the region. A precedent of selective accountability would only increase tensions in Iraq and Syria, making it more difficult to promote justice in the wake of the previous decade’s extreme violence.

“An ISIS tribunal would be able to deliver justice to at best a tiny percentage of those who committed crimes,” argues a recent position paper by Impunity Watch (“ISIS-only tribunal: selective, politicised justice will do more harm than good,” Oct. 31, 2019). “Though a tribunal would bring welcome attention and acknowledgement of the ordeals suffered by some victims, it would do little to address the needs and demands of wider victim communities, such as safe and voluntary returns for the displaced, fair compensation at the individual and collective level, opening mass graves, and other measures to reveal the fate of the missing and disappeared.”

The question of how to deal with foreign fighters seems to have few easy solutions.

Leaving them in Iraq presents significant issues of due process given Iraq’s often-partial judiciary, in which judges are known to exact extremely harsh convictions for fear of being perceived as soft on ISIL. Reports suggest that ISIL trials in Iraq frequently last for less than half an hour and have a conviction rate of 98 percent, after which most are sentenced to life in prison or execution, regardless of their position in ISIL’s bureaucracy or the presence of significant, convincing evidence. With woefully inadequate support thus far from the international community, Iraq’s judiciary can hardly be expected to bear the burden of justice alone. As a result, Iraq’s courts have been unable to provide adequate standards of justice.

In order to best improve conditions on the ground, foreign governments should both extradite their foreign fighters and, if possible, provide substantial support to the Iraqi judicial system as it adjudicates trials for its citizens. Many countries must help shoulder the burden of restorative justice in Iraq, especially given the enormous role that foreign states have played in the region’s conflicts over the past several decades. Bringing home foreign fighters is just one way that the international community can exert a legitimately positive influence on the situation and help Iraq move on from the horrific nightmare of the fight against ISIL.

Ohio Legislature Gun Control Debate Reveals Poor Priorities Jackie Brant Opinions Editor Just over three months ago, a mass shooting at Ned Peppers — a local bar in Dayton, OH — left 27 injured, 17 from gunshot wounds. Ultimately, nine people died as a result of the shooting on Aug. 4, 2019.

When the shooter fired into a large crowd at the bar, he was carrying an automatic rifle that held 100 rounds, which he had previously ordered online from a Texas distributor.

He also had numerous ammunition magazines with him, along with body armor, a mask, and hearing protection. Until the time of the shooting, he had been hiding the gun and the ammunition magazines at a friend’s apartment.

Aside from a few traffic violations, Betts had no prior criminal record — although he had allegedly been suspended from school for having a hit list in 2012, an official investigation by the police found.

Despite the events of Aug. 4, — the shooting of 17 people and the death of nine — the Ohio General Assembly has made no effort to enact gun restrictions. Before the Dayton shooting, former Governor John Kasich, a Republican, supported numerous attempts to pass some sort of gun reform bill, all of which were repeatedly blocked by Republicans in the state legislature. Kasich’s gun reform proposals were a direct response to the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL, in 2018. Yet Republicans still refused to budge on the issue. Now, Republican Governor Mike DeWine is facing a similar challenge following the recent Dayton shooting.

Since September, the Ohio legislature has held debates on seven different potential gun control bills. However, only three are still under consideration. Of these three, two are co-sponsored by Democrat State Senator Cecil Thomas and Republican State Senator Peggy Lehner, and the other is sponsored by Republican State Senator Matt Dolan. The bills that are co-sponsored

by Thomas and Lehner are not expected to pass, while Dolan’s bill seems more likely to pass.

The two bills sponsored

by Thomas and Lehner are, unsurprisingly, much more progressive than Dolan’s.

The two bills together would ban bump stocks — a contraption that allows guns to fire shots much more rapidly — and make background checks for purchases at gun shows a requirement. These two bills in particular have been met with hard opposition from the Republican members of the state legislature, despite Lehner’s urging to view them as “pro-life” bills. Ultimately, these bills are being dubbed by Republican Ohio legislators as “too progressive,” even though the regulations that these bills aim to enact are still quite moderate in comparison to gun restrictions in other states.

Alternatively, Dolan’s bill would only require state-run voluntary background checks for private firearm deals, and would include an expansion of pink slip laws. The pink slip law means that when someone is found to be a danger to themselves or to others, they will be held in a mental health facility for 72 hours for evaluation, and then the courts decide if and how long the individual should stay at the facility. Currently, background checks are not required for firearm sales in Ohio, and Ohio has one of the least restrictive gun laws in the country.

Ironically, none of these three bills would have prevented the Dayton shooting. Betts almost certainly would have passed a staterun background check, as he did not have a criminal record aside from a few minor traffic violations. The shooter’s profile is a textbook case of why the gun control policies introduced by these three bills are simply not enough to prevent mass shootings. Even though the shooter had been previously investigated by the police for having a list of fellow students he wanted to kill, and for telling classmates that he was planning a school shooting, his criminal record was spotless. Betts — and other potential perpetrators like him — would have slipped through the cracks of background checks.

Despite the comparatively minor impact that any of these three bills would have on the ability of residents to buy guns, many Ohio Republicans have strongly opposed all three. Pro-gun groups in Ohio have written countless messages to Governor DeWine about the issue.

“You see, if Husted and DeWine have their way,

they’ll never stop until our ability to defend ourselves and our loved ones from killers and tyrants is outlawed and our firearms confiscated,” stated a particularly notable one.

Somehow, even a horrific event like the Dayton shooting has not been enough to strike a chord of fear — or even empathy — in many Ohio Republicans, especially those who hold office in the state legislature. While DeWine claims to support Dolan’s gun reform bill and other policy packages, he is also endorsed by the National Rifle Association and accepts generous campaign contributions from the association. It seems that DeWine’s support of the bill is simple lip service, a hollow promise in order to maintain popularity among moderate voters and to assure political damage control following the Dayton shooting.

The Ohio state legislature’s priorities are disturbingly skewed. It seems that the state government would rather continue vigorously pursuing anti-abortion legislation and Juul bans than pass legislation that would actually protect the lives of the children that Republican officeholders claim to care about.

What do these priorities say about the Ohio representatives? Do they really care about the lives of Ohio citizens? In Dayton, nine lives were taken in under 30 seconds. Three months later, and Ohio state legislators are still questioning whether passing meaningful legislation to stop more shootings from happening again in the future is worth it — a resistance that flies in the face of supposed pro-life ideals.

Republicans in the Ohio state legislature must shift their focus from trying to control people’s decisions — through recent policies such as anti-abortion legislation and Juul bans — and focus on how they can better protect their citizens’ lives from the very real threats of gun violence, opioid overdoses, and the like. Ohio is at the center of many of these issues, and yet the citizens of Ohio have seenvery little effort from state government officials to effectively address these life-threatening issues. The hypocrisy of some Republicans in Ohio is showing — if they continue to take no action, they continue to risk the lives of Ohioans every day.

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Photo courtesy of Sarah Weeks

Photo courtesy of Diane Lee

Diane Lee, Interlibrary Loan Supervisor [Interlibrary Loan] is a service for students, faculty, and staff that gives them access to resources not available here in Oberlin. So I borrow from other libraries around the world and we lend to them, these same libraries. It’s a cooperative effort between libraries.

Being in a library is like my dream job. Being able to find this stuff is like a treasure hunt — I never know what people are going to request or where I’m going to find it.

I think there are a lot of students who don’t know that the service exists. And I need to do a better job of explaining that they don’t need to request a whole book, that I can get scans of pages or chapters, and those will arrive much faster than a book that has to come through the mail.

Sarah Weeks, Associate Director of Libraries and Head of Technical Services Technical services acquire and make accessible many of the resources that are available through the libraries to our users. The first thing that comes to mind is books, DVDs, scores, media of different sorts, but increasingly, nowadays, a lot of it involves electronic resources. The biggest part of our budget is spent on electronic resources, primarily e-journals and databases. There’s definitely still a lot of work being done in our technical services here around physical items; we still buy lots of books, we catalog them and process them and get them on the shelves. But increasingly, we’re spending more and more of our time acquiring alternate resources.

In my experience, the number one [misconception] about library work is that … if you have e-books and the internet, you need less staff time, when in reality it’s the opposite.

Instead of purchasing one physical book at a time, we’re purchasing a collection of 3,000 or 12,000 books, and each one has its own metadata and its own URL ... and somebody has to be on top of managing that.

Kenneth M. Grossi,

The archives are respo tutional history [of Ob back to 1833. We have related to the Board of of the President, the [d of Arts and Sciences an academic departments association, [etc]. We a ity for [over 400] perso … of people that have ation with the College. community records. … here, we’re answering history, or somebody h went to school here. W related to former stude We also do instructiona es. I do a session on ho talk about what we do collections that might b class.

Photo by Lily Jones, This Week Editor

We always ask student a student organization do out of the classroom primary responsibilitie dent life. Student orga times hard to documen don’t] have a headqua keep records and so fo students to help us to p

Behind the Scenes of the Mary Church Terrell Main Library Layout by Lily Jones, This Week Editor One of the best parts of being an Oberlin student is our extensive access to academic resources. Whatever your major or discipline, you are likely very familiar with the Mary Church Terrell Main Library, one of the main sources of learning and research materials on campus. But for all the hours we spend working and socializing in the College’s libraries, it is far too easy to graduate from Oberlin without ever meeting the people who make so much of our learning possible.

This week, we asked some members of the library staff to share their inside scoops and advice for taking full advantage of what the library has to offer.

These individuals and many more play an essential role in the everyday workings of Terrell Main Library.

Interviews have been edited for length and clarity.

onsible for the instiberlin], which dates e institutional records f Trustees, the Office deans] of the College nd the Conservatory, s, athletics, the alumni also have responsibilonal paper collections some kind of affili. We also have some … So on any given day requests about our had a relative that We have lots of records ents and graduates. al sessions with classow to use the archives, o, and we’ll focus on be relevant to the

Tim Keller, Head of Discovery and Metadata Services

I’m most closely identified with special collections on the fourth floor. The major focus for my department is supporting instruction … There are also curatorial responsibilities — we’re constantly shopping for the collection, we’re evaluating gifts, we are trying to move along various projects that involve arrangement and description and physical processing of collections. And on the preservation side, we are responsible for environmental monitoring, disaster preparedness, the book repair unit, microfilming for newspapers, deacidification of acidic volumes that we buy — those all come under the rubric of preservation.

What Discovery and Metadata Services does is make sure that all print materials get into the collection and are searchable. We’re in the middle of a really big reclassification project where we’re reclassifying the part of the collection that’s in Dewey Decimal into [The] Library of Congress [system], because that’s the prevailing norm in academic libraries especially.

Letterpress Studio is an annex that we started to build up in 2010, and it’s still going strong. It’s meant as a secondary teaching space, where we can get ink-y and noisy without worrying about getting ink all over our rare books. … Most of the classes that come in there are talking about the history of movable type. They’re talking about design and the impact of printing and how it shapes language and perception. It’s a setting for a lot of different conversations, and it’s used by a lot of different departments.

Photo by Lily Jones, This Week Editor

ts if they participate in n, or what things they m, because one of our es is documenting stuanizations are soment because [many arters or an office to orth. We always ask preserve that history.

Photo courtesy of Oberlin College Libraries

Photo by Lily Jones, This Week Editor

Photo by Lily Jones, This Week Editor

College Archivist

Ed Vermue, Head of Special Collections and Preservation

Recently, I’ve been on a Subject Headings Working Group, and it was our group’s task to analyze existing research about ethical issues related to subject headings and classification schemas used in libraries and other information professions, as well as make suggestions for improving the future creation and curation of these headings.

In Oberlin, what that might look like is doing away with problematic language. For example, the current Library of Congress subject heading for undocumented immigrants is “illegal aliens,” which the American Library Association has been working to get changed since 2015 or earlier. Similarly, Japanese American internment camps are given the subject heading “Japanese Americans — Evacuation and relocation, 1942–1945,” which clearly whitewashes what was really happening. As catalogers/metadata specialists, we strive to be unbiased and ethical in our descriptive work. But because of the history of knowledge organization and subject representation, there are sometimes messes to clean up and situations to improve for a more balanced bibliographic future.

I don’t think people fully understand the scope of what goes on in libraries; most people think of front end circulation or reference, but the back side of things is sort of the foundation. Because if you don’t have a well-organized or easily accessible collection, then research doesn’t really mean a ton. Making things discoverable makes all the difference in the research process.

Friday–Saturday, Nov. 15–16 Student Dance Showcase Watch a variety of pieces by student dancers and choreographers. The show is free!

8 – 9:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday // Warner Main

Saturday, Nov. 16

Tuesday, Nov. 19

Painting and Poetry with Liv.E A performance by musical artist Liv.E, whose work blends elements of hip-hop, jazz, and R&B. 10 p.m. – 1 a.m. // The ’Sco

Eli Valley: Drawing the Dystopia A presentation by Jewish political writer and artist, Eli Valley.

7:30 – 9 p.m. // Dye Lecture Hall

Master Ballroom and Runway Class Hands-on ballroom performance art and runway session with Twiggy Pucci Garçon, senior program director of the True Colors Fund and choreographer of the second season of television show, Pose. Registration is required and limited to 50 students; tickets are free.

6:30 – 8:30 p.m. // Birenbaum Innovation and Performance Space

A r t s & C u lt u r e

ARTS & CULTURE November 15, 2019

established 1874

Volume 148, Number 9

DuBois Salon First Step in Honoring Legacy On Campus Kate Fishman Arts & Culture Editor In February 2018, two Oberlin professors ran into each other in the archives and realized that they were both researching the thesis of the same highly-accomplished Oberlin alumna. Visiting Assistant Professor of Ethnomusicology Fredara Hadley and Assistant Professor of History and Comparative American Studies Tamika Nunley were both inspired by the life and work of Shirley Graham DuBois, OC ’34, and at Nunley’s suggestion they decided to craft a class around her tremendous accomplishments in music, activism, history, and literature.

“This thesis is really her conceptualization of African-American music as being very expansive and broad-reaching into lots of classical forms of music, and seeing those connections more broadly across the African diaspora,” Nunley said. “Fredara and I thought it was really phenomenal [and] innovative of her to even think along those lines, and it is rooted in her training as both a historian and a composer.”

DuBois was an ethnomusicologist who studied music at the Sorbonne

in Paris and, inspired by the African and Afro-Caribbean musical culture there, later returned to America and earned both a B.A. and a Master’s degree from Oberlin. While at the Sorbonne, she began her opera, TomTom: An Epic of Music and the Negro, which went on to be performed for thousands of people in Cleveland. She also wrote multiple plays and books, in addition to joining the organization Sojourners for Truth and Justice and becoming a director of the Chicago Negro Unit of the Federal Theatre Project. Eventually, she married W. E. B. DuBois.

The first step in making the campus aware of this incredible woman and her connections to Oberlin was Nunley and Hadley’s StudiOC cluster class offered this semester, The Student as Artist and Intellectual: Gleaning from the Legacy of Shirley Graham DuBois.

“The [theme-based] learning communities of StudiOC are designed to bring together [Conservatory] and College students and ... faculty,” Hadley said. “It was perfect because I’m in the [Conservatory] and Shirley Graham DuBois [did her graduate work] in the Conservatory, and she also got a [Bachelor] degree in history, which

is Professor Nunley’s department. So it felt like we were well-balanced to bring an in-depth look at her life.”

On Tuesday, the Conservatory hosted a Shirley Graham DuBois Salon in Stull Recital Hall, celebrating her work and life and giving a glimpse of upcoming events centering on DuBois.

“We felt like she was really not extensively researched and talked about in the academy, and when you compare that to her husband W. E. B. DuBois … there’s definitely a disparity there as to the kind of scholarly treatment that she receives and the scholarly treatment that he receives,” Nunley said. “We thought it was a really wonderful opportunity [to] begin to understand and contextualize her life and work, and why Oberlin was really instrumental in getting that work off the ground.”

Years after her time at Oberlin, DuBois and her husband moved to Ghana, a country they loved and the place where they would eventually be buried. It was important to Hadley and Nunley that their scholarship be thoroughly connected with folks researching DuBois in Ghana, and with the DuBois Society there. A trip there this summer helped them cement

Oberlin alumna Shirley Graham DuBois, OC ’34.

Photo courtesy of oberlin.edu

those connections and crystallize their intentions in their syllabi.

“In a lot of ways Ghana represents an opportunity for her to use all of the skills that she’s gathered along the way — as a composer, as a writer, as a coalition builder,” Hadley said. “[Thinking about it that way] helped me to better understand what I wanted to convey to students, and how I wanted that to shape my syllabus, and what I wanted them to walk away at the end of the semester knowing about this woman.”

See DuBois, page 13

All-Female Waiting for Godot Cancellation Sparks Collective Rage Aly Fogel Arts & Culture Editor Two weeks ago, communication with Samuel Beckett’s estate halted Oberlin’s production of Waiting for Godot due to its all-female cast. The script calls for a cast of five men, and Samuel Beckett’s estate has a long history of putting an end to female versions of Godot, often taking theaters to court over the issue.

Months before the production was cancelled, designers had begun working on the show — the set design had been finalized, costumes were set, and the director had developed his concept. However, when auditions came around, only two men expressed interest, and the Godot team cast the best actors for the roles — all of whom were female. Due to complications with the Beckett estate, the same cast and production team will now produce the play Collective Rage this January.

College fourth-year and cast member Clarissa Heart was disappointed that she couldn’t take on the challenge of working on this canonical show.

“It was going to be reimagined in a very new way,” said Heart. “It [would have been] very exciting to have the opportunity to, especially as a woman … work on this male play … because it’s like, okay, ‘What does it mean for us to be working on this piece now in this day and age versus when it was written versus what the playwright intended?’ So I think it’s actually the reimagining of very canonical pieces that’s most exciting, especially on this campus, and it’s something that is done often.”

However, this excitement was not immediately shared by everyone in the Theater department. College third-year Lauren Elwood, who is a Theater Department Student Representative and a cast member of the Winter Term show, was excited by the prospect of performing Godot. However, she mentioned department show choice is one of the largest concerns that Theater students have brought to her. “[The Theater Representatives have] been trying to implement as many ways as possible [for] people [to] have their voices heard,” said Elwood. “Because a lot of people don’t feel seen by the department… Especially when it comes to gender ... a lot of people feel like there aren’t as many opportunities for women or any-

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body who doesn’t identify as a cis man, so we’ve been trying to implement more ways to have voices heard.”

The traditionally all-male show was discouraging for some non-male auditionees. College third-year and cast member Sophie Rejto said the all-male character descriptions made her hesitant to audition.

“I just didn’t think [Oberlin] would cast women, which was a valid assumption considering I’d also done my own research into female casts of Godot and whether that was even a possibility, and [I] had discovered that [Beckett] had said things in his lifetime about women not being able to play these parts properly because they didn’t have a prostate,” said Rejto.

Rejto’s concern over Beckett’s views on female actors is historically founded. In 1988, Beckett took a theater company in the Netherlands to court for attempting to produce an all-female production of Godot. He argued that the character Vladimir, who Rejto was cast to play, had prostate problems, and female-bodied actors could not understand that experience. Beckett lost the case, and he subsequently banned all renditions of Godot in the Netherlands for three years.

Oberlin’s production fits in a long line of all-female productions of Godot that have been halted by the Beckett estate. Eric Steggall, Managing Director for Theater, Opera, and Dance, explained that although the Oberlin Theater department had secured the rights to Godot, the all-female cast was against the stipulations of the contract. The department sent a letter arguing its case to the Beckett estate, but it was denied.

“This [situation] wasn’t completely unforeseen from us as a department, but there was a lot of artistic and personal integrity on the line,” said Steggall. “We as a department had to try to convince the Beckett estate that in this day and age, there is absolutely no reason why this outdated law should still be part of how theater is created. That being said, I fully acknowledge and appreciate an artist and a playwright or musician, whoever it is, that it is their work and they can restrict it or constrain it in the way it’s performed. Whether you agree or disagree with the rule, it’s the rule set forth by the playwright as continued through his estate and we are legally bound to adhere to the laws that govern rights and royalties.”

Had the Oberlin team moved forward with the pro-

duction, they would have faced legal ramifications, which could have resulted in a court case. Though the court has ruled in favor of all-female casts for professional companies in the past, there have also been productions that have lost their cases.

“I fully understand and appreciate that this should be a moment for us as artists to make a stand and to do what we consider ‘the right thing,’” explained Steggall.

“And we very much want to do that, but what would we be sacrificing if this did move forward and we were taken to court? There could be far reaching ramifications that need to be weighed against this scenario.

And I’m not trying to place value. I’m not trying to devalue one or the other. It’s a very complicated equation.”

With all of these factors in mind, the Theater department decided to switch productions. Tlaloc Rivas, the guest director who was set to direct Godot, worked with the department to pick a new play for the original cast. The full title of the new show is Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Betties; In Essence, A Queer And Occasionally Hazardous Exploration; Do You Remember When You Were In Middle School And You Read About Shackleton And How He Explored The Antartic?; Imagine The Antartic As A Pussy And It’s Sort Of Like That. The play, by Jen Silverman, explores the lives of five queer women.

“There’s something very poignant about going from this all-male piece about humanity and potentially God, depending on who you ask, to this play about all women and about queerness and identity,” said Heart.

“It’s just a total 180 that feels like a very nice, very solid rebuttal to the Beckett estate.”

Cass Gutterman-Johns, College second-year and Stage Manager, stressed the team’s commitment to the upcoming project and expressed her excitement about the production.

“I think that it’s a testament to the department [and] to the production process that the actors have been willing to stick with the show, that the stage management team has been willing to stick with the show, and [that others] have been willing to do such a quick pivot,” said Gutterman-Johns. “I think it’s going to be an incredible show with a great guest director no matter what we do, and I’m really excited about the show that we’ve chosen.”

Diwali: A Photo Essay

Students light sparklers as part of Diwali festivities.

Living thousands of kilometers away from family, the food you’re familiar with, and the language you’re used to– everything can be just slightly overwhelming. The part that is most difficult though, is missing all the traditional holidays that you’ve experienced for years and have always taken for granted. So when Diwali came to Oberlin last Friday, South Asians dressed in their salwars and kurtas and gathered in Shansi House.

In Hindu mythology, Diwali marks the day that Lord Rama returned to his kingdom of Ayodhya after 14 years in exile, culminating in a war against the 10-headed Ravana.

Today, we celebrate the occasion with fireworks, food, and family festivities, sparing no expense in making each year’s celebration bigger than the last. The whole family visits every relative in town, distributing sweets, joining in prayer, or even just sitting down for a nice cup of tea. Many of my happiest memories are of Diwali celebrations, and this year was no exception.

As trays laden with Indian sweets and savory dishes made their way to the tables, a tangible wave of joy swelled in the room. People exchanged stories of home, both in Asia and the U.S., over warm samosas and gulab jamuns. As Bollywood music hummed in the background, students and faculty turned a corner of Main Street into a veritable Little South Asia, complete with a mix of Hindi-Bengali-English, sparklers, and festivities. Just for that night, as with any Diwali night, where we were didn’t matter – that we were together was good enough.

Diwali isn’t special just because it’s a holiday in the Asian subcontinent. It’s special because every year, we are given the opportunity to make new friends, and to find new families. So when we come together, we don’t just celebrate Diwali; we celebrate family.

Text by Kushagra Kar, Production Editor Photos by Mallika Pandey, Photo Editor

Students in Shansi House with the leftovers of the Diwali meal.

College third-years Bhairavi Mehra and Reet Goraya enjoying some food and drink.

Student-Written Play MOIRAI Reimagines Greek Mythology Casey Troost Staff Writer MOIRAI, College fourth-year Giulia Chiappetta’s debut as a playwright, follows the classical Greek Fates Atropos, Clotho, and Lachesis as they seek to reclaim Atropos’ scissors from a thief in the modern world. The project is Chiappetta’s playwriting debut, and was directed by College fourth-year Maddie Henke. MOIRAI is a dark comedy, exploring themes of mortality, sisterhood, and traveling. The production is being put on with support from the Oberlin Student Theater Association, and is entirely student-run.

MOIRAI reflects Chiappetta’s interest in humanizing legendary mythological characters.

“I was interested in expanding and giving these staple characters who are part of this canon … a voice,” she said.

“It’s so often just the three of [the Fates], they’re the same and they dictate what’s going on. But what’s their story?”

This humanization and interest in individual stories brought genuine emotion to the play’s forefront, according to Henke.

“The most important thing was to bring out the relationships between the characters and the sisterhood that felt so honest,” she said.

To foster this naturalness in the performance, Henke encouraged the actors to experiment through improvisation.

“I made sure it was a welcoming and kind space where everyone could become friends and make the energy real,” she said. “We would go through scenes in different ways, like with whispering or [acting] very overdramatic, so that nothing stayed the same. That allowed the actors to create things that worked.”

Chiappetta encouraged the actors to adjust their lines, which Henke believes made the play more sincere.

“Giulia’s been super great about telling the actors that if something doesn’t feel natural to say, they can say it a different way,” she said. “We’re not working with copyright, [...] we’re workshopping and creating this play on the spot.”

Although she was ready to tweak wording, Chiappetta The Oberlin Review | Nov 15, 2019

said she steered clear from introducing narrative changes during the rehearsal process.

“Making changes would be stressful for the actors and stressful for Maddie,” she said. “But it has been challenging at points [to not make changes]. ... I’ve had to step back and remove myself from it while being in it, which has been interesting.”

In participating in the evolution of the play, Chiappetta and Henke’s collaboration has also changed their previous impressions of theater and scripts as inflexible. For Henke, collaborating with the actors has made the experience of putting on a play more valuable.

“It all feels very level, like we’re creating this together,” she said.

For Chiappetta, seeing her work performed has increased her interest in scriptwriting.

“I do other forms of writing, but seeing it come to life is literally the coolest thing,” she said.

Henke was also excited about producing a student-written work.

“I’m really inspired by the act of putting on something that was written [by a student] rather than just letting it exist in a vacuum,” Henke said. “I would love to write and put on a show someday.”

The play’s success is particularly impressive considering that this play is both Henke’s first directing experience and Chiappetta’s first completed theatrical work, and that neither Chiappetta nor Henke went to any academic departments for support.

Students interested in formally learning to write for theater don’t have the most obvious formal avenues to learn the craft, but there are options. The College offers courses across multiple departments that are relevant to student playwrights, especially in Creative Writing and Cinema Studies. These departments have a history of supporting playwrights, such as B.J. Tindal, OC ’16, who authored What We Look Like, which was produced by the Theater department last semester, and work by the prolific playwright Rich Orloff, OC ’73.

Professor of English and Creative Writing David Walker had taught a playwriting class every other year for the

past two decades. Following Walker’s retirement this spring, Associate Professor of English and Director of the Creative Writing Program DeSales Harrison is determined to continue supporting the medium in partnership with other departments.

“We will always be open to working with Theater, English, Cinema, and [Comparative Literature], to name just a few of the relevant departments,” Harrison said. “Playwriting, like all writing for performance, requires interdisciplinary flexibility on the part of students and departments alike. In the past, the administration has worked with us to maintain this flexibility, and it’s our hope that it will continue to do so going forward.”

For students not interested in pursuing playwriting through an academic department, College fourth-year Emma Wehrman, OSTA’s previous playwriting production coordinator, has created a program that aids students to workshop and stage their pieces. Students only have to email OSTA to arrange a public reading of their work.

“One of the things that’s nice about doing a reading is that it’s a great way to get feedback on your work without taking a class,” said College fourth-year Annie Schoonover, OSTA’s current secretary.

OSTA also hosts a day-long playwriting festival over Reading Period, in which students have 12 hours to write a play and another 12 hours to organize a performance. This is another great entry point for beginning playwrights.

“It’s a whirlwind adventure, and a great way to dip your toes into playwriting,” Schoonover said. “Nobody’s expecting you to beat Chekhov in 24 hours; people will still be happy to see it.”

As Chiappetta and Henke have shown, OSTA provides enough resources to fully produce and perform a play. Furthermore, Schoonover reflects the organization’s eagerness to see more student playwrights come forward.

“I’m always really excited to see student playwrights put themselves out there,” she said. For playwrights and non-playwrights alike, this production promises to be inspiring.

The show runs Nov. 14–16 in South Studios, with performances at 8 p.m. Tickets are free.

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A r t s & C u lt u r e ON THE RECORD

Professor of Hispanic Studies Ana Cara, Amanda Dargan, Steve Zeitlin, In the Moment Co-Directors

Steve Zeitlin and Amanda Dargan directed In the Moment: Poetry Duels and Improvisations from Around the World, a documentary film that screened on campus last Tuesday. Professor of Hispanic Studies Ana Cara sponsored the screening.

The film, spanning a 20-year body of work, explores different histories and traditions of poetic improvisation around the world.

All three have Ph.D.s in folklore from the University of Pennsylvania. Zeitlin and Dargan are the respective Founding Director and Education Programs Director of Citylore, an organization based out of New York City that focuses on the preservation of cultural heritage. Beyond her professorship in Oberlin’s Department of Hispanic Studies, Cara is also a prize-winning translator for various works of Jorge Luis Borges.

These interviews have been edited for length and clarity.

Kate Fishman Arts & Culture Editor Klara Jacobs How did your interest in folklore develop, and how did that inspire the creation of this film?

Amanda Dargan: We both had started doing some projects that involved improvisation. I was creating a short documentary about an artist who does henna for weddings. When the bride comes, she gets her hands and feet done with henna and it takes hours and hours, and so her friends come and they improvise lyrics about their friend and the person she’s about to marry. They’re banging pots and pans and it’s a very funny, raucous thing. I loved that and I have always been interested in improvisation in that way. It

was interesting to see the settings in which that kind of improvisation takes place.

Steve Zeitlin: I have a longstanding interest in verbal art.

One of the things that actually got me into folklore was coming across a book on the folklore of New York City and it had children’s rhymes collected by a folklorist named Benjamin A. Botkin. I remember one of them which goes: “I should worry, I should care, I should marry a millionaire. He should die, I should cry, I should marry another guy.” And I thought, “This is such a great piece of folk poetry.” I thought, “This is a perfect job for me, going around and collecting work like this.” I mean, who thought you could make a living doing something like that? After working for a number of years with Poets House, a literary institution, we started to realize that there are improvised poetry traditions in all different parts of the world. Then we began to go places where there were improvised poetry traditions and started recording them.

Ana Cara: Folklore is a huge field, but what interests me is the relationship between traditional verbal art and literature. I work primarily on Latin America, and I’m originally from Argentina. So all those factors led me to studying the traditional verbal art of the pajadores, verbal duelers [who] improvise poetry and feel a great sense of pride and ownership of Argentinian tradition by virtue of being able to improvise their poems. When I was in graduate school, I met Steve and Amanda. When they decided to make this film by bringing together … pieces of their work from different moments over the last 20 years, they asked me

Professor of Hispanic Studies Ana Cara, Amanda Dargan, and Steve Zeitlin.

about going to Argentina and filming some pajadore artists.

We ended up doing that together and capturing some film.

How would you define folklore?

AC: The term folklore was instituted in the 19th century, but that doesn’t mean folklore started then; human beings have had folklore since the beginning of time. The term has been batted back and forth by scholars … over decades. It’s a strange term because in some ways, when you use it people immediately assume that you’re talking about old-timey stuff that’s rural or non-written. That’s not necessarily the case in the 21st century — folklore is being made daily. So the question is, “What are the crucial elements for folklore?”

A definition that I have gathered from numerous definitions of folklore is that folklore is traditional art shared by a community. It has a historical dimension or has existed over time. It’s also shared by the community in the sense that it’s pertinent to the values and practices in the everyday life of a particular community.

In terms of the film, it was fun to bring together a filmmaker and somebody who’s an expert in this tradition and the

performers themselves and try to create a context in which it seemed appropriate for them to be filmed. There is this question that any field worker faces — or any ethnographer — when you’re representing a culture, when you’re writing [about] a culture, when you’re filming a culture, the constant question: Am I representing this as that culture itself would want it to be? And there’s no single answer.

How will the film impact the study of folklore in the future?

AD: We don’t like the idea of finishing it because it’s sort of our lifetime project. So what we’ve decided to do with it, I think, is good. In the film you see each tradition separately.

We come back to them sometimes, but basically there was a piece about each tradition and we created a web page on the Citylore website that has each tradition separately and translations and references for people who want to do research.

There’s more information about the forms that they’re improvising with that can be used by educators.

What place does oral culture and folklore have in today’s society?

Photo courtesy of Ana Cara

AD: It’s a time when the virtual world has come to be so that people are constantly on their phones. In some ways, folklorists have continued to do pretty well compared to, let’s say, … all the taxi drivers [who] are going to be put out of business by artificial intelligence.

I think part of it is that people need that connection to real traditions that are happening today, but also what has been documented in the past.

SZ: There is still this face-toface, intimate sharing between people that’s a part of folklore and I think young people long for that too, and so it has kept its importance. It’s kept its audience [that] you would think would be disappearing.

AC: I think that where folklore shows up is in everyday interactions. I’m sure that there are words that have meaning for students that are not necessarily officially in the dictionary and have become code for certain things that would fall under folklore. Stories may circulate about how one does things at the library or things about professors and … in some ways we don’t think about those things as folklore. Folklore has a lot to do with how people in relationships speak to one another.

Baroque Meets Bass Boost at the Kaleidosonic Music Festival Connor Daley

For Conservatory students, College musicians, and community members interested in music, the Oberlin music scene can seem divided. College and community musicians may feel that their music is viewed as less important than the work done by Conservatory students. On the other hand, Conservatory students may feel that their dedication to either Jazz or Classical music shuts them away from other more contemporary genres.

To bridge this divide, Oberlin’s Kaleidosonic Music Festival, held this Saturday in Finney Chapel, showcases the variety and capability of every student and community member’s musical talents.

The idea of having a Kaleidosonic musical experience was first imagined by Tom Lopez, OC ’89, who is a professor of computer music and digital arts and chair of Technology in Music and Related Arts at Oberlin.

“I wanted to celebrate the legacy of Olly Wilson and John Clough, [both OC] ’53, who championed electronic music (Wilson) and computer music (Clough) at Oberlin Conservatory,” Lopez wrote in an email to the Review.

“Wilson taught the first electronic music class at Oberlin, ‘Introduction to Electronic Music’ in the fall of 1969. In the following spring semester of 1970, ‘Computer Sound-Generation’ was first taught with groundbreaking computer music research by John Clough. It was clear to me that a spectacular fulfillment of these ideas should embrace the musical community of Oberlin in its vast stylistic diversity, and also employ the electric imaginarium of the TIMARA Department.”

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The festival promises performances in a wide variety of genres.

“Kaleidosonic is a free, exciting, evening-length musical collage with [over 500] Oberlin College and community musicians presenting styles from gospel, classical, rock and roll, jazz, early music, marching band, ... and avant-garde,” said Lopez.

Not only that, but there will be three food trucks at the event. The itinerary for the festival is jam-packed: there will be 40 five-minute-long performances. Performers come from a number of Oberlin ensembles, including the Oberlin Choristers, Oberlin College Black Musicians Guild, and the Obertones a capella group. The festival also encourages community involvement and features a performance by the Northern Ohio Youth Orchestra.

The experience promises to be a genre-melding, experimental funhouse.

“We’re performing a Baroque-era choir arrangement with electronic overlay from synths,” said Oberlin College Choir member and College first-year Jory Teltser.

However, the festival isn’t all about making strange music just because people haven’t heard anything like it before. “[The festival] allows a new take on old music. Students feel they contribute to something bigger than themselves,” said Tesler.

For many, experimentalism lies at the heart of this festival. Yet like its name suggests, there is no one clear purpose of this festival, and no singular definition to which it adheres. In an email to the Review, Seyquan Mack of Oberlin’s Black Musicians Guild expressed why the festival was

important to him and his colleagues.

“This festival gives performers like us the opportunity to create an environment in which all kinds of music are accepted and enjoyed equally,” Mack wrote. “Because we go to a conservatory, I think it is looked down upon to do music other than Classical and Jazz. The KMF wants to send a message out to the audience of inclusivity.”

In addition to musical inclusivity, the KMF organizers have created a welcoming festival environment.

“I’m looking forward to just vibing out on stage,” said Sam Hart, a double-degree first year and a member of Oberlin’s Brass Ensemble. “I think the audience should consider the festival performances as not really music as much as it is a sonic experience.”

Given the rapid-fire schedule the festival will follow, it makes sense to expect each performance to lead into one another and create the type of journey Hart imagined.

“Hopefully the festival will be a breath of fresh air for people who feel antiquated with pop music or classical music,” said Hart. “This will be an entirely different experience that hasn’t been produced before.”

For the performers, Oberlin’s Kaleidosonic Music Festival is a symbol of breaking down barriers in music. Kaleidosonic gives Conservatory students a chance to perform and experiment in a genre different from their genre of study and College students a chance to show off their talent. But for the audience, this festival will be an experience that will leave them challenged and inspired. This show is an opportunity that attendees won’t want to miss.

The Kaleidosonic Music Festival will take place this Saturday in Finney Chapel from 7:30-11:30 p.m.

CROSSWORD Lauren O’Hear when I got it back, the handles were on backwards!

It was really ______.

60. If you like pancakes, the ______ is serving an all-day Brexit.

61. I overheard the nurse say I had to get a vaccine in my ear. I wish I wasn’t in ________.

62. When you hit someone too many times with a paintball gun, he ______.

63. Physical education.

ACROSS 1. When a rock can’t roll, it’s a ______.

9. 3.14 percent of sailors are pi-______.

13. Sheep’s disgust.

14. Greeting from the ocean.

16. Friend or _____.

17. What to yell to get the attention of a landowning farmer.

18. Eight-legged cat.

22. How does the mathematician close on a house with her partner? She ______.

24. The bird who lost the flying race was a real ______ loser.

25. Peruvian bean.

26. Most effective profession at getting clients to open up, plural.

30. Dorothy’s favorite letter.

32. A farmer’s stitch.

33. The kind of osteology that gets under your skin.

35. When a seamstress laughs too hard, she gets a

______ in her side.

36. Sweet potato’s declaration of being.

37. A lightbulb’s favorite metal.

39. The Americans who struggle most with bills, abbr.

40. A primate 41. A musical term to refer to oneself.

42. Sherlock Opera singer, Adler.

44. Deep purple feathers.

48. I can’t believe I have to hem this ball gown! It’ll take ______ long.

49. Legume Pursuit.

50. Expression of a Spanish optometrist.

51. I don’t like German sausages. They’re the ______.

52. How do spiders design their webs in the digital age?

54. From ear to ear.

56. Greeting from above.

57. A group of individuals who share, abbr.

58. I took my bike into the shop for a repair but

DOWN 1. What happens if you don’t pay your exorcist?

2. When said once, expression of pain. When said twice, expression of excitement.

3. Excommunicated secular cousin of AD. 4. ____ sign.

5. In___ of a toilet, British people go to the loo.

6. Document of identification in Idaho.

7. Dawn and dusk are ______ in and ______ out.

8. Political jokes are all fun and games until it’s time to ______ one.

9. Football-playing sheep.

10. Although the bridal shop workers were helpful, it was to no ______.

11. The loudest sport; it makes such a racquet.

12. It has its ups and downs.

15. Successful courtship “______-hoo!”

16. I ______ how to throw a boomerang but then it came back to me.

19. Alternative offer when bartering over a marble slab.

20. A habit of being late.

21. What the mathematician was waiting for.

23. To project feeling in text.

27. To steer away from a big sneeze.

28. Initials of Route 6A in Cape Cod 29. House shoe made from a banana peel.

30. Handy GPS function measuring efficiency.

31. Provider of womb and board.

34. My friend said she didn’t like my mascara. ______ out!

37. A musical cat that takes no breaks.

38. Distaste for saucers.

41. You can’t search for a lighter on Google because it only gives ______.

43. A horse’s denial.

45. Washing out tie-dye is so messy you could call it ______.

46. A woman with poor aim, abbr.

47. The building was taller than the trees — it was really overwh_____ing.

49. Baseball player’s favorite cake.

51. ____na Ryder.

53. If an American spy defects from the ______, then Soviet.

55. Cheer for the Ancient Egyptian Sun God. 58. The same word as 41. across, repeated twice for internet humor.

59. Gentleman of the round table, abbr.

60. After missing a cosmetology exam, she had to do a make-______.

Shirley Graham DuBois Celebrated by StudiOC Class Continued from page 10

Nunley based her syllabus around digital archives of history and the humanities, while Hadley wanted to examine the way that creative and academic pursuits are in constant conversation with current events. Both classes have a number of College and Conservatory students, and will culminate in students crafting chapters to be included in a book of information on DuBois’ life.

“Scalar is a new software that we’re using that allows you to build a book,” Nunley said. “But what’s awesome about it is that it’s an interactive book, so as you click to the next page you can click into the document and experience sound, or experience images, or see a piece of the archive in that. What I like about it is that it allows students to author their own analyses and contextualizations of Shirley’s life, but not in the traditional format.”

For the remainder of the semester, Nunley’s students will also be working on exhibition panels for display in the Mary Church Terrell Main Library in the spring — similar to those on Mary Church Terrell and the Sanctuary Project — that will be embedThe Oberlin Review | Nov 15, 2019

ded with QR codes for their digital book. After the semester ends, these transportable panels will be shipped to Accra, Ghana, for display and use by the DuBois Society.

Students will get to premiere their book during a symposium on DuBois’ work on Feb. 27 and 28, 2020. The first staging of DuBois’ TomTom since 1932 is tentatively scheduled for December 2020, to be directed by Professor of Theater and Africana Studies Caroline Jackson Smith.

Preceding these two larger undertakings, Hadley described this week’s salon as a first re-introduction of DuBois’ legacy into Oberlin campus life. The salon included performances of selections from her opera

by Conservatory fourth-years Anthony Anderson and Matteo Adams, an analysis of her compositions

by Daniel Spearman, OC ’16, and a talk on the play’s progressivism by Jackson Smith, in addition to other speakers.

“We wanted to do something public-facing while we had the course going, and [DuBois] was a part of salon culture in both Paris and Harlem,” Hadley said. “So it felt like a really great way to start intro-

ducing her to the broader campus. … A salon is more intimate [and] more informal.”

Adams was moved by the handwritten text of TomTom, and the importance carried in performing a selection from this play that hasn’t been staged in nearly a century.

“You have to really delve into the text,” Adams said. “I don’t think I would have been able to look at the handwritten score and just sing it without having understood the rest of the opera, because that’s the premise of what we do as performers. We have to do our research into the history [of ] what we’re actually performing in order for the audience to understand it.”

This convergence of history and artistry carries DuBois’ legacy into the current moment, and represents the vitality of studying her work.

“Shirley Graham DuBois is a quintessential Obie,” Hadley said. “I think she loved Oberlin, and she represents so much of what all of us try to do well here as faculty, students, and staff. We like to think that we train young people who can go out and change the world … and she does that many times over.”

13

Sp ort s IN THE LOCKER ROOM

Rania Ziar, Third-Year Varsity Lacrosse Player

College third-year Rania Ziar is excited to start her third season on the varsity women’s lacrosse team after dealing with various injuries that have kept her sidelined for multiple seasons. Despite her setbacks, she has remained spirited and determined both on and off the field. She is a Neuroscience major on the pre-med track with a minor in Middle East and North Africa Studies. In her free time, she works with Professor Gunnar Kwakye in a neurotoxicology lab and as a Peer Advising Leader. Raised in Chicago, she is also a Posse Scholar.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Zoë Martin del Campo Contributing Sports Editor How long have you been playing lacrosse?

I started playing lacrosse my sophomore year of high school, and I’ve been playing ever since.

What is your favorite aspect of the sport?

I love being on a team, and I also love the way that playing makes me feel. It’s a cool community-building sport and really lifts you up when you’re feeling down.

How has being part of the team shaped your overall Oberlin experience?

Being a part of a team has given me friends from day one as well as an opportunity to network through the athletic community, which is so amazing and strong. The people in the athletic community are brilliant and talented, so being on a team has given me a pathway to meeting such great people. I don’t know what my Oberlin experience would have been like without it.

Outside of athletics, what are your other interests?

Outside of athletics, I do research in a neurotoxicology neuroscience lab. We work with neurodegenerative diseases and look at the effects of environmental toxicants on conditions such as Huntington’s disease and Multiple System Atrophy.

Do you see overlaps in the various communities that you’re a part of on campus?

Wherever you go, community is always really important, whether it’s athletic or cultural. The

communities that I’ve built up in both my religious and cultural clubs and my athletic team have both been really important in helping me grow into the person that I am today. I do see a lot of overlap in the sense that they both provide a sense of home that I’ve missed.

How does fasting during Ramadan affect your athletic abilities, and how do you balance both?

Ramadan has been falling after our season is over, so I haven’t really had to deal with it while I’m in season.

However, when I was in high school and playing over the summer, I would still have to go to practice. The point of Ramadan is to make you grateful for what you don’t have and what you do have. I would just be really tired, but it also made me so much more grateful to be an athlete because I realized that there are people who don’t have that.

What do you enjoy about being a PAL? I love PAL! In high school, I also worked with mentoring first-years, so it’s something that I’ve always been really interested in. As a first-generation student, it’s been hard for me to acclimate to college. I really wanted to help other people who may have had the same experiences as me. It’s always good to have a mentor that you can look up to, and I enjoy being that for other people because the people who have done that for me have been so important.

Could you speak on what it means to be a Posse Scholar and what it is like to have that cohort on campus?

Posse is a high-school scholarship that covers tuition for all four years of college. The concept is that you come in with 9 or 10 other people that are part of your “posse” who help support you throughout your college experience. You also get a mentor, who’s usually a professor or an administrator on campus who is there for you. My posse has probably been the most important group of people because I see a lot of myself in them. We’re all from Chicago, and we come from similar backgrounds and experiences. With a lot of people on this campus, it sometimes feels like they don’t understand me, so my Posse cohort have been important people for me to turn to for support — they’re my backbone on this campus.

What are you looking forward to next season?

This is going to be the first season that I’m back playing

College third-year Rania Ziar.

Photo by Jane Agler, Sports Editor

completely healthy, which is really important to me because I haven’t really been able to play for two years. I’m really excited to have that experience both on and off the field. I haven’t really felt as though I’ve been able to play to my full potential, so I think that this season will be really important for me and for the team. I’m also really excited to potentially win a [North Coast Athletic Conference] championship.

What has held you back from playing to your full potential?

Sophomore year of high school I tore my ACL, even though I had only been playing lacrosse for about a month. In between the time that I tore it sophomore year of high school and the time I got here, I tore it again, but I had no idea. So I was still playing on it. Then when I got here, I completely blew my knee during our first fall ball tournament, tearing my ACL, MCL, and meniscus.

I continued playing on it and eventually also flipped my meniscus. So I was really out. I got surgery in March of my first year, and I’ve been working to get back to playing. It’s taken a really long time, but I’m really excited to be where I am today.

Former Soccer Players Embark on Semi-Pro Careers Khalid McCalla Contributing Sports Editor Sports, as many athletes are aware, is a temporary activity. Between the inevitability of age and the unpredictability of injury, there comes a time in every athlete’s life when they make the decision to stop playing the sport that used to define them.

For the vast majority of athletes, the conclusion of an athletic career comes at the end of high school. Others manage to extend their career through four years of college, but that’s where it ends. However, three recent graduates of the Oberlin men’s soccer team have managed to continue their playing careers even further, continuing to hit the pitch even past the end of college.

Tim Williams and Jesse Lauritsen, both OC ’17, and former Oberlin student Jake Crim have all continued playing soccer at various levels. Head Men’s Soccer Coach Blake New remembers the unique trio well.

Williams currently plays semi-pro soccer for LA10, a Los Angeles-based team that plays in the United Premier Soccer League. A former All-North Coast Athletic Conference second-team selection, Williams is considering a potential career change.

“When my current job finishes in the spring, I may try to play professionally abroad,” said Williams.

This doesn’t surprise his former coach.

New considers Williams one of the more entertaining players he’s coached, but also one of the hardest workers. “[Tim] loved to have fun and worked

14

really hard to become a better player,” said New. Lauritsen currently plays on a number of amateur teams that occasionally compete in big tournaments. Although none of his teams have advanced very far in these tournaments, he enjoys the time he’s continued to spend with the game. His rapid development over the course of his Oberlin career culminated in a first-team AllNCAC selection in his fourth year. This impressive growth is what New remembers most.

“My best memory of Jesse is the monumental leap in his development from his [first year] to [his second year] and how dedicated he was to [getting] better,” said New. Crim left Oberlin after just three semesters to pursue a career in professional soccer. So far, he has managed to carve out a pretty solid role in soccer, playing for Loudon United in Virginia for a few months earlier this year before suiting up for Vaksala SK in Sweden, where he played until October.

“Jake was pretty quiet and fought me on a position change, but now admits that I was right because that is where he is playing in the pros,” said New. New contends that the trio’s obvious talent isn’t the only thing that’s allowed them to continue playing beyond their college days.

“I think it is important to note that a lot of my players have the ability to go on and play after college, but it is players like Tim and Jesse and Jake who have a real desire to keep playing for as long as they can,” said New. “So, they were good players here

at Oberlin and stood out on the team, but it is their desire to keep playing the game that they love that pushes them to keep chasing it.”

Even though he remembers his experiences at Oberlin fondly and values the time he spent on campus, Crim still can’t say that anything truly prepared him for professional competition.

“The professional level, compared to [Division III] soccer, is much more rigorous,” said Crim, “It is incredibly mentally taxing, whereas, at Oberlin, [playing] soccer was an escape from the difficulty of the schoolwork.”

Williams, like Crim, is playing at a high level that demands a lot of his time.

“We actually practice three times a week [which is] less than the everyday grind of Oberlin soccer,” said Williams.

“However, it goes all year and 8 p.m. practice three night a week, coupled with a regular 9 [a.m.] to 5 [p.m.] workweek can be exhausting. The play of the team is so rewarding though. Half of the guys have played professionally in Europe, Mexico, or South America, so it’s awesome to get to compete with those guys every day, and thrive alongside them.”

Unlike Crim and Williams, Lauritsen doesn’t view his current level as more rigorous than college. Instead, he sees amateur soccer as a way for former players to continue playing the game they love in a competitive environment.

“Everyone works a full-time job, so it is tough to make practice mandatory,” said Lauritsen, “It is mainly made up of guys still trying to grasp the competitive style college or semi-pro offered.”

Their current experiences with the game may be different, but the trio all agree that their time at Oberlin was marked by one thing.

“Camaraderie,” said Crim. “The Oberlin soccer team is a family.”

Lauritsen agrees, believing the Oberlin soccer team to be a one-of-a-kind environment.

“The most valuable part of my experience [playing soccer at Oberlin] is the bond everyone on the team had,” said Lauritsen. “I am extremely confident no other program has this, regardless of [the] sport.

As it is for most teams, the guys in your class are automatically your best friends, but there were guys who were in their late 20s and early 30s offering support or advice.”

Williams echoes the same sentiments as his former teammates while also acknowledging that it isn’t always easy to get along with teammates.

“It goes back to that sense of family,” said Williams, “Our team motto: OC Love.

When you’re on the practice field, you yell, you fight, you get mad. But when practice is over, you walk right back through that gate knowing that whatever happened on that field, you’re still a family off of it.”

It is clear that the players aren’t the only ones who feel this way about the program. New has coached many players over his 21-year career and manages to keep in touch with several of them.

“I still talk, email, and text with all three guys pretty regularly,” said New, “[They are] all great guys that made a great impact in our program and continue to be an important part of our extended family.”

Actors Train Like Athletes for Upcoming Production of The Wolves Jane Agler Sports Editor Students will don their soccer uniforms and sneakers and warm-up before taking to the stage — not the field — in the upcoming Oberlin Theater Association production The Wolves. For plays and films about sports, actors often take on the persona of an athlete, regardless of whether they have previous athletic experience. This requires intense physical preparation and devotion to learning the craft of the sport that they hope to portray.

The play’s nine characters are all members of a high school soccer team, whose stories unfold through the conversations they have while doing pregame warm-ups. Much of the play’s preparation was comprised of traditional acting exercises and rehearsals — but with the unique addition of soccer practices.

“There’s nine of us and we do the same warm-up each scene,” said College fourth-year Miranda Purcell, who is playing the role of #46. “It’s a choreographed sequence of stretches and dynamic warm-ups ... but we also worked with [College fourth-year] Izzy Rosenstein, who is a [former member] of the [varsity] women’s soccer team. So, she was there to be our soccer consultant.”

The play rehearsals included soccer drills, where the actors would practice passing the ball, learn how to control the ball’s movement with their feet, and perfect their form to reflect years of practice

through just two months of actual preparation. Their soccer sessions took place on the turf field in Williams Field House, where a number of varsity teams practice during the winter.

The soccer practices were an opportunity enjoyable for both the cast and its consultant, Rosenstein, who has been unable to play soccer regularly since undergoing knee surgery last semester, to engage with the sport in a unique way.

“It was wonderful to be able to continue to have [soccer] in my life in a new way,” Rosenstein said. “Everyone was really committed to learning. I enjoyed seeing how engaged the actors were with the sport. … I had to get used to the sport in this very new context, but it was cool to see the two worlds collide.”

One of the biggest challenges for the cast was performing their lines and physical movements in tandem.

“We would meet with [Rosenstein] to learn how to kick the ball and [for her to] show us how to act as close[ly] to real athletes as we could,” said Purcell. “It was difficult for me, because it turns out I am just terrible [at soccer]. There’s also so much [going on]. We’re thinking about lines and how to deliver those, but we are also thinking about, ‘Do I look like I’m actually good at soccer?’”

While the actors were tasked with emulating the movements of actual soccer players, the director, College fourth-year Carrie Babigian, was tasked with choreographing the actors’ physical gestures.

“It was hard to figure out what [the

The cast of The Wolves get into position on the Williams Field House turf field.

Photo by Chris Schmucki, Photo Editor

actors] should be doing if they weren’t stretching or passing. [We decided on] doing little ‘sports’ things like drinking their water or shaking down,” said Babigian.

Babigian explained that the physicality of a contact sport like soccer was vital to successfully emulating an athlete, as well as a prevailing theme throughout the play.

“There’s a lot of allusions to [soccer] as preparing for battle, like an army, and how intense [and] powerful they are with their bodies,” said Babigian. “Also, they accrue all these injuries. That physical intensity is a big part of [the play].”

Babigian’s efforts reflect the overarching question that these actors had to ask

Women’s Swimming and Diving Win Against Tiffin University

themselves, which is what it means to act like an athlete.

“I think a lot of [acting like an athlete] is the community mentality that comes with it,” Purcell said. “We are all ‘athletes’ individually, but I think what is really emphasized in the play is how much of a team we are, and how we are very tight-knit. Getting in the group mentality and [showing] that there is one single reason why we are here, which is to play soccer. That mindset has been what we are really trying to work for.”

Audiences will be able to see these actors’ athletic endeavors onstage this coming Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., and Sunday at 2 p.m. in Wilder Main Space.

1947 College Rejects Crimson Knights Mascot Continued from page 16

Outscoring their competitors by a whopping 171–68 margin, the Oberlin women’s swimming and diving team took away its first win of the season against Tiffin University, an NCAA Division II school. The Yeowomen snagged first in 13 of the 16 events, with impressive performances by team newcomers and veterans alike. College first-year Tara Draper clinched first-place in two freestyle events, while College third-year and diver Lauren Young won both the 1-meter and 3-meter diving events.

“I think I’ve made a lot of progress this year, and it feels great to win both boards,” said Young.

The Oberlin Review November 15, 2019

“I’m really just proud that I got to contribute to the team’s first win of the season. Everyone worked super hard for that win and [has] been working incredibly hard all season.”

Prior to facing Oberlin, the Tiffin women’s swim and dive team lost to the University of Notre Dame, a Division I team, 142–78 — a comparatively closer margin than their final score against Oberlin.

Text by Jane Agler, Sports Editor Photo Courtesy of OC Athletics

“The Review, which initiated the search for a new team name several months ago, bows as gracefully as possible to the expression of student opinion and withdraws from what a cursory glance would reveal to be an untenable position,” they wrote on June 10, 1947.

However, just this past year, the Oberlin Athletics Department added a new mascot, one that would represent the school along with the Yeomen: Yeobie the albino squirrel.

While the albino squirrel has been a symbol used to represent the college since the 1970s, it has been inaugurated as an essential representative of collegiate athletics through the new Birkenstock-wearing, red-eyed albino squirrel mascot costume.

While the decision to introduce the albino squirrel was not decided democratically, the naming process was. OC Athletics reported that over 400 name submissions were submitted, about 14 percent of the College and Conservatory population, another example of surprisingly large student engagement.

Eventually a vote took place to determine that the mascot’s name should be “Yeobie.”

Whether it be 1947 or 2019, Oberlin students hope to be represented by something that is both unique and slightly off-beat, just like the essence of the student body itself. are constantly focusing and working on their athleticism through rain, snow, and extreme heat, all year around.

15

SPORTS November 15, 2019

Established 1874

Volume 148, Number 9

Oberlin College No Stranger to Mascot Changes Nathan Carpenter, Editor-in-Chief Jane Agler, Sports Editor

College third-year Jordan Armstrong defends the basket.

Photo courtesy of Yale Athletics

Yeomen Fall to Yale, Defeat NYU Zoë Martin del Campo Contributing Sports Editor When athletes come to Oberlin College, not many of them expect to compete against Division I programs. However, Oberlin’s men’s varsity basketball team opened with an exhibition contest at Division I Yale University last week. This was followed the next day by their opening game against New York University, NCAA Division III. While the team suffered a defeat against Yale University (37–94), they went on to win against NYU (76–62).

On the court, the team conducts themselves with high intensity and strong coordination. Over the past two years, the team has accumulated 25 wins, in part due to strong senior performances and support for players both on and off the court. This was evident in the team’s spirit during both of the games, as starters were able to drive a tight competition with Yale during the first half of the game. Oberlin families attended to cheer players on, and the game was broadcasted on ESPN. Head Men’s Basketball Coach Isaiah Cavaco attributes the team’s success against NYU to the role of the upperclassmen in helping out in late game situations. The team generally tries to play through the bigger players first because that’s their strength during away games. In particular, he cited the importance of leadership from team captains, College fourth-years Andre Campbell and Christian Fioretti.

Campbell is coming off a career-best year, finishing second on the team with an average of 12.7 points and 5.9 rebounds per game. Last season, Fioretti earned an All-NCAC Honorable Mention and finished as the conference’s top distributor with an average of 4.3 assists per game.

“They steady us a lot,” said Cavaco. “When things get difficult, those are usually the two guys I can count on to get us back in the swing of things. The whole senior class has just been great in terms of leadership. Even the guys that maybe don’t get the minutes or the statistics that some of the others do, they’re great influences in practice. They show everybody how to work and how to be a good teammate.”

Losing one game and having to play the very next day can be a difficult task, but Fioretti credited the win against NYU to staying positive and expecting nothing less than the best from his teammates.

“I think it’s the one-night rule where you learn from your mistakes and you’re allowed to be down from a game for that one night,” said Fioretti. “But the next day you’re ready to attack that next game plan because Yale and NYU are two completely different teams and we had two different game plans going into that. Just keep staying positive and knowing that our guys can get the job done.”

Campbell added that mental preparation is important to the success of a game.

16

“Mental preparation is very key for us to be successful,” he said. “I think that it starts when we get on the bus and the day before in applying what we learned onto the games to make us very successful.”

The team also spends lots of time learning about the other team’s game plan and practicing accordingly, which helped them in their game against NYU. “We prep by going through the other team’s game plan, learning our scout for each game, and watching film,” said Fioretti. “Just making sure that you are being the best you can be in terms of getting your own shots up and shooting the shots that you know you can in addition to what the coaches expect you to shoot in the game. In preparing for our role as captains, we need to make sure everyone’s on the same page and bring energy so everyone can feed off of that.”

Campbell views his leadership role as a way to connect everyone, which in turn improves how well the team plays on the court.

“We have a lot of influence on the team but I always emphasize that there shouldn’t be a split between the leadership role and the rest of the team,” said Campbell. “It’s less that we’re captains and more like we’re still teammates and we see each other as brothers. I think that if we drop that barrier between captain and teammate, it improves the performance.”

Outside of being team captain, Campbell is an Anthropology major and a Studio Art minor, drawing and painting in his free time. Fioretti is passionate about environmental protection and sustainability and has spent his time at Oberlin majoring in Economics and minoring in Sociology.

As the season progresses with the first home game against Otterbein University on Saturday, Nov. 16, Cavaco has high expectations of what the team is capable of.

“I think every game teaches you something,” Cavaco said. “The senior class has done a good job … every time we’ve been through something, which makes us better at that situation the next time. We’ve been in a lot of those situations, so I want to see the experiences that come out of it in regular games now.

And I hope that our younger guys can also learn from that. And then the hope is we play our best basketball in February, that’s always the goal.”

Reflecting on his final season of basketball, Fioretti sees the team as a crucial part of his Oberlin experience and is looking forward to putting together everything that he has learned on the court the past four years to play the best game possible.

“Just seeing the growth of the program while we’ve been here has been great,” said Fioretti. “We kind of struggled [our first] year and then we turned it up since. So this is the year to put that all together and really show that Oberlin basketball is for real. It’s a community for life and it’s been really fun to get to know both the coaches and the players.”

In the spring of 1947, it appears that The Oberlin Review’s editors — specifically the sports editors — got bored. For reasons lost to history, they decided that Oberlin’s mascot, the Yeoman, was no longer suitable to represent the school in its athletic endeavors.

So, they decided to sponsor a vote to christen a nickname for the Yeoman that would have a little more pizazz. After a brief selection process, which involved a committee constituted of the Review’s sports editors and some faculty representatives, the nickname Crimson Knights was selected. Immediately, the Review put it into use, insisting that while the name was new, it would eventually be embraced.

“The main trouble in giving our team a new nickname is the fact that it will take quite some time, several years in fact, for the new name to sink in,” the Review wrote in its May 2, 1947 issue. “However, in several years, the name should be more permanent in Oberlin.”

The Review staff argued that the performance of Oberlin’s sports teams was paramount to what they were called — as long as the Crimson Knights brought home wins, community members shouldn’t be so deeply invested in its nickname.

“We have been told that ‘Crimson Knights’ is clumsy, ridiculous, and ostentatious; however, no one accuses the nicknames of the Duke ‘Blue Devils,’ the Alabama ‘Crimson Tide’ or the Notre Dame ‘Fighting Irish’ of impropriety,” the Review wrote on May 16, 1947. “Teams which win games make any name sound good, whereas poor teams will make any name sound foolish.”

Within a matter of weeks, the nickname change ignited backlash of a scale not often seen, even on Oberlin’s contentious post-WWII campus. Many rejected the new nickname as forced, contending that it did not represent Oberlin’s core commitment to the union of learning and labor. “‘Crimson Knights’ sounds altogether too gaudy and out of keeping with the tone of Oberlin,” read a letter to the editor, published June 6, 1947 and signed by 23 students. “This hackneyed epitaph shows no originality; hundreds of schools employ either one or the other of these seedy names.”

“Oberlin is a distinct entity among American colleges and universities,” the letter continued. “She has a reputation of her own, well known for a sturdy individuality and sound liberal character. Must she resort to trite terms to designate her teams? Hell, no! This isn’t a big horn-tooting factory that turns out stereotyped individuals to be swallowed up in the mob; neither should the name of her sports teams be ‘base, common, and popular.’”

The letter was published after the Review reported on June 3 that the Student Council had announced an all-student referendum to decide the issue democratically. A headline in the June 3 issue read, “Dissatisfaction with ‘Knights’ Brings Action.”

While Oberlin’s sports teams enjoyed great success earlier in their history, by the 1940s student apathy toward athletics appeared to mirror the levels of today’s student population. Still, 1,277 students participated in the referendum, according to the Review, and overwhelmingly reinstated the Yeoman as the College mascot.

Nowadays, when the turnout for Student Senate elections regularly just scrapes over 20 percent, the level of campus engagement in 1947 is mind-boggling by comparison. A student at the time remarked, “It’s the most interest I’ve seen in athletics since I’ve been here.”

The Review staff, which had originally complained that none of the students opposed to the name change had participated in the original contest, didn’t press the issue further.

See 1947, page 15