Washington Square News | May 3, 2021

3 ARTS

7 OPINION

‘All Light, Everywhere’ offers an enlightening viewing experience

Scott Stringer is wrong for New York City

4 CULTURE

10 UNDER THE ARCH

API students wrestle with whether they are Asian enough

The Foreigner

VOLUME LVI | ISSUE 8

MONDAY, MAY 3, 2021

Professors express solidarity with GSOC

ALEXANDRA CHAN | WSN

The Graduate Student Organizing Committee’s strike continues into its second week. Some NYU professors have come out in solidarity with the graduate student workers and are urging the university administration to work towards a fair and reasonable contract.

Many NYU professors have come out in support of the Graduate Student Organizing Committee’s strike and are urging the university administration to work toward a fair and reasonable contract.

By ROSHNI RAJ Deputy News Editor As the Graduate Student Organizing Committee’s strike continues into its second week, some NYU professors have expressed solidarity with the graduate student workers. They issued statements in support of workers and their strike, moved classes from NYU Zoom accounts to nonNYU Zoom accounts, and urged professors to not do teaching assistants’ work or report on their union activity.

University President Andrew Hamilton and Provost Katherine Fleming explained in an April

25 email to the NYU community why they believe GSOC’s strike is unwarranted. They cited the union’s rejection of a mediator and grad student workers’ wages, which at $20 an hour are better than Harvard University grad student workers’ wages of $17 an hour. GSOC recently agreed to use a mediator under certain conditions, but their pay demands have not yet been met.

GSOC responded with a letter on April 25, noting that the cost of living is 20% higher in New York City than in Boston and that NYU hourly graduate workers’ current monthly income of $1600 is below the $2500 median rent price in New York City.

The NYU chapter of the American Association of University Professors issued a statement in support of GSOC’s strike action, asking fellow members and faculty at large to support, honor and join the picket line.

“Over the years, NYU spent tens of millions of dollars on union-busting law firms in order to prevent the establishment of a graduate employee union,” NYU-AAUP’s executive officers wrote.

“We are dismayed to note that GSOC is only the

latest NYU employee union that has had to authorize a strike in order to secure a contract. No union wants to ask this of their members, and it is always a last resort. Why does the NYU administration push bargaining to the brink so often?”

Lenora Hanson, a member of NYU-AAUP and an assistant professor of English at NYU, sees NYU as functioning as any corporation does, keeping labor costs low in order to invest money elsewhere.

“I think that NYU has a long history of trying to cut labor costs in order to produce as much as they can to pay upper level administrators, to pay down their debts on construction projects and real estate projects,” Hanson said. “That has a lot to do with the reasons why they don’t want to budge on compensation issues with their graduate union. So this is a struggle, at the end of the day, around NYU wanting to keep their labor costs low — which is obviously not a concern of the quality of student education, which they keep kind of referring to you as a way to negate the strike.”

Hanson believes Hamilton and Fleming’s letter

undercuts the value of the education the graduate students receive at NYU, as GSOC’s demands are based on intensive research they have done around costs of living, healthcare and quality of life.

“If NYU wants to promote itself as a highly ranked and influential program with a robust and respectable graduate school, then they should trust the research that their students are doing around their own conditions of living and their own conditions of working,” Hanson said.

“If our university is undercutting the research that graduate students are doing, they’re not doing a whole lot to represent the quality of education in the quality of work that the graduate students do here.”

Vasuki Nesiah, a member-at-large of NYUAAUP’s Executive Committee and a professor of human rights and international law at Gallatin, has lived in both Cambridge, Massachusetts, where Harvard is located, and New York City. She believes the city’s different costs of living should be considered and adjusted for, not used as a comparison to keep hourly wages low.

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Professors express solidarity with GSOC CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

“A living wage in New York City is radically different from a living wage in Cambridge,” Nesiah said. “I’ve lived in both cities and so I don’t think Harvard is necessarily the reference point … It needs to be the cost of living in New York City, the cost of rents in New York City. There’s a few places where it’s more diff icult to live without living in precarity, and we shouldn’t ask our graduate student workers, or any workers for NYU for that matter, to live in precarity.”

Melissa Maldonado-Salcedo — a medical anthropologist and adjunct assistant professor at the Tandon School of Engineering and College of Arts and Sciences Anthropology Department, and a former graduate student at NYU — said having a family during her postgraduate meant that

every moment working was also a moment away from home. She empathizes with and understands why GSOC is demanding higher wages.

“I was a grad student also at NYU, so I get how diff icult it could be to try to make a dollar out of 50 cents,” Maldonado-Salcedo said. “Still, while you’re trying to pursue your professional development, sometimes it comes at the expense of your emotional and mental well-being because you’re stressed about f inances or you’re stressed about trying to pay rent. So I understand why they have to take this drastic measure. That’s part of what happens when you’re in this collective bargaining space.”

Zachary Lockman, a professor in the CAS Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and the Department of History, is not sur-

prised that Bernie Sanders and other state and local politicians support the graduate students and hopes that GSOC wins a fair contract.

“I understand NYU’s had a really diff icult year dealing with COVID and its f inances are constrained in various kinds of ways,” Lockman said.

“There needs to be some serious give and take and some compromises that both sides feel they can live with.”

Hanson argues that because NYU brands itself as a global campus, they should be most attentive to the social justice demands regarding law enforcement and violence — such as keeping U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement off of campus and cutting ties with the New York City Police Department — that GSOC is bargaining for.

“These are the issues that people

have been out on the streets in New York City for the past year demanding and protesting for,” Hanson said.

“There’s this really strong continuity between GSOC’s demands and residents of New York City. And NYU brands itself as a campus in the city.

So to that extent, if we want to think of ourselves as a university that is organically a part of the city, then GSOC’s organizing and demands [are] entirely continuous with what the residents of New York want to see, which is, defunding the NYPD, getting rid of ICE, getting rid of student debt. None of these are extreme or radical demands. They’re actually demands that people are making all over the city and all over the country.”

Meanwhile, according to Maldonado-Salcedo, faculty should not forget that grad student workers are

both workers and students. While the strike is disruptive to both their studies and their work, she argues that sometimes disruption is necessary for change.

“My solidarity is always for the worker — my grandfather was a labor organizer for sugar cane cutters in Puerto Rico and my husband was a union organizer,” Maldonado-Salcedo said. “I think [the strike is] also a testament to the kind of values that NYU instilled in us in terms of our intellectual development. I met Marx in an NYU classroom, so we shouldn’t be surprised that these types of things are happening. Because this is a direct result of our critical thinking and our belief in social change.”

Email Roshni Raj at rraj@nyunews.com.

Future uncertain for Stern study abroad

ALEXANDRA CHAN | WSN

The Stern School of Business on Gould Plaza is located at the southeast corner of Washington Square. A Stern study away program will be cancelled.

By SAURABH KUMAR Staff Writer Robert Whitelaw, the vice dean for the undergraduate college at the Stern School of Business, discussed in a March 26 email the pandemic’s disruption of Stern’s Global Pillar study away opportunities, such as the International Business Exchange Program, the International Studies Program and short-term immersions.

Although he said a review of these programs was critical and recommendations would be forthcoming in the following weeks, more than a month has passed without updates.

“A committee of Stern faculty and

administrators have begun a review of our competitors and are discussing how things like the pandemic and other global crises influence global business education,” Whitelaw wrote in the email.

This is not the f irst time Stern has revised its academic programs. According to Whitelaw, Stern completed a review of the four-course Social Impact Core in 2017 that resulted in increased diversity and inclusion content for all required coursework.

“As common practice, we review all of our academic programs from time to time to ensure the highest standards of academic excellence and alignment with the latest research and

developments in business,” Whitelaw wrote in an email statement to WSN. Whitelaw believes that the current environment calls for new approaches to teaching global business.

“The pandemic, as I’m sure I don’t need to tell you, halted air travel and impacted visa processing, but it also shined a light on just how globally interconnected our world -- and business -- has become,” Whitelaw said in the statement.

According to Whitelaw, the committee will share its f inal recommendations before the 20212022 school year.

“The committee was launched in April, so they are still very much in

the learning and discussion phase, and there are no recommendations at this time,” Whitelaw said. “The committee has been asked to share their assessment and recommendations during the summer so that we can plan to implement any recommendations before the start of the new academic year.”

With a number of programs involving study away — such as the Barr Family International Studies Program for spring break, the International Business Exchange Program for a semester and the BS in Business and Political Economy degree program for two semesters — many students expect to study abroad during their time at Stern.

“Studying abroad is the single best thing someone can choose to do in college,” Stern junior JonPaul Lambert said. “Going abroad forces you out of your comfort zone … ISP and study abroad opportunities in general are some of the reasons many of us chose Stern and NYU.” Due to the pandemic, this year’s juniors were unable to travel through ISP, the Stern program in which juniors immerse themselves for the week of spring break in the culture of the countries and economies they are studying.

“The lack of a trip for ISP due to the pandemic has certainly been the most abrupt interruption,” Lambert said. “I think everyone in Stern looks forward to the ISP trip and the opportunity to understand a company and country on a more personal and cultural level.”

“While the ISP Program didn’t influence my decision to apply/enroll at Stern, it was something I was looking forward to since the day I committed,” Stern f irst-year Julia Denissenko added in an email to WSN. While the ISP web page previously boasted that 100% of Stern students have a global experience, this statistic has been removed. The page also no longer mentions the part of the program that allowed students to travel internationally.

“We did update the language re-

cently because we felt it was disingenuous to promote 100% of students having a global experience when our global programs have been grounded for over a year due to the pandemic and as directed by government and NYU policy,” Whitelaw told WSN. Stern junior Lavinia Gabriele told WSN in an email that Stern’s Global Pillar heavily influenced her decision to pursue a bachelor’s degree in business and political economy.

“The main reason why I decided to attend Stern, and specif ically BPE, is because of the NYU Shanghai study abroad session that happens in my Sophomore year during the Spring semester,” Gabriele wrote. “I wasn’t able to do that, and so overall I feel like the main goal of BPE, which is to understand business, politics, and economics in the three major business hubs (NYC, London, Shanghai), has not been met.”

Gabriele also said the inability to go on the Shanghai trip restricts interactions between BPE students.

“BPE students are known to be good friends with one another, and that is mainly because of the Shanghai study abroad session,” she said.

“I am still very grateful that I was able to go to London,” Gabriele added. “Some of my favorite classes were taken there. I was able to take an architecture class and go around London to visit museums, buildings, and galleries. I loved to learn about Brexit in the city where major political decisions were being made.”

Lambert said he was fortunate to be able to study abroad earlier in his academic career. He hopes the Stern administration f inds a way to give students the international experience they expected.

“I was also able to develop more meaningful friendships that have lasted throughout my time at NYU,” Lambert said regarding his experience in London. “I would encourage NYU faculty and staff to f ind a way to make up for part of the lost experience.”

Email Saurabh Kumar at news@nyunews.com.

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MONDAY, MAY 3, 2021

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Edited by SASHA COHEN and NICOLAS PEDRERO-SETZER

Janicza Bravo Q&A Event: A Glimpse Inside the Director’s Mind

By SOPHIA CARR Staff Writer In a collaboration between A24 and the NYU Program Board, Janicza Bravo, NYU alumna and director of the upcoming movie “Zola,” gave a remote Q&A session for NYU students. In the intimate session, moderated by Tisch sophomore Myles Madden, a small number of students had the opportunity to ask Bravo about her experience within the film industry. During the candid and inspiring session, Bravo delved into personal experiences spanning her career from her time at NYU to her transition from theater to film and television directing. Finally, she reflected on her most recent work, “Zola.”

After Madden introduced her, Bravo began the session by talking about her decision to be a director. Though she came to NYU to pursue theater, an instructor told Bravo that she was destined to be a director instead.

Bravo was initially discouraged by the professor’s advice — she had a hard time seeing herself succeeding in a field with so few Black women. “I wasn’t able to cite anyone who looked like me who was doing that,” she said.

It is now evident that Bravo has found her calling in directing, paving a way for many more Black women to direct in the future.

When asked about how she made the transition from theater to film, she explained that after graduating from NYU, she moved to Los Angeles. She initially planned to stage direct, but

she dropped that plan when a director of photography for the television show “Atlanta” approached her about directing. She began writing scripts for short films. Bravo explained that her life changed when her 2011 short “Eat” was accepted into South by Southwest.

After the success of “Eat” and other shorts and TV episodes, she went on to co-write and direct her first full-length movie, “Lemon,” in 2017. Within a year of its release, Bravo was hired to direct “Zola,” the primary topic of the second half of the Q&A session.

“Zola” is based upon a 148-tweet Twitter thread that Aziah “Zola” King, a waitress and stripper from Detroit, wrote in 2015. The thread detailed her wild experience going to Florida with a girl named Jessica, Jessica’s boyfriend and a pimp in a story involving murder and sex trafficking.

Like many other Twitter users, Bravo was captivated by the story when it was tweeted about internationally as #TheStory. The story immediately garnered a lot of attention from film studios for a potential adaptation. Yet Bravo wasn’t initially selected to direct it.

When the story was once again in need of a director in 2017, Bravo expressed the things she wanted to bring to the project. She wanted to make sure Aziah King — the original Zola — was a part of the project. King’s approval was her number-one priority.

“If she likes it, then it doesn’t really matter what else happens,” Bravo said.

“Because I made her feel seen, I made her feel heard, I’ve materialized this

MANASA GUDAVALLI | WSN

Zola is a biographical comedy-drama film directed by Janicza Bravo. Janicza Bravo, an NYU alum, gave a Q&A session for NYU students.

event that happened to her, and she is the one that will forever have the tangible object of what she lived, so her read of it is the top read.”

She emphasized that she made “Zola’’ in a way that no one else would have, especially since the last group to be in control of the project was predominantly made up of white men. When asked to compare their possible version of “Zola” to her own interpretation of the story, she replied “If their movie is on Earth, then my movie is whatever planet is the farthest away from Earth.”

Bravo also spent the Q&A emphasizing her directorial intentions with the “Zola” project, talking about how she envisioned the look and feel of the film and how her directorial choices influenced the story.

“I wanted to imbue it with this sort of rosy patina that I feel the way little girls retell stories, and I wanted to recast it in a way where everything looked and felt a little bit more beautiful than it might’ve been,” Bravo said.

When Madden asked about the key references Bravo used to formulate the world within “Zola,” she emphasized how photography has always been an integral part of developing her filmmaking. She was also inspired by movies such as “Paris Is Burning” and “The Wiz,” even referring to “Zola” as “the ratchet ‘Wizard of Oz’” where, instead of making three friends, Zola gains three enemies.

She emphasized that the experience of watching “Zola” is not intended to be particularly comfortable, due in large

part to the fact that the disturbing story is entirely true. Bravo emphasized the unsettling truths of the story through its colors, costume design, score and cinematography. She said that her version of the story should feel like 90 minutes spent eating cotton candy, gummy bears, diet coke and red bull. “You should be like, ‘That was fun, but like, I don’t feel right,’ and that’s the movie,” she said Bravo showed both her love for filmmaking and her dedication to helping aspiring filmmakers through the anecdotes and details of her creative process she shared. It also displayed Bravo’s dedication and commitment to storytelling and authentically bringing a story like King’s onto the big screen.

Email Sophia Carr at arts@nyunews.com.

‘All Light, Everywhere’ offers an enlightening viewing experience

COURTESY OF NEON PRODUCTIONS

All Lights, Everywhere provides a stunning and insightful commentary on the development of cameras and surveillance. The film delves deep into how the images produced are shaped not only by the camera but the people behind the lenses.

By NICOLAS PEDRERO-SETZER Arts Editor Theo Anthony’s “All Light, Everywhere” is that rare type of film that forces viewers to reappraise their reality.

It chips away at viewers’ preconceptions of authority and surveillance through spliced footage from various attempts to wield cameras as a weapon to suppress the marginalized, arriving at a

new understanding of our reality that acknowledges the harm engendered by these practices.

“All Light, Everywhere” is Anthony’s follow-up to “Rat Film,” another atypical documentary that examines Baltimore’s redlining practices by focusing on fixed district increases in rat populations to expose the ongoing harmful effects of said practices. Much like “Rat Film,” “All Light, Everywhere” takes an uncon-

ventional approach toward surveillance policing. The film feels an adjustment of vision where things may appear blurry at first but soon come into focus.

The film begins with a series of philosophical statements that revolve around the idea that because the eye contains blindspots, the act of seeing is a constant collision between what we actually perceive and what we choose to perceive. In short, the mind creates a world where the eye cannot see and as such, people must grapple with the vision of the world they project before the world around them.

It is from here that “All Light, Everywhere” strangely proceeds to delve into the history of camera development. It’s a strange choice, but one that ends up providing the film’s critique of cameras with a solid backbone of historical facts that further the director’s argument.

Through these historical interludes, we learn about how the chronophotographic gun, an early camera model that strongly resembles a rifle, was used to produce ethnographic films about the subjects of French colonial rule. Camera technicians imitated the act of shooting citizens under colonial rule to register their bodies as ethnographic content.

From the very start, Anthony’s argument is clear: it’s not that cameras take a side, but that they are infused with their creators’ ideologies. As such, the history of filmmaking is skewed to support the

vision of the world promoted by those in charge, typically white men.

We see this play out in Baltimore, Maryland, throughout “All Light, Everywhere.” Anthony offers viewers a tour of a body-camera factory. As a pasty, pudgy man walks viewers through the intricacies of developing a camera that can supposedly mimic the human eye to perfection, the warped articulations of manufacturing such devices expose themselves.

The body camera, a tool whose stated aim is to keep police officers in check, merely acts as an extension of them: a technological form of policing. It is not an unbiased recorder, it is an oppressive tool. Its placement on the chest distorts police officers’ interactions with the people around them. Movements appear more aggressive and the legal right officers hold to review their footage prior to being prosecuted offers them the chance to reshape reality.

It’s heavy stuff, and as if that weren’t enough, Anthony unravels the strange case of a surveillance project in Baltimore dubbed Aerial Investigation Research run by a company called Persistent Surveillance Systems. It’s essentially live Google Maps on steroids.

Using a stationed plane, PSS monitors the city below with the hopes of uncovering crimes and offering the Baltimore Police Department a set of eyes in the

sky: a god’s view.

With this perspective, humans look like ants. The man controlling the plane acts like a child shining light through a magnifying glass. The operator is an extension of the state. Cameras are used to gaze upon humans like animals, in a manner all too similar to how the chronophotographic gun took photos of colonized subjects.

Critics could argue that Anthony’s approach is incredibly one-sided, as his arguments contradict official narratives of reality. Yet it’s for this very reason that “All Light, Everywhere” works. The film is built to express the voices of the voiceless and counter cultural narratives in order to improve society. The film is biased in that it promotes the righting of wrongs, acting as propaganda that aims to reconfigure systemic flaws that necessitate call outs.

As Anthony needle drops Laraaji’s “All of a Sudden” while the credits begin to crawl down the screen, the film leaves viewers to ponder. With Laraaji singing “All of a sudden/The sense of self/Is centered/In a new awareness,” Anthony places the final punctuation mark on his filmic essay. Viewers are forced to contemplate how they view policing, filmmaking and the act of seeing.

Email Nicolas Pedrero-Setzer at npedrerosetzer@nyunews.com.

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API students wrestle with whether they are Asian enough

SUHAIL GHARAIBEH

NYU students of Asian and Pacific Islander descent are sharing their experiences with racism in New York City during the pandemic. The past year’s pandemic-related hate has targeted some students under the AAPI umbrella while sparing others, causing some who have not faced heightened racism to question whether they count as AAPI.

By SABRINA CHOUDHARY Deputy Culture Editor May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in the United States. This year, the celebration comes after thousands of hate incidents against Asian and Pacific Islander people were reported during the pandemic, a figure that is assumed to be an underestimate. Anti-API hate crime reports went up by almost 150% between 2019 and 2020, even as the overall hate crime rate fell. New York City saw the greatest increase of any major U.S. city.

While NYU’s API students come from an enormous range of backgrounds, racism functions by reducing those nuances to perceivable traits — namely, appearance. The past year’s hate has targeted some students under the API umbrella while sparing others, causing those who have not faced heightened racism to doubt their validity in the API community.

Crystal Parikh is a professor in the Social and Cultural Analysis and English departments as well as the director of NYU’s Asian/Pacific/American Institute. Her work addresses the complicated histories behind the formation of these identities.

“I spend a lot of time with this category of ‘Asian American,’ or ‘Asian Pacific American,’” she said. “The larger context of history of that category is one that’s been vexed from the very origins.”

She explained that Asians didn’t im-

migrate en masse to the United States until 1965 due to the government’s anti-Asian discrimination.

“Most of the 20th century is just one Asian exclusion act after another,” she said. “Basically from the early 20th century until 1965, there’s just no immigration from Asia to the U.S. Not because it’s an accident; it’s by design.

The Congress and the federal government arranged that.”

This history means that API and AAPI are terms that only emerged within the past few decades to describe a relatively new population in the United States. As a result, people are constantly defining and redefining these identity categories. The recent flood of hate has become a new moment to grapple with who these labels include and exclude.

Parikh also suggests that the anti-API hate we’ve seen could be a result of contemporary anti-API sentiment at the state level.

“Much of this might very well be rooted in a kind of anti-China rhetoric from the top down,” she said. “But it’s not only Chinese Americans or Chinese immigrants. Those who are bearing the brunt of it is the whole range of Asian Americans and, I think, Pacific Islanders.”

Tisch sophomore Anvita Gattani, who is Indian American, added that people commit hate crimes based on their perceptions of the victims, not the victims’ actual ethnicities or identities.

Even if the aggressor’s logic is founded

in anti-Chinese racism, they only care about whether the person they’re attacking fits their conception of how a Chinese person looks.

“They don’t look at someone and be like, ‘Ah, they’re Korean. The coronavirus did not come from Korea. Let me not hate-crime them,’” she said. “The oppressor doesn’t necessarily see the individuality of the communities.”

By the same token, many students who consider themselves Asians or Pacific Islanders are hesitant to claim space in the Stop AAPI Hate movement because they have not been the targets of pandemic-related hate. On top of that, many have felt excluded from the API community because their experiences don’t fit what the term has come to signify to others. Both of the Indian students I spoke to said that South Asians are treated as separate from the API umbrella.

Tisch junior Inaya Carroll, who is Canadian and half Indian and half white, doesn’t think she should be included in the Stop AAPI Hate movement.

“These attacks have been on East Asians and Southeast Asians, and I’m half South Asian, and very fair for a South Asian, and I understand that. I understand a lot of the time South Asia gets forgotten as a part of Asia,” she said. “This isn’t for me. I don’t feel like I’m included in this at all.”

Gattani expressed a similar sentiment.

“I consider myself to be AAPI, but it’s also interesting that India as the

subcontinent is often excluded from those conversations, and Indian Americans are told kind of like, ‘Go find your own place,’” she said.

Other students feel that while those experiencing pandemic-related hate should be prioritized within the movement, gatekeeping is problematic in other ways.

Caroline Younglove is a junior in Tisch and CAS. As a biracial American who’s half Filipina and half white, the Stop AAPI Hate movement has intensified her search for a racial identity.

“Being half and half, sometimes I feel like I have experienced anti-Asian racial profiling and hate and comments like that, but that was in my past. And now, I guess I’m coming to more of a reckoning of finding my identity as a person of color, and I’m not really sure where I land,” she said.

For Younglove, the notion of being “enough” to count as an API person is dangerous.

“I think there shouldn’t be a barrier on, ‘Oh, you aren’t Asian enough, you don’t look Asian enough,’” she said.

“There’s a whole thing about not being enough to identify as a race or ethnicity, which I think is very harmful for a lot of people.”

For Gallatin junior Carlisle Wang, who is Chinese American, this attitude is apparent when people of Asian descent define their identity by their migration from a different culture and homeland. As a result of the United States’ anti-Asian immigration legisla-

tion up to 1965, 57% of Asian Americans in 2021 are immigrants, compared to 14% of the entire U.S. population.

Wang says that the Facebook group Subtle Asian Traits, which has nearly 2 million members from around the world, roots Asian identity in this kind of experience. “[It’s] just a little exclusive to people who are maybe not second-gen or firstgen, people who are a little more disconnected from the ‘home country,’” he said. “That’s kind of also implying that America does not count as a home country, even though I was raised here.”

Even if this gatekeeping is implicit, it can weigh heavily on those who are excluded.

Tisch senior Alyssa Silver is an American of Japanese and Jewish descent and a co-founder of the Tisch club All Asian Arts Alliance. After the Atlanta shooting, she felt conflicted about whether she was part of the API community in mourning for the victims.

“I talked with someone else who was mixed in the club and they said, ‘Can we even claim this grief? Are we allowed to claim this grief?’” Silver said.

“I think we are allowed to claim it because it’s part of our identity, but it was still hard to grapple with.”

These kinds of questions are why she intentionally creates space for other mixed people in her club.

“Something I’m really passionate about within my club is to make sure mixed kids have a space in the club, and they know that they’re accepted no matter what,” she said. “Because I know what it’s like to be not accepted within an Asian community, even though you’re Asian.”

Steinhardt senior Sinead Anae is a Pacific Islander of Native Hawaiian, Samoan and Irish descent. She believes that while most of the hate we’ve seen during the pandemic has targeted Asian people, and while the term AAPI emphasizes Americans, using the term AAPI in anti-racist activism is an important step towards inclusion.

“The acronym itself is extremely powerful, to include Pacific Islanders,” she said. “I hope that people understand that it is a different experience, though, and that’s why it’s important to still have that intersectionality.”

Gattani agrees that it’s crucial for API people to build a coalition while acknowledging their unique and layered identities.

“I think it’s important to recognize that there are several identities that experience Asian discrimination differently,” she said. “I think individuality is important, but I also think it’s important to band together as a community under an AAPI type of term.”

This year, AAPI Heritage Month is an especially meaningful time to embrace identity in all of its complexity and to make space for those who don’t feel like they belong.

“I think being an Asian in America, that identity is being opened up right now,” Younglove said. “It’s just about this country’s identity as a whole because it’s so shifting, and I think we are finding ways to include more people.

It’s still, it’s hard for people who fall in an in-between, I think, to find a space in conversation.”

Email Sabrina Choudhary at schoudhary@nyunews.com.

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NYU’s Class of 2024 reflects on their first year

By NATALIE MELENDEZ Staff Writer When the Class of 2024 imagined their first year of college, they envisioned spending their days strolling through the city streets and their nights laughing with friends during impromptu dorm room study sessions. They saw themselves planting the seeds of relationships that would blossom into lifelong connections.

Above all, they hoped to experience the unadulterated freedom that comes with moving away from home. The city held promises of a memorable first year of college for the Class of 2024, but thanks to COVID-19, their expectations did not exactly become reality.

The pandemic hampered many firstyear students’ plans across the United States. Many universities opened with heavy restrictions for the 2020-2021 school year, while others continued their remote operations from the spring. NYU reopened its Washington Square campus with a combination of hybrid, in-person and fully remote classes. Students were given the option to either return to New York City, attend Go Local locations or remain at home.

Those who returned to the New York City campus were met with stringent

COVID-19 compliance rules such as a 14-day quarantine, prohibitions on dorm room gatherings and an almost entirely remote schedule.

While these restrictions ensured the safety of everyone on campus, students like CAS first-year Angel Davis felt that they made it difficult to connect with peers.

“The greatest challenge was honestly just meeting people,” Davis said. “I feel like a lot of people say the same thing because there wasn’t like [an in-person] Welcome Week. There wasn’t a direct way to meet people and kind of put yourself out there.”

Though CAS first-year Elizabeth Abraham was able to form strong friendships and meet students in her residence hall, she agrees that the lack of in-person events undermined the unity within the Class of 2024 at large.

“I still do kind of feel not as connected with the people around me,” Abraham said. “I’m very content with everyone in my life. But it’s also kind of like, I wish we had a Welcome Week, I wish we had more interaction, more events and we were just able to be in the same room with other peers.”

Though university-wide restrictions made it difficult for students to gather on campus, the thrills of the city along with online community-building opportunities helped first-years make the most of their

turbulent year. “[I loved] exploring the city [and] going to places at night, especially Brooklyn [and] Times Square,” Davis said about her favorite moments of the year.

Davis wasn’t the only one who was able to make the best of her first-year experience. Stern first-year Sofia Elhusseini was able to make friends thanks to the community programming at Rubin Residential Hall, where she lives. “[I really enjoyed], obviously, spending time with my friends, and just the NYU spirit,” Elhusseini said. “NYU did do a lot to make us feel comfortable … I would go to a lot of [residence hall] events in the beginning when I felt alone, and that’s how I made a lot of friends in my dorm.”

Despite the challenges brought forth by the unprecedented year, some students also found opportunities for reflection and self-growth.

CAS first-year Sofia Fajardo switched her major from Politics to Psychology.

Fajardo believes that if she had completed her first year remotely instead of living on campus, she may have never discovered her true passion.

“I’ve been wanting to go to law school since high school,” Fajardo said. “It wasn’t until my first year that I was like, wait a minute, I don’t know if I want to do this

genuinely for myself or because of my family. So I think that through my first year, like being away from home, I’ve been able to think more on my own and for myself and realize that this is genuinely my life.”

Like Fajardo, Abraham lives on her own in New York City. Through the experience, Abraham learned more about herself and the world.

“Honestly, looking back within the last year, I think I’ve just grown so so much,” Abraham said. “[I] got in some emotional maturity [and] life maturity having to live by myself … Not [having] my family around all the time, not having that dependence and just fending for myself has been a good [experience].”

As the year comes to a close, the Class of 2024 looks forward to having something that more closely resembles a traditional college experience in the fall. “[I’m hopeful for] the fact that we can have visitors for dorms,” Elhusseini said.

“I’m hoping for in-person classes, anything that’s in person and that it’s safe in terms of COVID so that we can do as much as we can.”

Abraham hopes not just to meet people but to take advantage of the city as an NYU student should.

“I’m hoping next year, there’s more community building,” Abraham said. “[I

hope] there’s more human interaction and just overall [that] I can go to Broadway shows, go to movies — do the whole thing and actually get an NYU New York experience.”

Email Natalie Melendez at culture@nyunews.com.

MANASA GUDAVALLI | WSN

For the 2020-2021 school year, NYU reopened its Washington Square campus with a combination of hybrid, in-person, and fully remote classes. This nontraditional experience has given NYU first-year students some unique college memories.

Reconnecting with my Iraqi roots at Damascus Bread & Pastry Shop

GABBY LOZANO | WSN

Damascus Bread and Pastry Shop, located on 195 Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn, is a Syrian bakery known for its flatbreads, pastries, dips, and spreads. This bakery has been serving its community since its opening in 1928.

By GABBY LOZANO Dining Editor I stumbled upon Damascus Bread & Pastry Shop last January upon my return to New York for the spring semester. My mom and I had just spent hours aimlessly walking through the neighborhood to catch a glimpse of life outside of Manhattan, a real treat for this Virginia native.

“Oh, Gabby,” my mom said as she grabbed my arm. I looked up and saw the red letters that spelled out “Damascus Bread & Pastry Shop.” “Gabby, we have to go in,” she said, leading the way into the store.

When we walked in, we were greeted with the sweet, nutty aroma of freshly baked baklava and knafeh. Parallel to those desserts were refrigerators filled with savory dishes and dips like kibbeh.

In the back of the store stood a wall of spices, sauces and other condiments that give Middle Eastern cuisine its vibrant and inviting flavors.

My mom’s eyes lit up in excitement.

She pointed to the stack of spinach pies on the counter. “We used to have these

all the time when we were kids. They’re absolutely delicious, we must try some.”

I declined, but continued to walk around the store as my mom’s enthusiasm grew with each new discovery, almost as if she were a kid in a candy store.

I’ll admit, it was pretty heartwarming to see my mom reconnect with the staple foods of her childhood. My mom was raised by my grandmother, an Iraqi immigrant who, I’ve been told, was someone who showed her love with a home-cooked meal and her frustration with “the shoes.” (My grandmother would throw her shoes at my mom and her siblings whenever they got in trouble.

From their stories, it sounds like they got in trouble a lot, so they coined her action “the shoes”).

Unfortunately, my grandmother passed away decades before I was born, so I never had the opportunity to get to really know her or my Iraqi roots.

I don’t speak Arabic or Aramaic, and neither does my mom, although she can understand some Arabic phrases and words. Our disconnection to the language drew us to the kitchen as a way

to food as a means to bridge the gap between our Iraqi heritage and my grandmother. That’s why finding the store was so special: Damascus Bread & Pastry Shop brought us closer to our culture and grandmother in another realm that isn’t our kitchen.

I slowly, but surely, felt a part of my Iraqi heritage come to life as I took in the sights and smells of the shop. Dolmas, hummus and jars of grape leaves: these were the foods of my childhood that founded my understanding of what it means to be Iraqi or Chaldean.

It had been months since I returned to the store, but this past week, I finally made the trek back to Damascus Bread & Pastry Shop.

I saw the familiar rows filled with baklava, spinach pies relaxed on the counter and the magnificent spice wall standing proud in the back.

This time I had the fortune to speak with the owner, Gus Matli, and who told me more about his shop and its role within Brooklyn’s Middle Eastern community.

“1928,” said Matli as he made falafel sandwiches. “The founder of this place…

They came from Damascus in 1900, and he opened the bakery in 1928.”

Little did I know, this bakery was one of many Middle Eastern shops that crowded Atlantic Avenue during the 20th century, a street in Brooklyn that was once a hub for Syrian immigrants and other Arab communities. “[Syrian immigrants] first come living in downtown Manhattan on Vector Street, before the buildings come up,” Matli said. “Once the buildings start coming up they chase them down here.”

While the community consisted of multiple Arab groups, the owner made a point that the immigrants who came to Atlantic Avenue were Syrian Christians.

“They used to come from Syria at a time that land used to be Damascus... they Syrian, understand? And they used

to be Christian, okay?”

I smized and nodded to signal my understanding. His concern with making sure I understood the distinction between the Syrian Christians from other Arab communities reminded me again of my grandmother. From what I’ve heard, she was very particular about separating her identity as a Christian from other Middle Eastern communities.

The Syrian and Middle Eastern community thrived in Atlantic Avenue until the 1990s, when rising rents forced them out of the area. Yet while many of the community’s residents and businesses left over the years, Damascus Bread & Pastry Shop still serves as a reminder of the avenue’s historic past.

“Still, we are very famous, we don’t need any advertising, everybody knows about us,” Matli said. “If you come from California, you have to come to Atlantic Avenue if you have some [Arabic] in your blood.”

I began to tell him my own connection to the Middle East and the personal significance of the store’s food.

“Oh, well actually my grandmother immigrated from Iraq—” “Ah, Iraq! That’s it, you’re Arabic!”

I politely declined out of respect for my grandmother, who, from what I’ve heard, identified as Chaldean and

Iraqi, not Arabic.

After our conversation I continued to explore the store and pick up some essentials. The shop quickly filled with customers as I set my items on the counter to check out. I had settled on three items: sumac, a tangy, tart spice often used for vegetable dishes, a tray of baklava and of course, the spinach pies from my mother’s childhood.

“Take care, my dear, and good luck,” Matli said as I exited the shop.

I left the store with a sense of clarity. Seeing all those spices, sauces and other dishes brought back nostalgic moments from my childhood that not only reminded me of my heritage but my family as well. I had found my home away from home.

Matli told me that his shop was famous, so they don’t need any advertising, but I’m going to give you my endorsement anyway.

If you ever happen to find yourself wandering around northwest Brooklyn, go to the corner of Atlantic Avenue and Court Street and walk until you find Damascus Bread & Pastry Shop. You’ll find comfort, Middle Eastern pride and delicious spinach pies.

Email Gabby Lozano at glozano@nyunews.com.

GABBY LOZANO | WSN

Damascus Bread and Pastry Shop has a multitude of authentic middle eastern foods that line its shelves

Washington Square News

6

MONDAY, MAY 3, 2021

OPINION

OPINION@NYUNEWS.COM

Edited by EMILY DAI and KEVIN KURIAN

POLITICS

RACE

Conservative win in Second Amendment case could spur liberal court reform

The COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act aids and abets a racist policing system

By EMILY DAI Opinion Editor On April 26, the U.S. Supreme Court announced that it would review a longstanding New York law that restricted the ability to carry a gun outside the home. New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Corlett is set to be the first major Second Amendment decision in more than a decade. The previous 2008 case, District of Columbia v. Heller, created an individual right to bear arms, including keeping a handgun for self-defense. The newest case has the potential to expand a Second Amendment right of self-defense beyond the home, and given the court’s 6-3 conservative majority, this extension will likely happen. While a conservative ruling in this case would be extremely damaging to gun regulation advocates, liberals should take this as an opportunity to push for further court reform.

The case addresses a New York handgun licensing law, which has been in place since 1913, that denies concealed-carry licenses to individuals who do not demonstrate a distinctive need for self-defense. Examples of those who demonstrate “proper cause” to carry a handgun in public range from people who fear their stalker to storekeepers who want to protect their store. While the initial claim in Corlett was narrowed to “whether the State’s denial of petitioners’ applications for concealed-carry licenses for self-defense violated the Second Amendment,” the case still has the potential of creating a right for virtually anyone to bear arms outside the home. A ruling in favor of the plaintiffs would embolden lower courts to dismantle laws regulating guns.

These laws were largely applied to fit in the narrow scope of Heller, but an expansion under Corlett may make many state regulations unconstitutional.

While the Second Amendment has not been addressed by the Court since 2008, mak-

TAYLOR KNIGHT | WSN

On April 26, the Supreme Court announced that it would review a New York law that restricted the ability to carry a gun outside the home. This is the first time the Supreme Court has taken up this issue in over a decade.

ing the precedent sparse and the outcome uncertain, the Court will almost definitely side with the plaintiffs. The Supreme Court only grants writs of certiorari and hears oral arguments in about 80 of the 7,000-8,000 petitions filed each term. Which cases will be accepted is decided by informal rules, the most important of which being the “rule of four.”

This rule describes the Supreme Court’s practice of only granting a petition for review if there are at least four votes to do so, meaning that at least four justices agreed to take up Corlett. Since it takes five justices to form a majority, conservatives are almost certainly going to be able to persuade at least one colleague into joining them.

Furthermore, three justices who were a part of the majority in Heller — Thomas, Alito and Roberts — are still on the court. Thomas has been the most vocal, going as far to write in a dissent to not take another Second Amendment case citing that “in several jurisdictions throughout the country, law-abiding citizens have been barred from exercising the fundamental right to bear arms because they cannot show that they have a ‘justifiable need’ or ‘good reason’ for doing so.” The two newest justices, Kavanaugh and Barrett, exhibited strong interest in expanding the Second Amendment while working in lower courts.

Kavanaugh wrote dissenting opinions questioning the validity of gun regulation itself.

While Barrett was a judge on the federal appeals court in Chicago, she wrote in favor of expanding the eligibility of individuals who could own guns to nonviolent criminals, making her at least sympathetic to gun rights activists. The current makeup of the court is promising for Second Amendment absolutists to win in Corlett.

Recently, Alito issued a 31-page dissenting opinion to a case dismissed by the Supreme Court. His dissent directly targeted lower courts who have narrowly applied Heller to uphold gun regulation, stating that this phenomenon is “cause for concern.” This type of judicial activism blatantly being projected by Alito is the real cause for concern, and signifies the eagerness of at least one conservative justice for striking down gun regulations.

There is one glimmer of hope in this case that will likely strike down New York’s law, and that is the possibility that the decision will prompt activists to push for court reform.

The six conservative justices already faced intense criticism from the left. Democratic leaders proposed legislation to expand the Court from nine to 13 justices, which would allow more liberal judges to join the Court. While President Biden has sidestepped the question of court packing, he ordered a bipartisan commission to examine politically incendiary issues regarding the Supreme Court, including term limits for justices. The momentum for court reform is only building, and a sweeping interpretation of the Second Amendment may be the tipping point.

The Pew Research Center found that 60% of Americans believe gun laws should be tougher. Since the beginning of 2021, the United States has suffered at least 147 mass shootings. If the Supreme Court delivers a radical, new interpretation of the Second Amendment in Corlett, liberals must weaponize this to push for reform.

Email Emily Dai at edai@nyunews.com.

By SRISHTI BUNGLE Staff Writer On Thursday, April 22, the U.S. Senate passed the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act. The Act passed 94-1, sweeping the narrowly divided Senate floor in a near-unanimous decision.

The Act, if passed through the House of Representatives and signed into law by President Joe Biden, would designate an official at the Justice Department to oversee the expedited review of hate crimes reported during the pandemic. The bill would also require the department to work with local law enforcement groups and community organizations to increase hate crime reporting efforts. This would include the establishment of an online hate crime reporting database in multiple languages. Notably, the bill would “provide grant money to law enforcement agencies that train their officers to identify hate crimes.”

In wake of tragic anti-Asian hate crimes, this bill is a victory to many politicians. Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) said, “We will send a powerful message of solidarity to the AAPI community that the Senate won’t be a bystander as anti-Asian violence surges in our country.” New York’s own U.S. Rep. Grace Meng (D-Queens), stated that increased reporting of hate crimes would “provide [for] increased data and a more accurate picture of the attacks that have been occurring against those of Asian descent,” which would help law enforcement take action against perpetrators.

Activists on the ground, however, see the threat that legislation like the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act poses. “The ‘George Floyd Act’ and ‘Anti-Asian Hate Crime Bill’ still operate with incentives to reform policing.

Reforms are not progress when the goal is to abolish the systems that are killing us,” musician Jordan Occasionally tweeted. Asian and Black American activists have demanded police abolition in wake of the tragic and violent

deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and now Ma’Khia Bryant. These hate crime bills are not asking for defunding or abolition: instead, they ask for the system to hold itself accountable. Ultimately, this means more tax-funded grants that do nothing but encourage policing.

Some even compare the quick passage of this act to the decades-long fight for anti-lynching legislation. They identify a crucial difference between the goals of countless anti-lynching legislative efforts of the past to the goals of the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act. Many attribute this quick response to the complicit nature of the new legislation. While anti-lynching efforts would focus on bolstering community resources, reparative payments and police abolition, the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act prioritizes none of those things.

It’s no secret that government grants are correlated with increased police presence.

However, it is also no surprise that this increase in funding does little to actually prevent crime of any kind. Activists and community organizers have minimal faith that the new bill’s expansion of the Justice Department — which has its own recent history of racism — and subsequent expansion of local law enforcement agencies will change much.

Before the passage of the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act, Shaw San Liu, executive director of the Chinese Progressive Association, stressed the importance of intercommunity partnership and collaboration. “For the Chinese community to be able to be safe in every sense of the word, we have to be working in partnership with other communities of color across the region,” Liu said.

Working with other communities of color, particularly Black Americans, means acknowledging the ways police continue to harbor racist and anti-Black sentiments that manifest in the form of disproportionate violence. Any solution to the hatred the Asian community faces must take into account the racialized harm police inflict — and divest from policing entirely. Sadly, the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act falls horribly flat. Instead of looking to the government, we must prioritize and celebrate the work of activists looking to build a safe future for all communities of color.

Email Srishti Bungle at opinion@nyunews.com.

SUHAIL GHARAIBEH

A community leader speaks out against Asian hate crimes during a protest. The U.S. Senate has passed a bill that attempts to address the rising tide of these hate crimes.

Washington Square News | Opinion

MONDAY, MAY 3, 2021

7

STAFF EDITORIAL

Scott Stringer is wrong for New York City Content warning: This article contains descriptions of sexual assault.

Jean Kim held a press conference on April 30. In this conference, Kim alleged that her former boss, Scott Stringer, had repeatedly groped her and pressured her to have sex with him in exchange for political favors. In graphic detail, she described how her former employer wielded his political power to take advantage of her when she was an unpaid intern on his 2001 campaign for New York City public advocate. Stringer joins a long list of New York politicians who engaged in sexual assault while seeking off ice, from Gov. Cuomo to Anthony Weiner. In a country that has too often seen leaders that avoid consequences for sexual assault allegations, New York City has a unique opportunity to demonstrate what accountability looks like.

Scott Stringer should drop out of the mayoral race immediately and resign his off ice as comptroller.

To make matters worse, the Stringer campaign has sought to diminish Kim’s claims. A spokesperson for Stringer claimed that Kim’s allegations are politically motivated, citing her recent petitioning for the Yang campaign.

Stringer also cited her closeness with his former rival, Eliot Spitzer, as well the fact that Kim was 30 when the alleged assault took place. For the record, Kim has not decided who she will support in the upcoming election, but it should not matter. Exercising one’s constitutional rights should never diminish the validity of a sexual assault allegation. The irrelevant fact of her age is immaterial to these allegations as well. With every floundering response to these allegations, his unf itness for off ice was embarrassingly apparent once again.

It is clear that Kim’s allegations are in no way politically motivated. If these claims were made to bring down Stringer to benef it another candidate, why would she not allege sexual assault during his other previous campaigns? It is clear that Kim believes that a Mayor Scott Stringer would be dangerous for his employees and constituents because of his predatory behaviour. We applaud her courage in sharing her story. In explaining her reasons for staying silent until now, Kim declared that she was “fearful of his vindictive nature and that he would retaliate against me,” destroying her political career. Stringer’s reckless behaviour frightened and silenced a woman for decades. Now, it is up to the people of New York to hold Stringer accountable for his lies and past behavior by demanding that he exit political life.

Stringer admitted to having an “on-andoff” consensual relationship with Kim. Even if Stringer had not assaulted Kim, it is an indictment upon his character that he pursued one of his interns, 11 years his junior. With his work as city comptroller, Stringer has a staff of interns who work for his off ice. As mayor, this would also be the case. Each second that Stringer’s subordinates continue to work for him, they are in danger. Having him continue as one of New York’s elected off icials is a danger to city staff. It is also a danger to the many thousands of young people that he would likely encounter in his capacity as mayor. Under no circumstances should he hold a position of power.

In a city where reported incidences of sexual assault are on the rise, it would not make much sense to elevate someone with a history of predatory behaviour to the highest off ice in municipal government. His attempts to bury this story and attack the credibility of

the accuser illustrate his inability to represent survivors of sexual assault.

For the most part, supporters of Stringer’s campaign were proactive in showing that they stand with survivors. The Working Families Party and Sunrise NYC, in addition to a cadre of leftist lawmakers, rescinded their endorsements of his campaign in light of these allegations. His remaining backers, from the United Federation of Teachers to U.S. Rep. Jerry Nadler, should follow suit. Progressive off icials and organizations who proudly support the #MeToo movement should take care to ensure that their conduct matches their words.

Scott Stringer refused to drop out of the race. Perhaps he thinks that he can follow the example of other Democratic politicians who managed to outrun their scandals by staying silent, from Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam to New York’s own Gov. Andrew Cuomo. The slow death of his campaign suggests otherwise.

Stringer has a choice to make. He can either suffer an embarrassing defeat in the mayoral democratic primary or resign from his office and leave the race on his own terms. Either way, Scott Stringer will be kept out of power indefinitely — thereby making the city safer.

After multiple women made allegations against Gov. Cuomo, Stringer stated,“We must have zero tolerance for sexual harassment, and we must end the pervasive culture of abuse in positions of power.” Washington Square News shares Stringer’s stated zero-tolerance policy with regard to sexual assault and harassment. It is for this reason that we call for Stringer’s immediate resignation as city comptroller, as well as his withdrawal from the mayoral race. New York City deserves better than a predator who covers up his behavior for political gain.

Email the Editorial Board at editboard@nyunews.com.

CHAIR Emily Dai, Kevin Kurian CO-CHAIR Asha Ramachandran CHAIR EX OFFICIO Alexandria Johnson, Paul Kim, Kaylee DeFreitas, Ashley Wu

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SEND MAIL TO: 75 THIRD AVE. #SB07, NEW YORK, N.Y. 10003 OR EMAIL: OPINION@NYUNEWS.COM WSN welcomes letters to the editor, opinion pieces and articles relevant to the NYU community, or in response to articles. Letters should be less than 450 words. All submissions must be typed or emailed and must include the author’s name, address and phone number. Members of the NYU community must include a year and school or job title. WSN does not print unsigned letters or editorials. WSN reserves the right to reject any submission and edit accepted submissions in any and all ways. With the exception of the staff editorial, opinions expressed on the editorial pages are not necessarily those of WSN, and our publication of opinions is not an endorsement of them.

Washington Square News

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UNDERTHEARCH@NYUNEWS.COM

MONDAY, MAY 3, 2021

UNDER THE ARCH

Edited by CAITLIN HSU and VAISHNAVI NAIDU

Rewriting the Narrative:

Conversations on Decolonization in Art

Contributing writer Sade Collier considers/explores what decolonization means for Black artists.

By SADE COLLIER Contributing Writer INTRODUCTION Against an orange oak-tinted backdrop, a Black revolutionary holds up a newspaper bearing a blunt message: “ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE.” There is a shout coming from their mouth and a weapon behind their back.

This image is one of urgency and cause, reflective of and rooted in the symbolism of the Black Panther Party.

This artwork was created by Emory Douglas, a revolutionary artist and minister of culture for the Black Panther Party, a political organization founded by Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton in 1966. The Black Panthers operated as a socialist militant group, seeking equality through armed resistance. Here, Douglas uses the visual power of art to portray a particularly imminent sentiment that has penetrated through time: the Black voice cannot be silenced.

Black artists have long used art as a tool for liberation, a mechanism to lift Black people from the depths of oppression and the plague of whiteness. Art is a way to establish a personalized identity of the Black community and a medium through which the Black experience can be expressed in all of its multitudes. It is inherently anti-oppressive because it is joyful, emotional and expressive, untouched by the apathetic inflictions carried by oppression.

In the same breath that art can counter oppression, it can also be a medium to understand decolonization. Decolonization in this context incorporates deconstructing the colonial ideologies of deprivation imposed by the Western world. When applied to art, this raises the question of how the art world excludes minority voices from the canon. It pushes us to examine the ways in which non-white art is often reduced.

Through a contemporary lens, art is both a normative template for dismantling systems of oppression and a means of understanding Black culture through its inherently musical nature.

At NYU, Black students embody the spirits of artists who came before them, using artistic expression as a mouthpiece for their individual and collective experiences.

COURTESY OF MELLA LAFRANCE

BLACK AS BLACK In his poem “Black Erasure,” Kyle Carrero Lopez writes against the interchangeability assumed between the terms “Black” and “POC” (people of color). Through purportedly progressive language, we have dangerously conflated the two — thus, in socioeconomic, political, academic and artistic conversations, the Black experience becomes generalized into the POC experience. White people are often convinced that using “POC” instead of “Black” is less offensive, a disposition that claims for white people the agency to curate what is considered to be socially moral language. The idea in white America that Blackness has to be continuously diversified ― becoming watered-down in the fixed parallels curated by whiteness — is an exercise in simplifying the Black experience and making Blackness more palatable. Through this so -called diversifying language, white people have decentralized Blackness in its own realm.

This conflation has contributed to the neglect and invalidation of the essence of the Black experience, harming the portrayal of the Black image in art and removing the specificity of identity in the Black artist.

“I think [there is a] misconception blatant in the term ‘BIPOC,’” Liberal Studies first-year Ian Partman said. “That there is something that is generalizable about the categories we all exist in, that our art is all reducible to the same thing: that it’s just not white art.”

This misconception noted by Partman is an institutionalized and intentional limitation on Black art and the Black artistic psyche. It is drawn from the same response white people often have to hate crimes, police brutality and other injustices done to marginalized communities. Instead of naming an experience as a Black or Indigenous or Asian or Latinx one, it becomes a POC one.

The limitation is based in the avoidance of naming something as it is. This avoidance catalyzes an absolvement from accountability and, in the art world, an absolvement from rightful appreciation, paving the way for appropriation.

Partman also alluded to the imposition of grouping together what is simply not “white art” within the Black community. Often, it is assumed that Black art can only exist under the umbrella of solely Black art, that there are no

spokes to the wheel of a Black person’s existence.

That all Black art falls into a monolith, and that all Black art is saying the same thing.

“People forget that I am an individual,” Mella LaFrance, a third-year Film and TV student at Tisch said. “When I say something—and maybe I’ll say something super out of pocket — I’m not talking about every Black woman. [A] misconception is that all Black artists speak for other Black artists.”

When speaking of decolonization, we are also speaking of radical differentiation. This means that there is no monolith among Black people, and that Black people do not have to be diversified to be spoken of or to exist. Here, Partman and LaFrance both acknowledge that at the heart of Black art is a communal experience. Yet such an experience is clouded by the assumption that it must be experienced or portrayed in the same way. This imposition is a lazy and imperialist one, as it erases the myriad of stories inherent to and separate from the Black experience.

The needle in the pore of colonization is dichotomization or conflation without agency. Reluctance in allowing Black people to contextualize their own experiences separates the person from their interiority, the person from the community, and the community from the world. It is ahistorical to not understand colonialism as an endeavor of stealing, not merely in a materialistic sense, but also in a soulful sense. It operates in such a manner because Eurocentric hegemony could not exist without forced conformity.

There is an ongoing process of unlearning in Black communities ― unlearning imperialism and the imposition of the monolith. Black art in such a sense can almost be regarded for its objectivity, of revealing a rewritten canon, one inclusive of the Black story. Imperialist thought does not function alongside inclusion because it can only stabilize itself by discouraging the latter.

Thus, indulgence in Black art must come with a radical understanding that it exists on an undefinable spectrum, alongside the Black artist.

want, writing is how I get to thinking about what that world looks like.”

This approach is common in the arts, but often unrecognized. In societies founded on the values of capitalism, art is invalidated as a vocation, pushing creatives to remove themselves from work and pursue what is deemed “real” or marketable. The issue seen in art is that it cannot always be monetized, and for this reason, it is demonized. It also cannot be controlled or fixed, as it is always in the process of being molded as though it were wet flour. Through conjuring comprehensive depictions of society, the arts have revealed the intricacies of the world that are hidden in its crevices.

“Art is the best way for people to hear and understand what’s going on,” Tisch first-year Justin Walton, who performs as hip-hop artist Jwalt, said. “People like listening to music. If you put that in music, sprinkle some of the stuff that’s going on, people are gonna listen to that and listen to what’s going on.”

Political commentary has often been vocalized through hip-hop culture, giving artists the foundation to craft relevance not merely through their artistic genius and personas, but also through the consciousness of their words.

Artists such as Common, 2Pac and Kendrick Lamar have encapsulated a generational experience through their work and have been recognized for both their lyricism and radical objectivity.

“Hip-hop came from a place where people were trying to talk about what was going on in their communities,” Jwalt continued, “It’s for people to talk their truth, for people to talk about realness.”

There is a necessity, though, in understanding when to make a distinction between the art and the artist. Imperialist thought has made the Black body into an inherently political one. Through art, this functions as though it were a disease.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 9

KEEPING IT REAL Writing, for Partman, has been a perpetual ascension toward examining the world.

“Art gives us a way of looking into the world,” he said. “If I’m organizing for a world that I

COURTESY OF JWALT

COURTESY OF IAN PARTMAN

Washington Square News | Under The Arch

MONDAY, MAY 3, 2021

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 8

“I don’t like to think of the relationship between my identity as an artist and my identity as an organizer as complimentary,” Partman said. “I like boots — cowboy boots. I like jazz music. These are aspects of my identity that are not reducible, even if they are tangential to or parallel to my Blackness. The problem with the conflation between art and identity is that it wants us to not recognize our wholeness.

It wants us to not give care to our wholeness.”

Like Partman, Jwalt wants to be a well-rounded Black artist, and part of that means that his art will be about celebration instead of politics and identities.

“People used to call me a conscious artist, and I used to hate that,” Jwalt said. “I was like, ‘Yeah, I can make political music and I can talk about what’s going on, but I also like to make music that makes people happy or wanna dance or have fun.’”

LaFrance, on the other hand, accepts that there will always be a political element to their work.

“Any Black person doing anything is revolutionary, right?” LaFrance said. “I think everything is political, or ideological … I think two truths can exist at once, and I think that, via my Blackness, I am political.”

It is a privilege to not have to have this conversation with oneself or one’s viewership. The debate of separation and its degrees among Black artists and their audiences is perhaps more thorough, given the white assumption that Black art is inherently political, while there are Black artists who have no intentions of creating political Black art. Such a topic delves into a question of privilege and removal and begs us to engage in the politics of applicability.

To simplify the argument, LaFrance punctured it with a decent sentiment: “I don’t know.

Read the artist’s statement.”

DISMANTLING THE WHITE GAZE The interview is well-known and loved. Toni Morrison, in all of her glory, gray-haired and wiseeyed, dismisses the question of white inclusion posed by Jana Wendt with a rhetorical question: “You can’t understand how powerfully racist that question is, can you?”

With whiteness comes the infliction of conventionality — in order to harbor the element of conventionality, one has to wear whiteness like a glove. This is because conventionality in the contemporary world is a concept introduced by Eurocentric standards. Conventionality is tangential to the status quo, but it is not always the status quo. In conversation, we often approach the topic of conventionality as though it exists on a spectrum, rather than assuming that there is a simple way to measure conventionality. Thus, we often applaud art for not being conventional, but this often means that the art is simply less proximal to whiteness. When an unconventional work of art is applauded, it is often applauded for its distance from the status quo rather than its intrinsic worth.

“White America has changed the narrative of what hip-hop is and what it sounds like,” Jwalt said. “In reality, it came from people just wanting to express themselves. For people to talk about what’s going on in their communities, what’s going on in the neighborhood.”

White people have certainly changed the narrative, and not just of hip-hop. In changing it, they’ve gentrified it. Musical gentrification is a rather new concept in the mainstream, although it has been happening for decades. Plenty of people are familiar with the song “Hound Dog,” seemingly written by Elvis Presley, but in truth only popularized by him. They are not familiar with Big Mama Thornton, the Black blues singer who first recorded the song in 1952. The music industry in America, so often fueled by the Black

COURTESY OF MELLA LAFRANCE

community, so often strips it of its authenticity.

Artists like Jwalt are working through that. “[My art] is authentic,” Jwalt said. “It’s me. It’s true. In no way in my art do I feel like I’m trying to censor myself and adapt to what colonialism is or try to make my music fit into that.”

LaFrance also denounced the assumption that Black art should be created with proximity to whiteness.

“All of my art is to figure out myself, because I like what I do,” they said. “ I feel like a lot of it feels like it’s for a white audience, [but] I didn’t make this with a white audience in mind. I made this in mind based on how I feel in the moment.”

This here is also often a lesson of unlearning for Black artists. Imagine spending your entire upbringing learning exclusively of white authors: Emily Dickinson, Sylvia Plath, Shakespeare, Walt Whitman and Charles Dickinson as staples — but not touching the works of Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Zora Neale Hurston, James Baldwin or Ralph Ellison until your adult years. This is why the canon is questioned as to whom it allows within its walls.

Then how do Black artists get a seat at the table?

“Representation is a trap,” Partman said. “It forces us not to aspire towards freedom, but to aspire towards the recognition of humanity.”

If we are bound to only being represented, we are bound to conceding to what should already be implied. The white gaze chirps and asks the Black artist why there is no inclusion beneath the Black pen. The Black artist, though, does not see an avoidance of writing about the white experience or painting the white experience as an act of exclusion. It is the act of redefining, for the Black community, an experience so often left out of the canon, an experience that is neglected and criticized. The insistence that the reasoning for Black artists’ negligence of the white experience must be explicitly revealed is a racist one that, as stated by Toni Morrison, would never be asked of a white artist.

ART AS LIBERATION and VOICES AS SURVIVAL As a child, Partman often used writing as a mode of communication rather than speaking.

Now, he ses writing to comb through the thick strings of the sociopolitical sphere.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about political depression, and how when we have all of these tools and ways of material organizing, that feel somehow still inadequate, what do you turn to?” he asked. “What I turned to personally was writing. Writing gave me a sense of clarity.”

Through writing, so many other Black creators have found this sense of clarity. It is knowingly cathartic

COURTESY OF MELLA LAFRANCE

to write, to be expressive on the page. Numerous Black writers have found generational healing by rewriting the narrative — Morgan Parker’s contemporary poetry collection “Magical Negro,” for example, brushes through the ancestral reigns of Blackness in a way both mystical and troubling. Writing has given birth to tangible thoughts through the quill and the ink, allowing Black people to communicate what they could not quite verbalize. It also alludes to the immense amount of radical resources that are available through text. Writing is full of an ancestral and radical mysticism. We speak of artists such as Spike Lee, Audre Lorde and Kara Walker as providing us with toolkits conducive to expressing the Black experience. When there were no vocalized words to produce what we were feeling, we turned to writing as an art.

Writing can be a healing mechanism. When speaking to LaFrance, she coined the beautiful phrase meaningful rage, in a conversation on trauma and the ways in which expression through art can help one heal. She also touched on art as survival.

“Some people are in [art] school because they can be, and some people are in school because they use art to survive.”

This, though, is not a practice of gatekeeping.

It is a practice of recognizing how often Black people have turned to art when their voices were not heard. How often Black people told their stories through art.

“It gave me another voice,” Jwalt said. “It gave me another voice to express myself. It gave me another platform to let go. For so long, I felt like my voice wasn’t valid.”

For years, Black people have existed in a climate that ignored their voices, their sounds, their art, their writing. In searching for validity, we find that meaningful rage. There is an urge to tell a story so often stomped on alongside the weeds.

The story, here, is one that exists with its hands aching toward liberation.

“There is actually something incredibly liberating about the act of disappearance and the act of mortality,” Partman said. He began to beautifully recount a scene in the 1989 short film “Looking for Langston,” a movie centered around the life

9

story of Langston Hughes. Partman criticized the necessity of imperialistic art to be immortalized, speaking of this hunger as a futile attempt to counter “noticeable imperial decline.” Immortalization, through Partman’s analysis, is nauseating and unfulfilling.

This haunting statement gives rise to another question: what exactly is the Black artist writing toward? Is it to be seen, to be recognized? No. This, as mentioned by Partman, is a question of humanity. We know we are human and deserving — we should not have to ask for visibility.

There is something more beautiful, seductive and alluring than writing towards visibility: writing toward the unknown.

There is an understanding in Partman’s words: Black art is impactful through mortality because of its urgent, soulful, loud, joyful and liberating.

It survives without imperial greed or materialistic fantasy. It survives separate, not inside or outside, of whiteness. It just is.

Audre Lorde famously wrote that the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. The thing is, Black art must function through this sentiment — where there is Blackness, there must only be what is curated by Blackness for Black people. Black artists are not writing on the foundation of whiteness. Black artists are not working to build a foundation that excludes whiteness.

They are working to build a space, a communal space, in which the Black person and the Black art will not be commodified or claimed. The foundation creates the monolith and fuels the conventionality. The foundation is imperial.

There has to be the continuation of Black art through some means, some outlet to further the legacy.

VIA YOUTUBE

“We’re gonna have to keep on creating for people to see that what we’re doing is art,” Jwalt said. “This is real art.”

Decolonization begins not by writing against or separate from whiteness, but writing without it plaguing the mind. Decolonization is a radical unlearning process, something that begins within. Once the institutions fall, these implanted ideologies that hinder the furthering of Black art still remain. We have no other choice but to write past it.

“How do we immortalize [art]?” LaFrance said. “Revolution.”

Email Sade Collier at underthearch@nyunews.com.

COURTESY OF IAN PARTMAN

COURTESY OF MELLA LAFRANCE

Washington Square News

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UNDERTHEARCH@NYUNEWS.COM

UNDER THE ARCH

MONDAY, MAY 3, 2021

Edited by CAITLIN HSU and VAISHNAVI NAIDU

The Foreigner

Tensions arise for Eugene Hu when he stays at his old college roommate’s house in Connecticut during the pandemic.

A seemingly idyllic sidewalk in Middletown, Connecticut.

By EUGENE HU Contributing Writer “I’m boycotting your Chinese bricks!”

Tim said to me.

It was dusk in Middletown, Connecticut. I was playing Settlers of Catan with my college roommate and his father. We were trading bricks, but our business negotiations were not as smooth as I hoped they would be. When Tim said this to me, my heart told me that I was in no position to speak out against a man who was only screwing with me in a game of Settlers of Catan. I genuinely did not feel offended, but my brain said that I should tell him that this was an incredibly insensitive thing to say, that you can’t say that kind of shit in this day and age. What I learned in high school told me that I ought to be angry and outspoken in this sort of situation. My more socially conscious peers told me time and time again that jokes shouldn’t just be jokes, since jokes are the perfect gateway to casual racism, but I held my tongue.

“OK, for that, I’m not trading with you for the rest of this game,” I said. I maintained a smirk so that Tim knew I was not really upset.

“Sorry, that was my Trump impression,” Tim said. *** When the world started classifying the coronavirus as a pandemic, universities dished out eviction notices by the dozen. The barren New York streets at that time reminded me of a childhood video game of mine called “New York Zombies,” where you play as one of the sole survivors of a zombie apocalypse and traverse Central Park, Holland Tunnel and the New York subway system while fighting off the walking dead. The apocalyptic vision of the Big Apple as a ghost metropolis had never felt more tangible. Perhaps it was because of the novelty, but I grew to like that idea.

With one week left to pack my stuff and find shelter, my college roommate, Harry, offered me a place to stay in his house in Connecticut. The offer took me by surprise, given that he was as talkative as a rock for the majority of my first year. His parents, Tim and Kate, were less exaggerated versions of Homer and Marge Simpson — an everyday man and his wife, who showed affection towards each other with nonstop teasing.

I kept in touch with my parents in China via Skype.

They insisted that I do two things. First, they wanted me to use the experience of being in the Gregory household from March to August as fuel for future writing projects that recalled the time when the world had gone to shambles. Second, they wanted me to get along with the Gregory family, because, according to them, “no one has ever done a greater favor for us in our lives.”

I was a vampire. I really didn’t care much for going outside, so I didn’t get to see the outside world in shambles. There was always a roof over my head. I only found cause to be angry about the little things that shouldn’t have made me angry, and because of that, I couldn’t always get along with the Gregory family. *** One night, I made the egregious mistake of eating buffalo wings with a fork. Tim stared at me with bulging eyes and a slack jaw, which made him look like a cartoon character.

“Why aren’t you using your hands?” Tim asked me.

“Force of habit.”

“Ok, well, if you go to any other place in this country, and they see you eating wings with a fork, people are going to think you’re a lunatic,” Tim said.

My brain began to tingle. Just like when we played Settlers of Catan, Tim felt the need to constantly remind me that I was a foreigner. He was not wrong. I was a foreigner, but I did not want to feel like one.

“Honestly, I don’t care about what other people think about me,” I replied. “This is what I’ve always done. I don’t like getting my hands dirty.”

“Are you saying we’re savages then?” Kate chuckled.

“Alright, but if you ever go to a bar, you’re gonna get mocked by everybody else,” Tim said.

On one hand, I didn’t want to be a foreigner. On the other hand, I didn’t want to give into the pressure to assimilate. My heart said to not make a big deal out of it. After all, eating wings with a fork is a trivial thing, but my brain was heating up like an impassioned furnace. It was too busy trying to reconcile the desire for individuality with the desire for a sense of belonging.

It couldn’t help but overheat. I couldn’t stay silent, so I let out a crude exhale. It was one of those exhales people do when they want to say “fuck off” without saying “fuck off.”

“Whatever,” I said. We resumed dinner after about ten seconds of peace. It was as if nothing had happened.

“How are classes, Harry?” Tim asked.

He gave a tentative nod and said, “Alright.”

Harry was the looming background character in the Gregory household. Regardless of whether he felt gratitude or disdain, he never raised his voice on any occasion. I did not share his talent. We never talked much, but I appreciated him simply for being there. Maybe it’s because an extra presence helped when people were forced to remain distant, or perhaps I merely envied him for his stoicism.

These were the early days of staying at the Gregory household. At that point, my parents made a habit out of exchanging emails with Tim and Kate. In every email, they emphasized, somewhat paradoxically, that “words cannot express how grateful they are” that the Gregorys took me into their home. When my parents heard about the incident with the buffalo wings, they said, “That’s a little out of line. You should apologize tomorrow.” When I told Tim the next day that I was unnecessarily aggressive after I heard his comment, he simply laughed it off.

“Oh, it’s okay,” Tim said, “I thought you were joking. I didn’t think you were actually worked up.”

“Well, I’m telling you now,” I responded. “I’m sorry.”

I wasn’t sure if it was me or my parents speaking. *** We went a few weeks without tension at the dinner table, not even on the night when Tim set down a massive platter of pâté chinois and told me, “We’re gonna turn you into a Frenchman.” This time, my mind insisted that it was a reference to colonialism. Like the last incident, there was the pressure of assimilation floating in the air. My high school peers repeatedly said that those were toxic ideas, that nobody has the right to dictate our identities or changes in our identities except ourselves. On that, I could not have agreed more. Why did I have to be turned into a Frenchman? Why did I have to be turned into anything?

I was too busy taking in the flavor of the dish to care about that. The mashed potatoes, corn and ground beef combination was something I never tried before,

EUGENE HU

so I simply nodded and complimented Tim on his culinary skills. Like Remy in “Ratatouille” when he mixes a strawberry with cheese for the first time, I forced my brain to succumb to the flourish of dancing colors. My heart felt nourished, and I simply allowed the taste of the pâté chinois to make my thoughts dissipate.

This was the way things should be, I felt. A family, plus a guest, coming together after a long week of working online. There was no need to think.

Every Saturday, my mother asked what we had for dinner during our Skype meetings. She never heard of pâté chinois before. When I described what it was like, she immediately remarked how desperately she wanted to meet the Gregorys, because once again, emails failed to communicate just how much gratitude she had.

“I love how you talk about the Gregorys like messiahs,” I said. The sarcasm transferred over.

“Do I?” she said. “I never thought of them as messiahs. I think of them as people that have done us a huge favor. If I was in that position, and my son’s roommate needed a place to stay, I don’t think I could’ve been that generous,” my mother said. *** Of course, tensions didn’t always rise at the dinner table. On the night of the Democratic National Convention, I was busy in my room watching Daredevil beat yakuza members to a pulp with his bare fists.

When I got thirsty and went downstairs to grab a Pepsi, Tim asked me if I wanted to catch the DNC on TV with him and Kate.

“Yeah, pass.”

“Well, it might be useful for you to learn about American politics if you wanna live here in the future.”

Maybe it was the idea of temporarily giving up watching “Daredevil” that ticked me off. Maybe it was the fact that American politics had been the only thing on my Instagram feed for the past few weeks, but my head could not take that statement. My brain and heart were like two sumo wrestlers pushing back against each other. In this case, the former barely managed to shove the latter out of the ring.

“Oh my god… You gotta stop treating me like a foreigner. I’ve seen enough American politics as it is. To be honest, it’s almost getting on my nerves.”

“I’m not treating you like a foreigner!” Tim said.

A brief, quiet moment.

“You know, you’re really sensitive sometimes,” Tim responded. “I feel like you see offense where there is none.”

He hit the nail on the head with that one. This was the perfect time for an escalation, but Tim was so spot on with his diagnosis that it didn’t happen.

“I guess you’re right, I’m sorry.”

This time, I did not tell my parents. *** After a perpetual cycle of churning out sociology essays, having political discourse over plates of mac ‘n’ cheese, hiking around the town’s various parks, learning how to paint a house and rewatching the hallway fight scene from “Daredevil,” school was about to start again. That was when Kate began to poke fun at me by saying, “I’m sure you’re relieved that you won’t have to put up with us anymore. You must be like, ‘Oh my God. Finally, I’m rid of the Gregorys.’” I smiled out of politeness, since I wasn’t sure if she was joking or being serious.

The crossroad of Yensett and Grumman.

EUGENE HU

My heart tightly squeezed my chest. There was no way that it was going to let me feel genuine relief for leaving the people who gave me more than I could have ever asked for. Of course, that could have been the stranglehold put on me by my parents’ desires. My brain was asleep. Packing bags didn’t exactly count as a mental workout.

Tim drove me back to NYU on an overcast day. I couldn’t remember much about our last discourse, except for when he asked me a question about people who were averse to the idea of wearing masks.

“Of course, I’m not defending it, I’m just not surprised at all. It’s a shitty mindset to have, but when you take even a little bit of freedom away from people, they will resist,” I said.

“I just don’t see how making people wear a mask is taking away freedom,” Tim answered. “It’s not that big of a deal. I mean, some places can’t even get their hands on masks, and it’s unfortunate. I think people sometimes mistake inconveniences for maltreatment because they don’t know how good they have it,” Tim said.

The memories of my spats with Tim struck me like an aggressive ocean wave. My brain short-circuited and my heart throbbed.

This is exactly everything that is wrong with you.

These people take you in as a guest. No, not as a guest.

They take you for one of their own. They see you as a part of their family. What do you do? You throw tantrums when the words don’t sound right, don’t taste right, don’t feel right. You don’t wanna be a part of their family, but you don’t wanna be a part of anything else, either. The food, the hikes, the painting, the discourse. How much was it worth to you?

This continued for the remainder of the car ride to New York. *** We arrived at my dorm in the West Village and pushed my suitcases to the front of the building. Before I bid Tim farewell, I took in the view of the streets.

A small part of me was looking forward to seeing New York as a ghost town again. There was an eerie satisfaction in seeing myself as one of the few survivors of a worldwide transfiguration. Unfortunately, at that point, it didn’t look much different from what it looked like before the pandemic. The only difference was everybody looked like they were ready to kick some ass with their masks covering the bottom half of their faces. The aura of mystery and isolation that I experienced in March completely vanished, and a feeling of disappointment washed over me. Things became vibrant, and I felt worse because of it.

Only then did I fully realize why I had always been a foreigner.

My original plan was to give Tim a fist bump or a touch on the elbow to adhere to the social distancing rules. I even rehearsed the lines in my head: “Thank you, Tim, for everything. I would hug you, but I wouldn’t want to get you sick by accident.” Before I could blurt out anything, he hugged me first. He had never done this before.

And for an instant, I had no thoughts, I had no feelings, I had no overwhelming, constricting sensations.

I didn’t push him away, and I didn’t hug him tighter, either. There was only the embrace.

Email Eugene Hu at underthearch@nyunews.com.

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