Friday, October 25, 2019

SINCE 1891

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD FRIDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2019

VOLUME CLIV, ISSUE 37

UNIVERSITY NEWS

Teach-in critiques colonialism in Watson Student panel describes exclusion, Western bias in classrooms, curriculum

BY SARAH WANG SENIOR STAFF WRITER Student panelists spoke passionately about their experiences of colonialism in the curriculum and classrooms of the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs during a packed Wednesday teach-in.

The Watson and the Africana Studies department sponsored the student-run event, titled “Colonialism in the Curriculum.” The event was organized and moderated by Junaid Malik ’20, whose article and petition asking the Institute to reevaluate the framework of its pedagogy circulated at the end of last semester.

Malik began his opening remarks by citing the University’s 2016 Diversity and Inclusion Action Plan, which committed to increasing the presence of historically underrepresented

groups, improving campus life and strengthening research on diversity and inclusion issues.

“It is in pursuit of that goal … that we ask ourselves and our professors to critically examine how 400 years of colonialism has shaped and continues to shape what and who we teach in our classrooms, curricula and concentrations,” he said.

The panel included the prepared reflections and remarks of four students from various geographic and academic backgrounds: Iryumugaba Biko ’21, an economics concentrator from Rwanda; Faith Blalock ’22, a native Hawaiian from Kaui studying environmental engineering; Luqmaan Bokhary ’21, a South Asian studies and public policy concentrator who grew up in San Diego; and Sharon Kioko ’20, a developmental studies concentrator from Kenya.

All panelists said they were frustrated with their experiences of U.S.-centrism and lack of non-Western perspectives and paradigms in the Watson’s curriculum. In the sub-

SEE COLONIALISM PAGE 2

UNIVERSITY NEWS

Power talks importance of individual change Former ambassador to UN describes early career, commitment to advancing human rights

BY CLARA GUTMAN ARGEMÍ STAFF WRITER On June 4, 1989, Ambassador Samantha Power was working for an Atlanta TV station covering sports news — her summer job after her first year at Yale — when one of the screens in the video booth where she was working started flashing images of students protesting in Tienanmen Square, Beijing.

The footage was raw and unfiltered, and much of it was never broadcast.

When the feed was cut off, “I sat in the booth aghast. I found myself wondering what the U.S. government would do in response, a question that had never before occurred to me,” Power recounted to the audience of the Noah Krieger ’93 Memorial Lecture yesterday, reading off the pages of her book, “The Education of an Idealist: A Memoir.”

Power, who served in the cabinet of President Barack Obama and as U.S.

SPORTS

Ehlert ’20 leads Bears to win over Lions Outside hitter guides volleyball to second Ivy League win, makes 19 kills against Columbia

Herald: What do you wish more people knew about volleyball?

Ehlert: There’s a lot more strategy to it than people realize. This came up recently when our coach was talking to the basketball coaches because when you miss a basket, you don’t automatically score a point for the other team.

You might be giving them an oppor-

COURTESY OF SAMANTHA GRIFFIN

Samantha Power discussed her new book called “The Education of an Idealist: A Memoir” with community members yesterday.

Ambassador to the United Nations, discussed the ability of individuals to enact meaningful change and the role of the United States in advancing human rights causes abroad, among other

NICOLE KIM / HERALD

Science & Research Commentary

Commentary

U. researchers develop ‘Portal-ble’ software, improving virtual reality experience BACK

Brown Immigrant Rights Coalition: U. should end contract with Palantir Page 11

Editorial: Undergrad students need to increase engagement with UCS Page 10

SEE POWER PAGE 2

MoMA holds roots in Providence

BY CHANIKARN KOVAVISARACH CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Makena Ehlert ’20 has been a constant force this season, playing in every set and standing at second in both Ivy kills and points. tunity, but you aren’t putting a point with a good pass. The good pass has on the board for them. In volleyball, to be turned into a good set, and that your mistake physically puts a point has to become a kill on my end. That’s on the board for the other team. It adds the only thing I control, so I couldn’t another level of pressure. do what I do without my teammates.

Also, when I go to get a kill, half the What do you attribute your success time I get blocked and there’s someto this season? one behind me to cover, which is really Everything is really dependent on important. That’s what enables me to the ball you’re getting. … There’s three touches on the court. Every kill starts SEE AOTW PAGE 9

topics like the importance of the media in shaping the knowledge of leaders.

Currently, Power is the professor

ARTS AND CULTURE

Museum founded by Providence native Abby Aldrich Rockefeller reopens

BY AMELIA SPALTER STAFF WRITER Outside hitter Makena Ehlert ’20 recorded 19 kills and two blocks to lead Brown in a win against Columbia over the weekend. Ehlert, a senior from Orange County, CA., played in all 99 sets last season and has been on the court for every set so far this season. She leads the team in overall kills, kills per set, rotation points, points per set and total attempts. She is currently second in the Ivy League this season for most kills at 209 and most points at 234. For her efforts against Columbia, Ehlert has been named The Herald’s Athlete of the Week.

BROWNDAILYHERALD.COM

Ninety years ago, three passionate, enterprising women came together with the idea to create a space devoted exclusively to modern art.

Lillie P. Bliss, Mary Quinn Sullivan and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller founded the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and held their first exhibition on Nov. 7, 1929, titled “Cézanne, Gauguin, Seurat, van Gogh” in a rented space in the Heckscher Building on Fifth Avenue.

The women, alongside their board of trustees, continued renting spaces in Manhattan to host their exhibitions until 1939, when they acquired a permanent headquarters on 53rd Street.

Eighty years later, the museum has just reopened following a $450 million renovation and reorganization.

Born and raised in Providence, Aldrich Rockefeller was daughter to Abby Chapman and Nelson Al-

drich, who was the senator for Rhode Island from 1881 to 1911. Aldrich Rockefeller developed a passion for art during her European travels in the summer of 1894 before she met John D. Rockefeller Jr. ‘1897, who was studying at the University. She and Rockefeller are remembered for both their immense wealth and philanthropic activities, according to the Rockefeller Archive Center.

Described as “a woman of extraordinary imagination and vision”

by Deborah Wye and Audrey Isselbacher, chief curator and associate curator respectively of MoMA’s Department of Prints and Illustrated Books in a 1999 exhibition, Aldrich Rockefeller was not only an essential figure in art history, but also in the local history of Providence.

Dietrich Neumann, professor of history of art and architecture, director of Urban Studies and a member of the Committee on Architecture and Design at the MoMA, noted how Rockefeller and Aldrich Rockefeller diverged in their artistic interests.

Unlike his wife, Rockefeller “loved architecture but wasn’t interested in modern art,” Neumann said. Aldrich

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COLONIALISM FROM PAGE 1 sequent discussion, their concerns sparked conversation, questions and an exchange of ideas among professors, undergrads and grad students.

Bokhary said that the exclusion of non-Western scholarship in education contributes to a “broader colonial mindset” that has real-world consequences. He recounted a discussion about the use of drones in one of his classes — the discussion reached a consensus that while drones were not the perfect solution, they were the best solution available. Bokhary still remembered what the last student said: “Drones maybe are inaccurate and aren’t able to just exactly target the terrorist in question, but at the end of the day, they are much better than risking American lives on the ground.”

The comment weighed on Bokhary, who is from a province in Pakistan regularly targeted by drone strikes. “The fact that students sitting in a classroom here at Brown can reduce the sanctity, or the value, of a non-American life to nothing — that, right there, is colonialism,” he said. When Bokhary asked the audience if they have had similar experiences, multiple hands in each row went up in the air.

Blalock said that the far-reaching and enduring impact of colonialism means that it cannot be confined to only a few disciplines. “Colonialism is not only for the humanities or parts of STEM,” she said. “We are not individuals studying particular fields for our chosen career path — we are part of a community that exists from a local to a global scale, all connected by an institution shaped by colonialism.”

Edward Steinfeld, director of the Watson Institute, wrote in an email to

POWER FROM PAGE 1 of the practice of global leadership and public policy at Harvard Kennedy School and a professor of practice in human rights at Harvard Law School.

“The Education of an Idealist” is her second book after “A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide,” which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2003.

“A lot of (“The Education of an Idealist”) is about at each juncture having doubts about whether one person can make a difference, even a small difference, and how those doubts are overcome over time,” she told The Herald.

Power called on the audience to ask themselves: “What is the way to take the big thing and reduce it to something that’s actually within your power to try?” In her answer, she quoted Obama: “Better is good.”

At her talk, Power cited Morton

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS

The Herald that he was “deeply moved” by the comments and discussion of the teach-in. Steinfeld wrote that the Watson Institute has been supporting these efforts in curricular reform in order to address “how power, hierarchy and histories of subordination affect how topics are studied and what kinds of materials are assigned.” Looking to the future, Steinfeld said that the Watson Institute is eager to include students in the development of curricula that address these questions.

Malik told The Herald after the event that he was happy with the number of people that attended and that it signaled student interest and a willingness of faculty to listen to the concerns of students. But there are still more actions that can be taken toward change, he said.

“The biggest change that I feel like students would want is just recognition of the gaps in the curriculum in terms of the non-Western narratives that aren’t mandated within our disciplines,” he said. In the long run, Malik hopes for more academically rigorous disciplines that include meaningful engagement with non-Western perspectives alongside Western ones.

Malik also told The Herald that the Watson Institute’s articulated values of peace and justice are key to thinking about colonialism when proceeding with the reforms. As he told the audience in his opening remarks at the teach-in, “Colonialism is not simply an intervention upon land and bodies, it is a contemporary process that seeks to shape knowledge and minds. In that broader lens, a critical examination of our education at Watson and Brown is critical to imagining a more peaceful and just world.”

Abramowitz, a senior diplomat whom she interned for upon her graduation from Yale and who influenced her approach to foreign policy, who told her to “get out into the field. Get close, hear from people who are being affected by our policies, by our decisions and our non-decisions.”

Instead of describing the U.S. government “as if it’s a monolith,” Abramowitz would say that “there is no ‘government’ as such. There a lot of individuals” in different governing bodies, who can work together to “ameliorate the situation for the civilians on the ground.”

While she recognizes that some students may “despair” about how effective U.S. peacekeeping and human rights efforts can actually be, Power said that “when you have legitimacy, and you’re backing the people on the ground, … that is a recipe for success.”

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2019

HUAYU OUYANG / HERALD

Student panelists described experiencing U.S.-centrism and a lack of non-Western perspectives in the curriculum and classrooms of the Watson Institute.

There is a wide-ranging “toolbox” of peacekeeping strategies that the United States can use. In addition, the United States has the ability to protect human rights “because we’re the richest and most powerful country in the world,” Power told The Herald. The United States has the responsibility to do so “for reasons of generosity,” and because “our stability over time is very linked” to that of other countries.

In her lecture, she pointed to “examples of harnessing U.S. leadership to make things better,” such as the U.S. leadership’s role in the multinational response to the Ebola outbreaks or the establishment of the Paris peace agreements. While “not perfect,” these moves were “steps in the right direction,” which had benefits abroad as well as domestically, she said.

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In This Issue

More Treats than Tricks POST- TRICK-OR-TREATERS 5

Warnings of the Dark

DANIELLE EMERSON 4

Stone Walls and Complicated Spaces

COLLEEN CRONIN 2 GRIFFIN PLAAG 6

Two Writers

postCover by Gaby Treviño

OCT 25

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VOL 24 —

ISSUE 7

FEATURE

Stone Walls and Complicated Spaces A History of the Dexter Asylum

BY COLLEEN CRONIN ILLUSTRATED BY RÉMY POISSON

W

hen thinking of scary spots on Brown’s campus, the Nelson Fitness Center and its surrounding sports complex probably aren’t the first places that come to mind.

Sure, the Nelson’s barre and spin classes can be harrowing, and most would agree the disappearing weights are particularly spooky, but at least there is a sound explanation for that—selfish patrons.

However, the history of the property tells a darker story. Where the Nelson and other sports buildings now stand, there was once an asylum.

According to the Rhode Island Historical Society Archives, the Dexter Asylum was completed in 1828 after the land was gifted to the city of Providence by a wealthy resident, Ebenezer Knight Dexter, upon his death. Originally meant to be a facility to care for Providence’s most vulnerable (both those with mental illness and those living in poverty), the Dexter Asylum provided a service absent in the city.

It was built with good intentions, but the Dexter Asylum, like many similar institutions of the time, faced periods of overcrowding and maintained

spartan conditions (brutal by today’s standards).

According to the Rhode Island Historical Society documentation, visitors were only permitted once every three weeks, and evening meals often consisted of only bread and tea. Fraternizing between men and women was forbidden, and if residents missed a meal, they didn’t eat. Most of Dexter’s residents were destitute and would have otherwise been living on the street, so it was Ebenezer Dexter’s trust, along with city money, that covered the majority of the facility’s costs. Still, residents had to work for their food at the

Letter from the Editor Dear Readers, The spooky season is ~upon us~, which means cinnamon sugar sweets, pumpkin spice drinks, and perhaps some not-so-nice tricks (though I much prefer treats). As we get through the thick of midterms, I hope you all can step out of the woods for at least a moment and breathe in the crisp fall air, crunch through a pile of red-orange-yellow leaves— maybe even cuddle up with a hot beverage of choice and eat some candy.

For those of us planning to dress up for Halloween, what are we thinking? I, for one, am deciding between wearing my blue koala onesie (warm, comfortable, vaguely resembling my one true love on this campus—Blueno) or channeling some book character no one knows. (Last year, I dressed up as Lara Jean from To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before.

Not that obscure, but most people just thought I had put slightly more effort into my outfit than usual.)

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In celebration of the upcoming holiday, post- is bringing spooky (and spoopy) vibes to you. Dare to delve into the Feature and explore the athletic complex’s history as Dexter Asylum. In Narrative, journey down memory lane with post-’s trick-ortreaters, and learn about one writer’s experience growing up with warnings, rooted in cultural beliefs, about the dark. For those who couldn’t care less about Halloween—we have content for that, too: Check out A&C’s reflection on Bob Dylan.

Wishing you all treats and no tricks (especially on your midterms) in these upcoming weeks!

Celina

Narrative Managing Editor

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EmWool Basement The Rock's Absolute Quiet Zone RISD The SciLi basement during first-year pre-registration The bus tunnel on Thayer Street The glowing yellow room in B&H The Andrew's pasta line The weights section of the Nelson Wherever you are when you see “Assignment Unmuted” The husk of Tealuxe

asylum’s farm. In 1843, one observer noted that about a quarter of the asylum’s population was “insane,” but treatments for mental illness were lacking. Instead, the asylum compensated by confining people living with mental illness to “maniac cells.”

Over time, the asylum became outdated, but the property it sat on became more valuable. After years of litigation, the city reneged on Ebenezer Dexter’s wishes and sought alternative uses for the land. The asylum was finally closed in 1957 after 129 years of operation when Brown University bought the land to build a gymnasium.

There’s not much left of the asylum, which, based on photos in the Library of Congress, looked like a drab version of a French chateau. All that remains is the large wall that used to enclose the complex.

Made of stone and no longer surrounding the whole complex, the barrier once kept those living in the asylum apart from the outside world. Although the closure of asylums like Dexter may have signaled a positive change in society’s perception of mental health, asylums and mental hospitals are still the backdrops of scary movies. They serve as places of cultural horror, and many of those still existing today, such as conversion centers, provide no legitimate psychiatric help. However, when mental hospitals were first constructed in the United States, they were some of the most expensive buildings in the country.

They were often built to mimic mansions in an effort to make their residents feel more at home, according to Southern Connecticut State University History Professor Troy Rondinone, author of Nightmare Factories: Asylums in the American Imagination.

In addition to being well-constructed, many asylums were the only places offering a living space for people who were poor or mentally ill, people who otherwise might have had nowhere else to live.

Despite the asylum being a theoretical place of safety, in practice it was often something very different. Asylums “have always had a scary element,” Rondinone says. “‘Asylum’ is a good word, it means a place of refuge; but by the end of the 1800s, doctors started calling asylums ‘hospitals’ simply because the word asylum had so many negative connotations by then that they were seen as places where people were unfairly locked up and tortured.”

By the 20th century, a majority of asylums were overcrowded and underfunded.

Undercover reporting by journalist Nellie Bly revealed conditions much worse than those at Dexter. In some asylums, attendants were abusive, treatments were extreme, and, at times, harmful to those whom they were supposed to help. The American mental hospital population ultimately peaked in 1955 with over half a million individuals institutionalized.

After this point, there was a swift downturn.

The invention of more antipsychotic drugs, the acknowledgement that institutions were too great of a public expense to sustain, and media coverage of some of the asylums’ atrocities finally catalyzed deinstitutionalization.

Pushback from pop culture resisted this mid20th century outcry against the horrors of asylums.

Two of the most popular media depictions of the asylum are One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and the original Halloween, released in 1975 and 1978 respectively. They show asylums as places people went to go mad and paint mental patients as people to be feared.

“When [Halloween] came out . . . people were expressing concern that released mental hospital patients were going to wreak havoc, they’re going to commit violent crimes on the streets. And so, kind of at the height of that fear we get a movie about a mental patient wreaking havoc on the streets in his own community,” Rondinone says.

Since the 1970s, the asylum has continued to be the backdrop for scary tales in literature, in movies, and on television. The Fox TV show American Horror Story created a whole season set in a malevolent asylum, where the devil himself presides.

A significant portion of haunted tourism has also stemmed from and perpetuated the fear of asylums. Teenagers have long been exploring abandoned buildings to scare themselves—more recently for macabre Instagram shoots. Even

against asylums. Both of Lovecraft’s parents died in Butler Mental Hospital in Providence. (Before Butler was constructed, the burden of mental health care in Providence fell solely on Dexter.)

Lovecraft’s novel, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, tells the story of a wealthy young man from Providence gone missing from an asylum. Dexter was a common name, but its use could be linked to the Dexter Asylum he must have been acquainted with.

Although “the pop cultural asylum is in dialogue with real places," and there are parts of asylums that were indeed horrific, “it says more about us as a society that asylums are now a part of our scary stories,” according to Rondinone.

“When we think about mental hospitals as being scary places, we should look at our own hang-ups and prejudices about mental illness and the people that suffer from it,” Rondinone says. After all, the horrible descriptions of asylums are often equally critical and diminutive towards the people inside them. Rondinone also points out that while asylums and mental hospitals are places where abuses and terrible things occurred, these things happen in nursing homes too. Why don’t we have more scary stories set in nursing homes? (And no, The Visit, a

“When we think about mental hospitals as being scary places, we should look at our own hang-ups and prejudices about mental illness and the people that suffer from it,” Rondinone says.

After all, the horrible descriptions of asylums are often equally critical and diminutive towards the people inside them. adults can partake in the “fun” and rationalize this asylum-interest by visiting museums and sites of the paranormal. During his research, Rondinone says he stayed in the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in West Virginia for a night, and unsurprisingly, found exactly zero ghosts.

While not a household name like Trans Allegheny, the Dexter Asylum may have its own connection to the transformation of the asylum from haven to hell. One of the horror genre’s most prominent authors—H.P. Lovecraft—lived just blocks away from its walls. Perhaps inspired by his experience with Dexter, he had a large role in the inclusion of asylums in the genre.

Lovecraft is a horror and science fiction icon today, although he was not widely known in his time, and his legacy permeates modern pop culture (having influenced works like The Shining and Batman, according to the The New York Times).

Lovecraft was born and raised in Providence and often frequented Brown’s campus to use its libraries, despite never attending college himself.

Beyond simply living physically near the Dexter Asylum, Lovecraft had his own vendetta

movie about possessed grandparents, doesn’t count).

"We kind of create our own monsters in America,” Rondinone says, and the asylum has become one of them.

For me, a scary movie and book buff, I find Rondinone’s theory realistic, but hard to swallow.

Why is the thing we are scared of always “the other”?

And how can we reconcile that our feelings about what we are scared of often say more about us than the “scary” things and people themselves?

I can confess that I love haunted stories about things that go bump in the dark, magic and murders, and yes, even asylums. American Horror Story is one of my favorite shows, and Asylum was a pretty great season; it even had its own Nellie Bly character (played by Sarah Paulsen) who sneaks into the asylum and reveals its deepest secrets to ultimately shut it down.

While it’s fun to be scared, it’s also important to think critically about the scary stories we hear, and, truthfully, about all the stories in our lives.

In that sense, maybe it’s a good thing that only Dexter’s walls exist: an unsuitable relic for a ghost story but a strong reminder of our past.

*Motorcycle revs* “Man, I love the sound of global warming at 7 p.m.”

“Have you heard that ‘Hollaback Girl’ parody about the plague?”

OCTOBER 25, 2019!3

NARRATIVE

Warnings of the Dark

Late Night Adventures on the Rez

BY DANIELLE EMERSON ILLUSTRATED BY IRIS XIE

The dogs at my aunt's house always started barking around 3 a.m. I’d pull the window curtains shut and warn my younger siblings to avoid looking out at night. You never know who might be staring back.

As an adult, I still follow a series of similar rules. These lessons, rooted in cultural beliefs and understandings, continue to live within me. Most Diné youth from the rez know not to mess with certain traditions. But every now and then, overcome with an irrational desire for recklessness, a friend and I will take it upon ourselves to challenge tradition. *** “Let’s take the back roads.”

I shook my head.

“Come on!” Mykel pleaded.

“Why?” He curled his lip. “You scared?”

I rolled my eyes. “No.” *** There’s a sense of finality in the onslaught of black after a vivid sunset. Growing up, I reveled in the presence of the falling sun, watching as bright pinks and oranges smeared across the sky. Though the sunsets offered beauty, they also came with stark warnings for children.

My cousins, siblings, and I all learned to abide by these rules. You can watch the sunset, but beware of the darkness that comes afterward. When we were between the ages of seven and eleven, my shímasaní, or maternal grandmother, always made sure we were indoors as soon as the stars began to dot the sky.

Stories of wandering night-beings that lured little children with little feet like ours into the dark kept us behind closed windows. These shape-shifters prefer

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the form of animals over two-legged humans, and we were taught to never say their actual names. In doing so, we would be calling their presence, calling bad omens. The term yanni became their universal name. But even speaking this name into existence, especially from deep within the rez, could have horrifying consequences. My cousins, siblings, and I knew this. So when our shímasaní hushed our rowdy behavior with warnings of four-legged creatures that would steal us away into their caves, we’d lock eyes before returning silently to bed, cuddling close on our shared mattress for security.

Only on nights designated for prayer and celebration were we allowed outside on our own. But even then, adults kept a watchful eye, counting on the dogs to provide salient alerts. Our young ages kept us naive but cautious. We knew the phrase: Watch out for the “things that go bump in the night.” *** Mykel nudged my arm. “Let’s spray paint that sign.” He gestured vaguely to the stop sign from the driver’s seat.

“I’m not getting out of the truck.” I eyed the pitchblack stretch of farmland, growing anxious.

“Come on!” Mykel tugged at my sleeve.

I slapped his hand away. “How do you even spray paint?”

“I’ll show you.” *** Ironically, though my aunts and shímasaní were adamant in their decision to keep us younguns within four walls during the night, they had no problem with sending us to the outhouse at 2 a.m. if the bathroom in the house wasn't an option. Occasionally, one of my cousins would walk into the bathroom and emerge five minutes later declaring that the toilet wouldn’t flush. Our cheii, or maternal grandfather, would follow to inspect the situation, then return, puffing an irritated sigh, and share the news—the water had been shut off. All of my siblings and cousins would groan.

Some months my shímasaní and aunt couldn’t pay the water bill. We all knew this meant the outhouse was again open for business. We hated it.

During the day, the outhouse was manageable.

Rancid, gross, and muggy, but nonetheless manageable. All of my cousins and siblings agreed: better a day outhouse visit than a night outhouse visit. But visiting the outhouse at night, no matter your preparation against it, was inevitable— especially for elementary school students with weak bladders.

You don’t need the experience of visiting an outhouse late at night to understand the sinkingpit-in-your-stomach reaction I’m describing. You’ve most likely felt it whenever you’ve had to enter a dark room because the light switch was far away from the door, or walked outside to feed the dog only to find that the porch light needed replacing, or braved the basement late at night because you left your cell phone charger plugged into the outlet down there. We all have childhood fears centered around similar experiences. Places tied to memories of dread and panic. Landscapes and stories that haunt our dreams, turning a simple set of basement stairs into a nightmare. The fear of what exists in the unknown constantly creeping at the back of our minds, breathing down our necks. Mine just happens to include an outhouse. *** “You hear that?”

Mykel shook his head. “Shut up.”

I struggled to remain serious. “You see that?” I pointed to a dip in the road.

“Fuck you.”

I nearly choked laughing. *** At the age of twenty, I now understand what my shímasaní was protecting us from. I now know what exists out there, what wanders the mesas surrounding our farmland. When I was younger, I knew there were things that simply weren’t right. People who went evil, becoming beings that took shelter under the night’s blanket. No one liked to talk about it, but yannis once had human origins. Their minds and spirits became one with the evil that can exist within spiritual power, their stories a mixture of tragedy and horror.

Though my friend Mykel and I joke about seeing a night-being running alongside the road or wandering

ARTS & CULTURE through the cornfields, we know when to be serious and when to avoid crossing lines that should never be crossed. Reader, you might consider the stories I’ve shared as simply that—stories. And you’re free to do so. But I believe there are things in this world that exist despite being inexplicable. Whether those things live in your closet or hide under your bed or are spotted along the highway at night, I suggest you keep my shímasaní’s words in mind: Don’t seek out what you know you can never understand. *** My shímasaní is a wise woman. I know I should listen to her more often. But every now and then, I swallow cultural fears for the sake of friendship. And that’s how Mykel and I found ourselves in the middle of nowhere, clutching our iPhones and pointing out shadows in the distance, pretending the quavering in our voices is from laughter—which it is. It’s just also laced with something resembling unease.

“Why are we doing this again?” I eyed my reflection in the window, then looked down at my phone in my lap. No service. Not surprising, but also not comforting.

“Because it’s fun.” His tone was nonchalant. I could almost believe he did this regularly on his own, without friends.

I turned to look at him, smiling. “And if we die?”

Mykel just shrugged.

“Dude, I gotta get home.” I checked the time— 2:43 a.m.

“I knew it.” He glanced at me. “You’re scared.”

I shook my head. “And you’re not?”

Mykel just shrugged again. “Just getting our spooks.”

More Treats than Tricks Halloween Memories

BY POST- TRICK-OR-TREATERS ILLUSTRATED BY HANNA RASHIDI

The House Unvisited

By Jennifer Osborne My first time trick-or-treating was also my mother’s first. Having just moved to Singapore from my mother’s home country, China, where I spent the first eight years of my life, we attended every schoolsponsored event in an effort to meet other expat families. My mother received notice at one Coffee Morning that there would be “trick-or-treating” in the neighborhood surrounding my school, so she promptly outfitted me and my sister with matching Cleopatra costumes and pumpkin-shaped buckets.

On Halloween night, we arrived to an utterly transformed version of our usual playdate surroundings: Houses were swallowed by mounds of cobwebs, porches were laden with lanterns, and, most importantly, parents were in ridiculous getups with 5-kg bags of candy. My mom was charmed by the festive decorations and the sight of little kids running around in costumes. As soon as we were old enough to go trick-or-treating unsupervised, she began preparing our house to receive young Halloween visitors.

There was just one problem—we lived 30 minutes away from the school and any other significant population of Americans. Since moving to the States, my mother has persevered despite the fact that the door to our side of the duplex isn’t visible from the street. No kids ever came trick-or-treating, and year after year, we wound up with enough Snickers bars and M&M’s to last us through Christmas. At most, the children of the downstairs neighbors would visit us.

It’s been years since I’ve been at home on

Halloween evening, but I’m comforted by the knowledge that, no matter what, my mom will be waiting by the door next Thursday night in a house bedecked with witches and ghosts, hoping that some wayward child will see our lights and come calling.

Wish upon a Starfish

By Sydney Lo When I was younger, Halloween was Cinderella’s Ball: an opportunity to become someone magical, heroic, special. What did it matter that I already wore a princess gown to my kindergarten class three days of the week? Or that I already had a foam sword I regularly used to fight “dragons” (the pine trees in my front yard)? Halloween was my moment to truly embody a storybook character. And, more than anything, that year, I wanted to be the Little Mermaid when I went trick-or-treating.

I had circled the costume in all the ad magazines my family got in the mail: a purple bikini top and a long green skirt that mimicked a tail. “It’s too cold,” my father stated when I gave him my sales pitch. He had a point; we lived in Minnesota, so each year there would already be piles of snow on the ground and belowfreezing temperatures well before October 31. Still, I badgered him, pointing out that since we already drove the car from house to house anyway, I would just be taking quick walks up and down driveways.

“Well, can you even walk in it?” he asked, halfjoking. I probably couldn’t, so I told him to roll me in our red wagon. He was even less entertained by this idea.

In the end, I didn’t get the costume. I don’t recall what I ended up dressing up as, or which houses we visited, or the kind of candy I got. I am left with the memory of an unfulfilled Halloween wish—one I can perhaps rectify now that I’m an adult. Then again, I doubt Providence will be much warmer than Minnesota this October.

The Costume Rival

By Julian Towers What didn’t they understand? It was I who was the chosen one, the boy who lived. The lightning bolt scar, the glasses with white tape on the bridge, the Quidditch gloves—these were all the intellectual property of J.K. Rowling, sure. But tonight, this special Halloween night, Harry Potter had been reserved just for me. So who was this fucker in the Gryffindor sweater two houses ahead?

As my family bounded from house to house, I

thought I overhead some cries of “Expelliarmus!” from the group further along our route. But it wasn’t until I received two mini Twix and a cherry Tootsie Roll Pop at Mrs. Tropp’s house that the dark truth revealed itself to me completely. As she beamed down at me from behind her goblin face paint (dealings with girls in intervening years have informed me that this was actually a “face mask”), I learned that I was “the second young wizard of the night!”

At age seven, my identity wasn’t yet secure enough to withstand such dissociative trauma. My parents tried to get me to continue down the street, but I wouldn’t budge. Instead, in protest, I began to eat one of the peanut candies I was supposed to turn in to our parents out of respect to my mortally allergic brother.

The EpiPen came swinging out, and I thought to myself that it resembled a wand.

A Picturesque Scare

By Amanda Ngo It started off as an uneventful Halloween night.

While one of my friends went all out, most of us were traditional, last-minute costumers. I, for one, put on a squid hat and called it a look.

The allure of the holiday was starting to fade for us; the only reason to go trick-or-treating was the free candy. Rejoicing in this time of year was left to the younger kids whose eyes lit up at the flashy lights and inflatable characters decorating the houses, and to the college kids who saw Halloween as a reason to throw some of the best themed parties of the year.

With our bags full, my friends and I were ready to call it a night when we heard metal scraping against the pavement. A little ways down the road, a masked man in a raggedy tee paced up and down the street, dragging a baseball bat behind him. The villain from Friday the 13th come alive. Alone.

Rational kids would have bolted in the other direction. Social media vultures like us, however, were actively drawn to morbid situations for the sake of getting that perfect photo.

After one of our friends egged us on, we approached the lone Jason Voorhees for a picture. I’ve never been one to scare easily, but in that moment, I was paralyzed. In the photo, my smile is forced on my face, overcompensating for my intense fear of this strange, silent man, whose only communication with us came in the form of heavy breathing.

I guess it’s a beautiful thing that some people never grow out of their love for Halloween. I guess it’s a terrifyingly beautiful thing.

OCTOBER 25, 2019!5

ARTS&CULTURE

Two Writers

"All Along the Watchtower" and the Beauty of Creating

BY GRIFFIN PLAAG ILLUSTRATED BY RÉMY POISSON

Let’s start simple: Bob Dylan is a Nobel Prize winner. Bob Dylan, with the flip of an amp switch, changed the course of popular music forever by merging folk and rock at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. Bob Dylan is also a strange religious zealot who has expressed less-than-savory views about women and once portrayed an n-word spouting racist in a song about boxing without batting an eye.

He’s complex, he’s talented, he’s revolutionary, and, according to my neighbor (who claims to be the granddaughter of Pete Seeger and to have met most of the ’60s folk vanguard along the way), he’s a pompous jerk.

I mention all of this to make it clear that I know exactly what kind of a person I’m reckoning with when I talk about Bob Dylan. Simply put, he’s kind of a bad dude. But he’s also, in my estimation, the most talented artist of the last hundred years—and I say artist as opposed to musician very intentionally, because, yes, Bob Dylan deserved his Nobel Prize in Literature. He’s responsible for what is probably my favorite song of all time, a song remembered not as his but as Jimi Hendrix’s: “All Along the Watchtower,” a 12-line folk ballad that’s uncharacteristically brief by Dylan’s standards.

I’m not the first person to speculate over the meaning of Dylan’s lyrics; YouTube is filled to the brim with speculative takes on what “All Along the Watchtower” is really about. Some people think its central characters—“the joker” and “the thief”—are Dylan and Elvis. Some people think the entire story is a Biblical parable. Personally, I believe the verses are Dylan talking to himself—an internal dialogue focused on the creative process. As an aspiring writer and poet (as well as a songwriter by moonlight), the song’s message—at least as I’ve interpreted it— extends far beyond its political foresight and becomes a kind of guidebook, a road map to being a creator.

Pull up a lyric sheet and follow along.

The song’s first verse is spoken primarily by the imprisoned “joker,” who more or less uses his allotted time to a) perpetuate an escape fantasy, b) complain about being beaten down by the world, and c) call everyone else a bunch of ignorant, sightless fools for not realizing the value of living. Yikes. As a person who too often expresses worldly cynicism myself, though, I recognize a lot of familiar ideas in the joker’s words—a desire to write off existence as pointless, to accuse other people of being less than me, to spend my time poking fun at them because finding real fulfillment is impossible. It’s an unhealthy mindset, but sometimes life gets to feeling brutally torpid and the act of creating (whether it’s writing, painting, or chemical synthesis) can seem pointless, futile.

This is Dylan’s lazy side, Dylan the cynic, Dylan the narcissist. It’s a sad way to open a song.

The second verse is sung from the perspective of a “thief”—an occupational choice that is not made lightly. Over the years, Dylan has been accused of plagiarizing the work of other artists, both from within the folk tradition and outside of it. And, of course, we would do well to remember that more or less all white artists since the early 20th century (if not earlier) have been creating within genres appropriated from black traditions. Pearl Jam stole from black people. Bon Iver stole from black people.

Get it through your heads, people. By personifying a part of himself as a thief, Dylan accepts a certain responsibility for his art’s history, acknowledging that even when he is capable of overcoming his cynicism, he’s engaging in creative larceny—an admission which, though clear-sighted, is quite sad in its own right and more or less tells the joker to cut the shit. He “kindly” (sarcastically, I think) reminds the joker that plenty of people are comfortable living as though life is “but a joke” (nice dis, thief ) but goes on

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Anita Sheih FEATURE Managing Editor Sydney Lo

“I thought I was alone, and then Christina Paxson stepped out of the shadows.”

Section Editors Sara Shapiro Erin Walden

– post- scarecrows, “scary sentences” 10.26.18

Staff Writer Anna Harvey

“If we think about the act of information acquisition like arranging furniture to decorate a room, we would not neglect thinking about the room holistically, nor would we neglect cleaning it and purifying it when necessary."

– Karya Sezener, “tidying up” 10.26.17

NARRATIVE Managing Editor Celina Sun Section Editors Liza Edwards-Levin Michelle Liu Jasmine Ngai

to insist that such indolence is “not our fate.” Then he tells the joker to put a sock in it because “the hour is getting late.” Here, Dylan’s Jekyll reminds his Hyde that a person with his creative gifts and a destiny to live up to (and a legacy of theft to make up for) isn’t allowed to simply tap out; Dylan has to give his all as a creator because his success as a white male artist is the ill-begotten product of a broken system and only someone with his command of language can tear that system down.

In what might be the greatest mic drop in lyrical history, Dylan then proceeds to do exactly that in the space of only two lines. “All along the watchtower,” he brays, “Princes kept the view / while all the women came and went / barefoot servants, too.”

If you don’t see why that’s a perfect description of the fucked up patriarchal institutions that have dominated world government for the better part of all historical memory, try listening to it a few thousand more times until it sinks in. Here, Dylan fulfills his purpose as prophet, overcoming his cynicism to circumscribe history in eighteen words—you know, like a badass. Dylan then changes course and tells us that “two riders were approaching,” which most interpreters believe to be a reference to the joker and the thief. I think so too, but there’s a double entendre here—“riders” sounds an awful lot like “writers.”

Apparently, Dylan never intended it to be heard this way—see the lyric sheet—but it’s fun to imagine how this reconfigures the song’s meaning. It’s also fun to imagine the joker and the thief as one man, Dylan himself, riding a steed across a windswept plain like some weird beatnik knight, curly locks thrown out backwards, ready to irrevocably fuck up the royal social order. How’s he going to do it, you ask? Why, by singing “All Along the Watchtower,” of course.

And thus does the circular myth of Dylan’s opus close itself, the joker and the thief conversing in perpetuity, the song’s beginning its end. It’s a deeply egotistical moment, with Dylan figuring himself as messianic, a divine figure. But it’s also an inspiring sentiment, not because it dismantles political history in the space of twelve lines (although it absolutely does that), but because, political overtones aside, it’s a song about what it means to be an artist. It’s an edict, a song about why creators must create. It’s a prophetic reminder, a reason to wake up every day and labor to speak what you believe. Whether you’re a biologist or a poet, and whether or not you think that his Nobel Prize was earned, you have to admit—that’s what all good creation should do.

Staff Writers Kaitlan Bui Siena Capone Danielle Emerson Naomi Kim Anneliese Mair Grace Park ARTS & CULTURE Managing Editor Julian Towers Section Editors Nicole Fegan Griffin Plaag Staff Writers Rob Capron David Kleinman

LIFESTYLE Managing Editor Kahini Mehta

SOCIAL MEDIA Head Editor Camila Pavon

Section Editor Caitlin McCartney

Editor Paola Solano

Staff Writers Eashan Das Lauren Toneatto

HEAD ILLUSTRATOR Rémy Poisson

COPY Copy Chief Amanda Ngo

LAYOUT Co-Chiefs Amy Choi Nina Yuchi

Copy Editors Maddy McGrath Jennifer Osborne Mohima Sattar

Designers Joanne Han Steve Ju Iris Xie WEB MASTER Jeff Demanche

Want to be involved?

Email: anita_sheih@brown.edu!

6!POST–

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2019

AOTW FROM PAGE 1 swing harder. Beyond that, it’s just using your eyes and communicating with your team.

How are you making the most of your final season?

I’ve felt the pressure, honestly. I want senior year to be my best year so far, so I’ve been really keeping an eye on my stats from previous seasons. Trying to beat those numbers has been a goal. On a team level, we’re part of a changing program. We have a new coach who is just in his second year. With that comes a lot of cultural change and change in actual play.

We finished seventh in the league my (first) year and eighth my sophomore

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS

year. In Coach (Ahen) Kim’s first year, we bumped up to fifth. So, I’m hoping my senior year will also be our best conference finish.

Are there any specific statistics you’re aiming to beat?

My (first) year was my best offensive year — 192 kills for the season.

Right now, I’m at 209 this season. I’m excited that I’ve beaten (my first-year mark) while we’re only halfway through (Ivy League play), and I’d like to keep pushing it.

What’s your favorite workout facility on campus?

During (the) season our training time is fully committed to the team. We do our lifting as a team in the athlete

area, which is a nice facility. On my own time I go to yoga classes. When we’re not in season, I don’t work out that much on campus. I go to Orange Theory on North Main a lot — it’s so fun.

What are your interests outside of volleyball?

I love the beach, of course, being from California. I really like to ski during the winter. (My family) goes to (Park City, Utah) a lot to ski. You could say skiing is my secondary sport.

I spend a lot of time playing beach volleyball at home. I definitely spend a lot of time at workout classes.

How will volleyball factor into your life when you leave Brown?

Volleyball has taught me a lot of

lessons, especially (from) being a leader on the team this year. … Time management skills are key (in volleyball), but they will be later on in life, too.

Volleyball teaches you a level of drive and commitment to something I’ll now always have in me, having played the sport for this long. It encourages you to stay 100 percent in everything you’re doing and put that extra time in because you realize the payoff really does come later. Playing specifically, there won’t be much volleyball after college. My body hurts, and I don’t know how much it’ll be able to take after this. But beach volleyball is considered a separate NCAA sport. So there is a chance that if I were to go back to school for my MBA, I could play beach volleyball during that time, as long as

9

I’m under 25.

What are your plans after graduation?

I did an internship in advertising over the summer and loved it. I definitely want to try to get into an advertising agency or marketing team, maybe fashion oriented. I don’t like setting super strict plans for my future; I’d rather just see where it takes me. But with advertising you don’t get hired until around May anyway, so we will see. A position at Chanel would be the dream job. With volleyball on the side, for sure. I’ll always play volleyball for fun, it’s ingrained in me.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

MOMA FROM PAGE 1 Rockefeller began her art collection during the 1920s, buying pieces when they were “still somewhat affordable,” while her husband devoted his efforts to projects such as the restoration of the Palace of Versailles. Despite Rockefeller’s different taste in art, he did financially support the MoMA. Although Aldrich Rockefeller’s contribution to the founding of the MoMA is widely acknowledged, her connection to Providence is less well-known.

“It’s one of those things you always have to tell each generation, all these great stories of how Providence and Brown is involved in so many important things,” Neumann said, recalling his students’ surprise when he mentioned the MoMA’s link to Providence in class. He emphasized how “life-enriching” knowledge of one’s local and environmental history can be. With a rich history and vibrant cast of notable and influential figures, Providence in particular gives students and residents of the city “lots of reasons to be proud of this particular location.”

The redesigned MoMA contributes to the constant reorganization of history that occurs within every generation, Neumann said. “It’s always our history, it’s not just history that sits there.”

The renovated museum, which officially opened to the public Oct. 21, offers newly expanded spaces that aid in the process of rethinking and reorganizing history, as well as the artistic canon, Neumann added.

Professor of History of Art and Architecture Lindsay Caplan agreed, saying that the new space provides “a moment to re-evaluate the narrative MoMA has been so important in

SUMMER ZHANG / HERALD

creating.”

While Martino Stierli, the Philip Johnson chief curator of architecture and design at the MoMA, also recognized that “the museum was in a way instrumental in establishing and maintaining a canonical understanding of art history,” he believes that the museum can also play a part in challenging preconceived notions.

The “new curatorial vision” that directed this expansion project aimed to “rethink in general how we think about the collection, how we can activate the

collection and how we can tell more complex histories with the collection than we were before,” Stierli added.

For Stierli, the museum’s collection exists “as a kind of living organism” that previously existed in isolated parts, and now attempts to put underrepresented art in new conversations and configurations. By “no longer using the notion of permanence” and implementing a rotating system that changes the galleries every 18 months, the MoMA hopes to show that there is something new to be said about mod-

ernism. “Modern art and modern art history is actually not a linear process but is something that happens at different speeds, at different times and in different places,” Stierli said.

The redesign has synthesized the various curatorial departments into the “overarching structure of the organization,” Stierli said. He hopes the new format will provide visitors and the art itself with greater visibility. By reorganizing how exhibits are presented, the renovation intends to provide new insight to visitors as they pass through

the galleries and realize how distinct art movements, created in different mediums, occur in the same time period — despite appearing entirely incongruent at first glance.

While the redesign has certainly brought significant changes to the MoMA, the museum still embodies the radical aims of its original founders, including those of Aldrich Rockefeller. Her “brilliance,” as Neumann described it, continues to be exhibited in the museum’s collection today.

10

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | COMMENTARY

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2019

EDITORIAL

Students should do more to engage with UCS Every semester, The Herald polls the undergraduate student body to gauge student opinion on various community topics. One question that has remained consistent across each semester’s poll is, “Do you approve or disapprove of the way the Undergraduate Council of Students is handling its job?” This fall, 53.3 percent of the student body reported having “no opinion,” and the percentage of students who have taken this stance has ranged between 40 to 60 percent — a sizable sum — over the last three years. These results reflect a disconnect between the undergraduate community and its student government — one that should prompt both UCS members and undergrads to consider working harder to dissolve barriers to student government engagement.

This board has long opined on our desire for a more representative student government, but we feel it is important to begin by acknowledging the Council’s recent heightened efforts to engage students. This semester, UCS created club liaisons, who are directly responsible for making the Council and its resources more accessible. Moreover, it recently introduced first-year representatives — who hold office hours in Faunce every Friday — and held a successful election to fill these seats, with 65 percent of the first-year class voting. These changes are welcome news, and we look forward to the student feedback UCS will incorporate into their agendas from these initiatives.

That being said, the persistence of student body indifference to the Council’s work does not bode well for the campus community. Many students remain unclear about the role UCS plays on campus and seem unaware of the Council’s quotidian objectives. UCS must continue its efforts to improve student body engagement, but students must be more willing to connect with UCS as well. The Herald’s poll results suggest a general sense of apathy among many students toward the Council, but by its very nature, UCS requires student input to formulate an impactful and relevant agenda. Moreover, UCS depends on student participation to make tangible changes on campus and to hold influence in University

decision-making processes.

The Council’s governing power certainly has limits, but students should not overlook UCS’s capacity to share student perspectives with the University’s administration. Indeed, the Council’s renewed efforts to connect students with administrators over this past year saw UCS performing at its best. For example, UCS hosted an open forum last week with Brown Dining Services administrators, which allowed students to voice concerns about the University’s handling of meal plan accommodation requests after the University made the decision to require sophomores to stay on meal plan. To be clear, the efforts of student advocates — like those in Project LETS — who worked considerably with the University to ensure meal plan accommodations would be met, also deserve immense recognition. Nevertheless, we found it gratifying to see UCS respond to student voices and use its platform to facilitate important conversations between students and administrative decision-makers.

Previous UCS members have also shown how the Council can use its platform for good. Former UCS President Viet Nguyen ’17 made national headlines when he used his position to call on Brown and its seven peer institutions in the Ivy League to eliminate the application fee for low-income students. Thanks to Nguyen’s advocacy, the University officially began waiving the fee in fall 2017.

This initiative is an important reminder of why we should not remain indifferent or ignorant to the power UCS wields — and the role that we can play in its direction as students. We encourage current UCS members to reflect on the Council’s rich history and continue to call on community voices so that the Council can use its platform as a vehicle for meaningful change.

Brown students are far from indifferent to many community issues, as recent student organizing and protesting around #BrownDivest, #NoTechforICE and Warren Kanders Must Go demonstrate. All of these protests reflect the immense passion and opinions students

have about the decisions that the University makes.

But to be clear, the onus to increase student government engagement does not lie completely with students outside of UCS. As a body whose purpose is to represent and advocate for students, UCS could do better in responding to student mobilization and remaining consistent with that support. For instance, our previous issues with the wording of the Brown Divest referendum question aside, if the Council believes that the 69 percent of students who voted in favor of divestment represents the will of the undergraduate student body, it should publicly and persistently advocate for the referendum’s enforcement even though the election season has ended. As we encourage students to use the UCS platform to make their voices heard, we also hope that UCS can follow through in doing the most to support them.

Ultimately, we hope that first-year students, who currently have the highest “no opinion” rate among the student body, at 37.3 percent, will capitalize on newly-created opportunities to hear about the Council’s work and how its agenda affects their lives on campus.

But overall, we hope that students of all years feel encouraged to connect with their student government, whether it be through following their updates on Facebook, attending their general body meetings or joining UCS as a voting member. As UCS continues to focus on improving student engagement this semester, we hope our fellow students will rise to the occasion and engage with UCS too.

Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board: its editors, Grace Layer ’20 and Krista Stapleford ’21, and its members, Dylan Tian ’21, Eduard Muñoz-Suñé ’20, Jonathan Douglas ’20, and Riley Pestorius ’21. Send comments to editorials@ browndailyherald.com. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.

C O R R E CT I O N A previous version of the Oct. 24 article “Herald poll finds almost 40 percent of undergrads feel unsafe around campus after dark” incorrectly named the acronym for the Providence Department of Public Safety as PPSD. The correction version of the acronym is PDPS. The Herald regrets the error.

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FRIDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2019

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | COMMENTARY

11

Brown University must cut its contract with Palantir SARA VAN HORN ’21, ANGEL MENDEZ-FLORES ’20, BRENDAN CAVER ’21, CAIYA SANCHEZSTRAUSS ’21, KIELAN DONAHUE ’20, AND PETER HAHN ’20 OP-ED CONTRIBUTORS

Palantir Technologies, a software company based out of Silicon Valley, recently renewed a three-year contract to provide crucial products to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The tech company makes data analysis software that ICE has employed in conducting workplace raids and in committing state violence at the US-Mexico border. Despite these offenses, the University maintains a financial contract with Palantir. Given the company’s documented ties to human rights abuses against immigrant communities, Brown Immigrant Rights Coalition (BIRC) demands that the University cut its contract with Palantir.

Palantir allocates $15,000 annually to Brown University’s Department of Computer Science through the Industry Partners Program, an initiative that allows certain companies to recruit on campus through tech talks and career fairs.

BIRC echoes the call of The Herald’s Editorial Page Board for the department to publicly clarify its policies and to create an ethical standard for corporate partnerships. In creating this ethical standard, it is imperative that the department cut its ties to Palantir.

In an attempt to pressure the CS Department, BIRC has circulated a petition among students and alums and has reached out to CS faculty and administrators. Additionally, allies participated in a protest at the Career Fair to call attention to certain companies’ financial and professional ties to ICE. The petition has received over 260 student signatures. The department has been opaque about its involvement with Palantir: It has removed it from an official listing of IPP companies online, presumably to avoid widespread criticism. Since the department has not released any official statement declaring that it has cut ties to Palantir, we are assuming that it continues to maintain Palantir in its IPP contracts.

The technology supplied by Palantir is crucial to ICE’s continued operation. According to language from the company’s renewed contract with ICE, “Palantir, the software developer, is the only firm able to ensure the continued effectiveness of the ICM system.” The Investigative Case Management system allows ICE agents to screen immigrants at the border; this operation, designed specifically to help ICE dis-

ing the University of California-Berkeley, Stanford University, Yale, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Carnegie Mellon University.

Former Assistant Secretary of State Michael Posner decried the company in Forbes, writing that “when firms like Palantir compete for lucrative government contracts, it is incumbent on them to take seriously the human rights risks that are associated with their services. To

“We believe that the department cannot embrace an ethical commitment to technology without cutting its contract with the corporation partially responsible for tremendous violence against immigrant communities across the country.”

suade children from joining their families in the United States, resulted in the arrests of at least 443 people over 90 days in 2017. Palantir has received widespread national criticism for its close relationship with ICE. Immigrant rights groups like Mijente have called on universities across the country to cut their ties with the company. Hundreds of Palantir employees have publicly protested their company’s relationship with ICE. Earlier this year, hundreds of academics pressured UC Berkeley to drop Palantir as a sponsor of a privacy scholars conference. In late August, Lesbians Who Tech dropped Palantir as a sponsor of its annual conference, citing its ties to immigration enforcement. Just two days later, the Grace Hopper Celebration, the largest global conference for women in technology, dropped Palantir as a sponsor, just hours after learning of its role in human rights abuses.

There have been similar protests and petitions at universities across the country, includ-

date, Palantir has failed to assume this essential responsibility.”

Alex Karp, the CEO of Palantir, has dismissed these criticisms, stating that “immigration policy is not a software challenge; it’s a political one.” The claim of technological neutrality — the belief that technology is a neutral tool that can be divorced from politics — should sound extremely familiar. It is reminiscent of the assertion by Warren Kanders, CEO of the tear gas manufacturing company Safariland Group, that “as with any product, ultimate responsibility for its use falls on the individuals involved in their use.” Kanders, whose products have been used to suppress protests on the US-Mexico border, claims technological neutrality in order to justify the violence and harm of his company’s products. This claim is neither intellectually credible nor benign. It ignores the fact that state violence depends on available technology and on the corporations that pro-

vide that technology.

The Brown CS department seems to be re-evaluating the broader philosophy of technological neutrality, but this has not extended to the IPP program. This past spring, the department announced its plan to hire 10 Ethics TAs to further a new initiative called “Responsible Computer Science.” These TAs are charged with developing curricula and facilitating discussions around the ethical use of technology.

As Department Chair and Professor of Computer Science Ugur Cetintemel told the The Herald, “We want our concentrators to think about the ethical and societal implications of what they do, not as an afterthought but as another fundamental dimension they should consider as they develop their work.” By hiring ethics TAs, the department has implicitly acknowledged that those who wield technological tools are responsible for their impact, an argument with which we agree. So, the department’s blatant hypocrisy in implementing new Ethics programming while continuing to support Palantir’s policies and presence on campus cannot be dismissed.

We believe that the department cannot embrace an ethical commitment to technology without cutting its contract with the corporation partially responsible for tremendous violence against immigrant communities across the country. The department should honor its commitment to ethical education and sever ties with Palantir.

Sara Van Horn ’21 can be reached at sara_van_horn@brown.edu, Angel Mendez-Flores ’20 can be reached at angel_ mendez-flores@brown.edu, Brendan Caver ’21 can be reached at brendan_caver@ brown.edu, Caiya Sanchez-Strauss ’21 can be reached at caiya_sanchez_strauss@ brown.edu, Kielan Donahue ’20 can be reached at kielan_donahue@brown.edu, and Peter Hahn ’20 can be reached at peter_ hahn@brown.edu. Please send responses to this opinion to letters@browndailyherald. com and op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com.

12

THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2019

SCIENCE AND RESEARCH

‘Portal-ble’ reimagines reality by opening window into world of AR New augmented reality software enables users to reach into, touch virtual objects

BY EMILIJA SAGAITYTE SENIOR STAFF WRITER Imagine grabbing a block from a stack on a table, throwing a ball toward a caricature in your backyard in a game of Pokemon GO or lighting up a dim room — only to realize that the cubes, the ball, the Pokemon pal and the illuminating lantern do not actually exist.

A new technology called ‘Portal-ble’ now brings to life these theorized possibilities. The software constructs these things in an alternate reality depicted through the screen of a smartphone, and with it, one’s hand can traverse the boundary into this virtual landscape, blurring the lines between the real world and augmented reality.

Developed by Assistant Professor of Computer Science Jeff Huang in collaboration with students in his lab and other University faculty members, the software incorporates virtual objects into a person’s surroundings. The technology also requires an additional attached infrared sensor to recreate a user’s hand and show its interaction with nonexistent objects in this virtual world. The sensor is connected to a mini-computer in the form of a compute stick that processes the input information and sends a wireless signal to the phone to simulate the image, Huang said.

The researchers have made the software available to the public for download so that anyone could build upon it to develop their own applications. Solely relying on the camera of a phone to run the technology is sufficient, Huang said, but for an optimal user experience, an infrared sensor is needed to provide depth-perception and expand the field of view.

The idea for the concept was born about three years ago, a time when virtual reality and augmented reality devices were popular but in need of improvement. VR systems had at the time existed primarily as wearable headsets, and the researchers hoped to change that by using a portable, everyday item that many people owned — a smartphone — to allow users to partake in these alternate realities while still interacting with their real environments. Smartphones are capa-

COURTESY OF JEFF HUANG

‘Portal-ble’ uses a smartphone and sensor to recreate people’s hands in a virtual world. Users can handle virtual objects and draw pictures in their surroundings. ble of rapidly processing images, and Huang said. email to The Herald that the product the perfect physical coordination nectheir use eliminates the need to wear The technology will correct for does increase accessibility to augment- essary in the real world. cumbersome devices. Huang also hoped natural errors in the way people in- ed reality. But “as this kind of augmenHolding up a smartphone and the they could improve upon the unsatis- teract with the objects, like grasping tation becomes increasingly overlaid attached sensor may be heavy for a fying experience in some augmented an object too strongly or too lightly in onto our experiences, it becomes in- length of time, but Qian, who presented reality environments, like the act of the way they move their hand, Huang creasingly difficult to determine what on Portal-ble at the ACM Symposium swiping a screen to capture Pokemon said. Users also learn and adapt as they is real and what is not,” Gonsher cau- on User Interface Software and Techin Pokemon GO. continue to use the product because tioned. nology this week, expects smartphones In scenarios like Pokemon GO, “all the app can train people by vibrating, In one application, Portal-ble was to become more lightweight in years your interactions are happening on a for instance, when a person’s hand gets used by RISD students to map a 3D to come. screen where the (actions) are supposed close to the virtual object they plan garden. Another program allows a user “Apart from directly controlling to be interpreted as part of the 3D envi- to touch. to carry a virtual lantern while the soft- (augmented or virtual reality environronment, so there’s a disjunction here,” One of the challenges of using a ware recreates the shadows and light ments) with your mind — which is not Jing Qian GS, one of Portal-ble’s de- phone to simulate three-dimensional contrast that someone would see if they possible yet — the most practical option velopers, said. objects is the loss of depth perception were actually lighting up the room, is to use bare hands. To get there, PorThe researchers tried to maximize that occurs when someone moves from Huang said. tal-ble provides the much needed systhe way people interacted with the watching the world with two eyes to The technology allows for the cre- tematic analysis of the usability issues augmented environment, keeping the viewing everything through a single ation of many other programs for a that may arise,” Assistant Professor at screen as a mere window to the world camera. But the infrared sensor attach- variety of applications in the future. the Institute for Software Research at as opposed to the means of interaction ment in Portal-ble solves this problem, Portal-ble could theoretically be used Carnegie Mellon Mayank Goel, who also with it.

Huang said. in a medical setting to view and vir- attended the USIT 2019 conference, “That’s exactly the most interesting Assistant Professor of the Practice tually touch the internal components wrote in an email to The Herald. part of it — how do we sort of trick of Engineering and Computer Science of a human body. In another example, “I know my students and I are going ourselves into making these virtual Ian Gonsher, who was not involved in Huang described how a user could to use it as soon as we get a chance!” objects as close to reality as possible?” the creation of Portal-ble, wrote in an throw a dart and hit a target without Goel wrote to The Herald.

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