The Brandeis Hoot 03/13/2015

Volume 12 Number 7

www.brandeishoot.com

March 13, 2015

Brandeis University’s Community Newspaper • Waltham, Mass.

Advancement in genetic enhancement potentially problematic

By Hannah Stewart

Students hold community gathering to promote reinstatement of Al-Quds partnership

Staff

By Hannah Schuster

A futuristic science fiction reality may be closer than we think. On Monday evening, in Gerstenzang 124, Jamie Metzl presented on the topic of the future of the human race. His lecture, titled “Homo Sapiens 2.0: Genetic Enhancements, Ethics and the Faith of Humanity,” was hosted by Professor Larry Wangh (BIOL/HSSP) and his class, “Genes and the Human Story” (BISC 2b) but was open to the Brandeis and Waltham communities.

Metzl is currently a senior advisor of a global investment firm and a senior fellow on the Atlantic Council. He has previously served on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the U.S. State Department, the National Security Council and as a Human Rights Officer for the United Nations in Cambodia. In

On Friday, March 6, 15 students and alumni held a community gathering in President Fred Lawrence’s office demanding a meeting discussing the restoration of the university’s partnership with Al-Quds University. This group requested the meeting be held within the week. Catie Stewart ’16, Eli Philip ’15 and Naomi Hornstein ’15 organized the event with a core group of the students from the Brandeis University and Al-Quds University Student Dialogue Initiative. Following an hour long sit-in, Lawrence agreed to meet with the students on Tuesday, March 10. The students, however, believe Lawrence did not allow them to fully express their concerns, even when the meeting did occur.

Brandeis suspended its partnership with Al-Quds University

Editor

photo by karen caldwell/the hoot

jamie metzl Speaker presents on the human genetics revolution on campus this week.

November, he published a crime and mystery novel titled “Genesis Code,” which revolved around the human genetics revolution.

Metzl prefaced his argument with the caveat, “I am not a sciSee METZL, page 2

in November 2013 after a rally on the campus in which demonstrators marched in dark clothing carrying fake weapons shouting anti-Semitic slogans. Al-Quds President Sari Nusseibeh issued a statement condemning the events, which Lawrence found “unacceptable and inflammatory,” according to an August 2014 article in The Brandeis Hoot.

Shortly after the partnership ended, Stewart and Philip founded the initiative to promote continued dialogue between the universities and restoration of the partnership. The initiative organized a trip to Al-Quds last summer and held an event to discuss their experiences in the fall. They also spearheaded a campaign in which over 200 students sent emails to Lawrence requesting reinstatement of the partnership.

“We want to impress upon our See AL-QUDS, page 3

Climate justice activism presses univ. for action

By Mia Edelstein Editor

Brandeis Climate Justice (BCJ) and Faculty Against the Climate Threat (FACT) are pressing the university to diversify Brandeis’ endowment from fossil fuels more actively than ever before.

After 79 percent of students voted in support of divestment in an April 2013 referendum, the administration formed the Exploratory Committee on Fossil Fuel Divestment, a committee dedicated to investigating divestment and the school’s options. Composed of undergraduates, graduate students, faculty, alumni and administrators, the committee is compiling a report about the social and environmental impact of investment in fossil fuel companies and the investment alternatives for Brandeis. In the letter describing the committee to the community, President Frederick M. Lawrence quoted the university’s investment policy, which would shape the work of the committee.

“Where a corporation’s conduct is found to be clearly and gravely offensive to the university community’s sense of social justice and where it is found that the exercising of shareholder rights and powers is unlikely to correct the injury, consideration should be

Inside this issue:

given to selling that corporation’s securities,” he wrote.

The committee is set to release the report within the next two weeks, and hopes to finalize changes before the March board of trustees meeting. Activists want the board of trustees to agree to a five-year process culminating in full divestment, said BCJ member Iona Feldman ’17. “[BCJ plans to] escalate, pick up the pressure and declare that even [if they are] telling us no,” Feldman said. “This is still crucial for us, for our generation, for our planet, and we’ll keep doing this until we get a yes.”

On Thursday, Feb. 12, 40 students and faculty marched from the top of Rabb Steps to Provost Lisa Lynch’s office and delivered a faculty petition urging divestment signed by more than 125 faculty members. “In addition to doing everything we can to promote climate-friendly alternatives and eco-intelligence right here on our campus, we must stop profiting from fossil fuel extraction and invest our endowment in sustainable alternatives instead,” the petition read.

“I look forward to reading the Exploratory Committee on FosSee CLIMATE, page 2

News: Conference held on ethics of stepping in Page 2 Arts, Etc.: Azerbajaini singer visits Brandeis Page 6 Opinion: Waste management needs improving Page 15 Features: Senior starts up new pep band Page 7 Editorials: Campus should care about elections Page 10

Speakers from across the Boston area brought a lecture to campus titled “Criminal Justice? Race, Gender and Incarceration.” symposium

photos by karen caldwell/the hoot

Criminal justice symposium examines socioeconomic inequalities

By Rachel Bossuk staff

Speakers from across the Boston area discussed American incarceration at the 20th Annual Tillie K. Lubin Symposium on Tuesday, March 10.

Titled “Criminal Justice? Race, Gender, and Incarceration,” the lecture focuses on women’s, gender and sexuality studies, with particular interest in contemporary issues and events. The

symposium was named after Tillie Kulp-Lubin, whose husband, Charles Lubin, owned a successful bakery chain in Chicago. Their daughter, Sara Lee, endowed the Lubin Symposium in honor of her mother and has enabled Brandeis to bring a plethora of distinguished speakers to campus.

The symposium commenced with a short introduction by Wendy Cadge, the chair of the WGS program, who then went

on to moderate the discussion.

Bruce Western, professor of sociology and criminal justice policy at Harvard University, gave a presentation titled “Mass Incarceration and American Inequality,” focusing on the relationship between prisons and socioeconomic inequality. In particular, he discussed what he described as “the very large racial disparity in incarceration in which African See JUSTICE, page 2

Empowering talk

‘for colored girls’

Hoot Scoops: Page 9

B.E.T. and Brandeis Players put together invigorating performance of Shange’s play

Heller School marks International Women’s Day with talk from women’s rights activist Hibaaq Osman

shows power of words

Arts: Page 16

2 NEWS

The Brandeis Hoot

March 13, 2015

Campus groups urge divestment From CLIMATE, page 1

sil Fuel Divestment’s upcoming report. In the meanwhile, I am eager to move forward with Jim Gray, our vice president for operations, and the soon-to-be-hired sustainability manager to reduce our carbon footprint at Brandeis and making more progress on our campus sustainability initiative,” wrote Lynch in an email to The Brandeis Hoot.

The groups pursue divestment not because it will solve climate change in one fell swoop but rather because it puts pressure on fossil fuel companies to change their ways and opt for

clean energy that reduces carbon emissions, which is what is heating the earth. “The goal of divestment is to shame the fossil fuel industry and to take away its legitimacy in society,” Professor Sabine von Mering (GRALL/ WGS) said.

A climate justice advocate for many years, von Mering said that recent Harvard and Boston University faculty climate activism inspired the Brandeis faculty movement. The schools submitted open letters to their administrations imploring them to divest, and Brandeis faculty followed suit.

From a practical standpoint, Brandeis’ continued investment

in fossil fuels is unsustainable, said von Mering. She says that the government will eventually be forced to impose a carbon tax on citizens in an effort to reduce additional carbon emissions.

People will choose cleaner energy alternatives in order to evade the tax and save money, which will diminish fossil fuel companies’ profits. That would in turn lessen the university’s endowment. “We have a choice between cooking the planet or losing our money,” von Mering said.

As faculty of a university, FACT feels that it is their obligation to respond to scientific misinformation spread about climate change. “We must speak up in

defense of science and in defense of our students’ futures and in defense of everyone who doesn’t have a voice in this,” von Mering said.

This is far from the first strain of activism pressuring Brandeis to divest from problematic endowment shares. BrandeisNOW reported that in the 1980s, the campus actively protested Brandeis’ investments in Apartheid South Africa. In 1986, students went as far as to build a shantytown, and the movement was successful in getting the administration to divest.

Feldman was attracted to the movement as a first-year because of its intersectionality. “We don’t

see ourselves as a movement narrowly focusing on just environmental issues,” Feldman said.

“We believe that part of the mission of Brandeis Climate Justice is a social justice issue to understand that the climate crisis is rooted in the imbalances of powers...so we really aim to stand in solidarity together with other struggles against injustice.”

On Friday, March 13, BCJ will be hosting a screening of “Gasland,” an anti-fracking documentary. The film will be screened at 7 p.m. in the Lown Auditorium.

In the future, the club hopes to host a speaker who will expand upon the effects of fracking and natural gas.

Embryonic mitochondrial transfer offers new posibilites for the human race From METZL, page 1

entist. I think of myself as a person who thinks deeply about what are the future implications of current technologies…”

On Feb. 23, the United Kingdom’s House of Lords passed a bill which will allow clinical trials of embryonic mitochondrial transfers.

Mitochondria is known as the “powerhouse” of the cell; it is responsible for transforming food molecules into a form of energy that the cell can use. Some women have genetic mitochondrial diseases that, if passed on to a child, will result in heart and brain defects. In an embryonic mitochondrial transfer, the egg from the genetic mother will be combined with the sperm of the genetic father to create an em-

bryo. Then this combined genetic material will be removed from the original egg and placed into an egg from a donor female with healthy mitochondria. This new, genetically-engineered embryo will be implanted back into the genetic mother, where it will continue to grow and develop as a traditional fetus.

With the passage of this bill, Metzl proposes a new future for the human race.

“Let’s just say that the average woman who’s having her eggs extracted [for the process of in-vitro fertilization] … you have your ten eggs, you fertilize them with sperm … you would take two cells from each one of those and then you test them, you do a full genome sequencing on each of those cells … you can tell gender … Tay Sachs and cystic fibrosis … Down Syndrome...”

Armed with this knowledge, parents “can screen early-stage embryos and then you can … select out certain things that we don’t want based on our understanding of what the genome says.”

This may seem harmless, possibly even beneficial to human health. However, some view this technological development as a threat to what it means to be human. They fear that it might create an overly aggressive and competitive culture where each individual’s fate would be decided prior to their birth.

Metzl continued with his lecture, outlining one possible future. He predicted that one day, this screening process will became cheap and fast enough for millions of complete genomes to become compiled. With this information, geneticists could then

reliably identify sequences of genes linked to specific physical traits and intelligence.

“Let’s just say that the United States blocks advancement of this technology, but other jurisdictions, let’s say China or Korea or somebody else, decides to go forward. Then what are we gonna do about it? … One thing that you can say, certainly about today’s Chinese government is that they are very comfortable with … population engineering … and thinking about children as tools for the glory of the state … I started to think about, well, what would it mean ‘x’ years into the future … if the United States learned that China had a secret genetic enhancement program … they were taking these super-enhanced kids and putting them … in specialty schools for science and math and engineering and

business,” said Metzl. “Are we going to be able to complete?”

Metzl has no desire nor intention to cause undue alarm and panic. Rather, his primary goal is to open up dialogue about this topic and force policy-makers to think about this hypothetical situation. “The fundamental problem that we have, as I see it, is that the science is advancing exponentially. There’s nothing that I’ve mentioned at all today, that can’t be done with future generations of technologies that already exist … the science is advancing exponentially, and our imaginations are only advancing linearly, only because we’re human … and the policy and regulatory framework is only inching forward glacially.”

He added, “We’re moving toward this new world, and we’re not prepared.”

Symposium examines link between race and incarceration From JUSTICE, page 1

Americans are six to eight times more likely to go to prison than whites.”

According to Western, the increase in incarceration rates since the 1970s was much greater in black and Latino men than in white men. He stated that by 2008, there was a one in nine chance that a black child will have their father imprisoned by the time they are 14. Western concluded his speech by stating that incarceration in the United States has produced a new social group that is chronically poor and struggles to attain full membership in American society.

Historian and professor in the History Department and the Department of African American Studies at Harvard University, Elizabeth Hinton spoke about poverty and racial inequality in her presentation, “The War on Crime and the Roots of Mass Incarceration.” She focused her speech on how black women are hit the hardest by the criminal justice system. “Women serving more than one year in prison increased two times as fast as men since Reagan took office,” she said. Discussing the criminalization of welfare recipients mainly in the 1960s, Hinton explained how the government would place single mothers on welfare under

surveillance to ensure they were not exploiting the government’s handouts. She also touched upon President Bill Clinton’s idea of a “new beginning” to help those on welfare attain higher-paying jobs.

However, Hinton ended her presentation by saying that the programs released during the War on Crime only led to more poverty and inequality.

Reverend Vivian Nixon is an activist, writer and executive director of the Community and College Fellowship, a non-profit that helps formerly incarcerated women acquire higher education. She revealed her own personal experience in the criminal justice system in her speech titled “Doing Time Before, During and After Prison: A Womanist’s Experience.” Nixon shared her belief that the criminal justice system is primarily a criminal punishment system, a claim that she developed from personal experience in the criminal system.

According to Nixon, those who have served time in jail and seek to re-enter American society are seen as “other,” and there are not enough programs in place to help them assimilate. In her closing statement, she expressed that society “must reconstruct knowledge into power … and take all the information we have and turn it into action.”

The next portion of the sym-

photos by karen caldwell/the hoot

posium was devoted to questions from students and professors alike. Topics included the idea of American exceptionalism, jobs in the criminal justice system, and

hope for the future. “We want our country back,” Nixon said while discussing the topic of a moral conscience. She said that the stories of the people who

were affected by this system need to be told by the people to whom the stories belong, and it is only then that the country will finally see change.

March 13, 2015

News 3

The Brandeis Hoot

Lecture discusses the ethics of international intervention

By Emily Smith Editor

The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) at 10 Conference, organized by the International Center for Ethics, Justice and Public Life at Brandeis and the Tami Steinmetz Center for Peace Research at Tel Aviv University, was held this week on Sunday and Monday, March 8-9. The conference featured panels with experts in international affairs, professors from Brandeis and Tel Aviv universities and other guest speakers. Each event focused on a different aspect of ethics and the responsibilities of nations in international politics.

The conference, titled “When is it Right to Step In?,” began with a welcome by Daniel Terris from the Ethics Center at Brandeis and Mordechai Tamarkin of Tel Aviv University. Sunday’s events included talks about ethical considerations within

R2P and “R2P in the Real World.”

Each event lasted about an hour and a half and gave audience members the opportunity to ask questions or make comments about what they had heard. The conference was organized by a committee including members of both Brandeis University and Tel Aviv University and in cooperation with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum as well as other institutions.

The “Justice and Accountability Roundtable,” moderated by Director of Programs in International Justice and Society Leigh Swigart, was one of the events held at the conference. It featured former U.N. Under-Secretary for Legal Affairs Hans Corell, Vice President Mordechai Kremnitzer of the Israel Democracy Institute, John Shattuck of Central European University and Richard Goldstone of the University of Virginia Law School.

Kremnitzer and Goldstone sat on the panel in the place of Felice Gaer and Phillip Rapoza, who were unable to

attend.

Corell was first to give his views on the role of justice and accountability in the context of R2P. He explained that bringing criminals to justice is essential to protecting the world’s vulnerable populations and preventing atrocities. “When criminals see that nothing is happening when they are committing crimes, then the criminality will just grow,” Corell argued.

He also made clear that he feels governments “should be very careful to defend the integrity of the U.N. charter.”

Goldstone, who spoke after Corell, criticized the U.N. Security Council’s decision to not intervene in certain situations. “The members of the Security Council have irretrievably weakened [their] own body, the Security Council. They have almost gone out of their way to weaken it by exercising their veto in situations when it shouldn’t be and, importantly, as far as the International Criminal Court is

concerned, not backing up their own referrals,” Goldstone commented.

Goldstone also discussed the importance of connecting justice with peace, something he feels will be essential in preventing future crimes against humanity.

Panelist John Shattuck took a different approach to this idea, saying, “Justice as an instrument of ending conflict is a more problematic concept, and it’s had a problematic history.” Shattuck was the only American panelist.

When Kremnitzer was given his opportunity to speak, he focused on the failures of the Security Council that Goldstone had previously discussed. “In the cases where the Security Council fails to act as it should act, there is a real contradiction between what justice requires, [or] demands very strongly, and what international law permits or allows. And I think to say in these kinds of cases, that when you intervene in the name of justice

you are acting illegally, is a very problematic notion,” Kremnitzer argued.

Kremnitzer said that he is not optimistic that bringing criminals to justice will be an adequate consolation for victims of crimes against humanity, reminding the audience that many of these victims are not alive to see reconciliation anyway. In response to this, Goldstone argued that many South African victims of crimes against humanity did in fact find criminal justice to be a meaningful form of reparation, acknowledging that this wasn’t the case for all the victims.

The discussion the panelists had at the R2P conference served as an example of the complexities of R2P and the inevitable challenges that trying to protect the vulnerable populations of the world presents. Though there were disagreements on the practicalities, the consensus was that nations that are able to protect vulnerable people are responsible for doing so.

Students take Al-Quds debate to President Lawrence From AL-QUDS, page 1

administration that students are very interested in this and that this is an issue that’s good for the student body, that’s good for Brandeis University and that it’s not something we’re going to give up on,” said Philip of the initiative’s goals.

Students from the initiative have attempted to meet with Lawrence since November. After a series of emails, Lawrence scheduled a meeting in February, which he later cancelled. Lisa Lynch offered to meet the students in April; however the students were frustrated by how long it had been since their initial inquiry. In an interview with The Hoot, Stewart, Philip and Hornstein explained that the group decided to stage the sit-in after Lawrence failed to reschedule their February meeting.

“We don’t want to escalate, but we’re just fed up with being ignored,” said Stewart.

Entering Lawrence’s office, students informed Executive Assistant to the President Celia Harris of their desire to speak with Lawrence. Harris explained that Lawrence was unavailable. Students stated their intent to hold a community gathering in Lawrence’s waiting room for the remainder of the office hour. David Bunis ’83 the senior vice president, chief of staff and chief legal officer, sat in on the gathering.

While in Lawrence’s waiting room, Stewart and Philip discussed why they feel the partnership and cross-cultural dialogue are important. The students read and discussed poetry and narratives which they labeled as very powerful to express their thoughts on the overarching and daily conflict between Israelis and Arabs and the importance of dialogue.

Works included those of Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish, Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai and a pair of letters between Israeli and Palestinian authors Sayed Kashua and Etgar Keret, written after Kashua had immigrated to America. Risa Dunbar ’17 shared an original poem about her encounter with an Israeli-Arab girl she met while visiting her school during a summer program.

Of the readings, Hornstein said, “I think it was very powerful, especially for the Chief of Staff and President Lawrence, to see there’s people who really care about this … It’s very important to open up the dialogue and

have those tough conversations.”

Partway through the gathering, Student Union President Sneha Walia ’15 arrived for a scheduled meeting with Lawrence. Walia offered to split her time with the students; however Harris explained this would be inappropriate as they were not on the schedule. Walia said that perhaps there would be time left over at the end of her meeting. Stewart expressed her dismay at not being allowed to split the time, stating, “It’s pretty demonstrative of how our voices are not being heard, and not for real reasons of not having time … but because the administration does not want to hear us.”

Lawrence emerged from his office at the close of the hour and scheduled the Tuesday meeting. Following the meeting, however, Philip, Stewart and Horstein expressed their dissatisfaction with Lawrence. The students have a proposal for reinstating the partnership, which they stated Lawrence refused to look at.

Of the meeting, Stewart said, “It was clear to us that he was not trying to hear our voices. He had made up his mind before walking into that room that he was not going to act or do any- students advocate for partnership to be reinstated Students wait outside the office of President Lawrence. thing to renew the partnership.”

The Hoot attempted to contact PresThe students will hold a press con- rence and expound their belief that lieve the partnership is valuable for ident Lawrence, but Lawrence and the ference today, Friday March 13 at 2 Lawrence has made no indication that both universities, promoting diaBrandeis Communications team did p.m. in the SCC. They will discuss he will reinstate the partnership. logue and enhanced understandings not provide comment as of press time. their proposal, the meeting with LawStewart, Philip and Hornstein be- between cultures. The students also discussed the negative impact of the suspension on Al-Quds. Horstein stated after the sit-in, they contacted Al-Quds students who were were thrilled about the meeting at Brandeis and proud of the initiative’s actions.

Philip stated he believes the partnership “is an opportunity for people from our university to have a serious dialogue with people who are from a very different culture but also with people that we normally think of as disagreeing with us.” He also hopes Brandeis is a place where tough conversations can take place. He hopes the dialogue between Brandeis and Al-Quds can serve as a model for valuable dialogue throughout the Brandeis community.

The students hope today’s press conference will help educate students on the status of this issue.

“I hope the president’s office knows we are not going to be shut down,” said Stewart. “They can try to ignore us, they can try to silence us, but we’re not okay with that, and we want to encourage all the students on campus who aren’t okay being shut down to students seek dialogue photos from internet source join us.”

ARTS, ETC.

4 The Brandeis Hoot

March 13, 2015

New Rose exhibition opens in Farber Library for the exhibition because it is often works of art hanging from their walls, teeming with students. “We want to Farber was selected for this year’s cuactivate an already heavily used spot ratorial internships by the Rose.

By Michelle Kim on campus for students to both casu“Sarah and I are very fortunate to Editor ally encounter the exhibition and also be the first interns to have this specific offer space to spend more time with opportunity,” said Retta. Previously, the works and additional reading ma- select pieces from the Carey Schwartz Unlike most of the Rose Art Muse- terials,” McCarty said. Although there ’87 Collection have been displayed in um’s exhibitions, the newest addition are many heavily-populated student the SCC, such as a video that was on will not be shown in the museum spaces on campus that already have view during the Leonard Bernstein building itself. Instead, it will be presented in the Farber Library Mezzanine. Titled “Disrupted Spaces: Photographs from the Carey Schwartz ’87 Collection of the Rose Art Museum,” the exhibition—curated by Sofía Retta ’15 and Sarah McCarty ’15— opened Thursday evening, March 12 and will be on view through May 20.

The works in this exhibition were gifted to the Rose Art Museum by Carey Schwartz ’87 with the specific intention of being displayed in student areas around campus. This is not only to facilitate experiences with art outside the Rose, but also to engage a broader audience with contemporary art in an innovative and stimulating manner.

“Sarah and I chose photographs specifically because we saw theoretical and visual connections between the images that were rooted in their medium,” Retta said. “The featured artists harness photography’s role in determining how and what we remember, but they also undermine the idea of photographic truth. Ultimately, each image raises questions related to history, place and belonging, bringing the works into conversation with each other and with the viewer.”

Farber was chosen specifically disrupted spaces Taken by Ori Gersht, this piece is from the Casy Schartz ‘87 Collection.

Festival of the Creative Arts in the spring of 2014. Retta and McCarty hope that more works from the collection can be displayed in other student areas around campus in the future.

“Sofía and I will be discussing the Carey Schwartz ’87 collection and our curatorial process, focusing on the thematic elements of the exhibition and the conceptual connections be-

photo by ori gersht/the hoot

tween the five works. There will also be time for questions,” McCarty said before delivering the curator’s talk on March 12.

Of course, Retta and McCarty have their personal favorite works in the “Disrupted Spaces” exhibition. McCarty’s favorite is “The Jewish Ghetto—Ancient Rome” from Carrie Mae Weems’ series “Roaming.” It is the first work visible upon entering the exhibition space. “It carries a quiet assertion that demands the viewers’ attention and time,” stated McCarty. A book of her work, including the “Roaming” series, will be included with the exhibition’s reading materials.

Retta prefers “Trace IV” by Ori Gersht. “Though it almost looks like a painting, it is actually a photograph printed on aluminum. The image’s surface and abstraction are mesmerizing, while the obscured landscape and the history referenced in the photograph give it a haunting effect,” she explained.

The two young but talented curators hope that the exhibition, due to its location in the library, will engage a broader audience consisting of students who usually only encounter art in traditional galleries or museum spaces. “I hope that students find that looking at art can be an excellent study break—you can keep your vision and mind engaged while taking a few moments away from your textbooks and computer,” Retta said. “We are very curious about the community’s responses to the exhibition.” To record audience reactions, the curators will provide a guestbook for comments and feedback.

‘The Way of Water’ shines and retains seriousness

By Emma Kahn Staff

This week, the Brandeis Theater Company launched its first performance of “The Way of Water,” a play that movingly highlights the lasting effects of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. The play focuses on four individuals impacted by the spill and how they try to endure the horrific destruction of their home.

Jimmy (Meir Alelov ’15), the play’s protagonist, struggles to work as a fisherman in the contaminated Gulf, while ignoring health problems caused by the spill. His wife, Rosalie (Jamie Semel ’17), struggles to support Jimmy as he loses hope for the future and his health deteriorates.

Meanwhile, his fellow fisherman and best friend, Yuki (Siddarth Mehra ’17), urges him to stay hopeful as the fish supply remains dry, yet Yuki and his wife, Neva (Jacquelyn Drozdow ’17), have a baby on the way that they will soon be providing for. The play follows the four on their difficult path as they come to grips with their new, grim reality.

Award-winning playwright Caridad Svich constructed “The Way of Water” from the true events that occurred in August 2010 in Plaquemines Parish, LA. Jimmy brings the audience closer to the incident, and closer into the lives of those affected, calling into question not the stories presented by the headlines and tabloids but rather the real and tangible effects of the spill. “It comes down to understand-

the way of water

The play is about the longterm effects of the 2010 BP oil spill.

ing and caring for an ecosystem that is vital—a shared understanding. In other words, don’t think of is as ‘something that happened in someone else’s backyard,’ but truly, deeply understand that it is all of our responsibility whether we live in Omaha or Houston or St. Petersburg or Swansea … No one is immune here,” Svich said in an interview with The Huffington Post.

Svich’s play and the Brandeis cast have reminded us through their production that the 2010 disaster is not

resolved and has not been forgotten by those affected, and we should not forget either. Even the program handed to the audience reminds us of the incident behind the play’s inception; a map of Plaquemines Parish marked the site of the incident on paper in our hands as we watched the plot unfold.

Mehra is a theater and business double major who has been featured in two other plays on campus, “A View from the Bridge” and “Stuff Happens.”

“We are fishermen. Our entire com-

photo by mike lovett/the hoot

munity is based on fishing, it is our raison d’etre,” said Mehra in an interview. “Our entire livelihoods have been wiped out and yet [my character] still [tries] to see the light. The essence of my character is to lift [Jimmy] up and make him see the light.” Although Mehra and the rest of the cast certainly dressed the part and recited the lines of middle-aged families in Louisiana, the substance of the play was the challenge behind creating a successful performance. “You can see

the poverty on our set; we even use a turned over bucket as a place to sit. In rehearsal we jokingly call it the ‘Vortex of Doom,’” he said.

Brandeis has the privilege of hosting Svich on campus through the duration of the show. Both Saturday night and Sunday’s performances will be followed by special talks with Svich.

“The Way of Water” will run this Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m.

March 13, 2015

ARTS 5

The Brandeis Hoot

‘Predestination’ fails to compel

By Jess Linde Editor

It is very hard to find fun and original science fiction movies these days.

Take for example, if you will, the year 2014. Last year, the three most financially successful sci-fi films were “Transformers: Age of Extinction,” “Guardians of the Galaxy” and “Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.” Of those three, two were big-budget sequels to big-budget franchises, and one was a

photo from internet source

big-budget superhero movie. That is not a comment on the films’ quality (“Dawn” and “Guardians” were great, “Transformers” was not), so much as on the fact that it is rare to see science fiction movies being made that use the genre to explore social issues, the future or other wild concepts.

The only place to find such movies these days is in the independent sphere. 2014 gave us the great “Snowpiercer,” but still, science fiction seems to be slowing down. 2015’s “Predestination” seeks to challenge that, presenting itself as a film that accepts the craziness of things like time travel while delivering a compelling and deep story. Put shortly, it fails to do both.

Adapted nearly completely from famed sci-fi author Robert Heinlein’s short story “All You Zombies,” the film deals with a “temporal agent,” Ethan Hawke, an operative who travels through time and space, chasing criminals and righting wrongs. For his last assignment, the agent must work as a bartender in 1970s New York in order to catch the “Fizzle Bomber,” who has eluded him throughout time, before the bomber kills 11,000 people and escapes again. One night, a writer calling herself “The Unwed Mother,” Sarah Snook, walks into the agent’s bar, and tells a strange life story, filled with mysterious strangers and heartbreak. As the story unfolds, more becomes clear about the agent’s mission and enemy, and the meaning of the title becomes increasingly prescient.

There are a lot of great sci-fi tropes in “Predestination”: time travel, laser guns, paradoxes, the list goes on.

It even features future selves going through time to go on dates with their past selves with so many twists in the

Life is Cruel By Linjie Xu

continuum that Doctor Who would blush. And yet, it is intensely boring.

Besides an action scene we see repeated two or three times, the majority of the film is a series of mostly silent scenes narrated by Snook’s droning monotone, as we see her life story. Every now and then, it will cut back to Hawke looking mildly bored or asking a question, but for the most part, the plot and its nuances are recited to us directly.

Because the entire movie consists of buildup, the character development is nonexistent other than the exposition, and the script is so ham-handed that the big twist at the end is hardly a surprise. Writer/directors Michael and Peter Spierig, who previously disappointed audiences with “Daybreakers,” confuse slowness with drama and visual flair with plot. The film pays stylistic tribute to the era of its source material, with trench coats and fedoras in juxtaposition to futuristic sets aplenty. Some of the dialogue is occasionally clever, but the actors seem so uninterested, and the plot moves at such a snail’s pace that there is no point to any of it.

I have no doubt that when Heinlein’s original story was published in the late ’50s, readers were enthralled by his writing and the slow development of the plot through conversation. There is however, a large difference between reading a conversation between two people and watching it. And when the people filming the conversation have no sense of pacing and the two actors look like they would rather be taking a nap, you have a problem. “Predestination” is no “My Dinner With Andre.”

It is not even really a movie, so much as a slog through the wastes of time itself.

Student curators speak about photography collection

By Cheshta Singh Staff

On Thursday, March 12, Brandeis students and other guests gathered in the Farber Library Mezzanine to celebrate “Disrupted Spaces: Photographs from the Carey Schwartz ’87 Collection of the Rose Art Museum,” which is the first curation exhibition of the Carey Schwartz ’87 Collection of the Rose Art Museum. Curators Sofía Retta ’15 and Sarah McCarty ’15 discussed the process behind the exhibition and answered some questions.

According to the program description, “Disrupted Spaces” presents photographs that challenge the boundaries of physical and theoretical structures. The artists featured in this exhibition harness photography’s role in determining how and what we remember, while simultaneously undermining the notion of photographs as reliable records of reality. Carey Schwartz ’87, gifted the works to the Rose Art Museum. There are 15 piece in total, all of which were donated specifically to be shown outside of the Rose Art Museum.

One person asked a question about the process of curating, and how the final project managed to look so well done in an effortless way. McCarty explained that there were many com-

ponents to be considered and said that it was wonderful for everything to come together. One issue was the lighting. Farber Mezzanine has two types of lights—natural and fluorescent—so depending on the time of the day, the space can look completely different. Furthermore, they needed to consider how large each work was physically as well as think about the photographs in a conceptual way.

Sarah pointed out that there is a certain irony in disrupting the library space, by pushing expectations and physical boundaries in an unconventional space for displaying art.

Both curators discussed how writing the photo labels was one of the most challenging parts of the process.

They needed to provide some analysis but keep it open enough so that people could come up with their own opinions. There was a lot of editing involved.

McCarty and Retta devoted a significant amount of time to express their genuine gratitude for everybody that helped them along the way. A great number of people were involved in the process. They needed to contact artists, the press, museum workers, facilities and library employees.

Everybody pitched in to work; it was really a team process. Both curators recognized that they could not have done the exhibition without help.

The two curators, who are also interns at the Rose Art Museum, have

been very involved with the Rose Art Museum, where they worked as gallery guards and gradually moved up to the head guard position. As a guard, some of their tasks included greeting people, informing them of museum rules, supervising events and opening and closing the museum. Retta also was a gallery guide and gave people tours of the museum. Both have learned a lot about the museum, including what it takes to run a museum, and made a lot of valuable relationships with the rest of the museum staff. This knowledge was applied to this event. They have

learned a lot about catering, donor relations, budgeting and planning this event where they were given freedom to create it how they wished.

One of the more intense photographs was called “Trace IV” from the series “Liquidation.” Taken by Ori Gersht, the photo was taken on a train moving through forests. These forests are where his father-in-law’s family concealed themselves from the Nazis. The photo label says: “Trace IV echoes his family’s connection to the land while speaking to the erasure of human lives and the memories the

Ukrainian forests carry.” The photos capture haunting, mesmerizing and soulful moments. I found it baffling to believe that I was looking at photographs because all of them were so deep and looked more like paintings.

The works have definitely fulfilled their purpose as they broke the traditional rules of photography.

The photographs are an excellent addition to the library, and brighten up the walls. The works can provide a great study break and may help to provide perspective while doing school work.

photo from internet source

6 ARTS

The Brandeis Hoot

March 13, 2015

MusicUnitesUs brings Fargana Qasimova & Ensemble to Brandeis

By Sabrina Pond Staff

The performers walked onto the Slosberg Recital Hall stage in brilliantly colored clothing. Their entrance was grand—a slight shimmer here and there of the fabric at the back of the gown—and then all five musicians took their seats on a great red rug. They wielded five somehow similar, yet peculiarly unique, instruments, and got down in their postures to adequately perform their craft. Not a word from anyone among the group was spoken, which gave all members a mysterious quality that warranted all the more attention. Almost immediately thereafter, feeling the anticipation of the audience, they started their performance.

Fargana Qasimova & Ensemble is an Azerbaijani group that performed on Saturday, March 7. The program included songs such as “My Beloved is Tormenting Me” by Jahangir Jahangirov, “Have Mercy on Me” by Emin Sabitoghlu and Rasul Rza and “You Are My Beauty,” an Azerbaijani folk song. The titles themselves are enough to conjure up beautiful images of a past that is still waging a battle against Western influence. Maintaining one’s roots is an extremely difficult task, especially in the light of increasing globalization.

The concert was brought to

musicunitesus

Qasimova brought Azerbaijani music to Brandeis.

Brandeis through MusicUnitesUs, a program with the intention of raising awareness of diverse cultures through music. MusicUnitesUs has sponsored concerts to highlight the musical traditions from India, Afghanistan, Brazil and Mali. The organization holds the firm belief that music is a commonality that transcends all cultures and can serve to unite people across the globe. A greater understanding of cultures, therefore, can be formed through the appreciation of divergent forms of music.

Fargana Qasimova & Ensemble is a quintet, with Fargana Qasimova as both vocalist and daf player, Rafael Asgarov on balaban, Rauf Islamov on kamancha, Zaki Valiyev on tar, and

Javidan Nabiyev on naghara. Though “mugham,” a form of Azerbaijani music, is typically performed by a trio—a singer and two instrumentalists—there is some variance and more instrumentalists can be added.

“Mugham” is an essential aspect of Azerbaijani culture and has been likened to Azerbaijani poetry, the intricate patterns of Azerbaijani carpets, and the architectural magnificence of Azerbaijani houses. This art form requires some improvisation and allows the singer freedom to play with the musicality of the song and the lyrical content. This may takes years, if not decades, to master.

Qasimova’s vocals were like a sweet, yearning melody along the shore. It

photo from internet source

drifted and carried its harmonious charm throughout the auditorium, appearing to tell the story of those before us. Her voice spoke of the lives of our ancestors, and our ancestor’s ancestors, taking us farther and farther into the past on an altogether epic journey. Her vocal style runs in deep contrast to the superficial autotuned sound that Western music has fully embraced, transforming the passion and sentiment that vocals can convey into a lifeless drone, an almost inhuman voice. Although the entirety of the performance was sung in another language, and therefore could not be understood lyrically, the overwhelming power of her voice and the range of feeling it could communicate was

profound, even awe inspiring. She put the life back into music, giving it heart and soul when it has shed those things long ago in the United States.

The other musicians wielded instruments that had a faint resemblance to the ones we have come to know, but with many stark differences. The kamancha, for example, looks something like a cello, but in order to play different strings, the performer turns the instrument slightly as opposed to moving the bow at a different angle.

Tar, Azerbaijan’s national instrument, is a lute that has a resonating chamber that is made from the pericardial membrane of a cow’s heart.

When Fargana Qasimova & Ensemble was introduced shortly before the start of its performance, the speaker made the comment, “I know that there will come the time when I never want you to stop playing.”

The speaker, in this instance, spoke very genuine words that I personally shared. Unfortunately, though, every picturesque moment in time must, eventually, come to an end. An end, however, does not denote an absolute loss or failure to recall. Actually, the reverie that was the musical performance was remarkable for its magical intonation, Qasimova’s charming vocals, and the mastery with which the other musicians played their instruments. All together this created such a profound sound that resonated well with the audience members, who will always hear the Azerbaijani music in their minds like the swift wind on the shoreline.

Prof. emeritus named president of American Academy of Arts and Letters

By Jessica Chow Staff

Who is Yehudi Wyner? To say the least, he is a man of many talents.

Wyner is a renowned composer, a former professor at Yale, Harvard, SUNY Purchase, Cornell and Brandeis, a professor emeritus at Brandeis and the new president of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Wyner was born in 1929 into what he described to be “a musical family.”

His father was a well-known Yiddish composer. Wyner described his father as a “remarkable musician and a wonderful composer.” Of course it was only natural that, following in the footsteps of his father, he too would pursue a career in music and composition. Wyner states that “the fact is, [he] was programmed to be a musician,” recalling that he was “given lessons at the first sign of any talent.” At first Wyner started as a pianist, saying that he was “being groomed and trained to be a professional musician, at first just a pianist,” but also recalling that “as [he] began to write pieces, [he] became more and more interested in composition. And also, [he] lost interest in being a career pianist.”

Wyner went on to pursue his talents at the prestigious Juilliard School, where he graduated with a diploma in piano. His musical and compositional studies continued at Yale and Harvard.

Over the years, Wyner has composed over 100 diverse pieces, from orchestral to choir, and has received myriad awards for his works, includ-

ing two Grammys and a Pulitzer Prize. His most well known works include “Friday Evening Service” and “On This Most Voluptuous Night.”

Wyner could not choose a favorite composition because “each of [his pieces] occupies a special place in [his] interest and in [his] affection.”

He eloquently described the compositional process, saying that there are two types of composers: There are those who are able to see the whole piece and how it all comes together, and those who are not able to see a clear cut path or plan for their works.

Considering himself the latter, Wyner said that he “will start without any idea of where a piece is going to go.”

He adopted the method of not having any clear idea of where his composition will go by “learning from novelists and writers.” He further explained “that these things just develop and evolve on their own and depend on a sense of intuition and momentum.”

In addition to composing for the theater and the orchestra, Wyner has taken some time to teach at various universities. Wyner worked in the Music Department at Brandeis between 1991 and 2005, holding the Walter W. Naumberg Chair of Composition. He currently holds the title professor emeritus. During his time at Brandeis, Wyner taught Introduction to Music each fall, according to Da-

vid Rakowski, a current professor in the Music Department who worked alongside Wyner. In addition to that course, Wyner also taught all levels of music theory, graduate level composition courses, an intense performance seminar and was head of the Brandeis Contemporary Chamber Players.

Wyner said he “very much enjoyed his time at Brandeis,” and some of his fondest memories include “working alongside students and performing with the students.” Rakowski described Wyner as a fantastic teacher.

Wyner’s “passion and energy in class helped imbue Brandeis students with a sense of the importance of music as an art and as an expression of the hu-

man spirit every bit as important and serious as any other human endeavor,” and “as a teacher, he encouraged students to think about the act of performance when they wrote, and he was ruthless with students whom he perceived were weak with fundamentals of composition. He didn’t mind compelling students to do counterpoint exercises or chorale harmonizations when he perceived that their training was not up to par.” Though he no longer teaches at Brandeis, Wyner’s influence prevails in the music department. As Rakowski said, “Yehudi was so much the face of the department and the personality of the department.”

photo from internet source

March 13, 2015

ARTS 7

The Brandeis Hoot

Hoot Bites: this week’s favorite places to eat in the greater Boston area The Gaff 467 Moody St., Waltham Three words: fried pickle chips. At first glance, the Gaff looks like your average bar. However, anyone who steps in will realize how amazing it is. Their menu is full of flavorful and fresh options, such as their fried pickle chips, corned beef fritters, salads and chicken tacos. The Gaff also sports a great selection of craft beers, making it a favorite for the 21-plus crew. The servers were also incredibly polite, efficient and friendly, thus solidifying the Gaff ’s status as one of the best restaurant bars in the Greater Boston area.

photo from internet source

By Michelle Kim Editor

Saus 33 Union St., Boston Once featured on an episode of “Good Eats” on the Food Network, Saus is famous for its gourmet sloppy joes (called Sloppy Jacques), which are widely considered to be one of the best sandwiches in the country. Small and unassuming on the outside, Saus is easy to miss. However, upon entering the restaurant, it was clear that I would not be disappointed. Saus is also the home to really good poutine and 13 different poutine sauces.

Koy 16 North St., Boston I am often skeptical of Asian fusion restaurants because many places butcher the two cultures being fused. But Koy won my stomach over with its limited but delicious menu. My favorite part of the meal was the coconut ice cream with caramelized banana. Service is also a major plus here.

Surviving Sodexo: Breakfast supreme

By Charlotte Aaron Editor

Breakfast is commonly thought of as the most important meal of the day. While Sherman does have a wide variety of breakfast options ranging from waffles to hash browns to custom-made eggs, these options alone can become old after a while. Below is the recipe to the Sum Waffle, a waffle created by Eric Goldberg ’18. It is the sum of hash browns, eggs and a waffle—a hearty meal for anyone who appreciates a large breakfast.

Ingredients ham peppers cheese 2 fried eggs 1 waffle

hash browns/tater tots bacon syrup Recipe First, go to the omelet bar and order an omelet with ham, peppers and a little bit of cheese, as well as two fried eggs. While the eggs cook, go to the waffle machine and make one waffle.

Take the waffle back to the omelet bar and pick up the eggs. Place the omelet on top of the waffle, and then layer the two fried eggs on top of the omelet.

Take the waffle over to the hot dishes area and put hash browns or tater tots on the waffle. Goldberg suggests sprinkling the hash browns around the side of the waffle. If bacon is available, and you are feeling extra hungry, place bacon over the eggs. Lastly, drizzle syrup on top of everything. Enjoy the Sum Waffle! photo from internet source

Easy Breezy By Katharine Selector

8 The Brandeis Hoot

FEATURES

March 13, 2015

Spirit band brings rhythm to the court

By Jacob Edelman Editor

Originally from Cherry Hill, NJ, Alex Faye ’15, a politics and American Studies major with minors in Legal Studies and music, keeps himself busy on campus. He serves as the musical director for various programs on campus, including the student-run pops orchestra Top Score. He also serves as a member of the Brandeis Wind Ensemble, a coordinator for Waltham Group’s Prospect Hill Kid’s Club, a senior interviewer for the admissions office, the admissions ambassadors coordinator and a co-president of the Brandeis Democrats. Oh, and he’s also writing a thesis on the relationship between the arts and the presidency of the United States. “My nature is that I always have to be doing something. If I’m not doing something for more than two hours, I start to get antsy,” Faye admitted.

Now, as a senior in his final semester, Faye is kicking off yet another pursuit. “I was having a conversation with Vice President Flagel about how at the other schools he worked at, he was very involved with marching and pep bands, and how when I was in high school, I was very involved with [them] too. I was a drum major,” he said. Faye continued, “We have a ton of talented musicians, and there was no reason we couldn’t have a really unique, Brandeisian spirit band.”

Vice President for Students and Enrollment Andrew Flagel was very involved with the spirit band from the start, drumming up support while serving as the first advisor of the band.

He has held many discussions and worked to organize with Faye to bring the concept to life. He even hired a musical director. In Faye’s words, “He made the band possible.”

Ken Field is the new go-to musical director for the Brandeis spirit band. Originally from New Jersey, attending college at Brown University and now living in Cambridge, Field brings a great deal of experience to the table. Majoring in computer science, he worked for several years in speech recognition, synthesis and digital signal processing at a Cam-

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photos courtesy alex faye/the hoot

bridge research firm before pursuing music full time. He’s been in this career for the last 15 years, having released multiple CDs and other pieces, while additionally performing with and leading a number of different groups.

Faye and Field both stress that the program is not a “Big U” style pep band. “We wanted to find a way for students who like to play in marching bands and pep bands to have a way to do that at Brandeis while finding more support for the teams. Instead of playing a lot of ‘ra-ra’ things, we wanted to do cool, jazzy and unique music,” Faye said.

Currently comprised of about 15 members, the band has only played at Brandeis basketball games, but they hope to be able to expand to other campus events. They plan to be present and performing during next month’s festival of the arts.

“The reaction from the crowd at the game, it’s been great. It’s new to them.

It’s new to us,” Faye said about his favorite part of the band’s experience.

“I’d like a wide variety of participation. Not just musicians who are very accomplished, but also ones who are feeling a little less fluent on their instruments,” Faye said.

Thinking about what he would

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like to see in the band down the line, Faye says, “In 10 years I would love to come back and go to a basketball game and see 100 people in the pep band with cool Brandeis uniforms; just for it to be a really big thing that everyone’s into, everyone’s passionate about and a real part of the Brandeis community.”

Although some might imagine that there’s an oxymoron embedded in the phrase “cool Brandeis uniforms,” the hope for the band to become a regular at Brandeis sports and events is an exciting prospect.

To find out how to get involved, those interested should contact Field

HOOT SCOOPS

March 13, 2015

The Brandeis Hoot 9

Feminist activist speaks at Heller for International Women’s Day

By Emily Smith Editor

Somali women’s rights activist and founder of the non-governmental organization (NGO) El-Karama Hibaaq Osman, spoke to students and faculty at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management on Wednesday afternoon, March 11 as part of their COEX International Women’s Day celebration. The Heller School has hosted International Women’s Day events previously, with guest speakers including Anita Hill (WGS/ALS), Kathryn Bolkovac and other influential women. Osman’s work to end violence against women in the Arab world earned her a spot among Georgetown University’s list of 500 Most Influential Muslims. Her talk at Heller described the development of El-Karama and her collaborative efforts with other women leaders in the Arab world.

“Something magic happens when women come together,” Osman said. Founded in 2005, El-Karama works in partnership with existing organizations that support the promotion and protection of women’s rights in countries including Jordan, Palestine and Sudan. The word Karama, which means dignity in Arabic, represents the organization’s goals.

It is based in Cairo, where Osman now lives.

Central to El-Karama and Osman’s vision for the Arab world is the idea that women’s rights are vital to democracy and human rights in general. Osman ex-

PHOTO BY Karen Caldwell/The Hoot

plained that while many regimes see women’s rights as an easy first target, they often move on to deny civil rights to their entire constituency. Though she recognizes that many leaders use religion or culture to back the stripping away of women’s rights, she denies the notion that Islam, in particular, justifies violence against women or any violation of women’s rights.

“Muslim scholars should really reclaim Islam … What is happening in the name of Islam is not Islam,” Osman insisted. What she views as a misinterpretation of Islam and Shariah law, is, in her opinion, due much more to politics than to religion. Understanding and working within the cul-

ture of Arab countries is essential to bringing about reform, Osman argued. In describing her efforts with El-Karama, Osman said, “It was a war of culture, and we understood it. It was a war of politics, and we understood it … the best people to bring the solutions are the people who are living in the crisis.”

Osman talked about her frustrations with the political aspects of her job, particularly the failure to completely implement U.N. Resolutions. She brought up U.N. Security Council Resolution 1325, which focuses on bringing more women into the U.N.’s decisions and the protection of women’s rights in member states. Fully

implementing these resolutions would, in Osman’s opinion, provide more support for women’s rights and open up dialogue surrounding the promotion of women’s rights and security.

One of the main focuses of Osman’s talk was the importance of women’s education. She asked, “What is wrong with asking for education … Is that women’s rights or is that humanity?” She stressed how important it is for women to have power over their own lives. Osman told the audience that women must be able to speak for themselves and not allow others to define them. “We are pushing for a woman to have choice wherever she is,” Osman

said.

“Women are the backbone of society,” she argued. “What can tear us apart is war and what can put us together is peace.” Though Osman is incredibly proud of El-Karama’s achievements and the achievements of women’s rights activists across the Middle East, she says that there is still a lot of work to do. Osman explained that the progress women have made is under threat in certain countries, giving the example of her friend and fellow women’s rights activist Salwa Bugaighis.

Bugaighis was a Libyan human rights lawyer and advocate for the rights of women in the Arab world who was assassinated in her home. In honor of Bugaighis, El-Karama has created the “Justice for Salwa is Justice for All” campaign. Though Bugaighis’ position meant that her assassination was highly publicized, Osman explained that violence against women, especially women’s rights advocates, is not uncommon. The COEX International Women’s Day at Heller event was sponsored by the Coexistence and Conflict program at the Heller School; the International Center for Ethics, Justice and Public Life; the Heller School’s Gender Working Group; the Graduate Program in Sustainable International Development; and the Women’s Studies Research Center. Program Director Alain Lempereur, who introduced Osman, has worked for many years in conflict prevention and has worked with Osman and El-Karama in the past.

THIS WEEK IN PHOTOS

winter ends Snow melts as spring comes

presentation Students listen to speakers

photo by marian siljeholm/the hoot

photo by sharon cai/the hoot

spring The sun rises above the Brandeis campus

photo by marian siljeholm/the hoot

for colored girls Students perform in the SCC theater

photo by emma hanselman/the hoot

EDITORIALS

10 The Brandeis Hoot

“To acquire wisdom, one must observe.”

Editors-in-Chief Dana Trismen Andrew Elmers

Senior Managing Editor Victoria Aronson Managing Editor Theresa Gaffney News Editors Emily Belowich Jess Linde Arts Editor Michelle Kim Sports Editor Sarah Jousset Opinions Editor Kevin Healey Deputy News Editors Charlotte Aaron Hannah Schuster Deputy Features Editor Jacob Edelman Deputy Hoot Scoops Editor Emily Smith Senior Copy Editors Mia Edelstein Julie Landy Copy Editor Allison Plotnik Senior Layout Editor Sasha Ruiz Deputy Layout Editor Ludi Yang

March 13, 2015

Union positions should be competitive and coveted

T

his week, Brandeis held its annual Student Union elections, and The Brandeis Hoot is dismayed by the apathy among Brandeis students. Very few students run for Student Union positions, and very few students vote in the elections. This year, candidates ran unopposed in every race besides vice president.

Only one student ran for Student Union President, a position that entails a great deal of work, such as making decisions and organizing events that affect student life.

This is not to assert that future president Nyah Macklin ’16 and the students elected to the Student Union will not do an excellent job serving our community. We simply wish that Student Union elections engaged greater student attention, in terms of number of can-

didates and voter turnout. We want students at our university to care about the way it is run. Students may have little say in selection of administrators, but they do have a say in Student Union elections. Moving forward, we encourage students to treat this privilege with the respect it deserves.

If the Union values its role in the Brandeis community, they ought to take more responsibility in advertising the elections and connecting to the student community. They must publicize the candidates’ platforms and hold a debate. Elections should be more than friends voting for their friends, and the Union itself should not be seen as a far-removed group that only exists through a weekly email listing the upcoming events.

The Student Union is a vital part of the university. Its members advocate for students and can act on changes they wish to see on campus, and as such students should relish the chance to be involved in their university. Voting for Student Union is an important way to get involved, as much as joining clubs and advocating for valuable causes.

Brandeis students have a reputation as a politically informed and socially active community and ought to prove that by interacting with the Union. As we have written in past editorials, the Brandeis community is ready and willing to work with groups such as the administration if said groups will meet students halfway. In this case, it is students meeting students, which should be even easier.

Brief: Longtime facilities worker dies at 57

By Charlotte Aaron Editor

On Tuesday, Feb. 24, Ricardo Rivera, a Brandeis facilities employee for 35 years, passed away at the Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge at the age of 57.

Rivera valued time spent boxing and following the Red Sox. Although in his later years he

no longer boxed, he continued to keep up with the sport.

Additionally, he loved spending time with his family.

Rivera was born in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, in 1957 and later moved to Waltham. He is survived by his wife Olga; his children Reinalily Rivera, Elizabeth Rivera, Jennifer Rivera, Nelson Rivera and his fiancée Ana Celi Perez, Jason Ri-

vera and his wife Monica, and Richard Rivera; and his sisters, Minerva, Magdalis and Wanda.

He is also survived by eight grandchildren and many nieces and nephews.

According to his obituary from the Brasco Funeral Home, “He will be remembered as a happy, loving man who was fun to be around.”

The Brandeis Hoot will offer a full article in next week’s issue.

Graphics Editor Linjie Xu Website Editors Zak Kolar Zach Phil Schwartz

Volume 12 • Issue 7 the brandeis hoot • brandeis university 415 south street • waltham, ma

Founded By Leslie Pazan, Igor Pedan and Daniel Silverman

STAFF

Clayre Benzadon, Ethan Berceli, Rachel Bossuk, Robin Briendel, Sharon Cai, Karen Caldwell, Shikha Chandarana, Jake Greenberg, Emma Hanselman, Curtis Zunyu He, Emma Kahn, Shayna Korol, Joe Lanoie, Nabi Menai, Monique J Menezes, Joon Park, Lisa Petrie, Sabrina Pond, Emily Scharf, Hannah Schuster, Marian Siljeholm, Chesta Singh, Eliana Sinoff, Emily Smith, Hannah Stewart, Michael Wang, Sophia Warren MISSION As the weekly community student newspaper of Brandeis University, The Brandeis Hoot aims to provide our readers with a reliable, accurate and unbiased source of news and information.

Produced entirely by students, The Hoot serves a readership of 6,000 with in-depth news, relevant commentary, sports and coverage of cultural events. Recognizing that better journalism leads to better policy, The Brandeis Hoot is dedicated to the principles of investigative reporting and news analysis. Our mission is to give every community member a voice.

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The Brandeis Hoot welcomes letters to the editor on subjects that are of interest to the community. Preference is given to current or former community members and The Hoot reserves the right to edit or reject submissions. The deadline for submitting letters is Wednesday at noon. Please submit letters to letters@thebrandeishoot.com along with your contact information. Letters should not exceed 500 words.

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Brief: Medical emergencies, theft and vandalism reported in police log

By Jess Linde Editor

The Brandeis Public Safety media log for the week of March 2-8 showed a pattern of BEMCo calls among students, as well as multiple complaints of vandalism and theft. The report also contained noise complaints and three cases of

drug paraphernalia being confiscated after students were seen smoking marijuana in full view.

The reasons for the BEMCo calls were varied medical emergencies.

Several students called the service reporting severe allergic reactions to food, and three separate incidents in Gosman involving students injuring themselves.

Another student burned their hand severely, and another complained of a “severe ear infection.” Only one of the BEMCo calls involved a person suffering from intoxication.

Theft complaints were of a pair of boots and cash, both from unlocked bedrooms. The log also reported eggs thrown at the Village B quad office door.

SPORTS

March 13, 2015

The Brandeis Hoot 11

Judges fight back but fall to Emory

By Curtis Zunyu He Staff

After losing five games in a row, the men’s baseball team was desperate for a big victory to bounce back with confidence and momentum. The number-nine ranked Emory might not have been the best target, as the Eagles are undefeated in the UAA conference so far, but the Judges tried their best to come back in a close game that finished 12-10 in favor of the Eagles.

The fifth inning turned out to be the turning point of the game, when the Eagles scored 10 runs in a single inning. The Judges would go on to suffer another defeat, extending their drought to six games in a row. Their record fell to 2-8, with a 0-5 record in UAA conference play. Emory maintained their undefeated 4-0 record in the conference.

Despite a tough loss, the Judges finally found their stroke, eventually scoring some runs against the Eagles, especially after the fifth inning. Before this game, the Judges had only scored a total of five runs in three UAA conference games. The desperation of facing a huge deficit in the bottom of the fifth inning actually awakened the energy from Brandeis players as they exploded in the seventh by sending home five base runners.

Kyle Brenner ’15 opened up the scoring after walking with the bases loaded, his second RBI of the game.

Then, another senior, Tom McCarthy, continued the momentum with a sacrifice fly to center.

The rally continued as Greg Heineman ’16 singled to load the bases again, followed by Connor Doyle’s ’16 and Lian O’Connor’s ’16 run-producing singles. The Judges also made the most of the Eagles’ mistakes as rookie Nick Falkson ’18 reached on an error by the third baseman of the Eagles.

The deficit was cut to 12-8, and the Judges truly demonstrated their ability to score and come back in this perfect inning.

The rally wasn’t finished as the Judges continued to shut down the

photo from internet source

Eagles’ attempts to expand their lead.

In the meantime, Tom McCarthy again snatched a clutch two-out RBI single to cut the deficit down to 12-9.

The crowd was on its feet when Luke Zeccola ’18 pinch hit and slugged his second home run of his college baseball career in the ninth inning.

However, the comeback was not able

to be completed before the end of the game.

The tying run came to the plate for the Judges, but Emory reliever Michael Byman closed out the game as he successfully got Ryan Healy ’16 to fly to left to nail the game.

The 10 runs the Judges were able to score meant a lot to the team and

to its future games since the players were finally clear about their incredible potential. Zeccola has managed to go deep two games in a row, and key players such as Brenner and McCarthy were able to step up even with a huge deficit. Hopefully, amazing performances from the Judges will be seen more often in their upcoming

matches to halt their six-game skid and to turn around the team spirit.

The next game for the Judges will be on Friday, March 13 against the University of Rochester in Florida, which will also be a UAA conference duel.

The Judges will play at home next Friday, March 20 with a game against Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

12 The Brandeis Hoot

OPINIONS

March 13, 2015

To protect students, univ. must step up residential security

By Jacob Edelman Editor

I was sitting in Shapiro lounge on Friday evening when my roommate came in and frantically asked whether I had borrowed a large sum from his wallet on his desk. I hadn’t, and upon returning anxiously to the room, I found that my wallet had been emptied as well. Someone had gone into our (carelessly) unlocked room in the early evening when it was vacant, stolen all the money that was readily accessible and left without a trace. It probably went down in less than 30 seconds.

My roommate and I filled out police reports, but there was nothing else to do, since stolen bills aren’t as traceable as a phone or a computer. This occurrence was the third time this style of untraceable, inexcusable and cold-hearted theft had taken place in our hallway during this school year. The first thought that came to mind was, “But we’re at Brandeis, this doesn’t happen here!” Unfortunately that sense is a misapprehension, as crime happens here just as it does everywhere else in the world. There will always be people who fail to grasp the moral concept of respect for personal property, and the repercussions, even on those who play by the rules, are all too real.

Purses are pilfered, sunglasses are swiped and laptops are looted.

Door locks remain the simplest solution for protecting one’s be-

photo from internet source

longings; however they are not always convenient or easy to remember. When leaving a room for just a minute, it’s sometimes easier to leave the door unlocked.

It’s easy to leave the door unlocked so that friends can come and go more conveniently. Regardless, forgetting to lock the door is an easy mistake that’s almost impossible to stop from happening now and again.

This recent series of petty thefts is a symptom of the greater problem of inadequate residence hall security. In order to access the Brandeis campus, one merely has to stroll or drive right in. Although there is a gatehouse, it is not required to drive through or check with a security officer on the way in. Veritably, a process of signing-in would consume important time and hinder traffic, but a minimum of being logged

by a camera would be an improvement that could protect the lives and safety of students.

Once on campus, access to living spaces is troublingly easy.

Standing by an entryway for long enough will inevitably result in a student opening a door, even for a complete stranger. In situations like this, the trespasser is usually present to drop menus under residence doors or deliver food, but the ease with which an outsider can enter a building without proper credentials is startling. The fact that a potentially dangerous individual can gain free access to one of our residence halls with a “Can you let me in?” is unacceptable.

Some universities have a checkin process during the nighttime hours, while others have a sentry present during the same time.

Both of these measures increase the safety of residents. That is not

to say that Brandeis should adopt these measures, but there must be options that can be considered beyond the easily bypassed swipe system.

To deter these sorts of incidents, the cheapest solution would be to install a small camera in residence entryways. A camera would have cost far less than the property that has been stolen in halls up to this point, and it may act as a discouragement from unknown strangers entering into buildings. These cameras would not be present for unnecessary observation or surveillance, and they would be there solely for the university police’s use, not that of the Department of Community Living or another non-police office. They would not have to record audio, they would not have to be constantly monitored and their records would not have to be permanently saved. In

Laundry services should be improved

By Zach Phil Schwartz Editor

There’s no doubt most of us have come across laundry troubles in our time here at Brandeis.

Those who haven’t maybe should invest in a lottery ticket. The process of lugging and doing laundry is strenuous and stressful as it is without the headaches the machines cause us. The machines and the payment system as a whole are hassles on the best of

days and downright miserable on the worst of days. As more calls are placed to our laundry repair service, it becomes more evident that the time has come to modernize some student laundry rooms.

I’m not even making assumptions when I say that some of the laundry rooms are ancient and need modernization; there are actual markers boasting the ages of the rooms. For example, Massell’s Shapiro laundry room has a magazine mounted on the wall that is apparently designed for the

viewing of bored laundry-going students. It doesn’t seem out of the ordinary until you see that the thing dates back to 1989. It hasn’t been changed since. The machines in that room break down and falter on a near-daily basis, invoking groans from frustrated residents of the entire quad.

The collective groans in Massell Quad, caused by a relative lack of open machines in the rest of the quad, resonate around many of our other quads. North has two laundry rooms for the entire quad, while Castle has few ma-

chines; fewer of them actually work. The Rosenthal Quad has it worse, with only one laundry room for all 120 residents, with a number of machines remaining nonfunctional.

Paying for the machines is almost as much of a hassle as setting out from a residence hall in pursuit of a working laundry machine or dryer is. The two options, quarters and WhoCash, are also frustrating to use. In a perfect world, if you have enough quarters, and the machines are even taking them, you’re fine. If

order to gather evidence (identifying a suspect) following a disturbance, authorities realistically only need the previous 24 hours of data.

This is not a savory option, as we all have reasonable expectations of privacy. Like most, I am repelled by the idea of being monitored unnecessarily. One doesn’t need to be hiding something in order to desire being left without observers; the right to be secluded is basic to the nature of being free. The truth is that certain methods of surveillance are not as necessary for safety as some would contend.

However, for community safekeeping, we enter into agreements for common measures to be taken for our collective care. With that in mind, a handful of entryway cameras with short-term recycled recording would be a reasonable price to pay for the safety of us all.

you don’t have enough, the Student Service Bureau up at Usdan is awaiting your visit. If the machines’ connection to the WhoCash card reader isn’t severed, you’re fine. If it is severed, you’re going to need to find another machine, use quarters or not do laundry.

It’s time to modernize the laundry apparatus on campus. As a necessity for students, we just cannot afford subpar machine performance. One of my profes See LAUNDRY, page 14

photo from internet source

March 13, 2015

The Brandeis Hoot

OPINIONS

13

Sodexo must label ingredients in food

By Kevin Healey Editor

Our campus is known for many things: rolling hills, distinctive faculty, an active student population and terrible food. Sure, it might be common for college students to focus so much on their terrible food options, but this issue is especially true of Brandeis.

I’m not going to be commenting—or complaining—about food quality again in this article, but rather focusing on an emerging issue for our students.

Despite problems with food quality, Sodexo has actually been working on improving their selection. They’ve scheduled a number of theme nights and special events, focusing cuisine on workers’ countries of origin. Personally, I think it is a really great way to help unite the campus with the Sodexo staff and was also a genius marketing campaign.

When we allow Sodexo employees to prepare the food of their homelands, we show that as a campus community we value them. They’re not just the person who makes chicken, or the guy who washes the plates, but someone with a story we want to hear.

We ought to all recognize the in-

credible work these people put in, especially during all the storms we’ve had, and this is a great way to do so. Beyond that, the campaign gives people the chance to try new cuisines and expand their culinary boundaries. Most students probably couldn’t tell you what the traditional starches of Brazil are, and even fewer have actually eaten cassava (it tastes similar to a potato). Getting the chance to try it helped me learn a little more about the spirit of Brazil and its culture. Plus, when students all get to try a new experience together, we can bond over our new experience. When we eat together, we all get to grow.

Well, most of us get to eat together. For some of us, those with food allergies who cannot pick up a fork without an ingredient list, theme nights are much harder to enjoy. Oftentimes, ingredient lists aren’t provided for the special food options, and those with dietary restrictions can’t partake.

You could ask the staff members, but they often don’t know ingredients for options that are only available for a day. Though pizza can be tasty, denying people reasonable options in choosing their meal is critical, especially since our meal plans cost so much. Just providing nutritional information See FOOD, page 15

photo by linjie xu/the hoot

Clubs bastions of student individuality

By Jake Greenberg staff

When I ask high school friends about their weekends at college, I usually hear tales of sporting events, partying and Greek life. In contrast, when I then talk about my weekends at college, I tell my friends about the cultural events, performances and activism I have attended or been a part of.

One of Brandeis’ greatest assets is its student-run clubs. Universities are known for having diverse populations with different talents and abilities, but it is rare for campuses to have students so passionate about their interests to found such a wide variety of programs. I’ve gotten to see the strength of campus organizations firsthand by being involved in the Intercultural Center. The ICC promotes student involvement through a training program for future cultural club leaders, while also acting as a key resource for the promotion and planning of many cultural events.

In addition, the center facilitates networking between different clubs.

These programs promote both pluralism and cultural understanding between groups that might otherwise be isolated.

In addition to cultural events, I have seen many religious organizations co-host events and reach out to the rest of the Brandeis community.

When I attended the Triskelion/Allies breakfast social during my first week here, I was impressed to see chaplains and campus administrators eating along with LGBTQ students and allies. Then, on Thanksgiving, I got a glimpse into Catholic culture when I attended the Catholic Student Association’s Thanksgiving feast. I otherwise wouldn’t get the chance to interact with religious groups outside of services, so I was honored to be able to attend these events. After all, who would have thought that my first experience with a Catholic organization would be at Brandeis?

Beyond attending spiritual and cul-

photo by the hoot

tural events, I’ve also been exposed to unique arts performances, including improvisational comedy, a cappella and step dancing.

While many colleges use faculty who micromanage many of their student activities, Brandeis’ administrative trust to make the school’s clubs run successfully. This trust not only prepares students for real-world projects and tasks, but also incentivizes

students to participate more, since individuals can shape each group’s development.

The wide ranges of new and innovative ideas that get proposed through the Brandeis University Sustainability Committee every year are an example of the fruition of this trust. These innovations are possible because the university respects student perspectives, which are oftentimes the most

insightful when it comes to the potential for reform. Beyond that, the committee hosts panels for faculty and staff to hear student’s concerns and answer critical questions about the campus movement towards a sustainable future. This type of discussion would not likely be possible at a campus less focused on student participation.

Since coming to Brandeis, I have

found the epitome of student participation at Chum’s. In and of itself, this student-run coffee shop is an impressive feature of the administration’s trust for undergraduates. It also functions as an important outlet for clubs to demonstrate those talents and interests that make them unique.

See CLUBS, page 15

14 OPINIONS

The Brandeis Hoot

March 13, 2015

Student activists should go national to get voices heard

By Andrew Elmers Editor

Brandeis has a large population of students who are passionate about issues occurring on campus, around the country and across the globe. For the most part, these students take action concerning the topics they are passionate about. A recent example of this is the opening of the Rape Crisis Center (RCC), which was an initiative motivated by student concerns. One reason this project reached completion was because the target was local—students needed to get the administration and board of trustees to accept the fact that more help needs to be given to survivors of sexual assault. Students knew where to voice their concerns to actually make things happen.

When it comes to problems that effectively break the Brandeis bubble and affect more people than those just on campus, directing protests at people and groups on campus won’t really enact any sort of change.

Look, for example, at the Sodexo problem. Though it could probably be said that any large, multinational corporation running food services for a smaller college would instill much derision, Sodexo is still doing a pretty poor job, and students are not happy with their efforts.

Often students have posted on Facebook or participated in other forms of protests to showcase their unhappiness about finding a hair in their food or something else. And while this is effective in convincing the rest of the community, and even some administrators, that the food services here are bad, it probably won’t force Sodexo to actually change anything.

With the way contracts work, it would be pretty fruitless to try and get the university to change the food service provider, especially since we just switched from Aramark two years ago. Student activists on this issue have been aware of that and focused their vitriol to surround the actual quality of the service and food.

Yet they target their claims at the Sodexo management who work here at Brandeis (whose jobs really aren’t in jeopardy if a group of students are unhappy) instead of trying to find a way to actually hurt the company’s bottom line and force them to react.

Students joke about how Sodexo also services prisons and hospi-

photo by katherine selector/the hoot

tals, pointing out the apparent lack of quality in our own food service provider, yet we should be using Sodexo’s large client base to our advantage. If students here at Brandeis feel slighted by the quality of food here, it would make sense that the vast other amounts of students, patients, prisoners and employees at other sites feel the exact same way.

Millions of people across the world are probably really upset with Sodexo, yet they are still “the largest quality of life services company in the world,”

according to their website.

So what should be happening is that Brandeis students should be working with students at other schools, as well as anyone else that wants Sodexo to make a change, and create an actual national protest against Sodexo’s practices.

If enough people speak out against Sodexo, and in a concentrated effort to get the main points across, eventually Sodexo will see enough of a dip in their bottom line to necessitate finding a new way of doing business.

Right now, they can quell displeased crowds at a small student university in Massachusetts or a hospital in California. Yet, when those voices are joined together, that task becomes much harder.

Look at the issue of divestment.

Many student activists want the school to divest from fossil fuels.

These students aren’t concerned about the school’s endowment or the future of their financial situation; they simply care about the environment and preserving the planet. Getting

high-profile schools, such as Brandeis, to formally divest from fossil fuel companies extremely helps the green movement. And while these student activists haven’t been successful yet, they know exactly what they need to do in order to get there.

I don’t know what the most effective way in actually affecting Sodexo’s bottom line is, but a larger base can create a national conversation on these food service providers. Sodexo might then have to actually improve their services.

Laundry rooms need to be brought into present LAUNDRY, from page 12

sors once emphasized how there is no more important resource than time, and that couldn’t be more true for students. We need time to study, to do homework, to eat and to sleep. We don’t need to be blowing time on fiddling with laundry machines because the infrastructure is outdated.

In order to minimize lost time to unintended laundry fiascos, all that is needed is a simple infrastructure upgrade. Newer machines would definitely help with the persistent issue of broken ones. The payment mechanisms should definitely be at the forefront of machine upgrades, with a more flexible monetary payment system. Quarters are an acceptable payment method, but the machines should also accept dollar bills so that the forgetful resident without WhoCash doesn’t have to scavenge for quarters. Those with WhoCash should also not need to worry about paying for laundry.

photo from internet source

The machines should be equipped with individual WhoCard readers so that external readers don’t eat money without enabling the machine to run.

The university should invest in not only installing new machines but also installing more machines.

In this way, fewer students would be plagued by a scarcity of laundry

machines and dryers on laundry day. Maybe then, students won’t have to run across their quads to clean their clothes. Finally, it may benefit the current student population if the laundry room wall magazine is updated by roughly 20 years. As much as I love to read about The Who’s newest endeavors on the wall of the Shapiro

laundry room, I think it’s getting a tad old.

A hopefully vital component to student life, doing laundry shouldn’t be time consuming. It should be a quick, in-and-out break from other more important uses of time. Unfortunately, the university’s outdated laundry and dryer machine infrastructure

makes it so this once-speedy activity is a huge waste of time. More frighteningly, the time factor may prompt other students to stall doing laundry altogether. Laundry room-related situations are all easily preventable, thankfully. My message to the university: Updating the laundry infrastructure is well worth the cost of doing so.

March 13, 2015

OPINIONS 15

The Brandeis Hoot

Univ. must take steps to prevent waste

By Zach Phil Schwartz Editor

The Mandel Atrium in the Rabb area, as one of the more modern common areas on campus, is a highly popular one for studying.

It’s got a lot of light, interesting light fixtures and even a television.

Hell, it’s even got comfy chairs.

However, if you glance around the spacious chamber, you’ll see a fireplace that looks as if it’s never been used. Look at it closely and you’ll see that there’s a pilot light lit—constantly. What’s the point of keeping the fireplace in commission if it’s never going to be used? It’s not only a waste of gas but also part of a larger problem of waste on campus.

To keep a pilot light lit is a guarantee that it will eventually be utilized to start a fire. When it isn’t lit, the university is simply wasting gas. Although it takes a small amount of natural gas to keep a pilot lit, the expenditures add up.

In a world with diminishing oil and gas supplies, it isn’t wise at all to just use it all up with the mindset that it will be there forever.

This specific mindset is exemplified by those who run the building, but by no means is it confined to Brandeis staff.

Brandeis students also share their part in a waste problem that grows ever so rampant around campus. Walk anywhere and you’ll find easily recyclable dated

photo from internet source

newspapers and periodicals just lying around. In the dining halls students take huge portions of food that many don’t end up eating. In the larger expanse of dining areas you’ll find napkin dispensers and students taking more than generous amounts of the dispensed product. At Sherman dining hall, salt and pepper are constantly replaced, most of the time when the shakers are barely used. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say the contents at the bottoms of the shakers haven’t been exposed to the outside environment since the shakers were last emptied and refilled. Frighteningly, the issue doesn’t end here.

To be fair, there are student-run initiatives run alongside university-run initiatives that try to get students to stop wasting. In many restrooms, there are dual-flush toilets that use less water when they are flushed upwards. I have no statistics on how many people flush upwards or how much water Brandeis uses per year, but you can’t expect everybody to be conscious of trivial toilet nuances. I sometimes walk into my dorm’s bathroom to find toilet paper sprawled across the floor, tons of unused paper towels neatly stacked in the garbage and shower heads that have been dripping for God knows how long. It’s comical

that so many blatantly ignore the advice on the towel dispensers that say, “remember that these come from trees!”

With the issue of waste as widespread as it is, encompassing both students and non-student members of the community, both education on refuse management and actions to rectify the situation need to be enacted. Students must be better advised, perhaps at their orientations, about the negatives of wasting. The university should strive to keep better oversight of their resources.

The university should, in order to conserve resources, upgrade to electric utilities. Instead of manu-

al paper towel dispensers, electric ones make it harder for people to waste them. Universal automatic sink heads make it so that people can’t leave the sinks on anywhere.

Shower handles that make it so accidental dripping cannot happen should be instituted in dorms.

In this way, if we can cut our rampant use of resources, there can be money saved in buying more goods less frequently. I don’t mean to generalize all students, to be perfectly clear. A few friends of mine have actually been organizing to collect and recycle old newspapers and periodicals scattered around campus that nobody is interesting in reading. There are definitely those that are actively trying to alleviate the situation, but there aren’t enough devoted to the cause.

Back to the fireplaces, Brandeis should just decide whether it wants the Mandel Atrium’s fireplace to be functional. For students that enjoy studying in the atrium, the working gas fireplace would be a nice addition to the room—perhaps even conducive to the studying experience. It’d be great because hey, it gets pretty cold in the winter. Or, they could decide they want to quit wasting gas and just have it be a small hole in the wall next to the television.

No matter what they choose, the current situation of saying, “hey, we may light that thing one day, but we’ll just take our sweet time,” isn’t going to fly.

Clubs represent diverse student body CLUBS, from page 13

Rarely does a weekend go by without a coffeehouse, comedy show or concert to enjoy.

Ultimately, Brandeis is a unique place because students use this freedom to express their diversity in unbelievable ways. While all college experiences are important to campus life, Brandeis clubs and organizations are unusual in how much they allows students to express their individuality. This feature makes Brandeis an exciting place to go to school and always provides me with the distinctive stories to tell with my high school friends.

photo from internet source

Univ. has an obligation to students with food allergies FOOD, from page 13

can go a long way to helping students have reasonable options.

Even when information is provided, however, people with food allergies still take a risk when eating foods made by people other than the regular chef. There’s always a risk of cross-contamination no matter where you eat, but when someone is cooking in a new kitchen that chance becomes even higher. It only takes a lone misplaced sauce or improperly cleaned counter to potentially kill someone, and disruption in the kitchen staff increases that risk.

I’m sure you think I’m exaggerating, but the risk is all too real.

Just last week, a student with a peanut allergy had to be rushed to the hospital after eating a contaminated meal in Usdan. The label didn’t indicate anything was

wrong, but that doesn’t really help when you need emergency medical attention. We need to take serious steps to make sure no one is hospitalized for careless mistakes.

Brandeis should label all food made by guest chefs, so that people have a reasonable chance to opt out of consuming those dishes. We also ought to improve the safety standards of our kitchens so people don’t have to fear eating new foods. What occurred was a terrible accident, but if it happens again it is all of our faults.

It’s great that Sodexo is trying to expand our food options, but they need to focus first on the safety of our students. Providing students only with foods they can’t safely enjoy leaves students left out and confused as to what they can eat.

It’s great that we’re providing students cultural opportunities, but we can make our food options more accessible.

photo from internet source

March 13, 2015

ARTS, ETC.

The Brandeis Hoot 16

B.E.T. and Brandeis Players put on a fantastic production of ‘for colored girls’

By Talia Franks

Special to the Hoot

I am a big believer in the power of words. They are what make us human even though they are not that important individually. What matters is how we shape and use them to show or hide our true selves as well as to communicate our thoughts. Words are both our greatest weakness and our greatest strength. The written word has enabled people to speak through time and space. A greater power, however, lies in spoken words.

I heard this power when I saw last Friday night’s performance of “for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf.”

This show blew me away. I have never been so moved by artistic media.

Nowadays, there is little room in our culture for serious entertainment, so when I come across a serious work, I really appreciate it.

Brandeis Ensemble Theatre and Brandeis Players co-produced the play, originally written by American playwright and poet Ntozake Shange.

The show is a series of interconnected poems that portray the lives of seven black women, all of whom are nameless and express their identities only by the color of their clothes: yellow (Khadijah Sawyer ’18), blue (Amanda Caroline de Oliveira Pereira ’15 & Queen White ’16), red (Oye

Ehikhamhen ’17 and Nyah Macklin ’16), orange (Kesi Kmt ’16), purple (LaQuasia Cherry ’17), green (Jessica Hood ’15) and brown (LaShawn Simmons ’18). The Brandeis production deviated a little by having two actresses in red and two actresses in blue. There were also four guides (Racheal Odusanya ’17, Stephanie Ramos ’15, Ajai Scott ’15 and Keara Vancol ’17), dressed in black, who act in the background of the scenes, often in the forms of dancing or moving props.

The cast was excellent. Each character was independent and unique, but the characters together formed a beautiful mosaic. Every poem that was acted out produced its own emotion. The show successfully tackles difficult topics, such as rape, racism, abandonment, domestic abuse, sexism, HIV/AIDS and abortion. As a society, we rarely talk about any of these subjects despite the fact that they are very real and very present.

One thing I thought was extremely satisfying about this play was that things weren’t sugarcoated; real and raw emotions of struggling women were relayed to the audience.

In one scene the women talk about all of the excuses that men make and the amount of times they have heard the words “I’m sorry.” When I saw their expressions and heard the tones of their voices, I was brought back to my own experiences and those of women in my family. I was connected to the actresses in that moment. All

of the cast members embodied this high-level acting.

One part of the show that really stuck with me was the poem about Sechita, the life of a woman living in the bayou who is melding with the spirit of her namesake, a goddess. The poem is accompanied by a beautifully expressive dance. I think that it takes a lot skill to not only pull off such a complex dance on stage, but also match it to the words of the actress speaking the poem.

The poem that will stay with me the most out of all is the penultimate one, which describes an abusive man who refuses to leave his ex-girlfriend and their two children alone. He continues to harass them despite a mandated court order. The women in red act out the entire scene, including a part where he is dangling the children out from a window in a threatening manner. When one of the women in red released her hands, I felt my heart fall into my stomach as though a father had actually dropped his two small children out a window and murdered them.

My favorite part of the show is when the woman in brown speaks about her love of Toussaint L’Ouverture, the leader of the Haitian Revolution and her experiences with reading about him and having him as her own friend. She reminded me of myself as a child sneaking off to read advanced books from the library and finding a friend in books where there was none

elsewhere. I felt very strongly about this scene because the media often portrays women of color as less academically gifted and not as interested in intellectual pursuits. Here, we see a character of color who does not fit this damaging stereotype.

I think that what makes this show so special is that while the stories shown are not necessarily those of actual people, they are most definitely narratives that women of color

can relate to and identify with, many of whom struggle with the issues put forth in this show.

Director Ra Malika Imhotep ’15 brought these topics out into the open with this wonderful show, which is an objective that I heartily support. The cast, production staff and crew did a fantastic job with their production of “for colored girls,” and I can only hope for more productions of such import and caliber.

photo by emma hanselman/the hoot

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