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VOL. 6, ISSUE 8

NEWS

42% of Upperclass Students Declare Minor School Suspends Online Shift for Ancient Greek Following Complaints Global Antiquity Approved as Yale-NUS's First Interdisciplinary Minor The Future Will Be Better Than the Good Old Days

FRIDAY APRIL 7, 2017

OPINION

Unwelcome to Our Campus Why Yale-NUS Must Divest

YALE-NUS, SINGAPORE

ARTS

Coming Up Next: A Review of the Arts & Humanities Festival (aside)'s Private Parts, and Its Explicit Portrayal of Sexual Identity

GLOBAL ANTIQUITY APPROVED

AS YALE-NUS'S INTERDISCIPLINARY

story | Justin Ong, Managing Editor photo | Penguin Classics

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tarting in August, Yale-NUS College students can better indulge their interests in the old world. A minor in Global Antiquity—the college’s first interdisciplinary minor—was approved by the Curriculum committee on Feb. 27. Courses under existing majors such as Literature, Philosophy and History, as well as courses in religion and ancient languages — which currently do not count towards any major or minor—will count towards the Global Antiquity minor.

The minor offers students the opportunity to design an individualized course of study on ancient societies, classical traditions and their enduring cultural significance. This would complement majors in related fields. The minor will be effective from Semester One of the 2017/2018 Academic Year, and will be open to students from the Class of 2018 onwards. Students in the Class of 2017 who are still active in the upcoming academic year are also eligible to declare the minor.

The minor was created to support interdisciplinary research in ancient societies for students. “[Those who] are interested in ancient literature are going to be interested in ancient

FIRST MINOR

history, and vice versa,” Mira Seo, a Literature professor and member of the Curriculum Committee that approved the minor, said. “The majors are too narrow for students of these broad interdisciplinary interests.” Faculty from different fields also decided that there was “some subset interest that was not represented in a major,” according to Dr. Seo. The new Global Antiquity minor is a way to package these interests with a “hot, sexy branding,” Dr. Seo said. She added that the minor should not be seen as an isolated field of study; rather, it serves to categorize pre-existing courses. For instance, ancient language modules such as Ancient Greek, Latin, Sanskrit and Classical Chinese can now be counted towards the minor. According to the unpublished module brief, at least 5 Modular Credits in the minor should be dedicated to an Intermediate or Advanced ancient language course.

According to Dr. Seo, many students spend a lot of time and effort mastering ancient languages since they are an important scholarly tool—a student cannot do a capstone on Ancient Greece or Homer without knowing Ancient Greek, she said.

However, previously none of these languages were counted towards a major or minor. “All that credit time is just donated,” she said. “[The new Global Antiquity minor] gives a home for ancient languages and gives credit for [learning them].”

The addition of the Global Antiquity minor may also increase the College’s funding for research in this field and aid in inviting speakers to the College, Dr. Seo added.

Several students expressed support for the addition of the new minor. “[The] creation of such a minor […] indicates that the school will be dedicated [in] recognising and supporting students pursuing interests in this area,” Jac Hsu ’18, a History major and prospective Global Antiquity minor, said. Although she had planned to go to graduate school in this field before this, she said that she now felt extra validation to pursue her interests beyond college.

Tay Jun Hao ’19 said that he thought that the minor was just a label. “I started taking the ancient languages and ancient history courses, because I had an interest in it, not because there was a minor for this,” he said. “[But the minor] is a bonus.

Dr. Seo said that although the minor is most relevant for students who wish pursue graduate school in this field, it also 1

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“gives [graduates] a distinct intellectual identity” that could also be attractive outside an academic context. “It gives people and employers a sense of who you are in a more specific, fine-grained way,” she said.

At the time of publishing, there has been no updates on when official information regarding the Global Antiquity Minor will be published.

SCHOOL SUSPENDS ONLINE SHIFT FOR ANCIENT GREEK FOLLOWING COMPLAINTS

story | Jasmine Gan photo | Odelia Teo

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ale-NUS College has suspended plans to move Ancient Greek language modules from face-to-face to online instruction, following student and faculty dissatisfaction.

Students penned an open letter to Yale-NUS College administration to petition against moving Ancient Greek language modules from face-to-face instruction to online instruction. The letter was coordinated by Tay Jun Hao ’19 and signed by 20 students. It argued that the online format of the Directed Language Study (DLS) modules would provide “inadequate support for an ancient language” like Ancient Greek.

In a separate letter also addressed to administration, Ancient World faculty members expressed their concern that the plans overlooked the uniquely difficult nature of ancient language study and the importance of ancient languages to the College’s intellectual identity.

In response, the College organized a forum on March 29 between affected students, faculty and administration.

During the forum, they announced the move to DLS would be put on hold for a year, and then reviewed.

Administration staff, including Language Coordinator and Saga College Vice-Rector Eduardo Lage-Otero and Humanities Divisional Director and Professor of Humanities Rajeev Patke, cite financial constraints and low enrollment numbers for discontinuing face-to-face instruction. Dr Patke said that such decisions are always a matter of balancing the many things Yale-NUS would like to offer, and the finite resources at hand. Ancient Greek courses currently have 5 students enrolled across Beginner and Intermediate levels.

Currently, DLS modules include Sanskrit, as well as modern languages Portuguese, Italian and Russian.The modules are conducted via teleconference with Yale University

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instructors, as part of the Yale Center of Language Study’s Shared Course Initiative. “Although we are still fine-tuning the implementation, the learning outcomes should closely match those of face-to-face instruction,” said Dr Lage-Otero.

However, at the forum current Sanskrit students said they faced difficulties with the online format of DLS. “There were big difficulties at the start,” said Vincent Lee ’19. “We can’t type Sanskrit unless we download the font; we need to transliterate. When the professor need[s] to write, he’s basically writing with his mouse,” he said.

Associate Professor of Literature Mira Seo said that Ancient Greek DLS students would likely face difficulties of a similar scale. “Ancient Greek is the same, because you have breathing marks, you have accents, you have a different alphabet,” she said.

Outside of practical concerns, Dr Seo said she believes that the clash over the proposal reflects deeper disagreements about visions and goals for the language program of Yale-NUS between faculty and administration. “[Ancient languages] are connected to the core academic strengths of the College,” she said, citing the intellectual framework set up by the Common Curriculum to foster students’ further pursuit of ancient world studies. “If you have limited resources you have to think about protecting your core academic needs and strengths, and not expanding into the periphery.”

The school administration, on the other hand, has expressed a desire to facilitate more language study, through lateral expansion of the program. When asked about the goal of Yale-NUS’ language program, Dr Lage-Otero said “If you look at the liberal arts experience, any area of study is linked to a culture, a language, and this is reflected to the broad range of languages our students want to study.”

The newly-created Global Antiquity minor has an ancient language course as a prerequisite course. If Ancient Greek were to be changed to the DLS format, then only two ancient language modules (Latin and Classical Chinese) would remain with face-to-face instruction. Tay said that the DLS format, with its associated additional difficulties, would cause enrollment numbers to further dwindle, creating a “circular problem.”

Students and faculty alike voiced another major concern: the lack of communication of the administration’s decisions.

The news to alter the Greek program caught students by surprise, who found out about the decision by word-ofmouth. Faculty members were upset that the administration did not consult them during the decision-making process.

Opinions also differed about the productivity of the discussion at the forum itself. While Dr Lage-Otero characterised the forum as a “good exchange of ideas between students, faculty and administration,” Dr Seo was frustrated at the perceived lack of understanding of the faculty perspective.

The Student Government is aware of this issue and is in ongoing communication with both affected students and the Dean of Faculty.

NEWS

42% OF UPPER CLASS STUDENTS DECLARE MINOR

story | David Chappell, Editor-in-Chief photo | David Chappell

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early half of the senior and juniors have declared minors, a breakdown of minor declarations has revealed. Of those declared, Arts and Humanities and Global Affairs (GA) proved the most popular.

The breakdown, obtained by The Octant, revealed that approximately 42% (87 students) of the class of 2018 and 2017 have declared a minor. Of those students, 17 students declared as Arts and Humanities and 15 declared as GA, accounting for nearly 40% of minor declarations. Despite an increase in popularity in majors, science minors saw few declarations, with only 8 students declaring as science minors.

Dean of Faculty, Steven Bernasek, said the number of students declaring a minor was not surprising. He said that the number is probably comparable to other institutions, although he said he didn’t have data to support that statement.

Mr. Bernasek added that the number of minor declarations may be indicative of broad liberal arts thinking and the desire to have add another “credential” to theirs CVs or transcripts.

The heads of studies interviewed by The Octant said motivations for declaring minors were varied. Nancy Gleason, head of studies for GA, said that GA minors came from all divisions of the college. She added that the minor tackles a broad range of current affairs and transboundary

Breakdown on the total number of students taking each minor.

issues, which could help enhance capstones in other fields.

Students echoed Ms. Gleason’s sentiments. Tamara Burgos Rojas ’18, a GA major, said she decided to minor in economics because she wanted to complement her major with quantitative analysis. “For my capstone and my career [...] the skills I need would not be complete without economics,” she said.

Despite 87 students declaring minors, only 8 students declared a science minor — less than 10% of minors. While he said he hadn’t given the subject much thought, Division Director of Science, Mark Bussell, said that it could be because Social Science and Humanities majors were less likely to cross over to Science for a minor. “It also suggests that science majors aren't dipping their toes into one of the other science majors to get a minor and frankly I don't have an answer to that,” he said.

Still, Mr. Bussell said that there was a lot of value in minoring in science. He said that many Social Science majors would be well supported by a minor in Mathematical, Computational and Statistical Sciences (MCS) and that a Life Sciences minor could complement an Environmental Studies major. Similarly, he said that linking science majors with a minor would give students “a broader set of skills.”

Currently, students can minor in 13 different subjects: Arts and Humanities, History, Literature, Philosophy, Life Sciences, MCS, Physical Sciences, Anthropology, Economics, Global Affairs, Psychology, Urban Studies and Environmental Studies.

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NEWS

THE FUTURE WILL BE BETTER THAN THE GOOD OLD DAYS

“I remember the excitement of the first day when we opened.”

story | Justin Ong, Managing Editor photo | David Zhang

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s the founding President of Yale-NUS College, Pericles Lewis has been in office since July 1, 2012. Since then, the College has evolved from a mere idea of a liberal arts institution to an entity housing its first batch of students in Residential College 4 (RC4) to the beautiful College that all four classes reside in today. This would not have been possible without Mr. Lewis’ leadership and contribution to the growth of the College. Mr. Lewis will be stepping down on July 1 this year, handing his duties over to Tan Tai Yong, the current Executive Vice-President for Academic Affairs.

Over the years, Mr. Lewis gave many interviews with The

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Octant, including ones about his time in Yale-NUS. Sitting across from me on a wide armchair in the President’s office, Mr. Lewis spoke with warmth and sincerity about fond memories of his time in Yale-NUS, as well as his hopes for the College beyond his presidency. Edited portions of the interview transcript follows:

What is your favorite Singaporean Dish?

I was asked this five years ago by one of the Singaporean newspapers and I said chili crab. I still like chili crab, and I like Peranakan food a lot too. But the paper then printed, “Will President Lewis gain weight while he’s in Singapore?” And the answer turned out to be yes, I did gain weight, although I don’t think it’s so much the Singaporean food, but just middle age (laughs).

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What’s your favorite memory of your time in Yale-NUS? I was just talking the other day about the two Week Seven trips I’ve been on. One was to the Philippines, where we saw Corregidor, an island in Manila bay where the Philippine and American governments moved when the Japanese took over Manila and where my [great] aunt lived when she was on the island during the war. The experience of walking around the island with a bunch of students and visiting the tunnel where my great aunt stayed when she was sheltering was very interesting and I enjoyed that a lot.

I’ve always had a lot of great experiences with music at Yale-NUS. I love the music groups and always find it very moving when I’m able to attend musical events.

I also remember the excitement of the first day when we opened, and the excitement of the inauguration of this new campus.

Those are very memorable moments for me. I’m sure another day like that will be our first graduation [of the Class of 2017].

Were there any unique challenges you faced as the first president of Yale-NUS? I think making sure we got an excellent faculty and student body right from the start. We were very successful in that regard, but we’ve continued to add more people in. I think each new appointment has been strengthening the college. We get people who are really committed to undergraduate teaching, who are also good at research (and who will therefore be able to connect students to the most current work in the different fields that they’re in), so I’m very pleased about that. That was the big issue at the beginning. Also, developing the curriculum was a challenge but I think overall that has worked out. I think most people feel like the common curriculum is a beneficial part [of the curriculum]. I know that there are certain courses that people feel like they just have to take and wish they didn’t have to take.

But I think that if they looked at this from a broader perspective, they’re getting something out of those courses. If you look at the evaluations, for example, you see that students recognize the value, even if they may be frustrated at certain aspects of the course.

What is the legacy you want to leave behind?

It is important to me that we are a strong—well, we use that phrase—community of learning, that we are a strong community with a lot of commitment on the part of the staff and the faculty and students to the mission of the College. An ethos and attitude of service [are important] — that [graduates] are going to go into the world and make a difference in one way or another.

How do you think you will be remembered by the school?

I am totally overjoyed. I think he will be a great successor. I am pleased because he has all the right personal qualities to be president which is the most important thing. He has the right kind of experience to be president; he knows the issues inside the college very well. Also, I’m happy to see a continuity. If you had a president who was [not initially part of Yale-NUS], people might ask if there are going to be any major changes. I’m sure [Mr. Tan] will have things he can improve that I haven’t done perfectly, but in general there will be more continuity than change, which will be a good thing.

What do you hope to see from Yale-NUS in the next decade?

I want to keep a strong relationship between Yale-NUS and Yale in New Haven. We’ve got various ways to do that: faculty exchange, student exchange, and so on, but I think there are ways to strengthen that further. More broadly, I want to see Yale-NUS thrive and become one of the best colleges in the world, and I think it’s already well on its way there. Continue to have excellent faculty, continue to attract the best students, and continue to have strong extra-curricular and international programs. Also, to make sure that the curriculum remains excellent requires continual attention.

Can you share a funny story?

I have a story that’s not about Yale-NUS but which I often tell. A friend of mine who is older than me [transferred to the] University of California, Santa Cruz [just after it was founded]. It is a very good university. They have a beautiful campus that looks out on the Pacific Ocean. He transferred in from Princeton, so he was there in the third year and they just built this beautiful new campus and they’d moved out of the temporary trailers they were in. He said he remembered walking along as a junior and overhearing other juniors say that this new campus is nice, but it’s not like when we were back in the trailers, which was the ‘true community’.

Sometimes I hear the same attitude about [when we were back in] RC4, saying we miss the days in RC4. RC4 was nice, but our new campus is much nicer. So I think that there’s a little nostalgia that everybody always has, that oh, we miss the good old days. But I think that the future is going to be better than the good old days, so we should look forward to the future. It’s onward and upward.

Mr. Lewis has been instrumental to the success and continuation of The Octant and we would like to thank him for his generous contributions to our organization. Above all, the team wishes him all the best for his future endeavors back at New Haven.

That’s for somebody else to say (laughs). I don’t know the answer!

How do you feel about the announcement of Mr. Tan Tai Yong as your successor?

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OPINION

WHY YALE-NUS MUST DIVEST

story | Lucy Davis ‘20 and Ng Qi Siang ‘19, Guest Contributors photo | Kei Franklin

Students attending the Fossil Free Fun event organised by Yale-NUS Divest as part of its Week of Actions.

e write as members of Yale-NUS College concerned about the threat of climate change and passionate about our institution’s capacity to be a positive force for change. Recently, it has come to light that part of our college’s endowment is invested in fossil fuels. A student-led movement called Yale-NUS Divest has emerged in response, calling on the college to act with a conscience and divest. Fossil fuel investments are a risk for investors and the planet, which is why we are calling on Yale-NUS to divest from an industry known for denying climate science and destroying the livelihoods of indigenous communities. Divestment is simply the opposite of investment—it means getting rid of stocks, bonds, or investment funds that are unethical or morally objectionable.

Divestment is not new; it has been done with great success in past campaigns against apartheid, tobacco and private prisons.

Fossil fuel divestment has been undertaken by organizations as diverse as the World Council of Churches and Yale University.

The Yale-NUS Divest movement has been working actively to find out more about the endowment’s management and its exposure to fossil fuels. Meetings and e-mail exchanges with the administration have provided some information: our $365 million endowment is managed by the National University of Singapore (NUS) Investment Committee, where Yale-NUS’s president sits as an observer. Earlier this year, the administration confirmed that

part of our endowment is indeed invested in oil and gas, though they did not provide a precise estimate. Making such estimates is challenging as the external fund managers hired by the NUS Investment Committee invest our endowment in a diverse range of commodities, bonds and other assets, the full extent of which is kept from administrators in order to guard against conflicts of interest. Importantly, the college already has an ethical framework for accepting gifts and donations—administrators recounted to the campaign several instances where donations from unethical sources were refused. Divesting thus requires extending this existing ethical framework to the college’s investments, and establishing the fossil fuel industry as in contravention to our ethics.

The ethics of fossil fuel divestment are clear: an institution dedicated to preparing students for the future should not be simultaneously investing in enterprises that poison that future.

Climate change is as much an ethical issue as it is a political or financial one, with negative impacts that disproportionately affect minorities, the poor, and future generations. We are destroying the very ecosystems that our descendants will rely on to survive.

Currently, international negotiations and scientific consensus point to limiting global warming to 1.5°C to avoid catastrophic effects. This allows us to emit only 353 gigatons of carbon dioxide (CO2), but the fossil fuel industry possesses within its reserves— right now, ready to extract and emit—around 942 gigatons of CO2

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CLOCKWORK | OPINION

What’s happening on campus?

Stranger in the Shower: On March 31, a stranger was found showering in an unoccupied Saga suite which was, at the time, being used for an Arts and Humanities Capstone exhibition, The Anatomy of a Home. Yale-NUS and UTown Security were called. He was confirmed to be an NUS student. Security said that he might have tailgated a student to enter since gates are closed at night. Students are reminded to be careful of tailgating at night.

Charlie Chan: Sonny Liew, artist/illustrator of the awardwinning graphic novel The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye, will be the speaker for this week’s Literature and Humanities II lecture. Join the freshmen to hear his thoughts on Singapore and its post-colonial history.

Guy Hibbert: The Yale-NUS Writer’s Center will be inviting acclaimed British filmmaker Guy Hibbert to give talks and workshops over the coming week. Hibbert has written scripts for films such as Eye in the Sky and Five Minutes of Heaven, and won four BAFTAs for his scripts.

SingPoWriMo: This year’s Singapore Poetry Writing Month has rolled around again. Aspiring poets, join the Facebook page for daily prompts and get your creative juices flowing.

Veg Pledge: This week Yale-NUS organized YNC Veg Pledge, where students pledged to be vegetarian/vegan for one week. The pledge featured many events throughout the week, including vegetarian cooking classes, movie screenings and panel discussions.

Capstone: Signalling the end of their Capstone projects, some Seniors could be heard screaming in sheer joy at the college courtyards on March 31 after the capstone deadline. The Octant congratulates all seniors on completing this milestone in what must have been an arduous academic journey!

See You Next Semester: This will be the last weekly edition of The Octant this academic year. We hope you have enjoyed our regular coverage of campus events and discussion. We look forward to continuing next semester.

contained in coal, oil and natural gas. If this carbon is emitted—and the fossil fuel industry has every business incentive to do just that—we are almost certainly looking at catastrophic effects for humans and ecosystems around the world.

Something has to give, and it almost certainly will not be the laws of nature.

Movements around the world have recognized this and acted to pressure the fossil fuel industry through a wide range of tactics, including divestment.

Divestment is powerful precisely because it rejects the veneer of legitimacy accorded to the fossil fuel industry, and calls on institutions across a variety of domains—churches, universities, sovereign wealth funds, and even cities—to reject a business model that would endanger our collective future.

Such a precedent should also start in Singapore. Currently, the oil and gas industries invest considerable resources in purchasing political clout and social license here: ExxonMobil continues to sponsor the annual ExxonMobil Campus Concerts at NUS, while Singapore proudly announces that it is the “undisputed oil hub of Asia”. By divesting, Yale-NUS is sending a signal that this sort of influence is not welcome here. This could start a wider conversation in Singapore, with other institutions potentially following suit and students across campuses being empowered to act on climate change.

Moreover, there are also compelling financial reasons to divest, and the college’s financial future need not be threatened by divestment. Stranded oil assets and increasing awareness of climate change mean that fossil fuel stocks are overvalued, since stock prices do not currently reflect the true ecological or human costs of emissions. Furthermore, impending restrictions on the ability of fossil fuel companies to draw on their oil reserves in light of international climate negotiations and rapidly growing “keepit-in-the-ground” efforts in local communities will undeniably threaten the profitability of fossil fuel assets in future. If we are truly concerned with the financial future of the college, we should be moving actively towards an investment portfolio free of fossil fuels, many of which have shown they can also be very profitable. In short, Big Oil is bad business.

We came to Yale-NUS with a vision to create a radically different kind of college, ready to boldly face the future. Our goal to be “in Asia, for the world” exhorts us to be concerned for the wellbeing of the world around us, as does much of our education in the Common Curriculum.

We are therefore concerned that our college, with its aspirational vision, is investing its endowment in an industry that is actively undermining the future we will inhabit. Instead, we call upon our college to exercise moral leadership and live up to its institutional values by fully divesting its endowment from fossil fuels. This is not an impossible ask: our conversations with administrators so far indicate some willingness to incorporate ethical considerations in the management of our College’s endowment. However, making divestment a reality will require a substantial shift from the status quo. Across the world, communities are mobilizing and building power in order to compel their institutions to act in an ethical manner . It is up to us, as members of the Yale-NUS community, to push our college to take a moral stand on the right side of history.

To this end, the Yale-NUS Divest movement has organized a Week of Actions (April 3-7) and released a petition, calling for a freeze on all investment in fossil fuel companies and a move towards full divestment within the next five years. It also calls for the administration to release a statement by May 5, affirming its commitment to sustainability and ethical management of our investments and institutional partnerships. We encourage all Yale-NUS students, faculty and community members to sign it. We hope this will be the beginning of a transparent effort from the administration to make fossil fuel divestment at Yale-NUS a reality.

The views expressed here are the author’s own. The Octant welcomes all voices in the community. Email submissions to: yncoctant@gmail.com.

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ARTS

(ASIDE)'S PRIVATE PARTS AND ITS EXPLICIT PORTRAYAL OF SEXUAL IDENTITY story | Justin Ong, Managing Editor photo | Rachel Juay

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watched Private Parts, a play by (aside), with no expectations and little knowledge of transgender issues. Directed by Sean Cham ’19 and adapted from the original play written by Michael Chiang in 1992, I was, firstly, interested to see how a modern theater group would present a production written 25 years ago, and secondly, whether there is potential for this play to be timeless.

Far from just displaying the everyday struggles of the transgender characters, this play acts as a time capsule that lets us decide for

ourselves how much has progressed since the Singapore of 1992.

It has become common for theater productions to opt for abstract presentations and subtle clues, choosing to leave the audience to gather what they will, instead of presenting everything on a platter. Private Parts is not one of those plays. Unapologetic in its portrayal of transgender issues in Singapore, the issue of transgender identity is unmistakably put under the spotlight.

The play begins with a studio filming “Today in Singapore”, a talk show featuring the opening of Bugis World, a fictional theme park that showcases drag queens and flamboyantly-dressed trans women for entertainment. Two personalities immediately

EDITOR'S NOTE Dear Readers, It is with great pride that I introduce our final weekly issue of the semester. However, it is a bitter-sweet moment me, as this will be my last issue as Editor-in-Chief.

This also marks Zula's last issue as Managing Editor, a position she has held for nearly two years!

Zula will be heading off to join the working world and I wish her all the best. It has been an absolute joy working with her over the past year. I'm sure The Octant will miss her attention to detail, sense of humour and wonderfully blunt feedback.

Our departure heralds in a new Managing Board. I'm really proud to announce that Justin Ong will be taking over as Editor-in-Chief and Pham Levi and Terence Anthony Wang will be our new Managing Editors. I've been really privileged to work with them over the past year.

The Octant has changed a lot in its three and a half year history. When I first started we were just 12 people meeting every Tuesday night to create four pages of news and opinion each week. Since then we've moved from four to eight pages, tripled in size, added copy editors and even changed our name.

One thing that hasn't changed, however, is the people. While none of the original 12 remain in the organization, their spirit does. Now, The Octant relies on the hard work of over thirty students. They sacrifice the time they could be spending on assignments to bring weekly discussion to the College. I know I can rely on them in the toughest weeks. I still look forward to every Octant meeting and editing session.

That said, there are always areas for improvement.

As The Octant transitions from a start up organization to a more established one it will need to find its niche.

This will require experimentation, boundary pushing and the occasional mistakes. I ask for your patience during this transition, where. tThe organization will

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refine and improve with every misstep. If you want to help with this, please engage with us and help make The Octant as established and respected in Yale-NUS as the Yale Daily News (YDN) is in Yale. It's taken the YDN 139 years to get where they are today — hopefully The Octant can do that in half the time. I have the utmost faith in Justin’s, Levi’s and Terences’s ability to take The Octant there. I can't wait to see what they have in store for the publication.

Thank you for a fantastic year and for your continued readership.

Yours sincerely, David Chappell Editor-in-Chief

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The drag queens take the stage.

clash: the glamorously dressed Diana, who is a drag queen, and the conservative Mrs Betsy Tan, a middle-aged mother of three. Both argue viciously on stage over the legitimization of adult entertainment by the Singapore Tourism Board. State exploitation of the pink dollar becomes at once reminiscent— almost eerily so—of reality, as does the accompanying pushback by conservative society. Cyril Collins, a representative of the Singapore Tourism Board, finds himself literally caught between two characters from opposing factions of Singapore's society.

The fact that most of this heated discourse happens in the television studio is intriguing, and takes us aback because we imagine a public audience that is not used to such uncensored discussion of transgender identity and issues. Sam, the director of “Today in Singapore”, is often enraged at the behaviour of the guests, desperate to keep them in check, and worried about the reputation of her talk show as a credible production.

Warren, the protagonist and the host of the show, is criticised off-stage by Sam, who implores him to “act like a man”, for he is unable to control the guests who get engrossed in their own arguments while on live broadcast. It is perhaps fitting that Warren is forced to take an emergency trip to Falcon Crest Medical Centre for surgery following an accident that severely injures his private parts, in an attempt to restore his manhood.

While there, he befriends three transgender patients (Mirabella, Edward and Lavinia) who are waiting to undergo genderaffirming surgery (previously known as sex reassignment surgery). Warren rudely asks Mirabella, “Are you one of them?”, immediately othering himself from the pre-operation transgender patients, not realizing that Falcon Crest Medical Centre is known for its niche in gender-affirming surgery.

The recurring theme of “us versus them” is constantly situated alongside “conservative versus liberal”, “public versus private”,

and “cisgender versus transgender”. These comparisons are explicitly fleshed out through the play, from Betsy’s outrage at the existence of Bugis World, to Rosalind’s muddling up of the transgender characters (which a sheepish Warren has to rectify at a wedding). On one level we see an outright resistance towards the emergence of a transgender community, but as Rosalind shows, the passive ignorance of the general public is as much of an obstacle. The reminder of why they are “different” constantly bombards the characters, and by extension, the audience as well.

What is truly interesting are the conflicts and disagreements between the transgender characters . Mirabella constantly and humorously criticises Nurse Vernon for his idiosyncrasies, while Lavinia cares more about her appearance the moment Edward suggests that Warren might be an undercover reporter. Such plurality within the transgender characters is the real merit of the show, not just giving the audience a glimpse into their lives, but also transcending the easy portrayal of one-dimensional, stereotypical characters for the sake of comedy. More than just criticising the othering of transgender people, the play actively seeks to bridge crucial gaps in understanding, showing us that beneath the labels of gender, we aren’t that different after all.

At first, the play pushes forth a harsh dichotomy of male and female, and emphasises the security of identifying as either one of the sexes. The transgender characters perceive themselves to be in an uncomfortable in-between state, and are seen waiting at Falcon Crest, anxious yet eager to finally be “whole”.

However, the play’s shining moment is when Mirabella, though “transformed” into a female with an “operational female anatomy”, still shows that she is uncontented. This could highlight the challenges of being a woman, or it could be just her longing for Warren. But perhaps these possibilities are too simplistic. To me this is a lingering question that the play asks: 9

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the curtain was the artist himself, pressing various buttons on his laptop keyboard to trigger the random movement of each of these projections. I was initially confused by what I was witnessing but I gained a deeper appreciation of the project when Chandra explained to me how his actions were in response to the movement of lifts around campus, as reflected by the footage of some metallic device in our school’s control room. I saw I Carry as a reaction, a re-enactment of the arduous yet critical processes that keep our school functioning, a meditation on the invisible forces that keep things running. I would never take our lifts for granted again.

I then entered Milestones, by Janel Sunflakes ’17. This project was marked by the sudden installation of tranquil sheets of sky blue on the lift walls of Saga College Tower A. It was a strange yet peaceful experience, to see the walls cleansed from the usual cacophony of events. Milestones consisted of an audio walk up the stairs of Tower A, where I was greeted by pieces of tie-dyed cloth attached to the ceiling of each floor. As I walked up the stairs, I was accompanied by the recorded voices and sounds of a person on the same journey as us. I felt in the audio track the visceral nature of this person’s anger and pain, and surprising degree of empathy for someone I didn’t see and know. I was so involved in the sounds and spiteful words of this unknown persona, that the burn in my calves was strangely absent. When my journey reached the end at the top floor of the Tower, I was greeted by a series of tranquil-looking puffy clouds, and I felt deeply encouraged by her parting words: “Thank you for walking with me.”

“Thank you for walking with me.”

On the similar theme of human relationships, Denise Ng ’17 ‘s At the End of the Line was a picture book and exhibition, exploring the challenging relationship between a sister and her younger brother. The simplicity of this story of separation and reconciliation, coupled with wonderful illustrations that Ng

The 2 colors, blue and yellow, merge at the end of the line.

displayed across the walls of the Georgette Chen Art Studio, reminded me of the importance of my own familial relationships.

As I left the exhibition, I felt amazed by the works in this festival: their engagement with matters of importance in society with boldness and candor, and yet with a great deal of heartfelt sincerity.

And indeed, another work that I managed to view in the Festival was one that struck hard at a crucial topic in Singapore today: the issue of meritocracy and streaming in the local education system. The Curve by David Chia ’17 was a participatory exhibition, one that simulated the great differences between the different tracks of Singapore’s education system. The Curve was preceded by an installation outside Café Agora a week before.

A TV screen displayed various submitted stories of failure, and viewers were encouraged to submit their own. I was struck by the honesty and similarities between them; many talked about the failure to get internships, the failure to be a model student, and even the failure to care for others. The exhibition also consisted of various articles and pieces of information about Singapore’s education system and its principles of meritocracy.

A haunting reflection on the 1987 “Goh Report”, which was instrumental in implementing more rigorous streaming in Singapore’s education system.

On the day that I visited The Curve, I remember being placed through a series of simple tests with several other participants, but ones with great importance. I felt a brief pang of shame when I failed the first test, a test of one’s reaction speeds, and was ushered into a different test sequence as the rest. I was ultimately labelled as a “lower-skilled worker”, while the other participants in the room with me all ended up at a “higher” socioeconomic strata. Indeed, The Curve gave me the space to reconsider the role of streaming in our educational system. As I recorded an incident of my failure on a voice recorder at the end of the exhibition, I felt a strange confidence to be more open about my failings to others.

To cap off the festival, I visited its final exhibition: An Anatomy of a Home by Sherlyn Goh ’17. I was struck by the apt pairing of physical objects, those mementos from one’s growing years, with heartfelt, bittersweet stories about an individual’s childhood. In spite of the sparse, unornamented nature of the objects presented, I could feel that it was imbued with an authentic sense of nostalgia, a recollection of the past that does hold its own weight.

Looking back, the art works presented in the Arts and Humanities festival all differ greatly in their tone, medium and subject matter. However, I found that what reverberated through all of them was the clear, confident voice of an emerging artist, a voice that cannot be ignored, especially in this chaotic world. Indeed, we have here the up-and-coming.

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whether the struggles of a trans person truly ends with surgery and the reassignment of their gender. These questions are as pertinent today as when the play was first written.

Alarming from the start is the loudness of the play, the explicitness of the themes, the struggle that is often said rather than shown. Sometimes the portrayal of Mirabella was overly sexualised, at many times the contrast between transgender and conservative characters seemed unforgivingly extreme.

Still, I’ve come to realise that to have seen these themes as overexplicit is part of the triumph. For playwright Chiang, there must have been the notion that the audience should not be coddled with subtleties and mere suggestions, but shown face-up the raw struggles that transgender people face. If anything, Chiang’s aim was to drive home the message that “we are all alike underneath the superficial differences”, an urgent point that he did not want the audience to miss. As I heard Mirabella point at her chest to tell Warren that “what matters is what you feel”, part of me

cringed. But I realised later that I only cringed because, as an audience member in 2017, part of me already knew these things.

That is not to say there is no room for further progress. The play’s effectiveness shines with a set that is both performance stage and television studio, inviting the audience into the conversation and blurring the line between fiction and reality. It poses the question: how much has really changed since this play was first performed?

In an ideal world, this play would lose much of its relevance through time, with the themes it raises gradually becoming nonissues. However, the play’s continued relevance urges us not to take progress (if any has been made) for granted. (aside)’s adaptation of Private Parts serves to mark our heights against the wall, as a stark reminder of how much more we still need to progress.

The views expressed here are the author’s own. The Octant welcomes all voices in the community. Email submissions to: yncoctant@gmail. com.

Poignant and rare is the outright (and I daresay, unsubtle) manifestations of frequently cloistered themes of transgender struggle and identity.

COMING UP NEXT: A REVIEW OF THE

ARTS AND HUMANITIES FESTIVAL

T

he past few weeks has been an interesting time for the Arts in our school. From debates about works labelled as art installations in the lifts, to the sudden appearance of a Stop Sign in front of the library, there has been much conversation about the definition and purpose of art on our campus, and in society at large. To top off this sudden surge in artistic activity was the recently concluded Arts and Humanities Festival.

As part of their capstone projects, seniors majoring in Arts and Humanities completed 16 different projects over the past few weeks. This gave the rest of the College the opportunity to be part of a myriad of exhibitions, readings and performances.

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story | Kan Ren Jie, Staff Writer photo | Kan Ren Jie

While a busy schedule prevented me from participating in all the programmes, I came back with a renewed appreciation for the arts in society, and am convinced that what I just saw is the work of the up-and-coming.

The first exhibition I visited, was I Carry, a piece by Jevon Chandra ’17. I stepped into a darkened room divided by a string curtain, and was confused by the projection of a crowd of multicolored arrows, swimming in a grey background on the curtain. Behind

OPINION

UNWELCOME TO OUR CAMPUS story | Yip Jia Qi, Opinion Editor photo | Yip Jia Qi

Open day is one of the only occasions our school’s name is proudly displayed on its facade.

A

lthough Yale-NUS College as a student entity is diverse and by no means painted in a single brush stroke, I want to focus on something static that people may base their impressions upon: our architecture. There are many reasons for Yale-NUS being perceived as exclusive, and there are many things that are more important than our architecture. But as the first thing people see before coming into our school and getting to know the community, it might serve to reinforce whatever existing notions people already have. It's something that’s at least worth talking about.

I am no Urban Studies major, but taking the perspective of a user, I find that our school’s design is distinctly less porous and more disconnected from University Town (UTown) than the rest of the residential colleges (RCs). This might make us seem uninviting, if not outright exclusive. Our campus is — at least from the outside — the architectural equivalent of, what some would call, a resting bitch face; cold, closed off, no sign of the life and relationships that are developed within its walls.

For example, our campus stretches the entire length of one of UTown’s busiest walkways, yet manages to remain quite invisible. Whereas each of the other RCs has at least a simple sign outside their premises, Yale-NUS is a white and grey, walled-off building with imposing metal gates. Whilst most of UTown is connected via sheltered walkways (something essential given Singapore’s weather), our school remains an island on its own, inconveniencing students during a heavy downpour.

This is not to say the school should raise money to build a shelter between our campus and UTown, nor will this be a cure-all to our problems. However, this infrastructural divide is a subconscious yet constant reminder of how our school was planned and built separate from the rest of NUS, making it as much a symbolic divide as it is a physical one.

Even walled-off Condominiums have clear signages at their entrances and connecting walkways to the nearest bus stops. If something as functional as a private residence can have all these things, why isn’t this the same for our college, which in many ways is beyond just a residence? More than just affirming our identity, proper labelling and connectivity also makes our campus look more inviting, signalling to people that Yale-NUS is present and a part of the UTown community instead of apart from it.

The design of our school may also shape our behaviour, even 12

if we don’t realize it. Back when the campus first opened The Octant reported on the design philosophy behind our campus.

One of the architect's’ most distinct inspirations was the courtyards that were present throughout both Eastern and Western institutions, so now we live on a campus that has a courtyard for each RC, where we live our lives around it. The architects probably had privacy and intimacy in mind, and it has helped us foster the tight-knit community we have here.

Still, there are trade-offs for every design decision. The courtyard is not a true public space - it is only public to the community that surrounds it. When walking along our corridors, only the courtyards are visible, because our view of UTown is blocked by the classrooms. As we traverse these spaces, wee are constantly looking only around ourselves and at ourselves, the way the architecture prompts us to do so.

To clarify, making the campus more inviting does not mean making it less secure, and does not have to entail massive changes to the campus. Our campus is beautiful and there are very good reasons for our campus’ design. Unlike most of the residential colleges in UTown, our college acts not just as a home, but also as a school. Though not all of us are comfortable with throngs of strangers wandering around our residences (or bathing in one of our empty suites), we should not be content with seeming invisible to the outside world, either. Ideally, a compromise should be made between being secure without being closed-off.

A good place to start could be the walls themselves. Tall, imposing, and a little too clean, they are a vast canvas. So much art has been springing up within the campus itself,from the lifts in the RCs to a Stop Sign outside the library. Why don’t we consider taking some of these works outside our gates? New locations could be considered where any art would surely make for better viewing than the plain white walls. Anything placed along the utown walkway is sure to get as much or even more attention than it would in one of our lifts. Given that our RC gates are plain, and take forever to open, there is potential for a captive audience right there. There are indeed many avenues and locations for expression that can make our college look very much part of the space that surrounds it. The Octant has even covered some potential locations.

In the end, none of this will change the larger problems our school faces in public perception, but little things like signs on our front door and a livelier more inviting facade might add up, and feed back into shaping the community here in school, or it might not.

In any case, the campus as it stands belongs to the architects who designed it. Like a virtual character in a Role Playing Game, it is up to us to personalize our college before we can truly call it ours.

EDITORIAL TEAM Editor-in-chief Dave Chappell Managing Editor Justin Ong Managing Editor Zula Badral Co-News Editor Pham Le Vi Co-News Editor Elaine Li Co-Opinion Editor Aditya Karkera Co-Opinion Editor Yip Jia Qi Co-Features Editor Yip Jie Ying Co-Features Editor Nicholas Lua Co-Arts Editor Neo Huiyuan Co-Arts Editor Terence Anthony Wang Visuals Editor Lucy Kuo DISCLAIMER: The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of The Octant.

Questions can be directed to yncoctant@gmail.com