Thursday, October 20, 2016

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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016

VOLUME CLI, ISSUE 89

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Brain science at forefront of U. scholarship priorities Brain science, emphasized on campus for decades, one of seven scholarship foci in strategic plan

By RACHEL GOLD SENIOR STAFF WRITER

One could say the brain is an interdisciplinary organ. When visual stimuli arrive, little does the occipital lobe care that it is distinct in name and function from the frontal lobe. It relies on its front-brained counterpart to kickstart the needed response.

One could also say, then, that Brown takes after the brain, valuing not just the development of individual hubs but also the constant evolution of networks connecting them. According to the researchers driving Brown’s exploration of the brain, Brown does brain science better than most because it builds networks better than most.

“What does it take to really come to grips with how the brain works? What happens when the brain doesn’t work?” asked Justin Fallon, co-director of the Center for Neurobiology of Cells and Circuits and professor of medical science, psychiatry and human behavior.

“These are questions that require many disciplines to be brought to bear. And what’s the one thing that Brown does better than anybody? It’s our multidisciplinary approach to brain science.”

Thirty years ago, Professor of Science and Director of the Institute for Brain and Neural Systems Leon Cooper, already armed with the 1972 Nobel Prize in Physics, set out to apply his understanding of that discipline to the workings of the brain. His students spent lunchtimes discussing neural networks and superconductivity, planting the seeds of a pioneering theory of synaptic plasticity — and of a Brown program in neuroscience.

In the ensuing decades, scholars here have pushed the University to the forefront of brain science, developing methods to map neurons, discovering how brain functions mature during development and investigating the causes of devastating neurodegenerative diseases. In the classic paradox of gains in knowledge, everything we come to understand about the brain suggests how much remains unknown.

But Brown has committed itself to this exploration, placing neuroscience at the core of its academic identity.

Building on distinction “Building on Distinction,” the University’s 10-year strategic plan launched in 2014, lists “Understanding the Human Brain” among seven themes of scholarship to be emphasized and invested in under President Christina Paxson’s P’19 administration. This designation is more than just a recognition of what is; it has implications for

ELI WHITE / HERALD

For years, the University has been home to scholars and students pursuing innovative approaches to research and pedagogy on brain science. what Brown will become, said Provost Richard Locke P’17.

Locke began visiting Brown on a regular basis in spring 2013, when groups of faculty and staff members were winnowing the many proposals for integrative themes down into a final list. “They were asking two questions,” Locke said. “What are we doing that’s already excellent? … And secondly, if we made targeted investments, how would they take us to the next level?”

The plan identifies the units that

will be responsible for conducting brain science research: the Brown Institute for Brain Science, various academic departments and the University’s hospital partners. It also lays out plans to invest in faculty positions, research infrastructure and new space in the Jewelry District, and it details the impact these investments will have — doubling the number of multi-investigator grants in five years and creating a computational neuroscience program, in addition to other goals.

The University’s ambitions could not be realized without these investments. For one, the recruitment and retention of top faculty members is predicated on strong infrastructure for research. For example, the prominence afforded to BIBS allowed it to acquire magnetic resonance imaging machinery, which is now used by between 25 and 30 research groups, said Jerome Sanes, professor of neuroscience and director of the MRI Research Facility. » See BRAIN, page 3

Representatives from centers discuss collaboration LGBTQ center, Women’s center, BCSC leaders talk about collaboration, Heritage Series GUS REED / HERALD

Head of global policy development for Facebook, Matt Perault ’02, spoke on campus Wednesday about the company’s security and privacy policies.

Alum talks privacy policy at Facebook Matt Perault ’02 weighs security, privacy concerns when developing company’s policy positions

By ALEX SKIDMORE SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Matt Perault ’02, head of global policy development at Facebook, spoke at the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs Wednesday, answering a series of questions from audience members and Watson Institute Director Edward Steinfeld on issues including

INSIDE

privacy, security and surveillance.

Perault runs Facebook’s policy team in Washington D.C., which shapes the company’s position on certain issues such as cybersecurity, law enforcement, human rights and sustainability, he told The Herald.

To enhance users’ trust of Facebook, the company is responsive to feedback and attempts to be open about the way it treats user data, Perault said. “We don’t do things that … are out of line with people’s expectations of how their data is used.” Facebook is also focused on “giving people control of their information,” Perault said, adding that users can choose

from many privacy and sharing options.

Yet Steinfeld noted that, on some technological platforms, there is a certain “burden on the user” to read through privacy agreements and settings. Facebook expects average users to read hundreds of pages of privacy agreements to truly stay informed with where their data is going, Steinfeld said.

While acknowledging that user agreements can be long, Facebook wants to leave privacy options to its users to avoid being “paternalistic,” Perault said.

Steinfeld then shifted his questions toward Facebook’s balance between » See FACEBOOK, page 2

By ROSE SHEEHAN SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Representatives from the Brown Center for Students of Color, the Sarah Doyle Women’s Center and the LGBTQ Center spoke about the intersection of identities and collaboration between their respective organizations at the Undergraduate Council of Students meeting Wednesday.

The three centers work very closely together, said Gail Cohee, director of the Sarah Doyle Women’s Center and assistant dean of the College. This cooperation enables the centers’ staffs to view their work through “an intersectional lens,” Cohee added.

Partnership between the organizations and the recently opened FirstGeneration College and Low-Income Student Center will also be important in addressing the intersection of student

identities, said Joshua Segui, director of the BCSC. “To say that there’s a first-gen, low-income center doesn’t mean that class shouldn’t be central to the work of BCSC,” he added. “We definitely need to be talking about class just as much as we need to be talking about other identities.”

But because of the limits of BCSC resources, creating a space specifically for first-generation and low-income students was crucial, Segui said. He added that the BCSC student advisory board includes members who represent the LGBTQ Center, the Women’s Center and the First-Gen and Low-Income Center. “This year, we were intentional about creating that space on the student advisory board,” Segui said.

The six Heritage Series organized by BCSC — Asian/Asian American, black, Latinx, multiracial, Native American and Southwest Asian and North African — also foster intersectionality through collaborative events, Segui added. The Heritage Series represents “different historically excluded or oppressed » See UCS, page 2

WEATHER

THURSDAY, OC TOBER 20, 2016

NEWS Laboratory Safety Committee meets quarterly to discuss incidents, protocols for labs

ARTS & CULTURE Student film ‘Into Nowhere’ to be released in 2017, explores mental, physical elements of utopia

COMMENTARY Steinman ’19: Brown Republicans’ op-ed ignores Donald Trump’s moral flaws

COMMENTARY Friedman ’19: News organizations have obligation to cover stories other than Donald Trump

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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

U. follows strict protocol to mitigate laboratory danger Safety committees meet often to discuss incidents, review safety criteria, look for possible improvements

By HATTIE XU SENIOR STAFF WRITER

From the use of fume hoods to the multiple trainings that students must attend to work in a lab, safety precautions and protocols are emphasized across University research laboratories. Safety regulation and building upkeep are monitored in tandem by departmental safety committees, the Department of Environmental Health and Safety and the Department of Facilities Management, said Alfred Tente, electronics technician and member of the Department of Chemistry’s safety committee.

Stringent laboratory inspections and trainings About 300 labs are inspected by EHS staff at least once per year, wrote Stephen Morin, director of EHS, in an email to The Herald. Any violations discovered are reported to the lab supervisor and the department chair, who are responsible for resolving the issues, Morin added. After responding to the problems, the lab supervisor must notify EHS, who will then visit the lab again to ensure that the issues have been corrected, Tente said.

Before entering the lab, all

researchers are trained in general laboratory safety — including chemical handling, electrical safety and emergency response — and hazardous waste management, Morin wrote. Depending on their focus, researchers may also be trained to work with biological or radioactive materials, he added.

Departmental safety committees are overseen by the University’s Laboratory Safety Committee, which meets every quarter to discuss incidents, new safety criteria and possible plans for action, said William Patterson, senior research engineer and chair of the committee. Committee members include faculty members from various departments and representatives from EHS, facilities management and the Office of the Vice President for Research, according to meeting minutes from June 22.

Dangerous incidents in the lab Examples of incidents discussed during the meeting include a broken mercury thermometer and a researcher fainting from working with chemicals, according to the minutes.

Other incidents may not be issues, upon further investigation. “A chemical odor was reported in a lab. Turned out not to be a chemical odor after all,” the minutes read.

The committee also discusses major incidents at other universities and ways to prevent anything similar from happening in University labs, Patterson said. In 2011, a Yale physics student

was working alone after hours in a machine shop and died after her hair — which was not tied up — was caught in a machine, pulling her head toward it and cracking it.

The University Lab Safety Committee obtained reports from Yale and developed further precautions, Patterson said. Patterson personally wrote the code for the card access system to the University student machine shop, which now requires two cards to access. The protocol aims to ensure that at least two people enter the shop together, he said. A security camera was installed at the entrance, and personal dress guidelines were emphasized in trainings, he added.

None of those interviewed recall any recent major safety incidents at the University. Patterson said the only fatal accident he remembers occurred around 1967 when a biology student was studying the effects of electrical fields on bacterial growth and was electrocuted to death after forgetting that the power supply was still on and opening the tank of bacteria.

Twenty years ago, in Patterson’s own lab, a graduate student did not immediately wash his finger after coming into direct contact with hydrofluoric acid, which initially does not hurt but reacts with calcium to cause severe damage to tissue and bone. The student’s finger had to be amputated, Patterson said.

Dean Hudek, laboratory physicist and member of the safety committee,

recalls an explosion in his lab about 25 years ago that occurred when a student accidentally created a bomb following “a series of unusual events.”

Safety regulations and infrastructure Though some of the buildings may need renovations, infrastructure problems are only inconveniences and do not affect safety, Tente said.

For example, certain floors of Barus and Holley were flooded in 2012 and 2013 due to improper connections to the cooling system, Patterson said.

Barus and Holley also experienced several power outages over the summer, he added.

Tente, who acts as the unofficial building superintendent of the GeoChem building, said that it vibrates because it sits over some mechanical systems and that there are some ventilation issues. These issues only affect research because of how machines register the vibrations, but they pose no threat to safety, Tente added.

The timing of repairs depends on the equipment. Some sensitive equipment are on a regular repair schedule, while other aspects of the infrastructure are only replaced when they malfunction, Patterson said. Equipment replacement may also depend on whether funding is available, Tente said.

Safety regulations are created by a combination of private and public entities, Patterson said. For example,

» FACEBOOK, from page 1 information requests from law enforcement and users’ expectations of privacy.

When Facebook receives information requests, “we push back as much as we possibly can … (and) interpret legal requests very narrowly,” Perault said.

But Facebook responds when requests are “legitimate,” he added.

One audience member asked if it is possible to reconcile the interests of the federal government with those of the private sector.

The two sides usually manage to compromise, Perault said, using the topic of encryption as an example. The goal of Facebook’s policy team is to “make sure that governments understand the value of the products and that there aren’t constraints placed on those products that limit the scope of innovation,” Perault told The Herald in an interview preceding the event.

When reflecting back on his time as an undergraduate at the University, Perault praised Keith Brown, director of

» UCS, from page 1 communities,” he said. “But we also have been intentional about creating collaboration between all six groups, so sometimes all six groups will come together and work on a bigger event.”

The BCSC is searching for a new assistant director and a new program coordinator and is also working on its Diversity and Inclusion Action Plan, Segui said. “We’re trying to be creative in thinking about what is diversity and inclusion when so much of what we do is around making the campus and the BCSC more inclusive,” he added.

Je-Shawna Wholley, program coordinator for the LGBTQ Center, also said that her organization’s goals include

some of the most recent changes to Barus and Holley have been the installation of ground fault interrupters — circuit breakers designed to shut off power to prevent electrical shock — to several labs, he said. These interrupters are now required for outlets within 10 feet of plumbing, due to a regulation outlined in the National Electrical Code. This regulation was approved by the American National Standards Institute — a nonprofit given authority by the state.

Machine shop regulations come from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, while hazardous waste regulations come from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management, Patterson added. Changes in regulation are monitored by EHS, Hudek said.

With the rise of more stringent and detailed regulations, the safety committee tries to find ways to balance safety and practicality, Hudek said.

If safety procedures are too tedious or “cumbersome,” people are likely to either ignore them or create additional problems when trying to follow them.

The lack of incidents at the University shows that “Brown is very dedicated to safety,” Hudek said.

“We just want (people) to concentrate on their research and studies and not have to worry about (getting injured),” Tente said. “Everybody takes safety seriously. It’s a system the University has that seems to work well.” postdoctoral and undergraduate policy programs at the Watson Institute. Perault and Brown collaborated on an independent study seminar about forest fires in Ethiopia, and Brown’s support and feedback on the seminar “has helped (Perault) think about the nature of the policy (he has) worked on since,” Perault said.

Steinfeld also asked about the climate at Facebook after Edward Snowden came forward with information about the National Security Agency in 2013.

The allegation that the NSA had a direct link to Facebook’s servers of user information is false, Perault said. But it is “a continuing business issue” at the company because “if people don’t trust us, we don’t have a viable business,” he added.

Perault suggests that current students who want to pursue careers in policy should “get involved” and “expose (themselves) to aspects of (technology) policy,” he told The Herald. “Put yourself in a position where you are thoughtful about how you wrestle with tradeoffs,” he added. building relationships between centers and discussing the intersections of different identities. “We’re very interested in politicizing identity and creating space for us to have those conversations around the intersection of several different types of identity,” she added.

The LGBTQ Center can also “facilitate and create space for” students who are questioning their sexuality or do not necessarily want to take ownership of a label for their sexuality, Wholley said.

“We’re also thinking intentionally about what it means to create a space for allies, so calling people in,” she said, adding that the LGBTQ Center is considering ways to foster “conversation with people who are just coming into allyship and want to know what that means.”

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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016 • PAGE 3

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

» BRAIN, from page 1 The MRI technology has also allowed long-time faculty members, such as Sheila Blumstein, professor of cognitive, linguistic and psychological sciences, to open up new lines of research, Blumstein said.

Increased investment also provides funding for pilot projects. Researchers can use University funding to generate preliminary data, which they can then bring to the National Institutes of Health and other granting bodies to secure funding for broader projects, said Diane Lipscombe, director of BIBS and professor of neuroscience.

The prominent position of brain science in the plan is both a reflection and progenitor of academic curiosity, exhorting students and researchers across departments to explore the brain at Brown. “The fact that (understanding the human brain) is in the plan is wonderful because there is nothing more interdisciplinary than thinking about how humans think,” said Dima Amso, associate professor of CLPS. “It defines us as humans.”

Distinctive collaboration The research faculty members, graduate students and undergraduates conduct on brain science has a home on campus in BIBS. “We’re very excited to be part of the campaign,” Lipscombe said. “Now, because we are in a privileged position, there is a responsibility that goes along with that and a great opportunity to engage a broader group within the community.”

Lipscombe has her sights set on a definition of community that spans the entire campus. She is in conversation with Joseph Rovan, director of the Brown Arts Initiative and professor of music, about “doing something collaborative between brain science and the arts,” and Jeff Brock, director of the Data Science Initiative and professor and chair of mathematics, about developing projects that capitalize on the “wonderful parallels” between research on brain science and computational science.

The bridges Lipscombe is trying to build across campus already characterize BIBS. “I am amazed that I go around the table and people are from surgery, linguistics, applied math, computer science (and) mechanical engineering, and they are all working on similar problems,” Locke said.

BIBS was launched in 1999 as the Brain Science Program when founding director John Donoghue went to thenPresident Gordon Gee and proposed a center that would provide scaffolding for discourse across disciplines. “We used to talk about how we could realize the most out of what Brown is and what Brown can be,” said Michael Paradiso, professor of opthamology, visual science and neuroscience. “John was a visionary in seeing that you can do more if you bring people together.”

Blumstein, then interim provost, told Gee she thought the idea was a “nobrainer.” And with that, the center was formed, marking the birth of “a much broader University approach” to brain science — an approach former President Ruth Simmons and now Paxson have built on, Blumstein said.

The collaboration fostered by BIBS has expanded the horizons of Amso’s work. For example, she has worked with researchers specializing in animal development to understand aging in humans.

This collaboration does not stop at the laboratory door. Amso and Associate Professor of CLPS David Badre have worked together to examine how socioeconomic status among schoolchildren in the state of Rhode Island shapes the prefrontal cortex and executive functions. Nor does collaboration stop at the brain science boundary. Last year, Amso and colleagues from the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs spent 10 days in Jordan learning about the stressors faced by refugee children in order to inform nonprofits treating the children.

The potential for this sort of collaboration is, like strong research infrastructure, a critical factor in recruiting faculty members to Brown, Locke said.

The University aims to attract faculty members eager to be part of a “larger community that cuts across disciplines,” he added.

“Quite frankly, looking at a question with one eye is not going to solve the problem,” said Blumstein. “And that’s where Brown is ahead of the game — because it happens so naturally here.”

Part of the reason collaboration happens so naturally is the role played by undergraduates, Fallon said.

‘Agents of interaction’ “Undergrads are the agents of interaction,” Fallon said. “They know different things and different people.

They take diverse classes and bring ideas to us.”

For many undergraduates involved in brain science research, the path starts with NEUR 0010: “The Brain: An Introduction to Neuroscience.” Though only 292 students are currently enrolled in NEUR 0010, known colloquially as ‘Neuro one,’ the number has hovered around 400 for the past few years, Paradiso said. This would mean around one quarter of Brown undergraduates has taken the course at some point in their academic careers.

“Neuro one is just fantastic,” said Paradiso, one of the two professors teaching the course this semester. “Students ask remarkably good questions, which is related to the fact that it’s such a young field. One of the reasons I got into neuroscience was that in physics, you feel like you do have to dig very deeply into the theory … to find the current state of understanding of something. But in the first week of Neuro one, people ask deep questions, (and) we have no clue what the answer is.”

Paradiso has been teaching NEUR 0010 since he arrived at Brown as a professor in 1990. He wants the course to be accessible to any undergraduate. That’s part of the reason he, along with Professor of Medical Science and Neuroscience Chair Barry Connors and former colleague Mark Bear, wrote the textbook used in the course, he said.

“The impetus for writing the book reflects transition in the field. The books that were around in the ’90s were geared toward a more advanced bio(logy) student learning neurobiology,” Paradiso said. “We didn’t want that. You can teach neuroscience to anybody. You just have to do a little background.”

Brown was one of the first universities to offer an undergraduate neuroscience concentration, the first to use a purely undergraduate textbook and a pioneer in exposing students to the breadth of neuroscience as soon as their first year. For all of these reasons, Brown was and “still remains the gold standard for how to develop a curriculum to teach undergraduates the wonders of

the brain,” Lipscombe said.

The fact that all faculty members are required to teach undergraduates — one of Brown’s distinguishing features — plays a key role in faculty recruitment, Locke said.

Locke taught relatively few undergraduate courses in his 25 years at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he said. “And what’s great about Brown is that though I would never want to do that, I would never be able to do that here. That’s a selling point for us.”

Locke cites the hiring of Gilad Barnea, associate professor of neuroscience, as an example. “He’s a real rising star, and we were able to hold onto him.

And he says that one of the things he found so special about Brown is being able to work with the undergrads,” who participate vigorously in both courses and research.

Mackenzie Woodburn ’17 is one such undergraduate who has delved deeply into brain science research on campus. Having conducted research in the Advanced Baby Imaging Lab, he is now proposing a novel theory about the functional connectivity of the developing brain for his senior thesis.

But in the legacy of undergraduates driving change, Woodburn has applied his energies beyond the classroom and the lab. Asserting that “neuroscience is such a pillar at Brown” but sometimes fails to reach communities beyond the Ivory Tower, he has thrown himself into the leadership of the Brown Brain Bee.

The bee provides neuroscience lessons and competitions to local high schoolers. Woodburn also helped organize the first-ever Brown Brain Fair in March 2015 in collaboration with Carin Papendorp ’17, a Herald opinions columnist.

Like a kid again BIBS is home to over 100 faculty members who collectively boast hundreds of academic degrees, thousands of peer-reviewed publications and millions of dollars in NIH money. Yet ask any of the faculty members or the students who work under them what most excites them about the brain, and the years of formal training, grant-seeking and paper-producing fade away.

In their place is the unadulterated awe that the brain has the singular ability — perhaps along with questions of black holes or the origins of the universe — to elicit in us all. What is a thought? What is the basis of consciousness? Is the mind powerful enough to understand how the mind works, or will the 3-pound globs of Jell-o that erected the pyramids and sent man to the moon forever remain enigmas?

Such are the questions that underlie the buttoned-up language of “Building on Distinction” and labeled diagrams of peer-reviewed journals; such are the questions that drive BIBS researchers — and thus drive Brown research.

There’s Blumstein, who has spent more than 40 years at Brown in pursuit of the mechanisms of language. “What

does studying the brain and language tell us about language? And how can we use that knowledge to get a better understanding of folks who have these language problems? How’s it going to help somebody?”

There’s Lipscombe, whose unbridled curiosity about the brain matches her eagerness to connect brain science to initiatives across campus — and belies the gravity of her job as BIBS director.

“If you look to each brain, you can’t see what the difference is. But all of our experiences are stored there, and depending on the context, you are going to react completely differently. That is extraordinary.”

Fallon is taken by the “alchemy” of memory formation, Amso by the rapid change from incapable babies to socialized toddlers and Sanes by the basis of conscious behavior.

Locke is not spared the curiosity.

“Two things — I really want to understand better what’s going on with Alzheimer’s and dementia,” Locke said. “And what makes us human?

What makes us different? What makes us reflect and not simply respond to stimulus?”

“The mind boggles the mind,” Paradiso said. “You start with systems in the brain that take physical energy and convert it into an electrical response.

Then the brain somehow creates a new internal world of its own. That to me is magic. It’s amazing — I don’t know how it works. I think it’ll keep us busy for quite a while.”

ARTS & CULTURE PAGE 4 • THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

‘Banana’ makes fruitful addition to campus music scene Newly formed, ‘groovy’ student band offers eclectic, soulful setlist of both covers, original songs

By MADISON RIVLIN SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Student cover band Banana ripened this past weekend at “Gigs on the Grass.” The dynamic duo of Rosanna (‘ana’) Lederhausen ’17 and Ben (‘ban’) Spector ’17 aimed for popular appeal with a set list that ranged from Amy Winehouse collaboration “Valerie” and Hozier’s “Cherry Wine” to Blackstreet’s “No Diggity” and Alicia Keys’ classic “If I Ain’t Got You.” Banana pairs Lederhausen’s lead vocals with Spector’s guitar and backup vocals.

Banana became acquainted through mutual friends and taking the same firstyear seminar CLPS0050J: “Psychology of Creativity.” In the most cosmopolitan fashion, Banana began to take shape abroad on the University-led Birthright trip to Israel in January.

“One of the Israeli soldiers on our trip had a guitar, so I wanted to join in and play,” Spector said.

“I knew Ben was really skilled, really musically talented,” Lederhausen added.

“I wanted to sing, and it turned out that we knew all of the same songs.”

The informal jam sessions and impromptu performances continued back on campus, where they transitioned into more formal practices by the end of the spring semester. “One time a lot of people just stayed to listen and we played for hours,” said Lederhausen, who now has

more time to spare after leaving the golf team. “I can jam and do gigs. It’s a dream come true.”

This semester, despite having only performed under the name Banana once, at a mutual friend’s birthday party where they sang Spector’s original song “Take It Slow,” Lederhausen and Spector’s “Gigs” performance exuded “nothing but good vibes,” Spector said. “As people, we really vibe well. We generally are on the same page about where we are in the music in terms of performing, which is great.”

Groovy Banana Primarily a cover band, Banana does not focus on a single genre, Spector said.

“We get so much joy out of playing music that we’ll play anything,” Lederhausen added. “So the Banana sound is comprised of stuff we can really groove to.”

“We have such an eclectic sense of music. I listen to folk, hardcore rap, Beethoven,” Spector said. “We grab from different areas. Not country, though. Anything but country.”

More concretely, “Winehouse is a pretty good example of the kind of music we like to play. Poppy, but soulful and groovy, too,” Spector added. “We don’t like to play popular songs. If it’s been done before, we don’t want to do it.”

But a passion for “groovy” music isn’t something recently discovered by the duo, as both members “come from a long line of family bands,” Lederhausen said.

“I play music with my dad, who also has a dad band,” Lederhausen said. “We sing old stuff, like general pop-rock hits, and play classical music for my grandparents because my grandfather is an opera

enthusiast.”

Likewise, Spector’s family is musically gifted and has played together. “Both my parents play piano, and my dad is really into nice, simple harmonies,” Spector said. “My oldest brother is a phenomenal singer. He likes to play very vocally driven stuff, which tends to be more soulful music, which is somewhat similar to what Banana plays.”

Besides providing the Banana-mates with a strong performance background, their family experiences molded their early musical palates as well. “My family was really into John Mayer and Dave Matthews,” Spector said. “When I was really young we listened to Relient K — a Christian punk rock band — ‘Be My Escape.’” Later, Spector became acquainted with the ballads of Maroon 5 and Five for Fighting.

“Growing up I listened to the first Adele album, and it changed my life,” Lederhausen said. The album “‘19’ was pivotal to my musical experience. I would belt Adele, and that’s how I learned that I could sing.”

Brown Banana Though new to the music scene as a group at Brown, both halves of the group have maintained their involvement in the musical community throughout their collegiate careers. Spector, who is involved in the applied music program and has participated in jazz jams and musical theater, has found his musical inclinations deeply influenced by the Brown community.

“When I came to Brown, I got much more into jazz, hip hop, funk. … Amy

COURTESY OF ‘INTO NOWHERE’

Filmed and produced by a cast and crew composed exclusively of Brown and RISD students, ‘Into Nowhere’ is set to be released privately in September and screened at film festivals after its release.

Student film ‘Into Nowhere’ examines utopia Film directed by Marcus Sudac ’17 chronicles five students’ search for blissful state of mind

By ELIZABETH TOLEDANO CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Most student films do not reach quite the same scale as “Into Nowhere.”

A legally registered, student-run production company developed specifically for the project has a significant budget available to it through crowdsourcing.

The 80-page script, developed during writer and director Marcus Sudac’s ’17 sophomore year, has undergone months of revisions. In the process, Sudac has done extensive research, including visits to several art communes. Since last spring, the team, assembled through connections and previous projects, has been meeting to begin work on the feature, which runs about 90 minutes. Sudac hopes to show his film at various festivals after its private release next September.

When examined, the seemingly simple concept of utopia has as many interpretations as there are individuals.

For Sudac, utopia takes a physical form:

“It would be a massive arena of artmaking.” For the film’s producer, Elizabeth Falkenberg ’19, the concept is more abstract. She describes “a state of mind of utopia: less a space or a time and more of a method of thinking.” Her co-producer, Annabelle de Gaudemar ’17 imagines “a world in which we can create … for the sake of creating.”

These three modern culture and media concentrators, like the characters in their feature film, harbor deeply personal and distinct interpretations of utopia. The script follows the lives of five introspective college students played by Sophia Washburn ’17, Eric Baffour-Addo ’18, Teak Sittipunt ’19, Hemang Kaul ’17 and Ellie Gravitte ’17 as they take a leave of absence from school to examine both themselves and their conflicting and idealistic aspirations. “Into Nowhere” revolves around “a demographic that is often snubbed as being sort of … whiny liberal arts college students who have it ‘so tough’ and need to get away from it,” photo producer Adam Hersko-Ronatas ’18 said.

In the film, Sudac said he considers the question: “How would a communal utopia be able to exist in 2016?” The myriad questions the script addresses

remain open-ended. Alessandro Borghese ’19, one of the film’s executive co-producers who describes his utopia as “very much based on food,” said he sees the central question as: “Is the utopia we envision in our imagination practically achievable?” Rainey Zimmermann ’19 said the film considers “at what point do you sacrifice the things you want for comfort and safety in consideration of others?”

The film, simultaneously relational and existential, will be “intellectually stimulating and aesthetically pleasing,” Borghese said. Hersko-Ronatas hopes to employ dynamic film techniques, allowing the camera to function as a character and parallel the story. He plans to juxtapose the use of the camera in the “stoic university” with a technique that becomes more “fluid in utopia.” Rainey describes her cinematic vision as an attempt to “mirror each character’s psyche.”

As the film’s release approaches, the team plans to publicize its premiere. As a cast and crew of exclusively Brown and RISD students, they plan to ensure the film will be accessible to students at both schools through screenings and streaming media.

COURTESY OF BANANA

Student cover band Banana put on a show for crowds Saturday at Gigs on the Grass with a varied setlist including “Valerie” and “No Diggity.”

Winehouse was a huge discovery for me,” Spector said.

“My roommate for the last three years is a phenomenal jazz pianist. He’s shown me how to appreciate more music,” Spector added. “Where I grew up, people didn’t listen to rap to appreciate it. Here, I have met so many more people that deeply appreciate the art of rap and hip hop, and now I’m way more into it.”

Though not experiencing a complete musical rediscovery, Lederhausen’s “tastes in music have been refined at Brown,” as have her performance skills. “Brown students keep pushing us to be better.

Student groups like richard, which captures this neo-soul, funk, jazz, hip-hop movement playing very hard grooves, encapsulates what music at Brown is and how music has shaped us.”

The fruitful life With no immediate split in sight, Banana has begun to experiment with more original music options, both in genre and in

originality.

“I would love to play more with electronic beats and make our sound more funky, like Chicago house movement,” Lederhausen said. They deviated from their typical cover set list, as the birthday party performance this semester was the “first time (Spector) had ever played a song (he) had written in public.”

“Sure, it’s easier when you don’t have to worry about the music,” Spector said.

“When you are developing your songwriting skills and finally decide to share, it’s hard to open up because it feels so personal,” Spector said.

But Banana feels it has been received with open arms. “I’ve wanted to be in a band since freshman year — it was validating to see how easy it was,” Spector said. “There’s so much anxiety about getting started it’s silly.”

“This has been such a great opportunity to search within myself because music makes me so inexplicably happy,” Lederhausen added.

Wind Symphony set to play for Family Weekend First concert of year to welcome parents, students with performance of Samuel Hazo’s pieces

By ETHEL RENIA STAFF WRITER

The Wind Symphony, conducted by Director of Bands and Senior Lecturer in Music Matthew McGarrell, will play its first concert of the year alongside the Percussion Ensemble during Family Weekend.

The Wind Symphony is a concert band that allocates only one player per part, unlike other types of concert bands. “The idea is not to be elitist, but it is to give people the chance to play their instruments without the complications of three or four people playing the same part that they are,” McGarrell said.

In order to join the group, Wind Symphony musicians go through an audition process in the first week of fall semester.

“Wind Symphony is a great way to play with musicians who are dedicated to making good music,” said Valerie Zhu ’19, a saxophone player in the Wind Symphony. “There is a whole audition process, so (the musicians) are all really willing to put in the effort.”

The Family Weekend concert will feature three Samuel Hazo compositions, which are more challenging musically than the pieces the group typically tackles for its first concert of the year.

“Wit h t his program our

percussionists are being featured in a way that they usually are not,” McGarrell said. “I noticed in studying the scores that all three (pieces) feature a particular kind of drum and feature it in a way that gives prominence in the music.”

Besides percussion, the band also features a wide range of wind instruments such as flutes, bassoons, horns, trumpets, trombones and tubas.

The three pieces come from a diverse array of musical traditions. “The first one is from First Nation people in Canada. The second one is an Irish ballad that has a bodhran (an Irish drum) and the third piece is called ‘Arabesque.’

It uses the doumbek, which is an instrument from the Middle East.”

In Hazo’s pieces, music is naturally derived from the percussion of these various traditions.

Percussionists will also have the opportunity to shine in the Percussion Ensemble’s performance that serves as the concert’s annual opening act. Most participants in this year’s Percussion Ensemble performance also play in the Wind Symphony.

“This ensemble allows percussionists to make music that is totally their own,” wrote Kevin Plouffe, teaching associate in music, in an email to The Herald. It “enables the performer to create more freely but also with a greater sense of ensemble because of its intimate size and texture. Percussion at this level is more about the proper engineering of sound than just playing the correct rhythm.”

TODAY

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016 • PAGE 5

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

menu

fresh and in season

SATELLITE DINING ANDREWS COMMONS

Pizza: Na’cho Pizza, Spicy Five Cheese and Garlic, BBQ Bam Bam Make-Your-Own Pasta Station JOSIAH’S

BLUE ROOM

Quesadillas

Turkey Chili, Fire Roasted Veggie Chicken Tomato Curry

DINING HALLS SHARPE REFECTORY LUNCH

DINNER

Spiced Chicken Wings, Beef Lo Mein, Sweet Potato Fries, Chocolate and Vanilla Cupcakes

Baked Sesame Chicken, White Beans with Ham and Italian Sausage, Cajun Apple Cake

VERNEY-WOOLLEY LUNCH

DINNER

Enchilada Bar, Gourmet Roast Turkey Sandwich, Spinach Strudel, Assorted Cupcakes

Fagioli Soup, Pot Roast Jardiniere, Orange Chipotle Glazed Tofu, Cajun Apple Cake

sudoku

SAM BERUBE / HERALD

Students shop for fresh produce at Wednesday’s Farmer’s Market on Manning Walk. The market, which runs every Wednesday, gives students the opportunity to purchase produce, freshly baked goods and artisan products.

Q U O T E O F T H E D AY

RELEASE DATE– Monday, February 13, 2012

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle c rNorris o s sandwJoyce o rNichols d Lewis Edited by Rich

ACROSS 1 Hitchhikes 7 Hiker’s snack mix 11 “Cocoon” director Howard 14 “Très sexy!”

15 Chevy hatchback 16 Tavern order 17 Baker’s sweetener 20 Columnist Landers 21 Swiss calculus pioneer 22 Odds and ends 23 “__ silly question, get . . .”

24 “Twittering Machine” artist Paul 26 Cinnamon blend for a Thanksgiving recipe 33 “The Sheik of __”: 1920s song 34 “Poor me!”

35 Carpenter’s cutter 36 Places for compost 37 Little ones who, they say, are made up of the ends of this puzzle’s four longest entries 39 Israel’s Netanyahu, familiarly 40 Took a load off 41 Writing implements 42 Elegant dress material 43 “All finished!”

47 Make less difficult 48 Ages upon ages 49 Heart or liver 52 The devil 54 Tavern spigot 57 1966 Beach Boys hit 60 Sick 61 __ pro quo: substitute 62 Laundry employee 63 Santa’s little helper 64 Trig function 65 Equivalent of A-flat DOWN 1 Old Roman garment 2 Sound of traffic frustration

3 __ Bator, Mongolia 4 Fellow 5 Feature of a clear day 6 Dog also called a Persian Greyhound 7 Garden entrance 8 Too much of a good thing 9 Little wagon’s color 10 Have in one’s hands 11 Classico competitor 12 Norwegian royal name 13 Indoor ball brand 18 Shepard who hit golf balls on the moon 19 Lone Star State sch.

23 LAPD alerts 25 Grazing lands 26 Blue Ribbon beer 27 Dickens villain Heep 28 Underwater ray 29 Examine grammatically 30 Last Supper query 31 Mountain quarters 32 “Dallas” surname

37 Thousands, in a heist 38 Buy for the future, as gold 39 German road 41 Manners to be minded 42 Rock-throwing protesters 44 Marsh duck 45 Heavy metal band named for a rodent 46 “’Bout this large”

49 Boo-boo, to tots 50 Turn at the casino 51 __ of Mexico 53 Senate page, for one 54 Rocking Turner 55 Expert server, in tennis 56 Whodunit quarry 58 Rapa __: Easter Island 59 Japanese dramatic form

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:

“A chemical odor was reported in a lab. Turned out not to be a chemical odor after all.”

— Safety Committee meeting minutes

See lab safety on page 2.

CORRECTION An article in Wednesday’s Herald (“BUCC meeting covers Title IX Office updates,” Oct. 19) stated that the University currently has community reintegration programs. In fact, Elliot Ruggles, a SHARE advocate, recommended the University consider community reintegration programming. The Herald regrets the error.

Letters, please! letters@browndailyherald.com

xwordeditor@aol.com

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How Do You Tell an Incomplete Story?

12:00 P.M. Nightingale-Brown House

From “Study More” to “Study Better” 12:00 P.M. J. Walter Wilson, 203

Ace Your Personal Statement 4:00 P.M. CareerLAB

Reading: Digital Poet Allison Parrish 5:30 P.M. McCormack Family Theater

TOMORROW NYC Bus Trip 7:15 A.M. List Art Building, 2nd Floor

Luncheon Lecture: Joel Neto 12:00 P.M. Smith-Buonanno, 201

Hawks and Doves: What’s Gender Got to Do With It 4:00 P.M. Pembroke Hall, 305

Family Weekend Dance Concert 8:00 P.M. Ashamu Dance Studio

COMMENTARY PAGE 6 • THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

Comments Re: Three first-years join Naval, Air Force ROTC, Oct. 18 It is worth noting that nearly half of those present at the faculty meeting at which these programs were discussed and approved actually voted against allowing our students this opportunity. Fortunately, a narrow majority approved. In all honesty, I would ask my colleagues who voted against (the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps) to read this article, especially the quotes from the three new ROTC students. Is this the horror you were afraid of? Sounds to me like Brown is a slightly better and slightly (ever so slightly) more intellectually diverse campus because of these programs. Do you still disagree?

Kenneth Miller ’70 P’02 Professor of Biology

K I M B E R LY S A LT Z

comics Ampersand | Wasita Mahaphanit

A horse of any other name | Zach Silberberg

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COMMENTARY THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016 • PAGE 7

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

10 things I wish newspapers covered over Trump ANDREW FRIEDMAN staff columnist

One of my favorite pastimes at Brown is scrolling through and reading the most-viewed articles on the New York Times app on my phone while eating lunch. With my phone in one hand and fork in the other, I smugly and contentedly read articles ranging from “A Single Mom Escapes the Friend Zone, One Non-Date at a Time” in the Modern Love series to an op-ed written by a black San Francisco 49ers fan about Colin Kaepernick to the United States’ escalation of a shadow war in Somalia. This brief half-hour respite from the constant chaos of classes, midterms and problem sets that I use to inform myself about current events and social trends has become (and remains) a highly anticipated part of my day.

But this year’s election cycle is making this process noticeably less enjoyable by introducing a level of disorder to the news cycle that I find intolerable. Scrolling through the Times’ general news coverage now amounts to scrolling through accounts of Republican presidential nominee Don-

ald Trump’s debacles, the corresponding outraged responses in the opinions section, corresponding pieces that commend Democratic nominee for president Hillary Clinton for not being an insufferable buffoon and more interpretative pieces that claim ties between Trump’s moral degeneracy and the degrading American conscience.

The articles are almost too predictable; as much as I appreciate Charles Blow,

least partially included). Trump is degrading the American conscience not only by inspiring hateful sentiments in his supporters but also by forcing all news networks to devote their resources to Trump coverage rather than other relevant current events. Brown students are also guilty of crowding their consciousness with their opinions of Trump’s personality instead of the policy issues he addresses, the fine

to online markets or lower the quality of their coverage in favor of quantity.

Because of this, the journalistic world is not as insulated from the chaos of the election as it was in previous years, and we as American citizens are worse off because of it.

The fact that coverage of this ridiculous election cycle continues to crowd out other newsworthy topics despite the fact that most voters have,

The fact that coverage of this ridiculous election cycle continues to crowd out other newsworthy topics despite the fact that most voters have, more or less, already decided on their presidential candidate of choice is astounding.

I don’t really care to read another of his recycled pieces about how Trump “is the logical extension” of misogyny, racism, privilege and anti-intellectualism and the matching claim that all Trump supporters are complicit in the xenophobia he perpetuates — even though it’s true. Most, if not all, news sources are shamelessly devoting their opinions sections to deriving new angles on the candidates (The Herald at

details of which remain unknown to many Brown students and much of the American public.

In a journalistic era dominated by bite-sized Buzzfeed articles titled “10 Things that (insert topic here)” that get just as many, if not more, clicks than a hard-hitting news piece published by the Times, traditional print newspapers are going extinct. Many news sources have had to branch out

more or less, already decided on their presidential candidate of choice is astounding. The United States and China — which account for 40 percent of global carbon emissions — both ratified the Paris global climate agreement Sept. 3 in a landmark decision; the National Aeronautic and Space Administration launched OSIRIS-REx, its first asteroid sample return mission Sept.

8; an unarmed black man, Terence

Crutcher, was fatally shot by police in Tulsa, Oklahoma Sept. 16; on Sept. 28, investigators concluded that pro-Russian rebels shot down a Malaysian airlines flight with a missile. I have discussed none of these events with my friends and have seen very few pieces written about them on social media or in the most-viewed section of the Times app. Hurricane Matthew’s devastation of Haiti and the deaths of at least 1,000 Haitian people were all but overlooked by most opinions sections during late September and early October. But Trump’s genital groping scandal was discussed to no end.

Surely, there are current events more worthy of airtime on the public conscience than Trump’s routine lewd statements. Coverage of Trump by the wider journalistic world, to me, seems eerily similar to Buzzfeed’s coverage of Chad Johnson’s violent behavior on the latest season of The Bachelorette; stories about Trump and Johnson are both based on cheap personality analysis via tweets. And to my chagrin, my peers have also succumbed to a Chad Johnson-level analysis of the world around them.

Andrew Friedman ’19 can be reached at andrew_friedman@brown.edu.

To Brown Republicans: too little, too late CLAIRE STEINMAN staff columnist

I read yesterday’s op-ed (“Rose ’19, Tarke ’18: Brown Republicans do not endorse Donald Trump,” Oct. 19) with high hopes. The fact that the campus group, which dates back to 1888, had issued no statement prior to this week had been concerning me ever since the Harvard Republican Club released its widely shared condemnation of the Republican presidential nominee. That article, published Aug. 5, was a sweeping and inspiring takedown of Trump on moral grounds, criticizing him for his utter disregard, if not contempt, for common standards of decency.

It is important to remember that, in this election, Aug. 5 was a veritable lifetime ago. This was before Trump’s 1995 tax returns were leaked, showing that he could have avoided paying all federal income taxes for almost two decades. It was before he attacked former Miss Universe Alicia Machado on Fox News 20 years after his fatshaming drove her to eating disorders and emotional trauma. It was before he threatened to jail his political opponent should he win the election, a move that would be condemned by any American politician should it occur anywhere in the world except, apparently, on a stage in St. Louis, Missouri. And it was before a video was leaked of him gleefully, between giggles, describing sexually assaulting women using language that still makes me sick to my stomach. Each headline of this election has given me more reason to wonder if America will ever recover from the toxic fumes of the Trump campaign. Through it all, my class-

mates at Brown Republicans had stayed silent.

Yesterday, in the 11th hour, they spoke out against him. I wanted to applaud their moral courage for finally and forcefully putting to rest an issue left unresolved for far too long. I wanted to feel the almost patriotic sense of pride that I felt when I first read the Harvard Republican Club statement, which elicited a sense that bipartisanship is perhaps not dead and that there are lines that are still drawn, transgressions that are still unforgiven. I wish that the Brown Republicans’ statement yesterday had accomplished all this, but I was disappointed.

After an opening paragraph centered on a

than blush. The Brown Republicans’ halfhearted, needlessly partisan argument looks only to the dollar signs on a Congressional budget, not to the unquantifiable human suffering Trump’s proposal is sure to inflict. Similarly, while they critique Trump’s proposed Muslim ban, they resort to practical reasoning to augment the moral argument, when in reality the betrayal of basic humanity is so egregious that it eclipses any practical implications.

When they eventually get around to criticizing Trump’s character, a small paragraph that takes up less than 10 percent of the argument by word count, they take a stronger stance. But

The Brown Republicans’ halfhearted, needlessly partisan argument looks only to the dollar signs on a Congressional budget, not to the unquantifiable human suffering Trump’s proposal is sure to inflict. gratuitous jab at Clinton, the piece notes that 36 percent of the club’s members plan to vote for Trump, and another 17 percent remain undecided. The vast majority of the piece provides examples of times Trump was out of step with conservative principles, listing gun control and free trade as examples. Their biggest problems with the border wall are that it is an “inefficient allocation of resources” and that the executive action involved “requires interpreting the Patriot Act in ways that would make President Barack Obama blush.” In actuality, it makes Obama do a lot more

they denounce nothing that even Trump’s running mate Indiana Gov. Mike Pence hasn’t also denounced. Coming weeks (or, in the case of the Mexican federal judge, months) after the events in question, these rebukes strike a tone of inconvenience rather than outrage. They treat Trump like a normal candidate who says things he shouldn’t, not as someone who poses a genuine threat to American democracy, Latinx people, Muslims, African Americans, women, LGBTQ people, Democrats and yes, Republicans. By then praising Trump’s conservative credentials

on the right to choose and gun control immediately after, they throw away any opportunity they might have had to condemn Trump in absolute terms.

I consider myself a believer in the possibility of bipartisanship rather than a cynic. I have written about the election as an opinion columnist twice in the past, and both times I have expressed sadness about the state of bipartisanship in the country and a hope that our democracy can be made better through deeper conversation and involvement. I am happy to engage in conversations about conservative policy, even when I am likely to disagree. But when it comes to Trump, the conversation cannot be about policy. If you see the difference between Trump and Clinton or Obama as a difference in policy, you are absolving Trump of his racism, his sexism, his xenophobia and his disregard for the truth and the Constitution. If you see the difference between Trump and yourself as a difference in policy, you are aligning yourself with the same.

The 36 percent of Brown Republicans members who are Trump supporters and the 17 percent who are undecided may choose to ignore this.

The Brown Republicans may wish that Trump were someone else, and that he would show reason and grace in the weeks leading up to the election, which might explain their prolonged delay in making any sort of statement. But in waiting this long, and in treating Trump like a candidate who doesn’t share their conservative policy views, the Brown Republicans have missed their chance to claim moral superiority.

Clare Steinman ’19 can be reached at clare_steinman@brown.edu.

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ARTS & CULTURE THE BROWN DAILY HERALD

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016

University theater productions win big at the Dorrys U. productions nominated for seven, win three awards at first Law and Order Party Awards

By MIA PATTILLO CONTRIBUTING WRITER

The first annual Law and Order Party Awards, the Dorrys, were held Sept. 27 at Aurora Providence. Members of the theatre arts and performance studies department and various Brown-affiliated productions were nominated for seven awards and won three.

The Dorrys are a celebration of the best arts and culture across Rhode Island.

The name comes from Rhode Island’s own history — Thomas Wilson Dorr was a Rhode Island governor in the 1840s who attempted to expand voting rights and was convicted of treason. The awards span a range of categories, including art, books, drama, film and music.

“There are truly world-class artists, musicians, writers and performers who live and work in Rhode Island, and the event is really a celebration of that,” said Matthew Lawrence, editor for the Law and Order Party, the Rhode Island newsletter that hosted the awards. Every week,

the Law and Order Party is sent out to around 2,000 people with a list of seven things to do in Rhode Island — one for each day of the week. These activities typically include various cultural engagements, such as art exhibits, concerts and readings.

In choosing nominees, Lawrence first put out a general call for nominations before narrowing the nominees down himself through personal judgement, word of mouth and others’ reviews. He then opened up the final voting for award winners to the public.

The Brown University 2015-16 performance season, which was noted at the Dorrys for having all female directors, earned the department much acclaim.

“The Red Paint,” by Nikteha Salazar ’16, received the award for Play of the Year.

This one-act piece tells the story of a Chicano woman who, through attempting to understand her own father and history, learns about breaking cycles of violence.

“The Road Weeps, The Well Runs Dry,” by Assistant Professor of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies Marcus Gardley, picked up the Production of the Year award, and Associate Professor of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies Kym Moore also won the award

for Director of the Year for the same production. The “myth based on historical events” follows a “community of self-proclaimed black Native American freedmen” as they explore their own faith and identity through the challenges introduced by a dried up water well, according to a press release.

“I could not have predicted a win, particularly due to the challenging content and structure of the play,” Moore said. “I was totally blown away.” She noted that the designers in particular made a significant impact on the production, working together to create dynamic and haunting effects.

Professor of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies Erik Ehn was also recognized at the Dorrys for his production, “Island of Love,” which took home the award for Drama Curveball of the Year.

Other Brown nominees included Crystal Kim ’16 for Performance of the Year for “The Road Weeps, The Well Runs Dry,” “Mr. Burns, A Post-Electric Play” and “The Love of the Nightingale” for Production Team of the Year and Diane Exavier GS, who is set to earn an MFA in 2017, for Play of the Year for “A Big House.”

Exavier, who had already been subscribed to the Law and Order Party,

COURTESY OF GEORGIA BLUE PHOTOGRAPHY

At the first annual Law and Order Party Awards, the Dorrys, various Brownaffiliated productions were nominated for seven awards, winning three. was touched by the nomination. “‘A Big afford to bring in artists and performHouse’ is a play that means a lot to me, ers that other places in the state could so I was really grateful and honored never draw,” Lawrence said. While that people who saw it went ahead and other Rhode Island universities like nominated it for the Dorrys,” she said. Providence College, Rhode Island ColBoth Exavier and Lawrence were lege and Rhode Island School of Design surprised by the number of Brown were nominated for awards in performproductions that were nominated, as ing arts or visual art, Brown swept the they both thought students were largely stage in the theater categories. unaware of the Law and Order Party “It’s a great sign that the Providence newsletter itself, even though Brown’s arts scene and art happenings at Brown arts events are often featured in it. don’t exist in completely different uni“The school is relatively big and can verses,” Exavier said.

An ICERM Public Lecture at Brown University

Why we won’t be able to verify the outcome of the 2016 election Many US election systems are past their prime. Election officials trying to cope with failing voting systems and inadequate funding may consider what they hope are cheaper alternatives, such as Internet voting. Barbara Simons, an expert on electronic voting, will describe how we got to where we are today and what needs to be done to move to an evidence based voting system. She will also discuss some of the false claims made about Internet voting, as well as why Internet voting is a major security threat to our democracy.

Thursday, October 20, 2016 Doors open at 6:00pm, talk begins at 6:30pm Salomon Center at Brown University Free and open to the public. Ticket required.

Reserve your seat today: icerm.brown.edu

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