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DAILY COLLEGIAN DailyCollegian.com
Monday, October 3, 2016
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Art on display at annual book fair
Event showcased local artists’ work By Mary Yates Collegian Correspondent
KATHERINE MAYO/COLLEGIAN
UMass student Bradley Polumbo finishes the Revolution Run 5k on Saturday. The 5k was part of last weekend’s UMass Homecoming 2016 celebrations.
The second annual Northampton Print and Book Fair took place on October 2, at the A.P.E. Gallery on Main Street, Northampton. The gallery housed over 40 booths, each with their own distinct personality. The booths displayed a wide range of mediums including comic books, photographs, works of poetry and short novels. Visitors of the gallery were given the chance to examine the artist’s work, ask questions and purchase pieces the artists were selling. The fair featured collaborations from artists like the Loculus Collective from Northampton. The collective is composed of six dancers who have joined together to publish quarterly journals filled with essays, interviews, photographs, and creative
writing. “Our journals are an extension of our choreography and our work as dancers,” explained one member, Olana Flynn, who contributed a journal of photographs. These journals give audiences a physical piece of their dancing that they can come back to. Another vendor, Canarium Books from Texas, is an independent press committed to publishing poetry from up-and-coming artists from the United States. Canarium publishes three to four books of poetry a year. Visitors were given a unique experience at every booth they approached. One artist out of New York City named Elvis Bakaitis writes a comic series called “Homos in Herstory!” This comic series is written by the decade and includes fun historical facts and information about famous gay people in history. They also recently finished a see
BOOK FAIR on page 2
Students and faculty discuss Farmers’ Market brings fresh climate justice with activist produce to UMass campus Wen Stephenson presented Thurs. By Julia Riordan Collegian Correspondent Author, activist and journalist Wen Stephenson met students and faculty at the University of Massachusetts Amherst on Thursday to discuss both the environmental and emotional effects of global climate change. The event was organized by Talking Truth: Finding Your Voice around the Climate Crisis, a newly developed group initiated in the fall of 2015, and was held in the W.E.B. Du Bois Library Stephenson’s focus was to raise awareness of the severity of global climate change and its impact on human beings through both spiritual reflection and societal and political analysis. Stephenson stressed the dire situation the earth is in due to political neglect and unwillingness to transform stagnant ways of thinking. “It’s too late to prevent climate crisis; we’re in it. If we don’t take radical steps to transform our energy system… and conduct a society-wide mobilization, our children will inherit an inhospitable planet,” he said. Stephenson stated that politicians and fossil fuel industries continue to exploit natural resources and the people who live around them to stay in power. Despite scientific evidence and regard for human safety, “politics and fossil fuel industry deny the science. These
are crimes against humanity,” he said. The activist drew parallels between the moral, spiritual and political metamorphosis of society due to the influence of Martin Luther King Jr., saying such a transformation is necessary now. Stephenson stated that “there’s a spiritual crisis at the heart of the climate crisis,” adding that “systemic crisis requires systemic response.” According to Stephenson, the propelling factor that will lead to community cooperation and human unification is a radical social movement, similar to that of the civil rights movement. He said a crusade of moral and spiritual enlightenment is the one action that will give hope to our battered world, and “our struggles for social justice and human rights matter now more than ever.” “Unconditional love for all of mankind becomes an absolute necessity for its survival,” he said. “If there is any hope of solidarity, then climate justice must be defined to incorporate and include everybody.” Stephenson said part of the influence for his ideas was from Martin Luther King Jr., who strived for economic and racial justice, because the majority of those struck hardest by the impacts of climate change are people of color. The discussion concluded on a hopeful note as Stephenson said “faith and hope and love are as real as the science.” The message of Stephenson’s interactive lecture coincided with the way in which it was
run. The event opened with the Kris Nelson, from the UMass office of civic engagement and servicelearning, who aimed to engage the minds and spirits of the attendees through self-reflection. “We come to this event as human beings...we aim to promote the engagement of hearts and minds,” said Nelson. Co-founder of Talking Truth and environmental conservation professor Lena Fletcher led the transition from introduction to discussion with a moment of meditation for the audience to reflect upon themselves as both spiritual and physical beings, connecting them to the surrounding world. The room fell silent as students and faculty closed their eyes, filling the room with deep breathing. “Our goal is to raise the level of awareness of the urgency of the climate crisis on campus and to increase the dialogue among students, faculty, staff and the community around the need to address this issue every day,” said Fletcher. “One of the primary motivating aspects of the climate crisis is how it’s impacting people worldwide, and generally the people who are not contributing to the problem,” said Fletcher. Talking Truth associates with all other oncampus clubs and organizations that focus on the issue of climate change, including the Climateers and Divest UMass. All of Talking Truth’s events see
CLIMATE on page 2
Local produce sold Friday afternoons By Ariane Komyati Collegian Correspondent While many students may spend their Friday afternoons going to their last class of the week and preparing for the weekend, some University of Massachusetts Amherst students attend the UMass Student Farmers’ Market on Goodell Lawn. The market takes place every Friday, 12:004:00 p.m. from Sept. 16 to Nov. 18. Every week, about 100-200 students drop by to check out the locally-sourced produce. This program has been going on since 2011, and is completely run by students. “Our mission is to bring organic, locally-sourced pro-
duce to the campus,” said Amy Henrikson, a senior majoring in sustainable food and farming who grows and sells produce at the farmer’s market. Students at UMass produce crops grown on campus at the Agricultural Learning Center, as well as on the six acres at the Crop and Animal Research and Education Center on River Road in South Deerfield. The farmers’ market is a student business that sells their produce to the dining commons, the grocery store chain Big Y, and the Community Sponsored Agriculture program. The CSA is made up of 100 UMass students, faculty and staff. The members prepay in the spring, and the money is used for the student farmers to cover labor costs for the fall. When autumn rolls around,
members are able pick up locally-sourced produce on Fridays. However, one does not have to be a CSA member to buy the produce at the market. For a small fee, you can choose from 48 different types of crops, including flowers, eggplants, chili peppers, tomatoes and kale. Vegetables and flowers aren’t the only things available at the market. It also features arts and crafts, and products you can purchase around campus such as tea, salsa and guacamole. Homemade tea blends to ease anxiety, calm the nerves, or help cure the flu are available as well. Some vendors offer samples of these products, and live music and dancing are also featured. Ariane Komyati can be reached at akomyati@umass.edu.
UMass hosts immigration talk
Visiting economists presented Thursday By Megha Srinivasan Collegian Correspondent
Harvard University professor and labor economist George Borjas and Rutgers University professor and economist Jennifer Hunt gave a lecture on immigration Saturday in the Bernie Dallas room in Goodell Hall. After a brief introduction, Borjas and Hunt each presented their perspectives on immigration to an audience of students and community members. In Borjas’s portion of the lecture, he argued that immigration is not necessarily good for the United States’ economy. Borjas explained that some believe “immigration is like trade,” and
it “simply allows production to be done domestically.” “Calculating the impact of immigration requires taking into account that immigrants act in particular ways, because some actions are more beneficial than others,” he said. He added that some actions “have repercussions and unintended consequences that can magnify or shrink the beneficial impact of immigration that comes from their contribution to widget production.” After Borjas’s lecture, Hunt presented and argued an alternative side. Hunt argued that the United States “should increase immigration if economics is [the] primary consideration.” Hunt explained that immigrants raise patenting per capital at double the native rate. Hunt went on to say that, “lowskill immigration raises [the]
native high school graduation rate.” She also said that although immigrants are a greater drain on the budget and are more costly than natives, “their children go on to be high earners and contribute more than other natives.” Hunt concluded by reiterating her opinion that the Unites States should increase migration and open its’ borders. After the lecture, the audience wrote questions on note cards anonymously and passed them up front. The questions were read by an announcer, and Borjas and Hunt answered. After the anonymous questions were read, appetizers were offered outside of the Bernie Dallas room for the audience.
Megha Srinivasan can be reached at meghasriniva@umass.edu.