April 17, 2019

The Chronicle

See Inside Graeme Stinson’s return uncertain

Page 8

T H E I N D E P E N D E N T D A I LY AT D U K E U N I V E R S I T Y

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019 DUKECHRONICLE.COM

ONE HUNDRED AND FOURTEENTH YEAR, ISSUE 53

APPLICATION NATION

Protester removed Duke’s application increase in context from activist’s talk

By Carter Forinash Selena Qian | Staff Graphics Designer

Staff Reporter

By Binisha Patel Contributing Reporter

In recent years, many higher education institutions have seen an uptick in applicants and a decrease in acceptance rate.

But this year is an exception for some elite universities.

For the Class of 2023, Duke had a larger increase in applications—around 4,300—compared to all Ivy League schools, the University of Chicago, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Northwestern University and Johns Hopkins University.

Princeton University experienced a decrease of 2,566 applications, and Cornell had 2,210 fewer applicants.

Duke also reported record lows for both early and regular admittance, with an 18.2% early acceptance rate and a 5.7% regular acceptance rate. The year before, 21.4% of early applicants were admitted, and 6.4% were accepted regular decision.

Christoph Guttentag, Duke’s dean of undergraduate admissions, said in 2018 that the number of early decision applications the University received for the Class of 2023 was the largest one-year increase that Duke has recorded.

“We were struck by the talents and accomplishments of so many of the students who applied this year, and had a difficult time choosing from among them,” Guttentag said in a Duke Today release about the early decision acceptees.

Duke has now broken its record for number of applications received for the fifth year in a row.

In a 2018 interview with The Chronicle, Steve Nowicki, then dean and vice provost for undergraduate education, attributed this increase to students being able to apply to many schools on the Common Application.

He said that this practice creates a positive feedback loop that gives rise to more applications submitted to highly selective See APPLICATIONS on Page 4

Meet the first lemur born this season

By John Markis

Other than one protester being removed, Linda Sarsour’s on-campus talk on “Islam and Intersectionality” took place on campus Monday night without issues—and with a heavy security presence.

Sarsour, a prominent political activist who co-chaired the 2017 Women’s March on Washington, touched on a range of topics, from current policies under President Donald Trump to her own experience as an activist, Monday at Schiciano Auditorium.

The talk featured a heavy security presence, with Sarsour arriving on campus less than three weeks after another Sarsour talk drew protesters in nearby Hillsborough.

The speaker did not shy away from the topic of Palestine, discussions of which have led to allegations of antisemitism against her in the past. Sarsour voiced support for the Palestinian people and the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement.

She said that her criticisms are focused on the Israeli regime—Sarsour has said that her criticism of Israel does not make her anti-Semitic.

“When I critique, I critique the state and the government of Israel, because in fact within Israel there are Jews who are leading the fight for Palestinians within Israel,” Sarsour said.

During the question and answer part of her talk, a protester carrying a blue and white flag interrupted Sarsour’s answer to a question about her support for the Palestinian movement. The protester called Sarsour a liar and an anti-Semite before he was removed from the room by event security.

Sarsour’s talk included discussion of intersectionality, a term coined by civil rights academic and lawyer Kimberlé Crenshaw. As Sarsour explained it, intersectionality involves understanding that one person’s identity is an interconnected web of different identities that they bring to the table. “[Crenshaw] basically said that you can’t talk about gender justice without talking about racial justice,” Sarsour said. “You can’t talk about racial justice and gender justice without talking about economic justice, environmental justice.”

Staff Reporter

Photo by David Haring, Courtesy of Duke Lemur Center Marie, the newest Coquerel’s sifaka at the Lemur Center, was born Feb. 23.

See ACTIVIST on Page 4

Make room, lemurs—there’s a new Coquerel’s sifaka in Durham, and her name is Marie.

On Feb. 23, 2019, the first lemur of the breeding season was born. At just more than 100 grams at birth, the equivalent of an apple, Marie’s arrival marked the first addition to the Duke Lemur Center under Executive Director Greg Dye. Notably, Marie is the granddaughter of Jovian, a resident of the DLC himself and central character in Nickelodeon’s 1990s television show “Zoboomafoo.”

Marie’s parents, Gertrude and Remus, met only last year, and the DLC was not expecting the two to mate so suddenly.

Staffers were exuberant when Gertrude’s mundane physical exam exposed something extraordinary.

As soon as the birth became imminent, the DLC quickly shifted into gear. Director of Communications Sara Clark described the process as exhaustive but certainly worth the effort.

“As baby watch approaches, the lemurs’ caretakers get busy preparing the ‘baby suite’ with cozy nest boxes and nesting materials. Prospective mothers are closely monitored See LEMUR on Page 3

Mary Helen Wood | Associate Photography Editor Activist Linda Sarsour speaks at Duke Monday night.

Arts and Culture: ‘On Cinema’

Where will Daniel Jones play in the NFL?

‘How to have depression’

Film symposium discusses film in a digital age at the Franklin Humanities Institute’s Friday event.

PAGE 7

Our sports columnist weighs potential landing spots for Duke’s quarterback as the NFL draft approaches.

PAGE 9

Columnist Rebecca Torrence opens handling college life with depression.

INSIDE — News 2 | Sports 4 | Crossword 9 | Opinion 10 | Serving the University since 1905 |

@dukechronicle @dukebasketball |

up

about PAGE 11

@thedukechronicle | © 2019 The Chronicle

2 | WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019

dukechronicle.com

The Chronicle

Housekeeper and city councilwoman:

Rhode Island lawmaker brings new perspective to city council

By Lena Yannella Contributing Reporter

The Chronicle’s Lena Yannella recently sat down with Providence, R.I. city councilwoman Carmen Castillo when Castillo was on campus for a talk.

Splitting her time between working as a housekeeper and a lawmaker, Castillo discusses how one aspect of her life impacts the other, and she considers her challenges and experiences since immigrating to the United States and beginning her time in office.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

imagined that you would ever become a politician?

CC: No. When I came here, I really hated political people because I saw that they weren’t doing the right things. So I said, “I hate you!”

TC: Are there any political issues in particular that motivated you to run for office ?

CC: I’m the woman who fights for everything in her life.

And when I run for political positions, it’s not because I want to be a political person. I’m running for the situation. My city councilperson passed away, and we needed someone to represent the community. When the community members asked me to do it, I was really scared and didn’t want to, but they said, “We are here for you, we will help you.” I said, “Yes.” The Chronicle: How do you balance working as a I won my first election, got to the second one, I went on to councilwoman and as a hotel housekeeper? the third one because when you do something with passion, Carmen Castillo: When I’m housekeeping in the hotel and you want to continue to do it. And that’s when I’m a city councilwoman, it’s two different worlds. You need to be where Someone always mentions why I made my third term on the city council. And I feel more comfortable you are in each moment. that I’m the housekeeper. here now.

When I started, I was really scared TC: Does your background as an I say it’s not true. I’m the and nervous and I said, “Oh my God, immigrant and your work as a hotel woman. I have a brain. employee enhance your ability to understand what am I doing? I’m not prepared to be and represent your constituents? carmen castillo a city councilperson, and my English is PROVIDENCE, R.I. CITY COUNCILWOMAN not articulate.”

CC: Yes. Because, you know, I’m an Someone always mentions that I’m the immigrant and a minority individual. housekeeper. I say it’s not true. I’m the I’m a woman, Latina and it’s a lot of frustration for people and they need to still believe. And woman. I have a brain. It’s sad that people judge me based on those things, or based on my education. They don’t think about I understand my community, that’s why I understand me like I’m a human, like I have a brain. what they are, what they need, what is needed in my neighborhood, what I want to see happen.

TC: Did you have a mentor? Who helped you achieve TC: What obstacles did you face when you immigrated to your goals?

CC: My mom was my first mentor. She organized the women the United States from the Dominican Republic and how did in my country, organized the students to achieve the first level you overcome those obstacles? for education, and helped organize the people to fight because CC: When I came here, I didn’t speak any English. English they believed the government doesn’t do the right thing. is hard to learn, and when I came here it was really difficult to understand how everything worked.

And the second one was my city councilperson. I saw him, a man and member of a minority group, working hard and then being discriminated against all the time because TC: What helped you overcome those obstacles? he was Latino. I worked with him, and he inspired me. I CC: School. I took an English class at the public library that saw him being arrested for defending people, marching they offer for people like me—you know, immigrants. They with people, and really fight with me for the workers, for want to help immigrants understand when people are talking immigration, for everything. to them because we need to learn English in order to go the doctor office. We really needed to work. We all really needed TC: After working as a councilwoman for about eight years, English for something. have you learned certain tactics or strategies that help you I passed the first and second step in the library but I needed to learn more. We had a union negotiation and forced the better accomplish your goals?

CC: In the seven years or so that I’ve been here, I have company to give ESL classes to the workers too. seen a lot of things change, like how the city council sees the TC: At that point when you immigrated, could you have

Courtesy of Rhode Island City Council Carmen Castillo, who didn’t know English when she immigrated to the United States, is serving as a city councilwoman.

community differently. The lawyers and professionals sit down with the housekeeping woman, and I don’t have a degree. I don’t have an education in this country. Also, we have had more new city council people coming in, and we have had more opportunities to work together.

TC: What would be your advice to a young person who wants to become a politician?

CC: I would tell them, “you have a lot of opportunities.” I believe education is the key, giving education to kids. Being involved in politics doesn’t mean being a rich person, or that you can do whatever you want because you have power.

When you decide to be a politician, it should be because you want to change the community and give opportunity to others. Young people have the future in their hands right now because we are old-fashioned. But technology gives them the tools and school gives them the chance to do better than we are doing right now.

find housing

at The Chronicle’s online guide to living near Duke.

The Chronicle

dukechronicle.com

Alum Omari Swinton elected president of National Economics Association

By Kari Larsen Contributing Reporter

Omari Swinton—Duke economics alumnus and associate professor of economics at Howard University—wants to break down barriers.

After being recently elected president of the National Economics Association, which “promote[s] the professional lives” of minorities in the field, Swinton—M.A. ‘03 and Ph.D. ‘07—wants to combat factors that discourage people of color from pursuing careers in economics.

“As a profession, if we don’t improve the way that we recruit students, we will always have a problem with diversity,” Swinton said. “I think that we struggle with diversity as a profession on several different levels and a lot of it is what people see when they are first exposed to economics.”

In his own research career, Swinton has focused his attention toward the impact of race on success in academia. In a paper cowritten with Rhonda Vonshay Sharpe, founder and president of the Women’s Institute for Science, Equity and Race, Swinton used data to investigate patterns in degrees awarded to black individuals and their success in academic fields.

They found that black women earned twice as many bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees as black men, and black female professors encounter fewer barriers to success in academia than those who came before them.

In a news release, Swinton said that it is important for universities to value diversity.

“Many universities have a commitment to diversity, but don’t always put it into practice,” Swinton said.

For Swinton, this new role at the helm of the NEA is the result of a lifelong interest in a field that he describes as more than just an academic discipline.

“Economics is useful in many different facets of life...It’s a way of thinking, a logic to approach problems in a different way,” Swinton said. “It’s a way to solve things in a way that has defined values.”

Recognizing the way systems of defined value emerge

in different areas and experiences, Swinton has explored ideas such as the conceptual economics of school grades in his research.

After the historically black Benedict College initiated an effort-based grade scale for those in first-year and secondyear-level courses in 2004—entitled Success Equals Effort— Swinton found that effectively assigning a system of value to effort led to a strong positive correlation between “effort” and “knowledge.” With certain restrictions, this can “be interpreted as ‘effort producing ‘knowledge.’”

As the son of an economist, Swinton can trace his interest in economics back to his early years.

“My dad was an economist,” Swinton said. “Ever since I was See SWINTON on Page 4

Special to the Chronicle Omari Swinton received his Master’s and Ph.D. degrees at Duke.

Term 1: May 15-June 27 Term 2: July 1-August 11

Let your future run through Summer Session 2019

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019 | 3

LEMUR FROM PAGE 1 for changes in behavior and other clues that the birth is approaching,” Clark said. “Once the infant arrives, both baby and mom receive a thorough examination by the veterinary staff to make sure both are doing well.”

Although unexpected, Marie developed rapidly, and Gertrude has performed wonderfully as a first-time mother, according to a release from DLC. The former has gained weight and has looked more and more attentive in recent weeks, while the latter provides ample room on her abdomen for warmth and security.

After a month to maintain her well-being, staffers finally gathered for the highlight of the young lemur’s life—the designation ceremony.

All of the DLC’s Coquerel’s sifakas derive their name from Western emperors and nobles, and Marie’s namesake is Marie of Luxembourg, who was approximately 18 when she was coronated as the queen of France in the 14th century.

Although she is the first newcomer this spring, Marie will certainly not be the last. Coquerel’s sifakas breed significantly earlier than other lemurs, an adaptive feature so as to avoid competition for essential resources. The DLC anticipates births from a multitude of species in the subsequent months.

These new infants do attract large crowds for their adorable nature, but Clark and the DLC ensure that visitors remember the importance of these pups to the vitality of lemurs as a whole.

“Genetic diversity among our lemurs is so important,” Clark said. “The more genetically diverse a population is, the more resilient it is, the healthier it is, and the better it can adapt to environmental pressures—crucial factors in the fight to protect lemurs from extinction.”

The DLC has celebrated the births of nearly 3,300 pups since its inception, and breeding makes up a crucial aspect of its mission. According to Clark, the DLC has become an ideal “genetic safety net” for endangered and critically endangered species from Madagascar.

The Coquerel’s sifaka in particular faces an immense constraint on its access to land.

As a result, its status was changed from endangered to critically endangered last year, an indication of the urgency required to preserve the species.

BE THE FIRST TO KNOW

ABOUT NEW ARRIVALS, SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, THE LATEST IN TECHNOLOGY, SALES EVENTS, AND MORE.

SIGN UP! The University Store Duke eSTORE Duke Technology Center Gothic Bookshop News & Events Medical Center Store Secret Sales Class of 2022

summersession.duke.edu summer@duke.edu

To sign up, visit our website at www.dukestores.duke.edu and click on the BTFTK icon on the left.

Our Privacy Policy: We respect your right to personal privacy. We promise to use this subscription service for the express purpose of keeping you informed of only those services that you have requested. Your personal information will not be disclosed to any third parties. We hope you will find our e-mails of benefit. We promise to keep them informative and to-the-point. You will have the option of unsubscribing from this service with each e-mail campaign.

OPERATION: Stores Administration

PUBLICATION: Chronicle

The Chronicle

dukechronicle.com

4 | WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019

SWINTON FROM PAGE 3 a little kid, I’ve been surrounded by economists. My father was actually in the NEA...and I used to go to the conferences with him as a kid, and I knew then that I wanted to be in this field.”

After receiving his B.S. from Florida A&M University, Swinton went on to complete his Master’s degree and Ph.D. in economics at Duke. For Swinton, one of the most rewarding parts of his role as a professor is seeing his students pursue graduate degrees in economics.

“I had two students who I taught in my intermediate microeconomics class that went on to get Ph.D.’s in economics,” Swinton said. “And that’s something that I’m proud of, that I was able to help guide them in the decision to become economists.”

According to Swinton, the field can provide students with a variety of outcomes due to its broad application.

“Whether students get a B.A., M.A. or Ph.D. [in economics], they have many different opportunities because they are taught to think about things in a systematic way,” Swinton said.

During his time as NEA president, Swinton hopes to create initiatives that will continue to help the organization after he is no longer president.

“My goal as the NEA President is to help grow the NEA and hopefully start some initiatives that continue, that push the NEA to continue to exist for fifty more years, as we’re celebrating our fifty year anniversary this year,” Swinton said.

Colleague Gaminie Meepagala, associate chair of economics at Howard University, noted that Swinton encouraged graduate students to complete their Ph.D.’s while serving in his position at the university.

“In the past, the department didn’t graduate that many Ph.D.s over the years,” he said. “Dr. Swinton was able to work with them and help them finish their degree and graduate on time.”

Meepagala believes that Swinton’s new position with the NEA reflects positively on Howard University. He noted that many faculty members and alumni of their economics department are members of the organization.

“It’s a real honor to select him into that position. He is energetic and committed to improving the department,” Meepagala said.

HOT ITEM of the WEEK

ACTIVIST FROM PAGE 1 She also discussed the implications of intersectionality in activism, touching on her own path as an activist. The 2017 Women’s March presented unique challenges, Sarsour told the audience, caused by the difficulty in bringing together a diverse group over shared principles. She stressed that solidarity often involves making sacrifices in order to agree on principles—but that unity does not require uniformity.

Among strategies that Sarsour proposed to streamline the movement is prioritization—focusing on pressing issues instead of engaging in what she called “oppression Olympics” by arguing about degrees of oppression.

However, the sacrifice required to build a movement isn’t a sacrifice of principles or identity, Sarsour said, calling herself “unapologetically Palestinian-American.”

On the topic of activism, she urged audience members, particularly young people, to engage any way that they can— regardless of skills or time commitment.

“Activism does not look the same for everybody,” Sarsour said.

Although much of her talk focused on intersectionality and her own career as an activist, Sarsour also devoted time to critiquing the Trump administration’s policies and discussing their place in what she described as an American history of oppression. She cast the present day as the most serious political moment of the current generation, referencing Trump’s travel ban and his decision to bar transgender soldiers from the military, among other things.

Sarsour stressed that she continues to work as an activist because of what she described as relentless optimism in the face of political challenges.

“I believe that in 2020 we’re going to send a very strong and inspirational message across every corner of this world that this country stands for dignity and respect for all people,” she said.

APPLICATIONS FROM PAGE 1

Duke 3-Pack Tees

Colors: Black, Oxford, Royal Available Sizes: S - 3X Fabric Content: Black, Royal: 100% cotton; Oxford: 90% cotton, 10% polyester Advertised price does not include tax.

Offer cannot be combined with any other discount or promotion.

Sold as a pack of 3. Packages cannot be broken.

Offer valid Wednesday, April 17 through Monday, April 22, 2019, or while supplies last.

24

$

95 for S - 2X and $2895 for 3X

Compared to $5085 up to $5985

Available in the following locations:

The University Store Upper Level, Bryan Center

Medical Center Bookstore Lower Level, Duke Clinics

eSTORE

www.shopdukestores.duke.edu Departments of Duke University Stores®

schools, causing acceptance rates to drop. This causes anxious students to apply to more schools.

This trend is prevalent at other top universities. Ranked first by the U.S. News and World Report, Princeton received 32,804 single-choice early action and regular decision applications for the Class of 2023.

It admitted 13.9% of early admissions applicants into the Class of 2023, compared to 14.7% the year before.

In 2011, the first year that Princeton reinstated an early admission program, it admitted 21.1% of early admissions applicants.

Harvard had similarly declining admission rates. Its restrictive early action rate decreased to 13.4% for the Class of 2023 from 14.5% the year before. Its first-year applications increased from 42,749 to 43,330.

Applications to Columbia’s Class of 2023 increased by more than 2,000 from last year’s matriculating class, increasing from 40,203 to 42,569. Columbia admitted 14.6% of early decision applicants and 4.0% of regular decision applicants.

The Class of 2023 at University of Chicago had a record number of applications at just under 35,000–increasing by nearly 3,000—resulting in its most selective overall admissions rate of 5.9%.

Tied eighth with Duke in the U.S. News rankings, the University of Pennsylvania saw a decline of just less than 4% than in its early decision rate from last year’s 18.55%. The University of Pennsylvania admitted 3,345 from nearly 45,000 applications this year.

However, some other peer institutions saw increases in their acceptance rates.

Northwestern had an increase in its overall acceptance rate for the first time in a decade from 8.4% to 8.9% this year.

Experiencing an uptick of more than 1,000 applications, Yale had an increase in its regular decision admission rate, going from 6.27% to 6.91%. The early decision rate, on the other hand, declined from 14.7% to 13.2%.

MIT’s early action rate increased from 6.9% to 7.3%, and its applications increased from 20,247 to 21,312.

Meanwhile, Johns Hopkins saw an increase in its early decision rate from 30% to 31% and an uptick of slightly greater than 1,000 applications for the Class of 2023.

Johns Hopkins’ Class of 2023 will be the first to matriculate after Michael Bloomberg’s $1.8 billion donation in November of last year.

These students will be eligible for scholarships since the university will no longer offer financial aid packages that include student loans.

The Chronicle

recess dukechronicle.com

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019 | 5

VOLUME 20, ISSUE 53 | APRIL !7. 2019

‘on cinema’

Symposium discusses future of film theory, page 7

beginnings and endings Managing editor Sarah Derris reminisces on Recess, page 6

R 6 | WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019

recess editors

What’s getting you down this week?

Christy Kuesel ............................ Nina

Sarah Derris......................... venereal Nina Wilder ............everything, always Will Atkinson ..................... moby-dick Selena Qian ............photo department Eva Hong......................i don’t get sad Alizeh Sheikh ..................stem majors Lexi Bateman ............existential dread Sydny Long .............................. mitski Jessica Williams ............photo essays Miranda Gershoni ............crying baby

I used to be an outgoing kid. Ask me five years ago, and I would have proudly identified myself as an ENFJ personality type. On my first day at my new school in fifth grade, I wore my best graphic tee, sat confidently at my table cluster and introduced myself to my new classmates.

“I’m Sarah, I’m new here!” I began chatting with wide, eager eyes, desperate to make new friends and to reinvent myself. Although I was met with less-than comparable enthusiasm, I continued to assert myself in the group conversation.

I have always been conscious of how others perceive me. As a kindergartener, I insisted on being friends with the group of girls that sported shiny blonde ponytails and nice dresses with matching bows. I knew I was different, but I was willing to give anything to be like them, even enduring their incessant bullying about my features, weight or personal style — which, to be fair, wasn’t even up to me at that point!

If I conjure up all of the hurtful things people have called me throughout my life, I find that I have internalized many of these attributes, and have allowed them, in some ways, to dictate my self-worth and social exchanges. Having been called every iteration of “fat” and “ugly” throughout my life, it has been hard to feel accepted, or to believe that anyone could truly find it in themselves to love me.

Yet, I found other ways to bolster my sense of self throughout high school.

Namely, getting good grades, involving myself in my community through service work and political campaigns and taking on leadership positions — one of which led me to cross paths with a certain former Recess managing editor. I began to learn, slowly, that I could measure my self-worth through my accomplishments rather than through the judgements of my peers.

IT’S SO CREAMY MENU SAMPLING Old School Veggie Burrito Regular Chicken Burrito Cheese Quesadilla Chicken Quesadilla Chips & Salsa

$2.86 $5.65 $1.41 $3.59 $2.06

The Chronicle

dukechronicle.com

recess

1920 1/2 Perry St. @ Ninth Street Just a block from East Campus

Over the summer before my freshman year of college, I read the former managing editor’s piece, “Vignettes of a fat girl’s life,” in my first-ever copy of Recess’s sendhome issue. The honesty and precision of her writing were of immediate salience.

It was a piece that I needed to read at the time — a piece about coping with past hurts but finding ways to self-acceptance. I, too, wanted to write with such immediacy and veracity, to reach others as she had reached me. So, my first mission upon my arrival at Duke was to join Recess, and that’s exactly what I did.

staff note It seemed that the learning curve at Recess was somewhat steep. Sure, I had always been interested in popular culture to an extent, but it wasn’t something that I had an overt exposure to as a young teen. I couldn’t yet tell the difference between 16mm and 35mm film, was certainly no expert in David Lynch’s filmography and had only recently listened to “Heaven or Las Vegas” as a newly anointed WXDU DJ. For the first few months, Recess was an irritatingly esoteric space — I was equal parts vexed and fascinated. My perceived incompetence at the time was worrying.

The confidence that I had worked so hard to regain was already waning as a student, and failing to deliver in the one extracurricular to which I had chosen to dedicate myself would have been an irredeemable blow.

But my first piece for Recess was moreor-less sufficient, save for accidentally transcribing “visceral” as “venereal” (will I ever live it down?) in an interview with the former head of Duke Performances. And since, I have amassed quite the impressive (to me, at least) portfolio of both candid — if slightly cringey — personal pieces and not-so-hard-hitting arts reporting.

Recess has been the avenue for finding the time to explore more of the things I have already loved, and has allowed me to engage in avenues that other Duke students do not often traverse. The meaning of Recess has become akin to acceptance — a community that has nurtured my personal growth as much as it has advanced my writing, and has offered me incredible opportunities (Sundance!) and friendships.

If you ask me now, the E in ENFJ has most certainly become an I. But I am okay with that. I have no desire to take centerstage, and I am content with letting my writing or my work do most of the talking.

As I step down as the Recess managing editor, I realize how far I have come since my freshman year. My self-worth is not dictated by how others perceive me. It is molded by the quality of my work, my passions and the great relationships I have come to build during my time here. I can only look forward to what more the future may hold.

on the cover: ‘In the Heights’

by David Xian

The Chronicle

dukechronicle.com

recess

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019 | 7

campus arts

‘On Cinema’ symposium discusses future of film theory in digital age

By Joel Kohen Staff Writer

Given the advent of streaming giants, the trend of bingewatching and the ever-growing mergers of content-creators in the film and television industry, it seems fitting to address whether the common account of cinematic theory holds true under these new conditions. To reevaluate its past and the future was the objective of a mini-conference held Friday at the Franklin Humanities Institute, under the title “On Cinema.”

The symposium’s subtitle, “Il n’y a pas de rapport audiovisuel” (“There is no audio-visual rapport”) itself was a subtle pun on the infamous dictum, “There is no sexual rapport,” by French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. The French slogan already indicates the provenance of most of the topics discussed, since, as speaker Fredric Jameson, Knut Schmidt Nielsen Professor of Comparative Literature, began, any contemporary thought on the moving image must grapple with the two heydays of film theory: the early Soviet era and 1960s France.

Jameson, professor of literature at Duke, delivered the first talk titled “Dilemmas of Film Theory Today.” First, he emphasized the distinction between philosophy and the now-canonical “theory.”

Whereas philosophy always ends up constructing all-encompassing systems like those of Johann Gottlieb Fichte and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, “Theory” allows for an unassimilable object that refuses to fit in a generalized account.

Two factors, he said, were quintessential for any contemporary theorizing on cinema: digitization and financialization. Evoking Michel Foucault’s notion of “capillary power” — power that is diffused and circulated throughout the entirety of society — Jameson argued that these two factors manage to penetrate every nook and cranny of contemporary life. Based on a reading of Dennis Broe’s recent book “Birth of the Binge,” he analyzed the consequences that the turn towards seriality has on the quality of leisure time. In an increasingly stratified and competitive economic order, even free time becomes structured according to logic of the market. This trend is in turn reflected by the production of cinema and the turn towards TV shows. Leisure time then turns into “leisurality,” the enjoyment of a few short sprees of free time while traveling between jobs and other obligations, rather than genuine freedom from obligations and appointments. “Some of us now find the short duration of movies boring compared to the endlessness of series,” Jameson concluded.

Next was Pietro Bianchi, whose talk was titled “The Restlessness of The Imaginary.” Bianchi, who recently obtained his Ph.D. from Duke’s department of romance studies, discussed the problem of sight in the work of Jacques Lacan. The latter first used the term “vision” in the 1940s and 50s, only to advance the notion of the “gaze” in the 1960s. That gaze, as Bianchi explained, fundamentally questions whether vision can be understood as a line between two points. It is not just the object looking back at its beholder, but also a radical challenge to the possibility of their relation. This object gaze cannot be localized and, as he argued, constitutes a major issue for the theorization of film in the present day.

Bianchi analyzed science-fiction author H.G. Wells’ short story “The Country of the Blind” to illustrate his argument.

In the story, a mountaineer accidentally discovers an isolated community inhabited exclusively by blind people. Motivated by the proverb “In the Country of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is King,” he attempts to use his vision to seize control of the community. However, he eventually realizes that the blind have adapted to their predicament so completely that, instead, the mountaineer comes to experience his fifth sense as a disadvantage. Being the only sighted person in the village, he constantly questions whether the events he sees are real or mere illusions, leading to growing frustration. The story, Bianchi argued, showed that vision is far more than the innocent sense it is commonly perceived as, intensifying the need for its theoretical articulation in cinema studies.

After Bianchi, Anne-Gaëlle Saliot spoke on “Jean-Luc Godard’s Europe: Geopolitics of the 19th Century.” An associate professor of romance studies at Duke, Saliot discussed the European idea and its rooting in the 19th century as deciding factors for FrenchSwiss Filmmaker Godard, who is widely reputed as the “enfant terrible” of 1960s French New Wave film. Based on his wellknown appreciation of German romantic authors like Novalis, Lenz or Hölderlin, Godard’s work adheres to a concept that sets the idea of Europe equal to the fate of cinema. “I loved Mao as I loved Goethe,” she quoted him. As such, Saliot argued, the 19th century provided a sort of “political unconscious” for Godard, which reverberates in his idea that the filmmaker effectively works as a historian.

The second session of the day was led by three faculty members from the University of Maryland: Luka Arsenjuk, who discussed the problem of audio-vision in Soviet filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein, Eric Zakim covering “The Problem of Music

at the Movies” and Mauro Resmini analyzing the work of Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini and an “ethics of autonomy.”

If anything, the symposium gave students and faculty a taste of the vast range of material that contemporary theoreticians ought to devote their attention to. In what has been called “a golden age of television,” series and streaming have become invaluable objects of cultural inquiry, and an understanding of the present can only be achieved through our relationship to those contemporary media, even if it is the latest season of “Game of Thrones.”

Joel Kohen | Contributing Photographer Professors Rey Chow and Anne-Gaëlle Saliot speak at the “On Cinema” symposium hosted Friday.

Narratives of Iraqi, Palestinian and Syrian Refugees

Sports 8 | WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019

dukechronicle.com

The Chronicle

The Chronicle

THE BLUE ZONE

2018-19 MBB PLAYER REVIEW: ZION WILLIAMSON dukechronicle.com

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019

BASEBALL

RED (RAIDER) DEAD REDEMPTION Blue Devils take down Texas Tech in rematch of last year’s NCAA super regional

By Glen Morgenstern Staff Writer

Revenge is a dish best served Texas-style.

A surprisingly pro-Red Raider crowd chanted “Raider Power” in the early innings, but Duke’s offensive display soon turned the Texas boast into Texas toast. The Blue Devils broke out the big bats to topple No. 16 Texas Tech 13-6 Tuesday night at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park. The midweek win is especially sweet for Duke, as Texas Tech eliminated the Blue Devils in last year’s NCAA super regional final.

“We’re showing people what we’re capable of,” senior center fielder Kennie Taylor said.

6 “From the first to TTU the last person in DUKE 13 the lineup, everyone is having great at-bats. Even when they’re getting outs, they’re productive outs.”

The dirt in front of home plate had a rough night, as Red Raider pitch after pitch pummeled it like a punching bag through the evening. Duke (21-16) scored three runs on wild pitches in a sloppy display from Texas Tech, while the Red Raiders scored two runs of their own off passed balls from the Blue Devils.

Baserunning proved vital for Duke in the early going. In the first inning, a passed ball from Red Raider pitcher Bryce Bonnin advanced second baseman Joey Loperfido and Taylor to second and third. A dropped third strike let Loperfido score and gave right

Henry Haggart | Sports Photography Editor

Kennie Taylor’s three hits and three RBIs helped Duke to a 13-run effort Tuesday night. fielder Chase Cheek a free pass to first. The subsequent double steal worked beautifully, as Taylor crossed home while catcher Braxton Fulford threw down to second.

“We did a great job in the run game,” head coach Chris Pollard said. “We wanted to apply pressure to them, whether it was with the stolen base or going first to third—dirt ball reads are a part of that.”

The Red Raiders (23-12) responded in the next inning, scoring one on a double play, but a two-out sequence from Duke in the next frame would double its score. After a walk, a hit-by-pitch and an infield single, Taylor

roped a bases-clearing double off the wall in right-center to increase the Blue Devils’ lead to 6-1 by the end of the fourth inning.

Texas Tech responded again, scoring two more on a wild pitch and a sacrifice fly in the fifth.

And yet, Duke had more in the tank.

A double down the right-field line by designated hitter Matt Mervis and a base hit by left fielder Kyle Gallagher put men on first and third. Mervis scored on another wild pitch, and Cheek walked. Shortstop Ethan Murray laid down a sacrifice bunt, which led righthander Caleb Freeman to intentionally

walk Maxwell, the freshman slugger, to load the bases. The strategy proved fruitless, though, as Freeman then surrendered a tworun single to Crabtree, extending the Blue Devils’ lead to six.

Duke just kept piling on. The Blue Devils would hit double digits for the fifth time this season on RBI singles from Cheek and Ethan Murray. Chris Crabtree’s two-run double high off the left field wall dumped an entire salt shaker in the wound and made it an insurmountable 13-4 lead. Crabtree totaled a game-high 4 RBI on the day.

“These past couple weeks, we’ve really shown a lot [of growth],” Taylor said. “We went through some tough stretches in the beginning. Coach Pollard has always said, ‘All gas, no brakes’, and I think we’re really playing with that edge and that mentality.”

Adam Laskey pitched three innings and gave up one earned run, marking his longest and best start of the season. Aaron Beasley pitched himself into a jam in the ninth, allowing two runs, but shut down shop shortly thereafter.

“We’ve played ourselves back into a position where we control our fate down the stretch,” Pollard said. “That wasn’t necessarily the case a couple weeks ago when we kind of dug ourselves into a hole.”

Having met its retribution quota for the season, Duke will hit the road for a three-game series at No. 23 Clemson starting Friday. The Blue Devils will look for a third consecutive series win.

BASEBALL

Still no timetable for Stinson’s return

By Derek Saul Blue Zone Editor

This was supposed to be Graeme Stinson’s year.

After dominating in Duke’s historic postseason run in 2018, the 6-foot-5, 260-pound left-hander appeared near the top of many MLB mock drafts, and was selected to preseason All-American lists nearly unanimously.

Yet Stinson’s velocity suddenly dropped this spring, and he has not appeared in game action since his start against Louisville March 15. After routinely lighting up the radar gun to the tune of the mid-90s in his relief role last season, the hurler was sitting in just the mid-80s against the Cardinals.

“We just don’t know yet,” head coach Chris

Pollard said prior to Duke’s series against Virginia Tech last weekend. “We just don’t know when he’s gonna be back and we don’t have a plan yet. Still waiting on some results of some testing and some meetings with the docs to determine a timeline for his return.”

For Stinson’s first few outings of 2019, he looked like the same pitcher who allowed just one run and struck out 18 batters in 13.1 innings of NCAA tournament work.

The junior hurler allowed no runs in his first three starts of the season, which all ended with a Blue Devil victory.

But Stinson struggled in his next two appearances, allowing 10 earned runs and 20 baserunners in 7.2 innings against Virginia and Louisville. Stinson, who relies on a powerful fastball and a nasty slider to get opposing batters out, did not appear to have the same

arm strength in these two outings.

With no timetable set yet for his return, both Stinson and the Blue Devils are left in an undesirable situation.

If Stinson can not prove that his arm is again at full strength by the end of the season, his draft stock will fall significantly. Regarded as a surefire top selection entering the season, Stinson could slide out of the first round entirely should the issue persist.

Without its ace and Friday night starter in the fold, Duke has hovered close to the .500 mark and will need an uncharacteristically strong close to the season to secure a spot in this year’s NCAA tournament.

For now, all Stinson and the Blue Devils can do is hope that the recent arm problems do not persist, and that the Norcross, Ga., native returns to dominance.

Chronicle file photo Graeme Stinson has not pitched since March 15.

The TheChronicle Chronicle

dukechronicle.com dukechronicle.com

WEDNESDAY, WEDNESDAY,APRIL APRIL17, 17,2019 2019| 9| 9

FOOTBALL

Where could Daniel Jones land in the 2019 NFL Draft?

By Mitchell Gladstone Sports Features Editor

In 10 short days, Commissioner Roger Goodell will be stepping out onto the stage in Nashville to begin the 2019 NFL Draft. And over the span of less than 48 hours, 254 players will hear their names called, marking the first step in their careers as professional football players.

Daniel Jones will certainly be one of those guys, and it seems highly likely that the former Blue Devil will know his next destination by the end of Thursday night’s first round.

But rather than add to the litany of mock drafts, we’re breaking down all the potential landing spots for Jones.

At the quarterback position, there appears to be four guys who may be first-round picks: Jones, Oklahoma’s Kyler Murray, Ohio State’s Dwayne Haskins and Missouri’s Drew Lock. There are plenty of teams that could use a signal-caller, but as always, the draft is loaded with talent across the board.

For this exercise, we’ll exclude the Arizona Cardinals as a team needing a quarterback—although they have been very much been discussed as a landing spot for Murray, the Cardinals used their first-round choice on Josh Rosen last year. If it’s not Murray at No. 1, Arizona won’t be taking another quarterback.

Here are, in order of selection, the six teams that could draft Jones next Thursday night: Oakland Raiders (Nos. 4, 24 and 27) On the roster: Derek Carr, Mike Glennon, Nathan Peterman, Landry Jones The fit: Outside of Carr, the Raiders don’t have a quarterback of the future. Both Glennon and Peterman—former ACC players themselves—have proven they aren’t more than mediocre backup options. Carr, the 36th overall selection in the 2014 NFL Draft, is another story. He’s a three-time Pro Bowler

who finished fifth in completion percentage last season despite tossing just 19 touchdowns.

But the Raiders are in an interesting spot. This is their last season in Oakland, as they are set to move to Las Vegas at the start of the 2020 season, and Carr’s five-year, $125 million contract has no guaranteed money after this season. It seems unlikely that they would cut their former second-round choice, yet head coach Jon Gruden may want to go in a different direction, especially given that Carr’s teams have not won a playoff game.

Jones was coached by Gruden at the Senior Bowl, so while Jones is almost certainly a reach at No. 4, don’t be surprised if the Raiders package their last two first-rounders to move up or wait and see if Jones falls to them late.

exchange for Super Bowl XLVII champion Joe Flacco, before trading away Case Keenum to Washington, just a year removed from signing Keenum to a two-year, $36 million deal.

Either way, Denver was going to be in a transitional period when it came to its quarterback. Flacco is owed $18.5 million this season and then $44.5 million combined over the next two years, but none of that money is guaranteed.

Lock seems to be the kind of guy that would align with Elway’s quarterbacking preferences, but Jones isn’t out of the question at No. 10.

Read the rest of this story at dukechronicle.com/sports.

New York Giants (Nos. 6 and 17) On the roster: Eli Manning, Alex Tanney, Kyle Lauletta The fit: This one seems almost too obvious. Manning is a former David Cutcliffe protegé like Jones, but the Giants’ staple under center is now 38 years old and in a clear decline.

Manning and Jones are said to have a relationship through offseason workouts, but New York has been connected to all of the potential first-round quarterbacks.

The Giants would give Jones the chance to sit for at least one season, if not more, as he learns the game from Manning and head coach Pat Shurmur, a 20-year NFL coaching veteran. The problem is the rest of the offense: With All-Pro wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. gone, New York lacks any real offensive talent—outside of Saquon Barkley—to make it a smooth transition for Jones.

Denver Broncos (No. 10) On the roster: Joe Flacco, Kevin Hogan, Grayson Garrett The fit: The Broncos, led by Hall of Fame quarterback John Charles York | Special Projects Photography Editor Newcaller York this Times Syndication Sales Corporation Elway, have already made a few moves atThe signal After a 620 Eighth Avenue, New three-year York, N.Y. tenure 10018 as Duke’s starting quarterback, offseason. They first sent a fourth-round pick to Baltimore in Daniel Jones is now focusing on a career in the NFL. For Information Call: 1-800-972-3550 For ForRelease ReleaseWednesday, Tuesday, April April16, 17,2019 2019

Advertise here for the best results

CLASSIFIEDS APARTMENTS FOR RENT ROOMMATE NEEDED 23 yo. male seeking roommate to share 2 BR/2BA� $700/mo, 12 mo� lease� Available May 9th� (Tenant would have own room & bath)� No pets� Non smoker, drug-free� 6 miles to Duke� Near I-40/15-501� Community pool, gym, business center, outdoor grills, clubhouse, car washing station� Detached garage avail� for add’l fee� Common areas already furnished� 2nd floor (top floor) Call Casey 919�698�3895

Crossword

EDUCATION

dukechronicle.com classifieds

SPECIAL TUITION RATE FOR DUKE EMPLOYEES Enroll in a fall undergraduate course for academic credit for $975� Audit a course for $100� Course schedule now available� Certain limits and deadlines apply� For application/registration details contact 919/684-5375 or https:// learnmore�duke�edu/academics�

TGIF

Recess ~ today!

classified advertising Sportswrap ~ today! www.dukechronicle.com/classifieds

The Chronicle Title of Coach K’s secret mixtape: Six Rings:���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������satistics One and Done:�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������touché On to the Next—Knee: ��������������������������������������������������������� americasnexttopmodel Special K:�������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� mcleodnine Jacket off: ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������� kingsaul Student Advertising Manager: ��������������������������������������������������������������Griffin Carter Account Representatives: �������������������������������������������� Paul Dickinson, Matt Gendell, Francis L’Esperance, Lancer Li, Jake Melnick, Emma Olivo, Spencer Perkins, Brendan Quinlan, Levi Rhoades, Rebecca Ross, Alex Russell, Paula Sakuma, Jake Schulman, Zoe Tang, Stef Watchi, Matt Zychowski Creative Services: �������������������������������������������������� Rachael Murtagh, Myla Swallow Student Business Manager ������������������������������������������ Will Deseran, Brian Njoroge

ACROSS 1 Metallic waste 1 Clueless 6 bystander 6 Isn’t Afterathe ___ 10 Longtime Syriana (when to leave leader phone message) 15 Preferred seating 10 [Bzzt!] request 13 Dairy 16 Some Get ready for plantingorders Queen 17 ___ Andrew 14 In Frequent (developing) Wyeth model 18 Understood 15 Palindromic 19 Ithaca, woman’stoname Odysseus 16 20 Affected Odysseus, to adversely, Ithaca or 21 physically Les ___-Unis psychologically 22 Patent preceder 18 installation 23 Oil Girder type 19 Siouans 24 Some Lineage-based grp.

20 women’s Part to play 25 “___ be my 21 Runaway pleasure!”bestselling Apple 27 “Star Trek: ___” products of series the (syndicated 2000s of the ’80s-’90s) 29 Pince-___ Draft org. (style 23 glasses) 30 of Pizza chain 31 ___ 24 Stumblebum Godiva

25 Rare 33 Part of craps the throws upper 36 deck?

Like Mercury 26 among Utopianall the planets 28 Naked 41 Legendary 33 Like an orange Manhattan music tan, club say 34 “Here Content of a bog 45 comes 35 trouble!”

Western tribe 46 member Distance for Captain operation Nemo 36 Military might last 47 that ___ package for months 48 Big name in 38 Got chicken, say mortgages?

39 TV Largest 49 host moon Ryan of Saturn 51 Singer Carly ___ 41 Org. with a Form Jepsen 1040 52 away 42 Hide Modern acronym “seize theto 54 for Place to go day” swim, informally 44 Play mates?

55 Mythical figure ribaldry 45 known Supply for with parts___ 57 updated Writer Edgar 47 Poe A puzzling 59 direction Places where streams flow 50 Asleep 60 51 Indirect “Listen!,”comment quaintly … or a hint to this 53 puzzle’s Fresh circled 54 letters Aerodynamic

ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE A C C O TL O T N E R O S L LI R A S C L R A E P S

T O O H OI T O E D E D I R E E P L R OI R D E

S L N A O V O A Z E C F O E P S E T L E U X N GI T E

EI E R KI S N O A R G B R F O U E D G E D

A C S E A N T L E RI K E A Y R O U S K E N O W

T G R E A L C D E L O F U T L OI C T E S

S H A O D O D D L E A M L O NI E Y M P CI A T

B A E L L E L YI U D P S T O F T D H R E B E A M R U

E S TL L A E T E N L E A E W M A O L A U N M E D

E S G O O D A A GI A D A C AI R D P E S

P A N PI C A A V T E T R A C S K E R C E P N L E

N O D PI E C R E HI S A R S EI L C E O A N

Z E E L RI O T B U L T E T V OI N D A O R W O N D

A W VI NI D C E E TI A R O S N E G L U E E N D O

P S E N G E S A D D E L N O N S G W E S D T E S W

66 Website 57 Org. for students with in uniform crowdsourced reviews 67 Danish money 58 Lip 68 Blackberrys, e.g., 59 Bagel go-with for short 60 of arain 69 Bringer Spread in spread 63 The Cardinals, on 70 scoreboards 27 Chopin works 64 Creator of a 71 Bombard logical “razor” 72 Bird Acorn, 65 in essentially the 73 flycatcher Deals withfamily 66 74 Favorite Indulged to “on” 67 excess, Sport, aswith a sport coat 68 Touches down DOWN 1 Like the slang “da DOWN bomb” and man!”

1 “tubular, When a play’s is set item in 2 plot Vaquero’s motion 3 Award for 2 Honked Washington and 3 *Bo-o-o-ring Lee event 4 Pupil of a lizard, 4 Comics e.g. exclamations 5 Becomes 5 established Happy ___ clam 6 *Go order a drink 6 Garden pest 7 Fashion 7 Dummkopf magazine with than 40 8 more “Personally …”

9 international Worry about, editions informally 8 Psyche part 10 The Charioteer 9 constellation *Flop sweat producer 11 Bit of theater 10 detritus The “x” in Euler’s Identity — 12 Tennis eiπ + 1Hall=x of-Famer with 11 Gung-ho a palindromic 12 Jumping name pieces in a classic 13 Arts and puzzle hard wooden sciences, e.g.

14 Car part called 14 a Sides of some bonnet in quads England 26 fabric 17 Pictorial Slight vestige 28 According Studying aid 22 to 30 *Scoffing 24 Grp. that gets remark the to show an on ignoramus the road

Edited by Will Shortz 1

22

33

44

55

9 10

1614

16 18

17 19

19 21

20 22

23 24

34

36 45

37

28

33 35

36 46

41 48

42 49

45 52

55

3834 39

18

11 13

12 14

31

32

29 32 30 41 35 42

40

38

39

51

58

56

20

31

54

50

57

37

29

43

46 53

15

27 2528

27 30

33

11 10 12

17

2123 22

24 26 25

26

54 60

7 6 8 7 9 8

6

13 15

0312 No. 0313

6157 62

52

63

44

50

47

55

43

44

4047

51 48

56

49

53

59 58

64

59 66

60 6761

62

68

63 69

64 70

65

71

66 72

67 73

68

74

65

PUZZLE BY JULES JEFFREY MARKEY WECHSLER

25 Recipient 32 Old Turkish of title media 27 complaints, Ride, in twofor short different senses 33 Some turkeys 29 Born: Fr. 34 Very [Yawn!]

30 conventional 35 …

1-1or a hint to the starts of the 37 Well-organized answers to the starred clues 38 four Eponymous Ernst 31 physicist H 39 Screening Horrid sortarea?

32 40 36 Chop Noble___ title 42 Rage Made the rounds, 37 say? Book” 38 “Green 43 co-star It varies from Mahershala black to white

54 Nonverbal 59 Page 2, 4 or 6, 44 Country 40 Ballpark on purchase the response to an generally Mediterranean: 49 Abbr.

N.B.A. Hall-ofinsult Famer with four 43 Many a time 60 Mythology Space balls 55 rap albums, informally 44 Kvetches 56 Way out 61 Art Deco notable 46 ___, of ___ 50 Jane “The Tale anonymous Saltan” (Rimsky- 57 Village People hit a spelledplaintiff Korsakov opera) 62 with Dissolute out title man 48 Transitioned 53 Like some golf 58 Zeno most 49 shots Peopleand who 63 Philosopher Butts of ___ bread to five by count saying “ett, två, 61 56 City underfem” siege 64 What “Dogs”a “neat” tre, fyra, drink is served from 2012 to ’16 52 Homecoming without 58 returnee, “No ___” (bumper 65 Abbr. on a informally sticker) brewery 62 An NCO sign

Online subscriptions: Today’s puzzle and more than 7,000 past puzzles, nytimes.com/crosswords ($39.95 a year).

Read about and comment on each puzzle: nytimes.com/wordplay.

T H E I N D E P E N D E N T D A I LY AT D U K E U N I V E R S I T Y

The Chronicle

“

I do not love thee, dear Old Duke

“

I do not like you. I cannot say why, but this much I know: I do not like you.” I was asked to translate this quip in my first semester of Latin at Duke. Since then, Martial’s beautiful bluntness has summarized how I’ve felt about this place as often as not. It’s one of our most sacred traditions: there are things at Duke we like, and there are things at Duke we do not like, and it is unfashionable to like everything.

In that best Duke spirit of complaining about what goes on here and doing nothing to fix it—I graduate in just over three weeks—here are a few of my (least) favorite things.

In my time here, I have been unendingly baffled at the mania for “service work” and “volunteerism” that achieves little more than making the volunteer feel good about themselves. Perhaps I misremember, but as I recall Mother Teresa made a bit more of a commitment. And the way too many of us use this service, to be “well rounded” in the next round of applications, is appalling. What is the intention?

To see what happens when systems which create inequality are in full operation, so that we have a better chance of getting a corner office in those same systems?

If you like consulting, “consult” with your better

onlinecomment “Due to allergy season and watery eyes, I first read “doubling down on purity tests” as “dumbing down on purity tests.” Maybe allergy season isn’t so bad.”

—David Richards, responding to “Privilege and the idea of myth” via Facebook on Apr. 16, 2019

LETTERS POLICY The Chronicle welcomes submissions in the form of letters to the editor or guest columns. Submissions must include the author’s name, signature, department or class, and for purposes of identification, phone number and local address.

Letters should not exceed 325 words; contact the editorial department for information regarding guest columns.

The Chronicle will not publish anonymous or form letters or letters that are promotional in nature. The Chronicle reserves the right to edit letters and guest columns for length, clarity and style and the right to withhold letters based on the discretion of the editorial page editor.

Est. 1905

The Chronicle

commentary dukechronicle.com

10 10 || WEDNESDAY, WEDNESDAY, APRIL APRIL 17, 17, 2019 2019

”

Direct submissions to: E-mail: chronicleletters@duke.edu Editorial Page Department The Chronicle Box 90858, Durham, NC 27708 Phone: (919) 684-2663 Fax: (919) 684-4696

The Chronicle

Inc. 1993

BRE BRADHAM, Editor MICHAEL MODEL, Sports Editor ISABELLE DOAN, News Editor BEN LEONARD, Managing Editor NATHAN LUZUM, SHAGUN VASHISTH, LEXI KADIS Senior Editors LIKHITHA BUTCHIREDDYGARI, Digital Strategy Director SUJAL MANOHAR, Photography Editor FRANCES BEROSET, Editorial Page Editor CHRISTY KUESEL, Recess Editor ALAN KO, Editorial Board Chair SYDNEY ROBERTS, Editorial Board Chair CHRISSY BECK, General Manager MARY HELEN WOOD, Audio Editor STEFANIE POUSOULIDES, University News Department Head JEREMY CHEN, Graphic Design Editor JAKE SATISKY, University News Department Head JUAN BERMUDEZ, Online Photography Editor MICHELLE (XINCHEN) LI, Local & National News Head IAN JAFFE, Special Projects Photography Editor DEEPTI AGNIHOTRI, Health & Science News Head CHARLES YORK, Special Projects Photography Editor KATHRYN SILBERSTEIN, Health & Science News Head HANK TUCKER, Towerview Editor JU HYUN JEON, News Photography Editor SHANNON FANG, Towerview Managing Editor SARAH DERRIS, Recess Managing Editor LIKHITHA BUTCHIREDDYGARI, Investigations Editor HENRY HAGGART, Sports Photography Editor KENRICK CAI, Investigations Editor WINSTON LINDQWISTER, Sports Managing Editor LIKHITHA BUTCHIREDDYGARI, Recruitment Chair MAX LABATON, Editorial Page Managing Editor FRANCES BEROSET, Recruitment Chair VICTORIA PRIESTER, Editorial Page Managing Editor SAM KIM, Senior News Reporter MIHIR BELLAMKONDA, Editorial Page Managing Editor MAYA ISKANDARANI , Senior News Reporter JIM LIU, Opinion Photography Editor SEAN CHO, Senior News Reporter IAN JAFFE, Video Editor TREY FOWLER, Advertising Director JAMIE COHEN, Social Media Editor JULIE MOORE, Creative Director The Chronicle is published by the Duke Student Publishing Company, Inc., a non-profit corporation independent of Duke University. The opinions expressed in this newspaper are not necessarily those of Duke University, its students, faculty, staff, administration or trustees. Unsigned editorials represent the majority view of the editorial board. Columns, letters and cartoons represent the views of the authors.

To reach the Editorial Office at 301 Flowers Building, call 684-2663 or fax 684-4696. To reach the Business Office at 1517 Hull Avenue call 684-3811. To reach the Advertising Office at 2022 Campus Drive call 684-3811.

One copy per person; additional copies may be purchased for .25 at The Chronicle Business office at the address above. @ 2019 Duke Student Publishing Company

angels whether your fair-weather activism achieves lasting and sustainable good. (A clue: it does not.)

In my time here, I have never understood why our first impulse is to division rather than reconciliation.

At almost every opportunity we burn bridges where we could build them. Take a paradigm of the Duke Protest (trademark pending): a recent article marveled how the unelected People’s State of the University has been meeting with the administration.

Did it occur to anyone who stormed a stage that they might have gotten farther, faster, by asking

Tim Kowalczyk COLUMNIST for a meeting? By asking for dialogue? Our student community used written advocacy and requested meetings and reversed work reassignments for housekeepers. Our student community used written advocacy and requested meetings and convinced the administration to partially reverse its decision to remove healthcare from certain student financial aid. From the news breaking to the resolution being reached, hardly a month went by. No wonder, that snapping the olive branch sooner than offering it has held them back so long?

Throwing yourself onto a sword does not make you a martyr. If no one asks what you have to say, perhaps you have yelled so loud and long that you never gave them the chance to engage you.

In my time here, the “social scene” has been an unending and grotesque ballet of self-debasement.

What do we free-thinkers do the minute we join campus? Find a ready-made group of friends and remake ourselves in their image, of course! Do you find that your work-hard-play-hard lifestyle, doing what other people tell you to do to “fit in,” is taking a toll? Why then, pre-med, play the physician you hope to be and heal thyself!

If your choices unerringly cause you distress, make different choices. If you allow yourself to be shaped by every passing tide, do not be confident that anything you call yourself will survive in the comprehensive ocean of life outside of Duke.

In my time here, I have seen people of promise do what I hold ill-guided at best and stupid at worst.

In my time here, I have not once doubted that these people do what they do because they care, and deeply.

Do people act on this campus in manners with which I do not agree, not to the worth of a cause but to the manner of its carriage? Yes. Do people on this campus seek community in ways that can most gently be described as toxic? Yes. Do people try the same counterproductive models and the same backward plans and pine for different results?

Yes. But they do this—my peers do this—because they want to at least help someone and they want to change things and they want to build community, somehow. Your methods baffle me. Your sincerity heartens me.

When I ask in my comun’s title, does the academy matter, I suppose I wonder how four years’ retreat into this stone ring in the middle of a forest prepares any of us for “the real world,” or whatever corner of it we ourselves will enter. And I think, four years on and in this chapter’s waning light, I have found my answer. The academy makes us care. We come to a place like Duke, and we find in our friends or our groups or causes or classes or any number of things some gap in the world that seems just our size and shape. We chase the chance to supply this lack, often imperfectly, often unevenly, often obliquely, yet ever sincerely.

Paul wrote that “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things,” and I cannot think that any of you would have been so resolute in your chosen path—whatever I thought or think of it—if you did not have love for what you were doing. Not some shallow candy-heart feeling of doing something nice, but a real intention of bettering whatever you were a part of.

And my only hope, chiding and exhorting and waxing philosophical for the last time, is that you continue to care. Applications are out for the next semester’s columnists, and I exhort you to apply.

You’ll read those words, or this school will read yours, and that will be the discourse you have: the product of your collective loves and hopes. You may forget “the academy matters,” but never forget that what you do here, that what the academy is, matters deeply.

And there is nothing I want more—no better fate for someone in a classroom—than to be forgotten: for whatever work comes after to run and to look farther than he could ever have hoped.

Permit me one last chiding. Be the good Duke students you are, and do this column one better.

Tim Kowalczyk is a Trinity senior. His column runs on alternate Wednesdays.

Letter: You’re invited to Pay-Ville

D

ear Duke community, Last week marked a historic victory for the Duke Graduate Students Union, SEIU Workers United Southern Region Local 27.

We’ve been fighting for over a year to force Duke to guarantee a 12-month living stipend for all grad workers. After months of meeting with the Academic Council, collecting petition signatures, writing opeds, securing a GPSC resolution, and applying public pressure, the Graduate School buckled and agreed to pay Ph.D. students a 12-month living wage. This enormous victory will put thousands of dollars in the pockets of grad workers. It’s a testament to the power of our union—and unions everywhere!

Make no mistake: Duke would never have announced this change had it not been for the tireless organizing of Duke grad workers. Gains often feel inevitable after we win them, but nothing about this gain was inevitable. A year ago, a commitment from university administrators to meet our demands seemed unfathomable. Now, 12-month pay starting in August at a living wage is a reality. This only happened because grad workers mobilized, built power, and made it a reality!

Duke’s announced changes are far from perfect.

The pay increase won’t take effect until 2022, excluding Ph.D. students with bills to pay now. It also threatens to make departments choose between a living wage for grad workers and crucial components of doctoral education like cohort size. But if we can pressure Duke to commit to a living wage, we can get them to move on a faster timeline and without such unfair trade-offs. It’s our job to organize so that every PhD student can live decently while at Duke!

We’ve proven we can make that happen. And with your help, we’re going to make it happen.

Join us this Thursday, April 18, from 11 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Abele Quad for “Pay-Ville” (like K-Ville—get it?). You’re invited to help us celebrate our union’s power and continue the struggle!

Hannah Borenstein, third year Ph.D. student in cultural anthropology Jarron Bowman, fifth year Ph.D. student in sociology Sage Lachman, first year Ph.D. student in clinical psychology Austin Wadle, first year Ph.D. student in civil and environmental engineering Members of the Duke Graduate Students Union (SEIU Workers United Southern Region Local 27)

Apply to be a Fall 2019 columnist:

chron.it/f19app

The Chronicle

O

commentary dukechronicle.com

How to be depressed

ne night during my first year, I called my mother in the middle of a breakdown. With tears rolling down my cheeks, I told her that a new mental illness was destroying my life, and that I felt utterly helpless to stop it. “I know how to be anxious, Mom. But I don’t know how to be depressed.”

I’ve been dealing with anxiety pretty much my whole life.

I started going to therapy when I was fourteen, started taking meds when I was fifteen. And I can’t lie, it was horrible for

Rebecca Torrence COLUMNIST a while—waking up in the middle of the night with sharp, twisting pains in your stomach, and then mediating the racing thoughts pounding at the walls of your skull every hour of the day.

But over time, I learned how to cope with my anxiety. I learned the things I could do when I was feeling extra anxious, like deep breathing, exercising, and journaling. Little by little, I started to feel in control again.

Depression is another animal entirely. When I fell into an intense depression my first year, I quickly realized that learning how to manage it wasn’t going to be as straightforward as before. Learning requires doing—and with depression, doing anything can become a challenge.

Before experiencing it myself, I had always perceived depression to be a form of chronic sadness. In reality, however, depression and sadness are not the same. Sadness tends to be circumstantial, and is usually remedied with time and tears.

Sadness can be a symptom of depression, but the two are not synonyms.

Depression is heavy. It is the loss of all emotional energy and motivation, the loss of all feelings of purpose, desire, and pleasure. It is feeling removed from everyone in your life, including yourself. It is existing without living. Depression is nothingness.

Because I could barely muster the energy to even want to get better, I had no idea how I was going to overcome my depression, or at least recover enough to function normally.

Getting over depression is incredibly hard. It’s like climbing out of a well with no rope, and no light except for the small patch of sunlight at the top. But, as I discovered, you can make your own rope, and you can build up the strength to pull

A

t Duke, you’ll find secrets everywhere you look: in the faces of gargoyles hiding beneath Gothic arches, whispered between students on the bus, buried in the Chapel crypt.

These days, it seems like every college student is looking for a way to get something off their chest. We practically carry around billboard-sized canvases to print our secrets on, in the form of a Me Too monologue, a Twitter thread, or a Chronicle column.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL APRIL 17, 17, 2019 2019 || 11 11 WEDNESDAY,

yourself out.

When I decided to grit my teeth and get better, I knew I would have to force myself to do a lot of things that I really didn’t want to do. What I needed—interaction with the people I loved, good food, sunshine, movement, and a sense of accomplishment—was not what I wanted. What I wanted, or rather, what my depression wanted, was to stay in bed and dissociate from reality.

Instead, I threw myself headfirst into reality. I was determined to experience the fullness of life, even when my body screamed that life wasn’t worth living. I savored my food, watched the rustling of leaves in the wind, and listened to the lilting laughter scattered across the BC plaza. Over time, I started to feel real again. I started to feel again—joy, pain, passion, all of it.

Most of all, I needed to feel love, and I needed to feel loved.

So I turned to my friends and family. I went to places I knew my friends would be and forced myself to sit there while they coaxed me out of my shell. I called my parents almost every day and listened to them telling me they loved me. I started to realize that their happiness mattered more to me than my depression ever could.

Finally—and this was the kicker—I realized I had to give that same love to myself. It felt idiotic at first, telling myself I liked the way I looked in the mirror even when I didn’t, feeding myself empty praises, and repeating cheesy affirmations over and over. But as ridiculous as I thought those practices were, they became the most important part of it all. When I actively loved the people and the world around me, I could feel content.

When I loved myself, I could feel happy.

Now I’m happier than I’ve ever been. And let me tell you— happiness is criminally underrated.

If you’re reading this amidst feelings of hopelessness, I want you to know that you are not alone. But more than that, I want you to know that even if you think you’re a lost cause, you will never be too far gone. You might be depressed to varying degrees your entire life, and that’s okay. It may just be your neurological predisposition. But that doesn’t mean your mental illness is entirely beyond your control. Learning to manage your depression is painstaking and tedious, but it possible–and it is more than worth it.

Rebecca Torrence is a Trinity sophomore. Her column runs on alternate Wednesdays.

Chronicle File Photo

A senior spills her secrets column about secrets, I should be required to tell a few.

Maybe. Maybe not. But anyone who has read this far deserves some small token, so here goes.

There are the secrets you wouldn’t know about me just by looking, like that I’m self-conscious about the number of freckles I have, or that my voice gets higher right before I’m about to cry.

That I am superstitious about Chinese take-out fortunes I find littered on the ground, or that I am very, very ticklish. That I think more about having children than I do about climate change, or that I can tell a lie with more ease than you’d expect.

You’ll learn these secrets slowly as you get to know me, assembling them like pieces of a puzzle I’ve scattered around the room for you to find.

But then there are secrets that I keep tightly

Janie Booth COLUMNIST What makes these platforms so easy to share on, though, is their relative anonymity.

They allow you to broadcast your hurt online without letting those closest to you know the sh*t that you’re stumbling through in person.

To be vulnerable costs something.

Over four years of college I’ve learned that to bear pain alone costs something, too.

I read this somewhere, I can’t remember where: Secrets are the currency of intimacy.

How we choose to share them—and who we share them with—are how we form bonds with one another that go deeper than the surface.

The secrets that have been trusted to me in college have often been a one-sided intimacy— asking for other people’s stories while not ever fully sharing ones of my own.

I’ve been wondering if by writing a

Sujal Manohar | Photography Editor

bound to my chest. I’ve accumulated a whole list of them that, as a senior, I wish I had whispered aloud to the right person when the time came: To my freshman year roommate: I’m not as happy as I seem.

To my sisters: I was wrong.

To my parents: I’ve thought about giving up.

To a certain boy: I think I love you.

To a different one: I definitely loved you.

To my friends: I’m terrified of leaving here without you.

These silences at times when it mattered start to add up. And, over time, their weight can feel unbearable, marking all of the million little ways we are quiet about our feelings to the people we love.

I’m here to say: let’s stop this cycle. Let’s learn how to say the quiet thing out loud.

A friend once stopped me before we walked into his apartment and said: “It’s a mess. I’m not doing great right now.” And he was right: cups and shoes and pizza boxes littered on every surface, trash spilling out of the garbage can.

But there was something honest about how he said it as he opened the door: This is me. I’m imperfect. Do you still want to be let in?

He was letting me in on a secret.

I can only hope for the same kind of honesty in relationships down the line: this is me. These are the parts of me that are hidden, and messed up, and a mess. And can you still love me?

I’ll tell you another secret: the answer will probably be yes.

Janie Booth is a Trinity senior who would love to hear all of your secrets, if you’ll let her.

Her column runs on alternate Tuesdays.

12 | WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 2019

dukechronicle.com

The Chronicle

UNIVERSITY CLUB MEMBERS enjoy stunning views in the penthouse of University Tower, casual and formal dining, and seven private dining rooms for all of life’s celebrations, The Club is offering SPECIAL NON-MEMBER DINING PRIVILEGES to Duke University students and their families for GRADUATION WEEKEND!

Friday, May 10th | Reservations available 5-9pm Saturday, May 11th | Reservations available 5-9pm Sunday, May 12 th | Reservations available 10:30am-2:30 pm Call Jessica Lee at 919-323-4815 or email jessica@universityclubnc.com to reserve your breathtaking window table with panoramic views of campus!

3100 TOWER BLVD. 17TH FLOOR | DURHAM, NC | www.universityclubnc.com