12 minute read
The Cum Laude Address
12 HACKLEY REVIEW COMMENCEMENT SUPPLEMENT 2021
Cum Laude
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The Cum Laude Address
Adrianne Pierce
I am so honored to be speaking to you today, and I want to thank Mr . Wirtz, M . Fahy, and my colleagues for inviting me to share some thoughts at this ceremony . I’d like to spend a few minutes talking to you about the “Big Picture” .
In 1985, about the time I was beginning my graduate studies, a movie called “Creator”, starring Peter O’Toole and Mariel Hemingway, premiered in theaters (do you remember movie theaters?). O’Toole plays a slightly manic scientist, Dr. Harry Wolper, devoted to bringing his dead wife back to life via her harvested cells. But that’s not important right now. Vincent Spano plays Boris, a young, eager grad student who arrives in Wolper’s lab looking for another professor for whom he will be a lab assistant. Wolper tells him that the other professor no longer has room in his lab and has run out of money, so Boris will have to join his lab. As Boris presents Wolper with his course schedule to approve and sign, Wolper, giant unlit cigar hanging out of his mouth and glasses halfway down his nose, dismisses all of his courses with statements like, “Whatever you learn in Cavelli’s Genetics 101 will be redundant by the final exam.” Boris objects that he needs to take 12 credits for the semester, to which Wolper responds: “Introduction to the ‘Big Picture’’’ — 12 credits.” “That’s it? (says Boris) One course in the ‘Big Picture’ — 12 credits?” “It’s very big; 12 credits probably isn’t enough, it’s so big.”
On the surface, the field of Classics and 12 credits of the Big Picture would seem at best irreconcilable and, at worst, oxymoronic. Classics with its focus on nominatives and genitives, ablative absolutes, the middle voice, and passive periphrastics (“what now?”, I hear you cry) — how could such a field possibly encourage engagement with the larger world? What Classics students have discovered, however, is that Caesar’s military strategies are still a part of the curriculum at West Point and the Naval Academy; that when Taylor Swift sings, “I say, “I hate you,” we break up, you call me, “I love you”...we are never, ever, ever getting back together”, she is channeling Catullus’ famous lament “odi et amo” — I hate and I love; perhaps you may ask why I do this. I don’t know, but I feel it happening and I am tortured. Quintus Cicero’s advice to his brother on how to run his campaign for consulship should be bedside reading for any politician, and I have given copies of this to more than one candidate.
These are but a few small examples of Classics’ continued relevance to our 21st century world, but they are echoed in recent comments by Dr. Cornel West: “The Classics force us to come to terms with the most terrifying question we could ever raise, which is what does it mean to be human.” Classics has come under fire, and rightly so, largely because of the way in which it has been taught and the age-old focus on Classics as “the roots of Western Civilization”. Dangerous misappropriation of symbols, misuse of images and texts, and misinterpretation of the ancient
Upper School teacher and DEI Coordinator Adrianne Pierce addressed the Class of 2021 at the Cum Laude Ceremony held on June 10, 2021 . Dr . Pierce retires on July 1 .
THE CUM LAUDE ADDRESS
world in recent times account for a reassessment of the value of including Classics in the curriculum. Nonetheless, there are lessons to be learned. What can Caesar’s domination of Gaul and the sprawling Roman empire his conquest set in motion, ensuring the spread of the Latin language and the resulting linguistic dominance, teach us about foreign policy? How can Thucydides’ warning about how words change their meanings during times of unrest prepare us to defend ourselves against authoritarian rule and doublespeak? What does archaeology reveal to us about our own discarded items in a throw-away culture and those who might be missing from the historical record?
Because Classics encompasses so many fields — language and literature, history, philosophy, art and archaeology — this training has engendered in me an endless curiosity about the vagaries of language, the patterns of history, and human nature.
My tenure as Allstom Chair in Foreign Affairs afforded me the opportunity to travel, meet students and colleagues from around the world, and explore other cultures — to learn from varying perspectives, if you will. It is no surprise that my predecessor in the Allstrom Chair role, Mr. Klimenko, has Gandalf’s words, “not all those who wander are lost” on his car bumper; as I walk my dogs in the afternoon, I have seen this sticker on his car and meditated on the nature of travel and exploration. But wandering, and therefore appearing to be lost, does not always need to involve passports, airplanes, and sturdy walking shoes. When a student asks, “where does this word come from”, I respond, “let’s look it up”.
These days, looking up a word’s etymology, however, is a mere click or two away on Dictionary.com. But in my classroom, we use the heavy American Heritage dictionary — yes, an actual book — to find the answers we seek. As I explain, if you use an online resource, you may get the answer you are looking for, but you won’t ask other questions in the process; your intellectual journey stops there. Looking in the dictionary, on the other hand, yields not only the lexicographical answer, but also all the other words on that page and the facing page — words you didn’t know you were looking for but which inevitably lead to a fascinating and possibly never-ending journey into language and thought.
Rabbit holes were not invented with the internet. The same idea applies to perusing library stacks while searching for a particular book. If you must use a request slip and receive only the volume you ask for, in closed stacks such as The New York Public Library, you don’t get to discover what else may be on the shelves near your desired book — the pleasure of finding something you didn’t even know you needed or weren’t even looking for is a true delight. When the
Cum Laude Society
The 2021 Inductees to Hackley’s Cum Laude Society:
Samantha Jewel Albright Austin Michael Benedetto Kiriann Elizabeth Fitzpatrick Isabel Maria Francis Cate Averil Goodwin-Pierce Oliver Winslow Griffen Arav Aksar Misra Nina Mital Lily Sara Napach Allison Yubin Oh Anthony Paul Pizzolato Audrey Anna Pizzolato William Matthew Rifkin Ava Rose Roberts Charles Wheeler Rudge Lara Anne Schechter Sarah Margaret Shapiro James Murray Spencer III Louisa Rose Thompson
14 HACKLEY REVIEW COMMENCEMENT SUPPLEMENT 2021
Eisenhower Library at Johns Hopkins, in a legitimate effort to increase their capacity, installed moveable stacks on the lowest level of the building (where the Classics books were shelved, of course), we lost the ability to spend leisurely minutes perusing the shelves. Your moments in the stacks infringed upon others’ ability to acquire their own books next door. The fact that we sometimes climbed onto the ends of the stacks, pushed the button and “rode” back and forth compensated only temporarily for our lack of unlimited access to our books (especially after the staff caught us at it…). Wandering, as Gandalf would agree, can take many forms, and we must be careful not to assume that we ourselves, or others, are lost when our curiosity about the larger world, whether physical or intellectual, has taken us down unexpected paths.
And those paths, unexpected or otherwise, must be your own. There is a phenomenon in nature called isomorphic mimicry — I ask for your indulgence for a moment. Some creatures develop methods of advertising that they are dangerous to touch or consume, for example an insect with a certain type of spot that exudes a poison. Birds recognize these spots and know to stay away. Hence, the insect survives. Other insects see this and think, in their little insect brains, “Hey, I could keep birds from eating me if I look like I might be poisonous”, and they develop the same spots, even though they are not really poisonous at all, but perhaps quite tasty, if you’re a bird. Not a bad idea, right?
What about in the business world — where gyms, video games, and coffee bars do not immediately increase productivity. Why not? Because that success, while certainly enhanced by cozy, multi-colored work stations, scooters, and massages, is also a result of a balance of business practices that are not necessarily quantifiable, definable, or imitatable. And, one size does not, in the end, fit all.
In international development, one country may admire the policies of another regarding education or health care or land use; but, without the infrastructure or training or oversight of the successful country, the policies will not yield the desired results. Isomorphic mimicry confers a false and superficial legitimacy. You can take inspiration from a mentor, peer, or teacher, and learn from their experiences, but you must work to discover what is best for you; explore, experiment, and engage with the world and find what works for you, makes you happy, and satisfies your passion. To quote Pablo Picasso, “the meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” Be generous with your knowledge, your experiences, and your time as you have received the same from others.
Sometimes, you must have the courage to pursue what others may question — those who see you wandering and assume you are lost and need direction. “Those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music,” a sentiment often attributed to Nietzsche, which again involves an assumption on the part of the outsider or observer. As I said just the other night to the DEI team, I have had this quote posted in my office, just over my desk, for a long time; day to day, I didn’t give it much thought until I went to take it off the wall as I was cleaning out my office. It occurred to me then that a large part of our work in DEI is to help others to hear the music and thus be more inclined to join us in the dance. So it is with the courage of your convictions that you must forge your path, and invite others to experience the music too, not necessarily as you hear it, but so that it makes sense to them on their own journey, with their own tune and beat.
Those of you who know me may be thinking at this point, “Dr. Pierce has been speaking for a while, and she’s covered Classics, global education, archaeology, and DEI, but she has yet to make a “Star Trek” reference.” Oh, fear not. Here it comes.
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In the episode “Mirror, Mirror”, James T. Kirk (and I would be remiss if I didn’t remind you that his middle initial stands for Tiberius), Captain of the Enterprise NCC-1701, and the landing party — Dr. McCoy, Lieutenant Uhura, and Engineer Scott — intersect, because of a transporter glitch, with their counterparts in a parallel universe. Their doppelgangers end up on the Enterprise, and they find themselves part of a more violent, cutthroat ship known as the ISS Enterprise, flagship not of the Federation of Planets but the Empire, where everyone is armed and no one can be trusted. After a number of attempts on his life by the alternate versions of Chekhov and Sulu, Kirk manages to get his comrades and himself to the transporter room and, with any luck, a return to their own ship. Commander Spock, ultimately realizing that this Kirk is not his Kirk, agrees to send them back through the transporter, but not before he and Kirk have the following exchange:
KIRK: You’re a man of integrity in both universes, Mister Spock.
SPOCK: You must return to your universe. I must have my captain back. I shall operate the transporter. You have two minutes and ten seconds.
KIRK: In that time I have something to say. How long before the Halkan prediction of galactic revolt is realised?
SPOCK: Approximately two hundred and forty years.
KIRK: The inevitable outcome?
SPOCK: The Empire shall be overthrown, of course.
KIRK: The illogic of waste, Mister Spock. The waste of lives, potential, resources, time. I submit to you that your Empire is illogical because it cannot endure. I submit that you are illogical to be a willing part of it.
SPOCK: You have one minute and twenty three seconds.
KIRK: If change is inevitable, predictable, beneficial, doesn’t logic demand that you be a part of it?
SPOCK: One man cannot summon the future.
KIRK: But one man can change the present. Be the captain of this Enterprise, Mister Spock. Find a logical reason for sparing the Halkans and make it stick. Push till it gives. You can defend yourself better than any man in the fleet.
Mr. SCOTT interrupts: Captain, get in the chamber!
KIRK: What about it, Spock?
SPOCK: A man must also have the power.
KIRK: In my cabin is a device that will make you invincible.
SPOCK: Indeed?
KIRK: What will it be? Past or future? Tyranny or freedom? It’s up to you.
SPOCK: It is time.
KIRK: In every revolution, there’s one man with a vision.
SPOCK: Captain Kirk, I shall consider it.
4 words — “I shall consider it” — a concession to the possibility of another way of looking at things. An acknowledgement of the “Big Picture” — that there is more out there than might be visible at that moment. An expression of courage, optimism, and hope.
Induction into the cum laude society represents but one stage, one step, in your graduation from Hackley. You heard M. Fahy speak about the motto of the cum laude society — the Greek words ἀρετή: excellence, moral virtue, good service, δίκη: order, justice, what is right, and τιμή: honor, dignity, or worth. Embrace these concepts as you embark on your journey. Open yourself to the world, wander just for the hell of it, dance whenever you hear the music, consider all the options, no matter how far-fetched they may seem at the time, and give others the chance to join you as often as possible. Take all 12 credits, but remember — the Big Picture is so big, 12 credits may not be enough.
I have one last wish for you, but, alas, I need a little help from my colleagues here, as I have never been able to pull off this move.
