The Dartmouth 10/19/17

VOL. CLXXIV NO.132

MOSTLY SUNNY

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

HANOVER, NEW HAMPSHIRE

Provost Carolyn Dever to return to teaching

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By RACHEL PAKIANATHAN The Dartmouth

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OPINION

MALBREAUX: THE ANTONYMIC LIFE PAGE 6

BARTLETT: IDENTITY CRISIS PAGE 6

GOLDSTEIN: PRESS 1 FOR ENGLISH PAGE 7

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Provost Carolyn Dever will step down as provost at the conclusion of the fall term, ending her three and a half year tenure. She will continue to serve as a faculty member in the English department, according to an Oct. 1 press release.

Dever said that now was a “good moment” to return to her academic roots, citing her 7-year-old child and her desire to continue her own research and teaching.

Dever has served as Dartmouth’s chief academic officer since July 1, 2014, when she came to the College after working as the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Vanderbilt

Students enjoy socializing during meals at the Class of 1953 Commons.

SEE DEVER PAGE 2

Latinx events Students celebrate conclude on Nov. 1 Indigenous Peoples’ Week

By GABRIEL ONATE The Dartmouth

Latinx Heritage Month has been celebrating the Latinx community and identity on campus since mid-September and will continue hosting events u n t i l N ov. 1 d e s p i t e decreased funding from

the College, according to Latinx Heritage Month Planning Committee members Rosa Mendoza ’20 and Juan Laínez Iscoa ’20. This year’s theme is “our strength lives in our roots” with the goal of uniting everyone into SEE LATINX PAGE 3

By EILEEN BRADY The Dartmouth

The Native American community at the College celebrated Indigenous Peoples’ Day last Monday, Oct. 9. The celebration, planned by Native Americans at Dartmouth, began at midnight with a drumming circle on the Green and the lighting of a sacred fire,

according to Kianna Burke ’12, the Native American Program interim director.

A rally protesting the celebration of Columbus Day and celebrating Native culture was also held on Monday afternoon. Events such as film screenings, meals and workshops were held throughout the following week in celebration of Indigenous

Peoples’ Week, a week-long celebration created last year by Burke.

The midnight drumming circle is an event that has taken place for many years at Dartmouth, according to NAD member Samantha Maltais ’18.

She noted that the event is something that most Native SEE NAD PAGE 3

Researchers study katydid evolution in Panama

By ROHINI MANDAL The Dartmouth

Biology professor Hannah ter Hofstede led a team of researchers through Panama this past summer in order to learn more about the process of evolution by examining the katydid species.

Katydids are predominantly nocturnal insects related to crickets, famous for their unique mating calls.

“One reason to do this kind of work in the tropics is that there is so much diversity,” ter Hofstede said. “In the tropics, there are a lot of species that use very high frequency sounds. Usually what’s happening with katydids is males producing sound and females walking to the male.”

The calls of katydids have both COURTESY OF LAUREL SYMES

SEE KATYDIDS PAGE 2

Researchers traveled to Panama to study katydid calls.

THE DARTMOUTH NEWS

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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

Carolyn Dever will end tenure as provost at the end of fall term FROM DEVER PAGE 1

University for six years. An interim provost will be appointed in the next few weeks, followed by a search for a new provost, according to the press release.

“Hanlon is about to launch a capital campaign that is a marathon,” Dever said. “And it’s a moment for him to go forward with leadership that’s going to be here for the long haul.”

Dever said that her primary goal as provost was to help Dartmouth advance its academic mission and promote diversity and inclusivity. “ We a d d e d n u m e r o u s postdoctoral scholars in areas of diversity across the campus,” she said. “And we’ve attracted a multi-million dollar grant from the [Andrew W. Mellon] Foundation in support of recruitment and development of underrepresented faculty in the humanities.”

She added that her office was instrumental in developing the Action Plan for Inclusive Excellence, an initiative comprised of three working groups focused on improving diversity among faculty, staff and students, respectively. “[The Action Plan for Inclusive Excellence] was designed to hold the [College] to a series of

commitments that would advance the culture on the campus around inclusivity, driven by an increase in diversity,” Dever said.

The 2017 Annual Report on Faculty Diversity & Inclusivity, published in winter 2017, reported that 73 percent of female faculty members and 83 percent of minority faculty members have contemplated leaving Dartmouth.

The report said that women and minority faculty cited a “lack of sense of belonging” as their rationale more than any other reason.

The Action Plan set out to establish clear goals and methods of accountability for improving diversity at the College.

Dever said that the provost’s office has worked with Hanlon and the deans of the five schools to improve minority faculty retention at Dartmouth, doubling the Diversity Recruitment Fund to $2 million annually for fiscal year 2017.

“My role as provost ... is to work with the deans to ensure that they’re best in class when it comes to the faculty retention, providing them with resources, both financial and in terms of expertise, providing them with support and providing when needed and when asked by

the deans direct support to faculty to ensure they have the chance to develop here and to stay here,” Dever said.

English department vice chair and professor Aden Evens said that he believes the administration in general has taken too conservative of an approach to retaining minority faculty.

“I would say that the administration needs to do even more,” Evens said. “And I know that there’s been significant discussion and genuine effort in this regard, but I think more needs to be done to diversify.”

Dever also filled several major leadership positions during her term as provost. Her appointments include Dean of the College Rebecca Biron, vice provost for enrollment and dean of admissions and financial aid Lee Coffin, Dean of Geisel School of Medicine Duane Compton, Dean of Tuck School of Business Matthew Slaughter and Irving Institute director Elizabeth Wilson.

“We’ve been unabashed at going after the very best people in their fields and making the case on behalf of Dartmouth successfully,” Dever said.

Evens said that he believes Biron’s appointment to dean of the

Team studies katydids in Panama FROM KATYDIDS PAGE 1

evolutionary and predatorial implications, ter Hofstede said.

“Females are selecting more songs or being more conspicuous because that would increase the likelihood that they’ll find each other, but they also have pressure from predators where if they’re more conspicuous, they’re more likely to be hunted by predators,” ter Hofstede said.

The predator ter Hofstede’s research focuses on is the bat, which preys on katydids, according to Laurel Symes, a Neukom Fellow on ter Hofstede’s research team. She explained that katydid calls can have conflicting outcomes.

“They listen to the sounds that they make, and then they’ll hunt them,” Symes said. “And so all of a sudden, rather than just having one nice, easy evolutionary outcome, you have two different forces pushing in different directions.”

However, evolution is the main focus of the team’s research, Symes said.

“The objective of the research is to try and identify suites of traits and suites of characteristics of animals that arise multiple times independently over evolutionary time that help these animals to mediate the conflict between sexual selection for more sound, and

predation pressure for more sound,” ter Hofstede said.

Through their research, the team found that katydids adopt various different methods of effectively resisting bats while mating, Symes said.

“It’s clear that there are different insects doing very different things,” Symes said. “Some of them sing eight times a night, some of them sing 80,000 times a night. There’s a huge amount of variation.”

She added that there is a correlation between hearing ability and behavior, particularly mating calls, of katydids, as some are able to hear bats better than others.

Ter Hofstede and her team are most intrigued by the reaction the evolution of a species to predation and mating pressure, ter Hofstede said.

The team’s research has long-term implications, ter Hofstede said, as “there is a lot that can be done.”

“To me, I think this is something I could be doing for a lot of my career because there’s more than a 100 species [of katydids] just in Panama,” ter Hofstede said. “If we wanted to get a picture of everything that’s going on there, that would be a very long time, but we’re trying to just get a good enough sample of each sub-family at the moment for each publication.”

The team sifts through its seven

terabytes of collected audio recording on campus with the Dartmouth computing cluster, Symes said.

“We spend a lot of time going through those data, extracting information about what happened, making graphs of those things and writing it in a scientific paper and sharing it with other scientists in the community,” Symes said.

The team has plans to return to Panama next January in order to extend their research, both Symes and ter Hofstede said. They said they’ll be recording spontaneous vibration signals from sub-families of katydids, ter Hofstede said.

Visiting faculty Sharon Martinson, another researcher on the team, explained the perennial and rewarding nature of scientific research.

“One of the fun things with science is that as you gather data and information, you start to see a picture and you end up with that shaping your future questions and future research, so your research is never over,” Martinson said.

Symes expressed a similar opinion of research.

“The accumulation of knowledge is a process that outlives one person doing it because those questions just get handed on, and future scientists build on the little bits of chunks of information that you gather,” Symes said.

College was a wise decision. “[Biron] is somebody who has her feet firmly on the ground, who is able to see things from an undergraduate student’s perspective, which I think is exactly the right kind of person to have in that role,” Evens said.

Dever said that on the admissions front, the College is working on a focused effort to improve its international profile.

“We will quite simply begin to visit schools and nations and regions where we’ve been absent for a long time,” she said.

Students have objected to certain administrative policies implemented during Dever’s term, including the elimination of the College’s need-blind admissions policy for international students.

Dever said that it was a “tough decision,” but that it came in the larger context of helping Dartmouth to “jump-start” its international student recruitment.

“As we are thinking, and as Dean Coffin and his team are thinking about the best practices in U.S. higher education for providing the most robust and the most comprehensive support for the most students possible, we’re making an effort to align our recruitment strategies with our support strategies,” she said.

As provost, Dever also helped recruit the inaugural house professors for the College’s undergraduate house community system. She also changed the College’s disciplinary policy on sexual assault in addition to helping organize the College’s 2014 Summit on Sexual Assault.

Evens said that when Dever was hired, the English department was excited to have an advocate for the humanities in an administrative position at Dartmouth.

“I would hope that her successor is able to do more to keep the humanities vibrant at Dartmouth,” he added.

Dever said that she will teach the first-year seminar “Reading Jane Austen” during the winter term and will spend the next academic year “rebooting” her research program. She said that at this time, she is not considering any other administrative positions.

“I’ve been in senior administrative positions for more than a decade at this point, and I’ve kept a research program active during that time, but [it is] not as robust as I’d like it to be,” she said. “So I’m delving back into my discipline in order to be able to introduce new research and new courses in the Dartmouth community the year after.”

THE DARTMOUTH NEWS

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

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Native Americans at Dartmouth host Indigenous Peoples’ Week FROM NAD PAGE 1

students she knows try to attend, especially considering that it is many prospective Native students’ first exposure to the Native community at Dartmouth, as it takes place during the College’s Native Fly-In program each year.

This year, the Black Hawk Singers, an Abenaki drum group, came to campus to kick off the Indigenous Peoples’ Day and Week celebrations with songs and social dancing, Burke said. Attendance at the event was around 200 to 300 people, she said.

On Monday, the Native community also held a rally at the Collis Center on the Green. NAD member Phoebe Hannan ’20, who attended both the drumming circle and rally, explained that the rally was to protest the celebration of Columbus Day in addition to issues like public education and the lack of Native representation in the media. Hannan added that the

rally was intended to open a dialogue about these issues on campus. At the rally, speakers included Native American studies professors, students and community members, she said.

“We tried to make [the demonstration] conversational,” Hannan said. “We didn’t want to make it seem like we were attacking the rest of the student body about this particular day. We’ve been trying to make it more conversational while keeping our points direct and our thoughts clear. We’re not changing our opinions, just the tones in which they’re received.”

The rally also included 15 minutes of silence in remembrance of the lives lost in the acquisition of the land on which Dartmouth sits and the lives of Native alumni and students lost in recent years, Hannan said.

Roughly 40 people attended the rally this year, a decrease from past years’ attendance which reached nearly 100 people, Burke said. Both Hannan and Burke largely attributed

that drop to Monday’s rain showers.

Throughout the day on Monday, a sacred fire burned behind the Native American House, a new feature of the celebration of Indigenous Peoples’ Day added this year, proposed by Hannan.

“I brought [the idea of having a sacred fire] forth because in other events and conferences when people come together in my tribe, you’re supposed to have a sacred fire burning to show that you people are coming together and your ancestors are communicating with each other,” Hannan said. “I thought it would be appropriate because it’s not something that’s us against the world or us against the rest of campus, it’s more like us coming together with other people to spread this idea and promote change.”

Hannan, who tended to the fire from its lighting at midnight until 9:30 a.m. on Monday, added that in adding the sacred fire to the celebrations, an effort was also made to keep with Abenaki traditions since the College

sits on territory that Abenaki people once claimed. Abenaki student MaliAgat Obomsawin ’18 led the opening prayer and shared information about Abenaki traditions.

“We wanted to make it inclusive while keeping with Abenaki tradition, so people could pray around the fire the way they wanted to but the fire was kept up in the Abenaki way,” Hannan said.

In accordance with Abenaki tradition, the fire was fed with tobacco and cedar throughout the night, she added.

Aside from the events on Indigenous Peoples’ Day, Indigenous Peoples’ Week programming was planned by the Native American Program.

Events included conversations, film screenings and workshops, including a presentation by Margaret Jacobs ’08, a local indigenous artist.

Last year, this celebration was called Native American Heritage Week, Burke said.

“We changed [the name of the celebration] to Indigenous Peoples’ Week because I think it better reflects the celebration that we have on Indigenous Peoples’ Day, and we’re hoping for it to expand to all indigenous identities instead of just Native American,” Burke said.

Burke emphasized the importance of recognizing the holiday on campus, especially considering Dartmouth’s history. The College was founded on the principle of educating Native students but failed to adhere to that mission until former College President John G. Kemeny recommitted Dartmouth to the goal of educating Native students in the 1970s, according to Burke.

Maltais noted that visibility is an important facet of the Indigenous Peoples’ Day celebration on campus.

“It’s so important to show that Native people are still here and that we are being educated at the same ivory tower that was initially created to ‘civilize’ us,” she said.

Latinx Heritage Month celebrations include kickoff barbeque FROM LATINX PAGE 1

a community motivated to push forward and proudly embrace their own culture, Mendoza said.

Mendoza said the committee has been planning events for the Latinx Heritage Month since last spring. Latinx Heritage Month, she said, opened with a kickoff barbeque on Sept. 15 and will close with a “Día de los Muertos” celebration on Nov. 1. Día de los Muertos, which is known as “Day of the Dead” in English, consists of commemorating family members and relatives who have passed away by offering them traditional food on colorful altars.

Each year, Hispanic Heritage Month, which is synonymous with Latinx Heritage Month, is celebrated throughout the U.S., honoring the heritage and culture of all Latinx students. The noun “Latinx” refers to an umbrella of terms that Latinx community members use interchangeably.

It is meant to incorporate all identities tied with Latin American and or Caribbean cultures while remaining gender inclusive.

Throughout the period, Latinx Heritage Month at Dartmouth expresses Latinx cultures and ideas through food, music, open discussions and panels.

Sometimes, Mendoza added, events are planned and hosted with other organizations and communities on campus.

“There’s a lot of collaboration, not just between Latinx organizations, because that’s one of the things that makes heritage month not just a Latinx event — it’s open to the community,” Mendoza said. “We’re trying to build more intersectionality between other communities.”

Iscoa said he has been working with other communities on events such as a discussion with the LGBTQ community on Latinx students that identify themselves as member s of the LGBTQ

CORRECTIONS We welcome corrections. If you believe there is a factual error in a story, please email editor@thedartmouth.com for corrections.

Correction Appended (Oct. 17, 2017): The article “Q&A with government professor Sean Westwood” was updated to correct misspellings of “affective polarization.”

Correction Appended (Oct. 19, 2017): The original version of the Oct. 13 column “Saklad: Rosaries Out of Ovaries” incorrectly listed Freshway Foods amongst companies that pressured the Trump administration to remove a birth control mandate for employers. The company had previously advocated this position, but has not done so during Trump’s term in office.

This article has been updated to reflect this change.

community.

Intern for Latinx Partnerships for Success Yesenia Mejia ’18 said despite not being part of the planning committee this year, she is still able to help plan other events for the Latinx community as well as work with other interns within the Latinx community. Latinx Partnerships for Success includes a first-year cohort that helps first-year Latinx students form a network with other students in their class and to find professional development opportunities. Mejia is currently helping to bring an event, “Poderosas y Peligrosas,” or “Powerful and Dangerous,” to fruition. According to Mejia, it will target female-identifying Latinx students.

Mejia said she has been attending events like the one she is planning since her first year, and she said they are designed to be “inclusive” and “relevant to this new generation of Latinx students.” However, she added that it’s a challenge to keep a balance between intersectionality, inclusivity and celebration in each event.

“Not all of it has to be lectures and panels and things that require people to be very vulnerable,” Mejia explained. “It’s also like a mix of celebration, having fun and enjoying other people’s culture.”

Laínez Iscoa added that he personally stands for inclusivity and intersectionality for all members of the Latinx community, regardless of their views or backgrounds.

“One thing that I’m trying to change personally [in events during Latinx Heritage Month]

is to just be more accepting of they are, and how they were conservative views in the Latinx welcoming to me.” community,” Laínez Iscoa said, Martinez said the College itself explaining that some Latinx had so far been supportive of members feel or may be outcast their work, but at the same time from the main group because of said its funding for Latinx events their political opinions. decreased this year. This reduction “People don’t fit into boxes,” has impacted the number of events Laínez Iscoa added. that could be hosted, and Martinez Emily Martinez ’21, an intern said she is not sure why the College for acting assistant dean and took this course of action. advisor to Latinx students Renata Laínez Iscoa said he was also Baptista, said working with uncertain why the College reduced Baptista and other students has its funding, but added that the provided her with an opportunity College may not prioritize funding to get involved with the Latinx Latinx Heritage Month because it community even though she has believes that the Latinx community just started college. is already well established on Despite campus. being new to the “A t t h e e n d “We’re trying entire process, of the day, isn’t M a r t i n e z to build more [the existence said she was intersectionality of the Latinx entrusted with community] organizing two between other what the College major events, communities.” wants?” Laínez “Latinx at Iscoa said.

Dartmouth and Mejia added Dartmouth at -ROSA MENDOZA ’20 that the planning Home,” which committee has to was held on apply for funding Sept. 29 and focused on the each year to be able to pay for presence of Latinx students on Latinx Heritage Month events. campus as well as talking about “It’s like the administration, or college life with one’s parents and the institute in general, is telling “Something My Father Would us that you have to put in labor, Do,” a dinner discussion on Oct. provide evidence as to why your 10 about masculinity in the Latinx events are important,” she said. community.

College spokesperson Diana “It was hard because I was the Lawrence said the organizers of only [first-year] in the room,” she Latinx Heritage Month received said, talking about her experiences sponsorship from over 15 areas planning events with students and such as academic departments staff who were already involved. and house communities, but did “But after the kickoff barbeque, I not specify the details about their noticed how close of a community budget.

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DARTMOUTHEVENTS

THE DARTMOUTH EVENTS

MY COSMIC AUTUMN REBELLION

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

NEELUFAR RAJA ’21

TODAY

8:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.

Photography Exhibit: various works by John Lehet ’80, 7 Lebanon Street, Suite 107

4:30 p.m. - 6:00 p.m.

Cleopatra Mathis Poetry & Prose Series: reading of “We Love You Charlie Freeman,” by Kaitlyn Greenidge, Sanborn Library

5:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m.

Lecture: “Opening Access to Energy Use Data for the Public Good,” with Irving Institute director Elizabeth Wilson and University of Minnesota professor Alexandra Klass, Moore B03

TOMORROW 3:30 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.

Colloquium: “Quantum Matter Without Quasiparticles: Strange Metals and Black Holes,” with Harvard University professor Subir Sachdev, Wilder 104

7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.

Film: “Dawson City: Frozen Time,” directed by Bill Morrison, Loew Auditorium, Black Family Visual Arts Center

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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

THE DARTMOUTH NEWS

PAGE 5

STAFF COLUMNIST TYLER MALBREAUX ’20

CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST NICHOLAS BARTLETT ’21

The Antonymic Life

Identity Crisis

We should refuse loneliness by finding its opposite.

“We don’t have a word for the opposite of loneliness, but if we did, I could say that’s what I want in life.” This was the opening line for Marina Keegan’s final column in the Yale Daily News, published days after her graduation. Keegan was a magna cum laude graduate with a promising future as a journalist at The New Yorker. Already an accomplished writer, Keegan had received an award for her play “Utility Monster” for best stage reading at a playwriting festival in Manhattan.

Family and friends alike were amazed by her precocious writing abilities. Max de La Bruyere, the 2012 editor-in-chief of the Yale Daily News, noted Keegan’s ability to challenge “people to think” through her writing and activism. Professors loved her. Harold Bloom, the renowned literary critic who taught Keegan at Yale, called her “wise, almost beyond measure.”

On May 26, 2012, she was tragically killed in a car accident. She was 22 years old.

The day after, the Yale Daily News published her final essay online, entitled “The Opposite of Loneliness.” In it, she described her uneasiness about leaving the Yale community and going into the real world, where she feared losing that feeling of being surrounded by “an abundance of people, who are in this together.”

There exists no word in the English language to describe “the opposite of loneliness.” But Keegan’s magnum opus goes beyond merely stating her fear of losing that feeling. On first reading, it may seem that she stated the obvious — but it is great-sounding, feel-good mush that can, at times, seem impossible to realize in the real world. “What we have to remember is that we can still do anything,” she said, “We can start over ... We’re so young.”

However, a deeper look at Keegan’s take on the last word in that title, “loneliness,” reveals two interpretations. Obviously, there is loneliness as a product of physical isolation, when one is detached from a community or without close friends. Keegan felt the opposite of this at Yale and feared most that after graduation, she would experience that.

Then there is the loneliness felt in the hypercompetitive environment of Yale — and, for that matter, the rest of the Ivy League.

Everyone seems to have their lives focused, scheduled and detailed. A handful of students

wreck grading curves. Professorial favorites gain brownie-points in office hours. If it were a club, “excessive resume padding” would have the highest membership bar none. A student at these schools may not be lonely, in the sense that they lack friendship. But they may be very, very lonely in the search for adequacy through the perfect internship, the lucrative job offering, the prestigious fellowship.

This reading of Keegan is significant. As someone who checked off all the boxes of the typical Ivy League resume — President of the College Democrats, intern for former President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign — she championed those “lost in this sea of liberal arts” as heroes. They may not have had “it” all figured out, but they at least refused to give into easy, passionless career paths offered at schools like Yale. Plus, perhaps Keegan didn’t have it figured out either. Toward the end she wrote, “Some of us know exactly what we want and are on the path to get it … To you I say both congratulations and you suck.”

The ultimate goal of her essay is not to forewarn fellow graduates of life of impending loneliness, without “a capella groups, sports teams, houses, societies, clubs.” Rather, Keegan reminds us of how young we are. How much possibility remains unexplored. How many good moments we haven’t had with people we haven’t yet met.

Keegan, the poet, novelist, philosopher and social critic, would have turned 28 years old later this month, on Oct. 25. Let us remember the legacy of optimism she left behind. To seniors in their home stretch or first-years just starting their journey, remember — “the notion that it’s too late to do anything is comical.” Join that affinity group that caught your attention in your inbox. Ask that charismatic professor to lunch.

Apply to graduate school.

Dartmouth will sometimes make you feel “in love, impressed, humbled, scared.” It may often make you feel lonely, in both senses of the word. But through it all, we must remember not to let college be a series of “I wish I had done X” excuses. Take chances; risk it all. We must pursue our dreams. We must find meaning and adequacy. We must find the “opposite of loneliness.”

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ISSUE

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

THE DARTMOUTH OPINION

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NEWS LAYOUT: Jasmine Oh

SUBMISSIONS: We welcome letters and guest columns. All submissions must include the author’s name and affiliation with Dartmouth College, and should not exceed 250 words for letters or 700 words for columns. The Dartmouth reserves the right to edit all material before publication. All material submitted becomes property of The Dartmouth. Please email submissions to editor@thedartmouth.com.

The Republican Party must define itself to survive.

On paper, the 2016 election cycle was an overwhelming success for the Republican Party — one that saw the Senate, the House of Representatives and, most importantly, the presidency fall under GOP control. With control of the White House and Senate, the administration of President Donald Trump was able to appoint Justice Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, all but guaranteeing a strong conservative presence on the nation’s highest court for decades to come. Yet, in spite of the resounding triumph within each of the United States’ three branches of government, the Republican Party remains more fragmented than it has been in decades.

Typically, divisions within major political parties have coincided with the presence of a crushing defeat, not an overwhelming victory. However, the recent failures of the GOP are anything but innocuous for a party that, despite its legislative dominance, seems increasingly disunified.

The recent division is a byproduct of the two-party system. A large quantity of American voters wanted a change in Washington or were unhappy with some facet of society. Voting itself is never anathema to the democratic process, but because Americans prioritize different beliefs and still confine themselves to the restrictions of the two-party system, the Republican Party finds itself in a difficult position. In victory, the “Republican” cause is one that is held together more by moniker than by unified political principles. The Republican Party finds itself torn apart by multiple perspectives on any given issue, all fighting for dominance over the political rhetoric of the entire party. From internal conflict stems a lack of consensus and, subsequently, a lack of productivity. While some beliefs are more uniform among conservative lawmakers, there exists a lack of a defined ideology, impeding political cohesion and frustrating constituents.

It is simple to see why many Republican voters are dissatisfied with the performance of their supposedly Republican government. During presidential elections, the ideals espoused by presidential candidates are assumed by many voters to be representative of the entirety of the parties they represent. Thus, the policies of a nominee — Trump, in this instance — are viewed as not merely unique to himself, but as representative of the Republican cause. It is not surprising, therefore, that voters are vexed by congressional actions in the opening months of the Trump administration — or, more accurately, congressional inaction. Trump pledged to repeal former President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act. Nine months later, several attempts have failed in spite of Republican control of Congress. Trump confidently proclaimed that “I believe [the United States] are going to build the wall!” Low and behold: no wall. In both instances, the implementation of public policy is far more nuanced than a straight yea or nay vote.

But when two of Trump’s best-known promises, declared time and time again to voters throughout the roughly 18-month election cycle, have yet to even be begun months into his presidency, voters will begin to grow impatient. Impatience is never a good thing for a politician seeking reelection.

A Republican government will always draw prolific criticism from supporters of the Democratic Party; the converse is true in years of

Democratic government. Such external pressure is to be expected, and it occasionally precipitates greater political consensus among conservatives, for it provides something against which they are able to unite. Internal divisions like those seen this past year are neither typical nor conducive to success for both a government and a party. The latest attempts at health care reform are perhaps the most demonstrative of this paradigm. Sen. John McCain, a prominent Republican leader and former presidential nominee, refused to support September’s health care initiative. “I believe we could do better working together, Republicans and Democrats, and have not yet really tried,” he told The New York Times. Cooperation is paramount within politics, and its pursuit is never an unholy ideal — although this refusal merely further isolated facets of a constituency that desires immediacy to perfection. Problems continued when other prominent conservatives, such as Sen. Rand Paul, criticized the health care bill for not being conservative enough. Paul said the repeal effort was, in fact, not a repeal but a continuation of Obamacare. Two leaders, one espousing compromise and balance and the other greater action and polarity, represent immaculately the current polarity of the Republican identity, which is injurious to the success of the party.

Even in government, the identity which once defined the party is no longer that which comprises it. “Republican,” a term once associated with defined conservative ideals on stances from abortion to health care, is no longer the concrete platform of years past. When one thinks of the Republican cause, vague ideals, not defined principles, come to mind. Voters making their voices heard at the ballot box expect from candidates the generality of this depiction; they want a “Republican,” but the image for which they are voting is no longer definitive of the party which shares that label. It is as a result of this disparity between expectation and reality that the GOP is struggling.

The best course of action in aiding these woes would be to consolidate the party’s platform and make the new-and-improved beliefs of the Republican Party lucid to the general public.

Doing so will inevitably isolate many of the current Republican members of Congress, frustrate a large portion of conservative Republican voters that are not in agreement with the new platform and likely cause the GOP to lose a substantial quantity of political power in the near term.

But most importantly, doing so will provide the Republican Party a solid ideological foundation upon which it can build in the future. Politically defined, the new iteration of the GOP would possess the understanding of itself necessary to properly and effectively represent its constituents.

Unified adaptation to the ever-changing political climate of the United States will be a simpler task — one cannot aim for the finish line without knowing where the race begins, after all.

As the old adage goes: “United we stand, divided we fall.” So, which is it, Republican Party?

Do you make the difficult choice and unify those whom you are able, defining once and for all what it means to be Republican? Or do you allow various conservative factions to evolve in disparate directions until your ideology is muddled and the GOP irreparably damaged? The clock is ticking.

THE DARTMOUTH OPINION

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

PAGE 7

STAFF COLUMNIST MATTHEW GOLDSTEIN ’18

CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST RACHNA SHAH ’21

Press 1 for English

Caveat Emptor

The dark undertones of our language.

The Atlantic’s Molly Ball wrote in September 2017 that many Americans “resent having to press 1 for English when they call customer service.” One might note that the mere motion of “pressing 1” is an odd action to complain about, but then, the complaint isn’t truly about phones or any number on their keypads. Instead, the objection to “pressing 1” is about the idea that, as an American, one should not have to undertake any effort to indulge in using the English language or indulge the outsiders coming in to hear — shock! horror! — Spanish.

The very notion of a group encapsulates both inclusion and exclusion. So it is for modern America, so it has certainly been for the nation-state and its political and cultural forebears throughout history. In defining its borders, whether geographic or sociological, the in-group elevates itself relative to the out-group that results from its formation. It adopts a name, a set of accepted practices, customs and laws, perhaps, and thus a collective identity. Its members develop a psychological connection to the group.

They incorporate its well-being into their own. And key to the in-group adopting a belief in its superiority to others is a signifier so ubiquitous, so readily accessible and so foundational that it can prompt true fear at merely having to lift a finger. That signifier?

Language.

The word “barbarian” can hardly be understood except as a pejorative denoting the “uncivilized,” “uncultured” or otherwise “unsavory.” But it traces its etymological roots to the northern Mediterranean where, to ancient Greeks, it originally denoted somebody who did not speak Greek — generally the Medes and Persians. The term originates from the Greek word “bárbaros”, an onomatopoeia mimicking the sounds Greeks heard when foreigners spoke.

Despite the term’s later negative normative connotation to the Romans, who used it to refer to peoples outside the Greco-Roman cultural tradition more broadly, “barbarian” originated as a purely descriptive term. The barbarians were merely those whose speech sounded to the Greek ear like a rattle of “bar bar bar” — no more, no less.

Whereas the Greeks had a term that specified to them those who could not speak Greek, the Polish have a similar term for an entire country. Among the many names for Germany in different languages is the Polish “Niemcy,” which derives from the proto-Slavic němьcь (nee-YEM-sih), which literally means “a mute one.” The term harbors more insidious implications than the ostensibly more insulting “barbarian.” The Greeks held only that barbarians were those who did not speak Greek, but the Poles held that Germans were actually, substantively mute — a small but important distinction.

In denying Germans the agency that speech accords a human being, němьcь reduces them to a level not just below the Poles but to nearly the sub-human. Whereas the Greek or Roman may have held that the barbarian

was worse than he in degree, the Pole held that the German was substantively different from him in kind.

The distinction between the Greek’s descriptive “does not speak my language” and the Pole’s normative “cannot speak at all” is evident contemporarily. In his 2001 article in Harper’s, “Authority and American Usage,” David Foster Wallace described the different dialects of American English, many of which “have their own highly developed and internally consistent grammars” and qualify, essentially, as distinct languages to the communities that use them. Wallace noted that so-called “correct” English is merely a sub-dialect, one whose community of discourse is characterized by, for example, the classroom.

We find the same kind of insidiousness as in the Polish term quite readily in the way speakers of “classroom” English treat those of other sub-dialects. Speakers of Black English (a sub-dialect of Wallace’s positing), for example, are commonly held to be merely bastardizing “correct” English. The notion that speakers of Black English might actually be speaking a different language — one whose syntax and spelling are similar to “correct” English, yet whose application occurs in a different range of circumstances and between members of different groups of people — is crucially overlooked. The speaker of “correct” English concludes not the Greeks’ “they are speaking some other language,” but rather, in their determination of the capabilities of speakers of Black English, the Poles’ “they are incapable of truly speaking at all.” This is a far more damaging proposition.

So the situation is with Americans and “pressing 1.” Those who protest the notion that they ought to be comfortable hearing languages other than English in regular use do so not out of annoyance but in a bid to retain their in-group superiority. Such superiority rests in part on the notion that the in-group exhibits greater capabilities than does the out-group. If some language other than English were afforded any sort of co-equal status, the speakers of that language would progress from “those who cannot speak at all” to “those who do not speak my language.” This is because capability as an idea does not enter the conceptual fray when one speaks of a non-language. If you do not consider Black English a language, it makes no sense to judge whether one speaks Black English “well” or not — in either case, to you, she is just mangling “correct” English.

Allowing Spanish to the American linguistic fore — considering it an American language — would erase the capability gap between in-group and out-group that occurs when Spanish is judged merely as not-English and thus its speakers as “those who cannot speak at all.” The English supremacist, as it were, would not have that happen, thank you very much. Complaining about “pressing 1” is no benign act, then. It is a tacit rejoinder to humanity of the would-be barbarians, the němьcь among us.

Not all roads lead to a four-year degree.

As a high school senior, the colleges I visited workplace. Internships allow us to test and prided themselves on their undergraduate refine the knowledge we learn in the classroom, experiences. Admissions tour guides improving our confidence and knowledge, but emphasized the depth and breadth of the there are other models that can help us extend opportunities available — study abroads, our education while balancing our finances. spring break internships, corporate recruiting One option already in place at other partnerships and more. College was depicted institutions is a co-op: offering academic as an all-you-can-eat buffet, where the idea credit for structured job experiences. In most that there was a single route to a degree was models, a semester of school is alternated preposterous. At the same time, these same with a semester of work, elongating one’s admissions tour guides spoke glowingly of undergraduate education in quality and their colleges’ four-year graduation rates. quantity. Co-op earnings are not counted Dartmouth was no exception. But spending a against students’ eligibility for federal needgreater number of years in higher education based aid, and these programs can pay students should not be so universally considered as as much as $46,000 per year, thus allowing indicative of failure. The benefits of a longer students to pay for college with both financial undergraduate education, which allows aid offers and co-op earnings. At schools such students to undergo a broader and deeper as Northeastern University that operate with range of academic the co-op model, many and non-academic students stay in school “When we were experiences, outweigh for five years instead of the costs, financial and younger, learning four, which gives them otherwise. more time to figure out was synonymous When we were — through both work y o u n g e r, l e a r n i n g with uncertainty and and school — what they was synonymous with curiosity; in college, truly enjoy studying. The uncertainty and curiosity; co-op model is therefore it is associated with in college, it is associated a practical extension of with future success. future success.” school that is renowned The moment we get for its success in helping our college acceptances, students develop both people start questioning flexibility and knowledge. us about our intended majors to give us advice Having free terms would also allow more on our careers. While the majority of college students to fit international programs into their students change their major at least once, college experience by looking for jobs outside there is generally a point where changing of the U.S. As the political divides in our your major is no longer an option. nation widen, collaborative and cross-cultural Unfortunately, introductory classes in a skills are essential and can be apprehended major can be misleading. As one advances through off-campus opportunities. Engaging through upper-level courses, the seminars and with different people and perspectives is a skill classes may either become terribly fascinating set that requires time to develop, and having or terribly mind numbing. When the latter added time in college through co-ops can allow proves true, our current four-year system students to go on more study abroad programs advises us to just struggle through the rest — or even their first one. Unfortunately, an of the major classes. But we should not be accelerated college education can detract from advised to settle — we should explore possible the time needed to build and sustain these opportunities and be reminded that multiple relationships. If most people agree that the options always exist. If you dread going to two main purposes of college are personal your major classes and are gravitating toward and educational growth as well as preparation another field, make the transition. The classes for a future career, a longer undergraduate that you have previously taken may be able education can help foster both through to work toward a minor, and even if they do additional study abroad opportunities. not, 10-week terms where you considered new An essential consideration in a longer perspectives and built personal connections undergraduate education is the elevated were never a waste of time. financial cost. However, study abroad A longer undergraduate education would programs with lower tuitions can save students therefore encourage academic exploration. money, an arrangement Dartmouth can The ability to take both introductory and adopt. And many employers, such as those upper-level classes in other majors becomes in co-op programs, are beginning to offer feasible, expanding students’ minds outside tuition reimbursements to their employees. of the tunnel vision focus of their major. The A longer undergraduate education should ability to take a larger number of classes also not encourage procrastination but instead makes stretching outside of one’s academic embolden curiosity and flexibility. Adopting comfort zone less risky, exposing students to an optional co-op system would allow students new fields of inquiry, knowledge and ways of to gain those skills. Students should use their thinking. extra terms or years wisely, learning from Of course, the reality is that a broader mistakes in the past to take advantage of range of courses means very little without what their undergraduate experiences can real-world applications. But the diversity of be. Whether you graduate in three years or relevant work gained while identifying one’s in over six years, you will be a Dartmouth passion builds skills that are applicable in the alumnus.

THE DARTMOUTH ARTS

PAGE 8

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2017

Student spotlight: actor, singer and designer Jaclyn Pageau ’18

By KASEY RHEE The Dartmouth

To deem Jaclyn Pageau ’18 an involved Dartmouth artist would be to understate the depth and breadth of her pursuits in theater and music. Pageau is a soprano in the Sing Dynasty a cappella group, a dedicated tour guide for prospective students and works as a head usher at events in the Hopkins Center for the Arts. As a student, she spent an exchange term at the National Theater Institute, worked in the Upper Valley and New York City’s professional theater scenes as part of the theater department’s “experiential term,” and traveled to London as one of 10 students in the theater department’s Foreign Study Program in order to take classes in general and Shakespearean acting techniques at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. This fall, Pageau was elected to serve as a company representative, a newly created leadership position, for this fall’s mainstage production of “Cabaret.” She is also dance captain for that production. Pageau has joined served as sound designer in student productions, and will be stage managing the upcoming winter mainstage production of “1984.” Chances are, if you open a program at a theater production on campus, you will see a Pageau credit in some fashion.

Pageau spent the entirety of her junior year off-campus, immersing herself in the world of professional theater. Her junior fall term was dedicated to the “E-term,” a program conceived out of Dartmouth’s long-standing relationship with Northern Stage, a local theater company in the Upper Valley.

The students were able to experience three distinct elements of professional theatre, Pageau said. The first month was dedicated to arts administration.

“Each of us was working in an office every day with a mentor,” Pageau said. “We all had different mentors, but I specifically was working on the fundraising part of the show.”

Through this experience, Pageau learned about “artist administrators,” who are people that work as administrative staff and as artists in some capacity. “[I] really enjoyed the

administrative side of it all — ­ organizing, picking the shows, putting the seasons together — but I also wanted to perform, so it was amazing to work with people in an office and then perform alongside them later on in ‘A Christmas Carol,’” she said.

The next phase transitioned the group to hands-on work as the show, “Orwell in America,” began its three-week off-Broadway run.

The students all took part in day-today work like loading the set in, but Pageau specifically was responsible for working with the soundboard, something she said she had “fallen into by accident at Dartmouth.”

She shared that the influence of the sound design is something that often goes unnoticed, because it can be a more “subconscious” element in a production.

“Sometimes a sound designer will put in just a drone or a note or the sound of a fluorescent light bulb,” Pageau said. “It’s white noise. But it can completely change the atmosphere of the room. I think now I can recognize it because I’ve done it, but otherwise I think it’s hard to notice it.”

The program rounded out with the students joining the company at Christmastime for a performance of “A Christmas Carol.” Pageau reaffirmed her desire to pursue a career in theater post-graduation after this experience.

Theater professor Jamie Horton expressed his confidence in Pageau’s ability to succeed in the industry, noting Pageau’s professionalism, focus and discipline.

“She’s had a broad range of experience in this department, a n d i n e ve r y i n s t a n c e h a s acquitted herself with the kind of professionalism we expect from our advanced students,” Horton said.

Horton taught Pageau in Theater 65, “New Plays and Development” and Theater 30, “Acting I.” “[Pageau is] a top student … one of the leaders in our department,” Horton said. “She is self-motivated, self-disciplined ... everything you would want as a teacher.”

Pageau has also acted under Horton’s direction in the Dodd playwriting festival winner “Good, Clean, Wholesome” in 2016.

Horton said that her approach to the craft sets her apart as a student. “[Pageau is] eager for direction

COURTESY OF JACLYN PAGEAU

Jaclyn Pageau ’18 studied acting, directing, writing, voice and movement at the National Theater Institute in the spring.

... and to understand more about herself as an actor,” Horton said.

“She brings to it so much natural talent … in rehearsal environments, she is meticulous in her preparation and able to incorporate notes from the director.”

Lela Gannon ’18, a fellow theater major who participated in the experiential term, the FSP and is a current Sings member as well, expressed that because Pageau is “so comfortable in herself ” she can “do everything whole-heartedly.”

“It’s a really difficult thing to do, especially on stage,” Gannon said.

Gannon added that the ease

Pageau brings in her work also affects people working around her. “[Pageau is] able to make others feel comfortable in themselves as well and just exudes that on stage,” Gannon said. “We’ve been friends since our freshman fall and she inspires me to be that way as well.”

Pageau said that she has matured throughout her theater career at Dartmouth, and that evidences itself in her centered presence.

“I’ve learned to be comfortable with myself,” Pageau said. “At Dartmouth especially, where you can only audition for one show a term, it’s easy to be discouraged.

I’ve realized that there are roles that I’m right for and roles that are right for me. I’ve really reached a place where I can take risks and place myself in uncomfortable situations that help me to grow.”

Pageau has a few terms left at Dartmouth, but she hopes to continue to be in programs and playbills after she graduates.

Her plan after the spring is to move to New York City and start auditioning for roles.

“We’re just very excited for her — ­ for both her current accomplishments at Dartmouth and her potential for the future,” Horton said.