Daily Herald the Brown
vol. cxlv, no. 26 | Friday, March 5, 2010 | Serving the community daily since 1891
U. to change faculty early retirement policy
D ress to I mpress
By Heeyoung Min Senior Staff Writer
By Kate Monks Senior Staff Writer
Brown is looking to change faculty retirement plans as part of University-wide budget cuts, according to recommendations made at the Jan. 26 Faculty Executive Committee meeting. The Committee on Faculty Equity and Diversity recommended phasing out early retirement programs and instead creating a health care retirement account. Such a policy would reward those seeking later retirement by giving them a greater amount of money to go toward postretirement health care, according to the meeting’s minutes. Professor of Physics and ViceChair of the CFED Michael Kosterlitz said that because of the current economic situation, he didn’t see many people taking advantage of the early retirement option for faculty. “Everyone’s retirement fund has taken a gigantic hit,” Kosterlitz said. “Until things settle down, I don’t see many people retiring.” He said he believed that the early retirement policy was being phased out because not many faculty members participated in the program. The current system that rewards early retirement was intended “to make retirement a little more attractive to a lot of faculty,” Kosterlitz said. But he said he believed few people had taken advantage of the plan. The new policy would use the money saved from the early retirement program to make retirement continued on page 3
U. plans a makeover for its main Web site
Freddy Lu / Herald
“Revealing Attire” by Sara D’Apolito-Dworkin ’10 is part of the student exhibition in List’s David Winton Bell Gallery, which runs through March 14.
For the first time in four years, the University plans to redesign its Web site’s main pages, said Vice President for Public Affairs and University Relations Marisa Quinn, who is spearheading the redesign team. The goal of the project is to architect a more accessible and dynamic Web site, Quinn said, not necessarily to improve the site’s aesthetic design. People will have varying opinions on the look of the new page, she said. Brown’s current Web site, designed in collaboration with Pentagram Design, Inc., is somewhat restricting in its potential to communicate the University’s character and mission, said Director of Web Communications Scott Turner. Though Web developers at Brown’s peer institutions have praised Brown’s “unique” design, the architecture of the site’s main page supports only 10 content windows and a limited number of links,
“Lulu,” Sock and Buskin’s latest production, is irresistibly dark and sensual, an exploration of the interplay between danger and sexual desire.
ARTS & CULTURE
inside
The titular character, portrayed fearlessly by Hollis Mickey ’10, is sexually aggressive and enchantingly attractive, yet impassive in the face of the wrongdoings she commits. The
News......1–3 Arts.......4–5 Editorial.......6 Opinion.......7 Today..........8
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Pitcher has major-league ambitions Int’l studies without the traveling By Penny King Contributing Writer
Every summer, college students begin internships intended to expose them to a particular career, provide networking opportunities and — they hope — lead to a job after graduation. In reality, a lot of internships are spent making coffee, updating spreadsheets and answering phones. But for Mark Gormley ’11, a baseball player who aspires to pitch in the major leagues, last summer proved to be a huge step towards his career goal.
As a pitcher for the Hyannis Mets, one of 10 teams in the Cape Cod Baseball League — the nation’s premier collegiate baseball summer league — Gormley competed against the best college
SPORTS baseball players in the country. The Cape Cod Baseball League is an unpaid, amateur league from which some of the most famous major league players — including Nomar Garciaparra, Barry Zito, Mark Teixeira and Mo Vaughn — emerged.
Many of the players in the league are from warm-weather schools with big athletic programs, used to large crowds and the constant scrutiny of major league scouts. Gormley said some of his teammates had not even heard of Brown or other Ivy League schools, except Harvard. He said they were “baffled” to learn that there were no athletic scholarships in the Ivy League. Gormley entered the Cape Cod league after an impressive sophomore season in which he continued on page 3
Fatal attraction: danger and desire in ‘Lulu’ By Amy Chen Contributing Writer
Turner said. A simple link to the University’s Facebook or Twitter page on the homepage, for instance, would require an existing link to be removed, Quinn said. The site’s latest version, scheduled to launch in Fall 2010, will support more functions and interactive multimedia, she said. A primary goal of the project is “to showcase Brown more effectively to key constituencies and better articulate Brown’s position within higher education,” according to the redesign team’s blog. Quinn identified one of the “key constituencies” to be prospective international applicants, who rely more on online resources to learn about Brown than students from the U.S. do. The project is a collaboration between the Office of Public Affairs and University Relations, Computing and Information Services and an external consulting firm. The redesign team, which began meeting in January, is
play, which runs in Stuart Theatre March 4–7 and 11–14, shifts geographically from Germany to Paris and then to London, chronicling the riveting life of Lulu as her multiple husbands subsequently die after marrying her. Her husbands, played with fervor by Chris Tyler ’10, Aubie Merrylees ’10 and Gordon Sayre ’12, each try to mold her to fit their ideal and choose their own name for her. One of her husbands calls her Eve, a possible continued on page 5
Nick Sinnott-Armstrong / Herald
Hollis Mickey ’10 plays an alluring wife as the title character of Sock and Buskin’s “Lulu,” which runs March 4–7 and 11–14 in Stuart Theatre.
By Brielle Friedman Contributing Writer
International students have always been a presence at the University, but technology is now allowing Brunonians to collaborate with students in Brazil, India and Cuba without requiring a passport. A new seminar offered for the first time last fall, PPAI 1701G: “Science and Technology Policy in the Global South,” enabled Brown students to work directly with students at other universities. Throughout the semester, students held video conferences with students from Brazil’s Universidade Federal da Bahia and Universidade Nacional del Sur on social and racial inequalities relating to access to science and technology. In addition, the Brown students maintained a blog about renewable energies with students from India’s University of Calcutta. In designing the seminar, Geri Augusto, adjunct assistant professor in public policy, said she wanted to create a way in which continued on page 3
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Arts, 4
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The blog today
focus on Palestine Student group highlights Brown’s role in Middle East conflict
Dreaming of oscar A Brown alum is nominated for best original score
Outing the Outers Dominic Mhiripiri ’12 on the importance of keeping an open mind
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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
C ampus N EWS
Friday, March 5, 2010
“We are focusing on how we are complicit.” — Rosi Greenberg ’10, Brown Students for Justice in Palestine member
Student group speaks out against profiting from Israel-Palestine conflict By Crys Guerra and Anne Artley Contributing Writers
With the hope of building a campuswide movement, Brown Students for Justice in Palestine held their spring kick-off event, Education without Occupation, on Wednesday, presenting their campaign for divestment from companies profiting from what the group called the Israeli occupation of Palestine. The presentation, an hourlong slideshow, focused on the terms and the reasons used to frame their position. As a part of a weeklong series, this event is in coordination with the 6th annual International Israeli Apartheid Week. The members began by introducing themselves and their reasons for responding to Palestine’s call. Six of the members present — Dia Barghouti ’12, Janine Khraishah ’12, Francesca Contreras ’11, Rosi Greenberg ’10, Gavriel Cutipa-Zorn ’12 and Ghada Abdelqader GS — have all either lived or spent time in Israel or Palestine. They shared a common story of their personal experience viewing and in some cases living through the injustice as driving their support for the campaign. “I witnessed the occupation
firsthand and its progress,” said Khraishah, who said she supports the campaign because it addresses “the root of the problem: occupation of Palestine by the state of Israel.” Though faith is sometimes perceived as dividing individuals on the issue, some members said their Jewish faith was the reason they took action. “I realized that Israeli actions were not in line with my Jewish values,” Cutipa-Zorn said. Identity, however, is not the only reason for the members’ solidarity with the movement against Israeli occupation of Palestine. Ruhan Nagra ’10, stated that “this isn’t about identity, its about fundamental human rights.” The other group members present — Alysha Aziz ’12, Lindsay Goss GS, Michael Dawkins ’12, Osman Chaudhry ’11 and Herald Opinions Columnist Simon Liebling ’12 — referred to their support as a responsibility, stating their complicity in the issue as taxpayers through U.S. investment in companies profiting from the occupation. The group’s campaign on divestment from Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories is in solidarity with the 2005 call by “Palestinian civil society” as stated on the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions
Web site. “We are basically focusing on initiatives that are specific and relevant to our complicity in Israeli’s human rights violations as Brown students,” Nagra said. The group called for Brown to divest from “companies that provide products or services that: contribute to the maintenance of the Israeli militar y occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem; that contribute to the maintenance, expansion and operations of Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories; that contribute to the maintenance and construction of the Separation Wall; and that contribute to violent acts against Palestinian and Israeli civilians.” The group compared the Separation Wall, which is often justified as necessary for security purposes, to South Africa’s Group Areas Act which reserved 87 percent of the land for the minority white population. When questioned about the possibility of opposition to the demands, Nagra said the group’s “entire campaign is centered around basic human rights and international law.” She said she believes that “Brown students would want to uphold those values.” Among the many American companies listed as facilitating Israeli occupation, according to the group, are General Electric, Caterpillar, Motorola and Raytheon, a major
arms contractor for Israel which has also recruited on campus. Emphasizing Brown’s divestment campaign from South Africa in 1985, the group noted the parallels between the two movements. “There is no greater testament to the basic dignity of ordinary people ever ywhere than the divestment movement of the 1980s,” the students said, quoting South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu. “These tactics are not the only parallels to the struggle against apartheid. Yesterday’s South African township dwellers can tell you about life in the Occupied Territories.” Special attention was also paid to the use of the term “apartheid” to describe the situation in occupied Palestinian territories. The group uses the 1973 United Nations definition of apartheid as “inhuman acts committed for the purpose of establishing and maintaining domination by one racial group of persons over any other racial group of persons and systematically oppressing them,” according to their presentation. Apar theid’s ultimate significance, Nagra said, is “a practice, not an experience. It’s a crime against humanity whose scope goes beyond South Africa.” The group said divestment from companies profiting off Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories is their action of choice toward peace between Palestine and Israel.
“It is nonviolent, grassroots and effective,” Chaudry said. The question-and-answer period prompted questions about the group’s evidence of Brown’s investment in the companies mentioned. “We don’t know what Brown is invested in, but we can establish a criterion for investment,” Nagra said. A question was also raised concerning Israel’s “right to exist” in light of the injustices presented during the event. “That is not a productive question,” Greenberg said. “This is not an idea of how Israel (and) Palestine should be. It is not for us to decide. We are focusing on how we are complicit.” The group said they plan to focus on “mobilizing the student body to approach the administration full force” and on creating a sustainable movement committed to the campaign, which according to them could take two to five years to succeed. This week’s events, so far, have given them hope. “We have been tabling on the Main Green and already we’ve collected hundreds of signatures,” said Nagra. “The support has been incredible.” The rest of the week’s events include Activestills, a photo exhibit, and a talk by Susanne Hoder on “Multinational Corporations and Israeli Apartheid.”
Brown.edu to get revamped for fall continued from page 1 incorporating feedback from current and prospective students, alums and faculty who participated in focus groups, Turner said. After researching more than 10 firms, the University selected mStoner, Inc., whose clients include Northeastern University School of Law, Princeton’s undergraduate admissions office and Yale Law School, according to its Web site. The firm was chosen based on its proposal, Quinn said, adding that costs were also a consideration. One of the alums involved in
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the project is About.com’s former CEO, Scott Meyer ’91, who also led the design of the New York Times’ Web site. Though he was a public policy concentrator at Brown, Meyer said he “spent a lot of time in CIS” and would seize “any opportunity” to help his alma mater, especially when his professional experience is useful. Brown trails the other schools in the Ivy League “by any analysis of Web statistics,” including the number of unique visitors each month, Meyer said. “When the Web site comes out, it will be dramatically better.”
At this stage it is difficult to assess what the new Web site will look like — but it will be distinctive. The new flagship Web site may incorporate certain features from the homepages of various schools, but there’s no model in mind, Turner said. “We certainly didn’t say that we want our Web site to look like that of school X or Y,” Meyer said. “Brown is Brown.” It’s impor tant that the new homepage communicates Brown’s unique brand, Meyer said. “One of the tremendous strengths of Brown is that the brand experience is deeply personal.”
Friday, March 5, 2010
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
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“Ideas and perspectives exist everywhere among students.” — Geri Augusto, adjunct assistant professor in public policy
Students collaborate with peers in Brazil, India and Cuba continued from page 1
her students were “learning with (other students) and not from them.” She said she wanted to create a forum for “an equitable and sophisticated two-way conversation.” “I’m always interested in how collaborative learning and teaching can take place across time and space,” said Augusto, adding that she also continually looks for “ways we can increase learning that are more equitable.” “Ideas and perspectives exist ever ywhere among students,” Augusto said. “What’s different is the access.” Technology is one way to make this access more equitable, she said. Though the class was not associated with specific internationalization efforts, Augusto said she received a course internationalization grant from the of fice of Vice President for International Af fairs Matthew Gutmann. The grant helped her travel to Sal-
vador da Bahia, Brazil, over the summer and contact professors and students there. “No matter how good electronic stuff is, face-to-face interchanges are ver y important when you are tr ying to establish a new relationship,” Augusto said, adding that she will include a section on the Andes to the course when she teaches it next fall. HMAN 1970R: “Literature and the Arts in Today’s Cuba,” a senior seminar offered last fall, also reflects the increasing role technology plays in classes that work with universities abroad. The class, taught last semester by Assistant Professor of Comparative Literature Esther Whitfield, was of fered in the fall for the second time. Throughout the semester, students participated in several video conferences with Cuban intellectuals and artists — including architect Mario Coyula, writer Victor Fowler Calzada and filmmaker Fernando Perez. Though the seminar was
conducted primarily in English, all lectures were in Spanish, as were many of the readings. The students conducted video conferences in the Watson Center for Information Technology that were linked to Casa de las Americas, the cultural institution in Cuba where Brown students take classes while abroad. Cuba’s Internet censorship required the program to acquire special permission from the government to hold the video conferences. Though specialists were present during the conferences, both at Brown and in Cuba, there were often technical difficulties. “The Cuban government had never set up one of these interchanges before, so they didn’t really know how to do it,” said Michelle Levinson ’11, who studied in Cuba last fall and attended the e-lectures. Despite technological problems, students back at Brown said they felt the class was a ver y valu-
able experience. Lily Friedman ’09.5, who took the class last fall, said one of the reasons she first became interested in the seminar was because it focused on such an isolated part of the world. “Traditionally, Cuba is a ver y inaccessible par t of the world, especially for us in the United States,” Friedman said. Without Brown’s special university-to-university relationship, the participating artists “probably would not have been able to present themselves to an international community,” Levinson said. Marianna Faircloth ’10, another student who took the class, said she used the opportunity to communicate with a direct source. While working on her final paper, she e-mailed one speaker, who helped her find sources on Cuban tattooing and body art. Without the guest lecturers, Friedman said, “It would have been a great ar t histor y class, but the artists never would have come to life in the same way.”
Gormley ’11 focuses on winning an Ivy championship continued from page 1 had a team-high 50 strikeouts and a 4.55 earned run average, which earned him the honor of First-Team All-Ivy. He had an inauspicious start to the season in Cape Cod, after the Brewster Whitecaps declined to renew his temporary contract. But Hyannis Mets Head Coach Chad Gassman, who coaches at Waldorf College in Iowa during the academic year, needed a left-handed pitcher and invited Gormley to join the team as a reliever. Gormley’s performance earned him a full contract for the season and, over time, his confidence grew. He proved that he belonged on the Hyannis Mets when he made the All-Star team as a reserve, “a real honor,” Gassman said. The Cape Cod Baseball League is known for attracting “a certain kind of swagger,” in the words of Jim Collins, author of “The Last Best League,” which chronicles a season with the Chatham Anglers. Gormley agreed, saying that some players “walked on the field and
announced their presence” — not necessarily through their athletic performance, but by their behavior. For example, a teammate once took his position in the outfield wearing an infielder glove, instead of an outfielder glove that has more padding, and missed a fly ball. But Gormley, most likely humbled by his experience at the beginning of the season, emphasized that he remained focused on taking advantage of the incredible opportunity at hand, which included the challenge of playing against some of the top draft prospects and exposure in front of major league scouts. Gormley recalled throwing the baseball when, suddenly, 30 guys raised their radar guns to measure his speed. Gassman acknowledged that players are under a lot of pressure, but he reminds them to treat each game in Cape Cod like any other game and avoid showing off. “Team was first with Mark,” said Gassman, who called Gormley one of the top five most pleasant players that he has coached.
While many unpaid summer interns might look forward to having lunch paid for by their supervisor at the end of the internship, Gormley received a much more substantial reward for his hard work with the Hyannis Mets. He joined the League’s Western Division All-Star team as a reserve for a game at Fenway Park, the home of his favorite baseball team, the Boston Red Sox. He called that night the best experience of his life and a gratifying conclusion to a season that gave him more confidence to take on the competition that he will face this season at Brown. Gormley says that his primary focus is winning an Ivy League championship this spring, having finished a “heartbreaking” game short of playing in the Ivy League championship last year. Brown Head Coach Marek Drabinski said Gormley’s “extremely competitive” attitude will benefit the team this season. Drabinski said he has high hopes for Gormley and would like to see him further develop his changeup and curveball. Nevertheless, the Major League
Baseball draft in June looms ahead for Gormley. Drabinski has talked about this possibility with Gormley and advised him to “go about your business every day as if nobody’s watching.” “There’s a real good chance Mark gets a pro contract and he signs,” said Gassman, who added that he remains confident that Gormley will win as many games as he can for Brown. Gormley has great expectations for the upcoming season, which begins today in Baton Rouge, La., where the Bears will play the Pepperdine Waves. Mark Gormley will be the starting pitcher.
New retirement plan could be finalized soon continued from page 1 more attractive to older employees. The money would go toward creating a “health-care retirement account,” according to the FEC meeting minutes. “The main incentive would be if retired faculty could get some kind of medical service,” said Kosterlitz. A new plan to take effect for the upcoming academic year is currently in the works, said Chung-I Tan, chair of the FEC and professor of physics. Though this plan was originally supposed to be announced in February, “there are certain details that are being worked out,” he said. Finalization could occur “as soon as this month or next month,” he said, but he is not entirely sure as to when it will be released. This faculty proposal follows several programs — including the Voluntary Staff Retirement Incentive — that encouraged early retirement in efforts to cut costs. Between Nov. 4 and Dec. 23, non-faculty staffers who were at least 60 years of age were eligible to retire and receive a year’s salary and $15,000 toward “the transition to retirement,” according to a University press release on the program. Despite the University’s efforts to encourage faculty retirement, it must work within certain constraints. Tenured faculty cannot be fired and there is no mandatory retirement age, so many faculty members choose to continue to teach and bring home a paycheck as they reach retirement age, Kosterlitz said. “A lot of people just hang on until they get too old,” he said.
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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD
A rts &C ulture
Friday, March 5, 2010
“The movie didn’t need much music.” — Marco Beltrami ’88, Academy Award–nominated composer
Performers flock to College Hill festival By Lindor Qunaj Contributing Writer
Musicians, dancers and other performers from around the world will gather at Brown for the Rhythm of Change Festival March 5–7. Presented by the Department of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies, with additional help from the Creative Arts Council and the Brown International Organization, the weekend-long event seeks to unite a wide range of artists, social entrepreneurs and educators from Africa, America and the Caribbean to use the power of performance for social change. The festival will feature a series of workshops and performances, including Burundian dance, Djembe
drumming and discussions about hip-hop as a force for change in Western Africa. Among the main events will be the Africa for Haiti Benefit Concert on Saturday night featuring Troupe Komee Josee from Mali and a dance performance by Rwandan children on Sunday. “It is very, very hard not to be moved by a group of young children who have just come to this country running from genocide joyously sharing this dance,” said Senior Lecturer in Theatre Arts and Performance Studies Michelle Bach-Coulibaly. They have an “ability to transcend trauma through their performance. There is a sense of engagement and of breaking down the boundaries of race, class and gender.” According to Bach-Coulibaly, the
roots of the festival can be traced back to the 1989–1990 academic year, when she, along with a diverse group of professors from various University departments, collaborated to create a course on the dance and culture of the Mande, a fairly large West African ethnic group. Spread throughout the countries of Mali, Burkina Faso, Mauritania and others, the Mande people have a strong tradition of performance art, Bach-Coulibaly said. As a student of West African dance, she said she was initially fascinated by the way that “performance is used in that society to negotiate very difficult social issues, including gender incongruities and global invasion.” The Mande people “utilize performance to bring the community together and heal,” she added. A team of professors and students was able to raise a significant amount of money, even receiving a grant, to develop the course, which would become a huge success. Since then, the course has been offered continuously, enrolling nearly 2,000 students over a span of 20 years. This semester, 137 students are registered for TSDA 0330: “Mande Dance, Music and Culture,” according to Banner. Aside from learning the various dance and performance styles of this ethnic group, students in the course are paired with an organization that does humanitarian work in
Courtesy of Sophia Shackleton
The Rhythm of Change Festival will take place March 5–7.
these Mande communities, particularly in Mali, according to Matthew Garza ’11, a teaching assistant for the class. They also organize raffles to raise money, design projects and otherwise help their cause through performance-based methods. Garza, who has traveled to Mali as part of an Undergraduate Teaching and Research Award project, wrote in an e-mail to The Herald that the main goal of the course is to foster “awareness about circumstances and movements in West Africa and to take action through performative deliberation.” The festival serves as a vehicle to provoke dialogue about these issues and get other members of the community to appreciate the role of performance in enacting social change and perhaps become
involved themselves, according to Bach-Coulibaly and Garza. Bach-Coulibaly said the festival would allow people to see the importance of building community. “Instead of sound bites and stereotypes, this is about real people engaging with each other outside of those constructed bits of communication. It’s about real communication between people.” Garza said he hoped the event would not only encourage students to “engage in transnational collaboration and action” but also “to learn from some of the world’s most amazing musicians, artists, dancers and social activists.” As Bach-Coulibaly describes it, the festival will be “a weekend of immersion, collaboration and participation.”
Alum nominated for best original score Oscar By Fei Cai Staff Writer
“I, Robot.” “Scream.” “The Omen.” These are just a few of the films for which Marco Beltrami ’88 has composed the scores. Recently, the Brown alum, with co-composer Buck Sanders, was nominated for his second Academy Award for best original score for Kathryn Bigelow’s film, “The Hurt Locker.” “The Hurt Locker” is an acclaimed thriller about a leader of an Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit in the U.S. Army in post-invasion Iraq in 2004. The film has been nominated for eight other Academy Awards, including best picture and best director. Beltrami’s score is going up against original scores from “Avatar,” “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” “Sherlock Holmes” and “Up.” An urban studies concentrator at Brown, Beltrami said he never thought he would be nominated for one, let alone two, Oscars. His first nomination was in 2008, for his original score in James Mangold’s “3:10 to Yuma.” The composer, who said that his first job out of college was with the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority, has since reached public acclaim for his film scores. He is also known for his work with Marilyn Manson and his collaboration with Guns N’ Roses on their 2008 album, “Chinese Democracy.” Beltrami said Bigelow had been in the process of editing her movie when she first contacted him. “I got a call over a few years ago from
Kathryn,” he said. “She had seen ‘3:10 to Yuma,’ and she liked the music in regard to her movie.” The writing process took about two months, after Beltrami first watched the movie with Sanders. Beltrami said the score was intended to be subtle and not draw attention to itself. He added that the music was there to enhance the intensity of the movie, and that he wanted the music to be seamlessly woven into the film. “The movie didn’t need much music, it was very much a documentary-type style,” he said. “The music is textural. There is a theme that comes in for the main character when he has emotional connections with his teammates, and this develops later on in the movie.” Beltrami added, “People have asked me, because the film takes place in Iraq, if the music has a little Middle Eastern flavor to it. But the lead role, (William) James, is a stranger in a strange land, and the music is more in his point of view.” He said that it was the first time he had composed a score like this, and it has changed how he thinks about film and sound. “I am much more conscious of the rest of the sound world than just writing the music and getting it done. I’m more conscious of the picture as a whole,” he said. Though this is his second Oscar nomination, Beltrami said that he was shocked and surprised, though very happy, at the nomination. “I knew that the movie was a great movie, and it was receiving
a lot of attention, but the score is very subtle, and musically, it’s very understated,” he said. He added that he thought there would be a very small chance people would notice it. He was not thinking about or considering an Oscar nomination, and he said he feels the same way about the results on Sunday. “There are some other strong scores, and musically, they call more attention to themselves,” he said. Jokingly, though, he admitted that he would be preparing a speech just in case. At Brown, Beltrami was first a geology concentrator before switching to urban studies, but was always interested in music. He said that it was at Brown that he was first introduced to electronic music, and has been attracted to it ever since. “Brown was very formative for me in many ways, especially academically and creatively,” he said. He added that when he visited the University, he found that, though the students were not as technically advanced as those coming out of a conservatory, they had something more unique and more interesting to say. “Just because you aren’t in music school doesn’t mean you can’t be a composer,” he said, and encouraged anyone interested in film scoring to continue pursuing it. Beltrami said he already has two future projects lined up. He is working on scores for an upcoming film called “Jonah Hex,” directed by Jimmy Hayward, and a Guillermo del Toro remake of a film called “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark.”
Arts & Culture The Brown Daily Herald
Friday, March 5, 2010 | Page 5
In ‘Lulu,’ everything is taken to the limit as love becomes fatal
Nick Sinnott-Armstrong / Herald
“Lulu” plays at Stuart Theater March 4–7 and 11–14.
continued from page 1 allusion to the biblical Eve. Lulu’s malleability at the hands of her husbands introduces the issue of sexual identity, which Spencer Golub, the show’s director and professor of theatre arts and performance studies, said is an important element of the play. “Lulu” begins with a jubilant female character sensually offering her body to the gaping mouths, clawing hands and whims of men. An undoubtedly bold play, the plot is driven by sexual aggression and the desperate hunger to fulfill it. Lulu cannot control the allure she has for men, as one by one, they plead for her love with gripping, uncontrollable urges. Lulu responds passionately to their love but cannot fulfill her own desires and eventually brings doom upon those who fall for her. Many of her admirers die over the course of the play — by their own hand or Lulu’s — including the lesbian Countess, played with poignancy by Jing Xu ’10. Despite the poisonous nature of their love for Lulu, despite the incredible sacrifices they must make, one of her husbands admits to her, “There is something about you that I cannot resist.” While she yells and screams in pain at the death of her husbands, and symbolically attempts to cleanse herself of her actions by rubbing her arms and body, Lulu recovers after each love affair to quickly move on to another man. Commenting on Lulu as a character, Golub said, “I don’t see this as being life. (It) draws the inner springs of life, but it wouldn’t be mistaken for real life, (it’s) not meant to be.” Though comical at times, especially when the men in the cast interact, characterized by silly dialogue and excitement, the play is dark, defined by violence and aggression. The use of weapons such as a knife, axe and gun suggest a disturbing relationship
between violence, sex and love. Portrayed in a suggestively artistic and abstract way, the weapons indicate a frightening enjoyment of danger within one’s sexual yearning and desire. The danger is further emphasized toward the end of the play when Lulu works as a prostitute in London. One of her many admirers appropriately tells her that “a brothel is your natural habitat.” The play also works as a mirror of itself, where the second part repeats events and actions from the first,
including Lulu’s attempt to cleanse herself in the on-stage bathtub and a song she sings in each act. But what is most striking about the play is its intensity. Everything must be taken to the limit and love becomes fatal. From the beginning, the stage is clouded in mist, lit by dim lamps that barely penetrate the murky atmosphere. The mix of myriad lights and colors suggest the explosive creativity and underlying symbolic meanings of the story. Washed in red, the stage hints at the possible grotesqueness of the consequences of sexual pleasure, lack of self-control and brazen passion. Instead of an overburdened set, “this set condenses the stage, allows you to create multiple looks and scenes. Different doors are used and have different meanings,” said Stage Manager Drew Madden ’10. “This is a tense production,” Golub said. The show has “great range of expression and color and shock,” he said. Lulu’s body is constantly moving, an endless repetition of symbolism throughout the play. Her fingers rock, her arms flail, and her body tremble like a slim, fragile twig in rhythm with the music. The play was originally a multihour work by Frank Wedekind and has been compressed over time to its current form. The show “compresses not just time and space, but also emotion and inner lives of characters,” Golub said. “It is an intense, high-volume, high-voltage production,” he added. Golub said he hoped the audience would know that they have experienced the “sense of all that’s there — to bring out all the invisible,
unspeakable things.” “One of the great things is how I don’t know how the audience will react,” said Madden, who worked with Golub previously on “The Changeling” in 2008. “Some will be shocked. Others will be repulsed.” Golub described the rehearsal process as painting and “moving a canvas, using different colors.” “As a director, I tend to bring a personal vision and style — this is just
the choice that I make. It’s not only meant about the play, but production also is a personal experience of life,” Golub said. “Lulu” is ultimately a play that explores the mysteries of desire and affection in relation to sexual appeal and passion. It experiments with what one is willing to sacrifice for love. And Lulu, the epicenter of all desire and attraction, serves as the dark core of this exploration.
Editorial & Letters The Brown Daily Herald
Page 6 | Friday, March 5, 2010
l e t t e r to t h e e d i to r
The nature of secular values To the Editor: In his recent column (“The creeping nihilism of Stanley Fish,” March 2), Brian Judge argues for the existence of secular, universal normative values by making recourse to what was always my father’s favorite logical argument: 1. A is true. 2. Duh. 3. Still don’t get it? You’re an idiot. I’d still like to know just where Judge thinks these secular normative values are coming from (I’m not going to touch on religious values here) if he’s not just trying to bully us into agreeing with him because the idea that secular, objective normative values don’t exist makes him uneasy. Do they exist in nature? Are they like height and color, which exist outside of us and can be perceived by the discerning (moral) eye? Is anyone who can’t “see” those values merely blind? If they’re out there, Judge hasn’t shown me where to find them. Let’s say that it is true that, due to “biological commitments,” suffering exists in others. But if I didn’t care, and I didn’t have any personal
pleasure at stake, I’m not convinced Judge would be able to do anything to convince me I’m wrong but give me a scornful wag of the finger. (Nihilism! Shame!) Now, my own biology may explain why I act as if there are normative reasons. I don’t go around punching children on the street because, as I am, doing so results in a most unpleasant gut reaction. Rather, I prefer to soothe injured companions until they stop crying and to eat ice cream sundaes (which are delicious), because, for reasons that stem from my “biological commitments,” those things are much more pleasant. But these are, in essence, practical concerns, not truly normative reasons. Then again, isn’t that enough? John Rawls argued that his Theory of Justice was supposed to be an attempt to describe our “considered judgments” (our intuitions after deliberation), not to prescribe universal values; maybe a similar approach could give Judge a sufficiently sound basis for his secular ethics. Andy Garin ’09 March 4
Letters, please! letters@browndailyherald.com t h e b r o w n d a i ly h e r a l d Editor-in-Chief
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julia streuli
e d i to r i a l
Formula one Rhode Island is well on its way to rejoining the rest of the country. Yesterday, the state’s Board of Regents for Elementary and Secondary Education considered a new method for allocating money to the state’s troubled public education system. Rhode Island let its last formula for this purpose obsolesce 15 years ago, and it is now the only state without one. The proposed plan would be considerably more efficient and comprehensive than those used by most other states. The General Assembly should approve it expeditiously and with minor adjustments at most. Since the end of the previous distributional formula, legislators have assigned money to each district based mainly on the previous year’s sums, with ad hoc adjustments. This system has to end. It prioritizes back-room wrangling and sheer force of habit over efficient and reliable procedures, and it has become increasingly detached from measures of the district’s actual needs. It even leaves the state open to litigation: Last month, Woonsocket and Pawtucket filed suit, claiming that the current system is unfair and arbitrary. Professor of Education Kenneth Wong, along with two of his graduate students, worked with state officials to craft the new proposal. In an interview with the editorial page board, Professor Wong laid out the team’s methodology. It considered the costs of a variety of standard school services — including some, such as special education, that many other states’ formulas neglect — and estimated the baseline cost of educating each Rhode Island student at $8,295 per year. Students from low-income backgrounds tend to require more public assistance to succeed, so the team assigned a yearly sum of $11,600 to students eligible for free or reduced lunches. Wong and his colleagues also developed a sound method of estimating the needs of individual districts. Their plan would adjust each district’s yearly funding
based on its median household income, concentration of low-income students and aggregate taxable property value — a reliable proxy for its ability to pay for school operations on its own. Wong said that many states’ formulas include only the latter factor, short-changing districts that have to deal with the challenges of educating relatively underprivileged children. Flexible grants of state aid would supplement the money allocated by the team’s method. They would include funds for early-childhood programs and other needs that would be difficult to assign through a general formula, Wong said. The proposal also includes a budget increase of one percent next year, raising to $722 million the state government’s share of Rhode Island’s roughly $2 billion primary and secondary education system. That contribution would increase by roughly 4.9 percent over the coming decade. The plan will not make everyone happy. Some areas would suffer significant funding cuts under the proposed formula: Southern Rhode Island’s sizable Chariho Regional School District would lose nearly 47 percent of its state aid. But hard-hit districts would have a full decade to internalize the reductions. Wong estimates that over 70 percent of Rhode Island students will receive more funding under the plan — one sign among many of the damaging skew of the current system. Even districts with smaller budgets will benefit from being part of a state that puts its public education money to better use. Once the proposal heads to the General Assembly, senators and representatives must keep that in mind.
Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.
correction An article in Wednesday’s Herald (“Faculty changes med school grad reqs,” March 3) incorrectly stated that there are 14 clinical departments at Alpert Medical School. In fact, there are 15. The Herald regrets the error. C O R R E C T I O N S P olicy The Brown Daily Herald is committed to providing the Brown University community with the most accurate information possible. Corrections may be submitted up to seven calendar days after publication. C ommentary P O L I C Y The editorial is the majority opinion of the editorial page board of The Brown Daily Herald. The editorial viewpoint does not necessarily reflect the views of The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Columns, letters and comics reflect the opinions of their authors only. L etters to the E ditor P olicy Send letters to letters@browndailyherald.com. Include a telephone number with all letters. The Herald reserves the right to edit all letters for length and clarity and cannot assure the publication of any letter. Please limit letters to 250 words. Under special circumstances writers may request anonymity, but no letter will be printed if the author’s identity is unknown to the editors. Announcements of events will not be printed. advertising P olicy The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. reserves the right to accept or decline any advertisement at its discretion.
Opinions The Brown Daily Herald
Friday, March 5, 2010 | Page 7
Understanding the odd story of gay rights in Africa DOMINIC MHIRIPIRI Opinions Columnist The gay rights movement, for all its endless challenges inside America and other Western nations, faces an even bleaker future in Africa. Pitted against the social aftermath of a continent that wallowed in colonial establishments for almost a century, and a stubbornly conservative culture spanning virtually every single country from South Africa to Egypt, Senegal to Ethiopia — the prospects do not look good for the countless Africans who seek to enter into same-sex relationships and marriages. Even in a place affectionately known to its natives as the “continent of dreams” and the “rhythm of our existence” — Africa is no refuge for the LGBTQ community, a fact epitomized by developments in one small country sitting at the very heart of the continent. No Brown student has a legitimate excuse not to be interested in knowing about this. Uganda is a beautiful country — carpeted with a central African equatorial savanna landscape and full of nature’s generous endowments of flora and fauna, a warm people whose charisma and sense of humor are never lost when they leave for faraway lands (if you meet one at Brown, you will understand) and an epic, storied history of a torturous political journey through colonialism and postindependence eras. The country’s former military dictator, the infamous Idi Amin who reigned between 1971 and 1979, inspired the Hollywood blockbuster thriller, “The Last King of Scotland.” But today, Uganda stands at the cross-
roads of a continent’s defining moment for the gay rights movement. A law proposed to the Ugandan parliament last year by toughtalking legislator David Bahati — now a subject of intense debate across the world — seeks to make some homosexual acts punishable by death. The Anti-Homosexual Bill of 2009 goes a step further than current laws that ban gays and lesbians by including capital punishment. The legislation has strong support from the country’s evangelical Christian groups and within the government itself, in a country where 95 percent of
reactions to the impending legislation, I have listened to countless varieties of discontent. And this is exactly where my problem with all these “open-minded” people lies. Those at Brown and in the U.S., who without any sort of understanding seek to batter and insult those opposed to them across the cultural divide, definitely need a little sense drilled into their heads. First, however misplaced Uganda’s intentions may be, they are very understandable. African culture is traditionally ultra-conservative, South Africa notwithstanding.
Killing people for who they want to be is unconscionable and not acceptable. Yet I want those who differ to do so with understanding — without patronizing or hastening Africa to force all notions of Western culture down its reluctant, conservative throat. the general population is reportedly opposed to legalizing homosexuality. However, the West has predictably been shaken by the legislator’s move. World leaders, international organizations and general people alike have roundly criticized Bahati and his “accomplices,” with President Obama recently condemning the bill as “odious.” I have personally talked to many people at Brown and RISD about Uganda’s story, and even by standards of the huge liberal inclinations on College Hill, I have obtained extremely one-sided takes on this controversial issue. From mild surprise at the nature of the bill, to teeth-gnashing, table-banging
The reality of Africa lies in its wise old men and women, the generation of their children (my parents), and the established culture that defines their history. They sit at the apex of Africa’s social hierarchy and tell their children that marriage is for a man and a woman, that anything outside of this is taboo and unacceptable. They hold homosexuality as an appendage of Western or imperialistic influence on their continent, and no one can question the basic logic of such convictions. Respecting these men and women means respecting their beliefs and culture. America itself, as a powerful example, has been on a winding road with issues of
race for centuries, and that process is far from over — a post-racial America is not yet here. Meanwhile, a more contemporary issue — homosexuality and gay rights — has joined that road as a challenge that requires a very long process full of great divisions across the country and immense struggles on the minority group fighting for their particular cause. The sensational defeat of the gay rights agenda in all 31 American states where the issue was put to vote signifies that even this country is not yet united in opening the doors for marriage equality. Brown students, and the Western world that they mirror, must realize that only by understanding first, without patronizing those who differ, will open the doors of understanding and dialogue. I’m sure Africa will not welcome any lecturers on how to make its own decisions — and the “where-have-you-beenslash-we-know-it-all” attitudes I have seen and heard will not solve any problems. Especially from people who do not have their own house in order on the very same issue. I obviously do not support the “barbaric” elements in Uganda’s proposed legislation. Killing people for who they want to be is unconscionable and not acceptable. Yet I want those who differ to do so with understanding — without patronizing or hastening Africa to force all notions of Western culture down its reluctant, conservative throat. Change towards more tolerance in Uganda is good for humanity, and therefore imperative and inevitable. Yet that change should only be gradual and respected by all.
Dominic Mhiripiri ’12 is from an even more beautiful country than Uganda. He can be reached at dominic_mhiripiri@brown.edu.
B.A. — D.O.A. BY WILL WRAY Opinions Columnist Monday’s editorial (“Cut it out,” March 1) was yet another iteration of the editorial page board cloaking socialist sensibilities in vaguely utilitarian terms. They chided Congress for cutting college subsidies, suggesting that said funding is a worthy “investment” in America’s economy. I demur. Four-year colleges are not worthless, and high-level educational programs should not be restricted to those who have deep pockets. However, taxpayers’ funds are not being used efficiently when we subsidize four years of tuition to glorified social clubs. The phrase “cutting public funding for colleges” conjures up images of destitute geniuses who will never hold a diploma due to the machinations of stingy conservatives. “Without tax subsidies,” the argument goes, “the next Einstein may waste away mowing lawns.” This alarmism is unwarranted. Financial aid exists in a world without taxpayer subsidies. Even the most profit-hungry universities have myriad incentives to pay the way for students who can’t do so themselves; need-blind admissions lead to greater prestige, increased applications and higher rates of alumni giving. Since colleges already have the means and the motive to provide student aid, taxpayer funding effectively subsidizes pet projects. Money is fungible. A National Review
article highlighted a recent Sports Illustrated story describing the consequences of federal “aid”: The University of Mississippi recently constructed the “indoor Tiger grotto... (which) takes on a South Beach vibe... Students chill in the hot tub or splash in a lazy river surrounded by palm trees and a rocky waterfall while waiters serve poolside wraps, smoothies and protein shakes.” There is no explicit connection between tax subsidies and Ole Miss’s palatial sports complex, but perhaps one or two of those 50 million dollars would have been spent on
quire college degrees? Author Robert Verbruggen suggests that, given the “massive tuition subsidies” taxpayers provide, the B.A. has become little more than a “convenient and free screening method.” To wit: While you will never use $150,000 dollars’ worth of undergraduate sociology, MCM or psychology in the private sector, prospective employers use your B.A. to establish a baseline of competency: The applicant was able to gain admission to a college and graduate. So long as we insist on sending every somewhat competent high school graduate to a four-year college, regard-
Hopefully, the B.A. will soon be seen as a luxury good, like a closet full of polo shirts or a sports car. initiatives less sexy than hot tubs and indoor waterfalls had not American taxpayers swallowed the bill for the basics. Tiger Grottos aside, it is not entirely clear that upping the number of Americans with four-year degrees is beneficial for the students or for the economy. The hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on four years of undergraduate tuition are often wasted. An early 2007 study found that one out of four college graduates works in an occupation that does not require a college education. 15 percent of college graduates are unemployed. The expected rebuttal? The converse of the above-quoted statistic is that three out of four college graduates are employed by a firm that does require a four-year degree. Conceded, but why do so many jobs re-
less of his or her ability to pay tuition, “B.A.” remains excellent shorthand for “somewhat competent.” If we stopped subsidizing college tuition, businesses would be forced to utilize less pricey methods of separating the wheat from the chaff. As Verbruggen puts it, with entrance exams, “a few minutes with a pencil and a sheet of paper could accomplish what requires four years today.” Verbruggen is in good — and startlingly diverse — company. A symposium of higher-education experts printed in the November 2009 issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education revealed that both liberals and conservatives within higher education felt that a four-year degree was always costly, often inefficient and did not necessarily impart the skills that work-
ers needed to be effective on the job. The four-year system is certainly worthwhile for engineers, pre-medical students, academics and a select few individuals. But author Charles Murray offers that, in most cases, “there are better, faster and more efficient ways for young people to acquire credentials to provide to employers.” Murray, Verbruggen and others suggest that if taxpayer subsidies come into play, they should more often be directed towards vocational and two-year programs in specified fields. The traditional benefits attached to a college education are rapidly eroding in the face of free public libraries and the Internet. To borrow a line from Good Will Hunting, why drop 150 grand on an education that you can get for a dollar fifty in late charges at the public library? It may smack of injustice that the rich can afford cushy colleges while less moneyed, more talented individuals attend stigmatized vocational schools. But stigmas change with time. Rest easy knowing that the shrewdness of the private sector will cut through the facade and hire the most qualified candidates. Hopefully, the B.A. will soon be seen as a luxury good, like a closet full of polo shirts or a sports car. It’s a status symbol that is nice to have, but it isn’t clear that everyone needs it to succeed. And it’s certain that taxes shouldn’t be paying for it.
Will Wray ’10 wants to splash in a lazy river and drink smoothies.
Today The Brown Daily Herald
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Students call for divestment
Music festival goes international
improve from its seventh place finish from last year. Skiing has been competing since Monday in the USCSA National Championships, which will conclude on Saturday. Men’s and women’s track & field will compete in the Eastern College Athletic Conference all day Saturday and Sunday at Boston University. Women’s water polo will travel to Indiana to compete in the CWPA Elite Eight Championship this weekend starting on Saturday at 11:10 a.m. and continue onto Sunday.
c a l e n da r Today, March 5
tomorrow, March 6
12:00 p.m. — Peace Corps Information Session, CDC Library
1:00 P.M. — 13th Annual Entrepreneurship Program Forum, Smith-Buonanno Hall
8:00 p.m. — “Lulu: A Pandora’s Box,” Stuart Theatre
A diamond to students who faced a wet Providence and got excited by orgasms coming to Brown. Perhaps the lecture will help students craving early release… of the Spring Weekend lineup. Coal to Dean of the College Katherine Bergeron for thinking a SideKick will improve our writing skills. Thx 4 ur tip.
Lunch — Brussel Sprouts Casserole,
Lunch — Chicken Fingers, Peanut Butter and Jelly Bar, Blondies
Hot Pastrami Sandwich, Antipasto Bar, Blondies Dinner — Manicotti Piedmontese, Filet of Sole with Bananas
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good to have a fresh perspective on being tough on terrorism. A diamond to Banner for adding a Mochaesque course search feature. Perhaps next they’ll add a feature to help the system get over its inferiority complex.
Coal to the four seniors who subscribed to the new Club Plan. A GCB membership would have given you the same feeling of exclusivity at one-eighth of the price.
Coal to University Librarian Harriet Hemmasi for telling students that the Sciences Library “needs to come to life.” It’s been sticking up straight for over 35 years, and we thought you were supposed to call your doctor after four hours.
Cubic zirconium to the Open the Books Coalition for researching the University’s investments on YouTube. Trust us — the secrets are not hidden in “Charlie Bit My Finger.” We’ve looked.
Diamonds to Dow Travers ’12 and Becky Kellar ’97, Brown’s proud Olympians. But coal to Travers for thinking he won’t get Coke for free after leaving Vancouver. Surely he hasn’t forgotten the Ratty so quickly.
A diamond to Robert Healey, candidate for lieutenant governor, for telling Rhode Islanders that the state needs an “explosion.” It’s always
Want more D&C? Check out a retro-diamond from 2000 at blogdailyherald.com, and write your own at diamondsandcoal.com.
comics
menu Verney-Woolley Dining Hall
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d i a m o n d s a n d c oa l
7:00 P.M. — imPulse Dance Company’s 7th Annual Spring Show, Alumnae Hall Auditorium
Sharpe Refectory
to m o r r o w
Friday, March 5, 2010
s p o rt s a ro u n d t h e b e n d Men’s basketball will close out its season with a pair of home games against Cornell on Friday at 7 p.m. and Columbia on Saturday at 7 p.m. Men’s lacrosse will kick off its season against the No. 11 Hofstra at 1 p.m. on the Pride’s turf. Women’s basketball will travel to Cornell on Friday for a 7 p.m. game, then to Columbia the next day for their last game of the season at 7 p.m. Men’s swimming and diving will compete in the Ivy Championships at Princeton starting today until Saturday. The team will look to
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to day
Cabernet Voltaire | Abe Pressman
Dinner — Salmon Teriyaki, Grilled Chicken, Spinach Pie Casserole Tortellini Italiano with Sausage
crossword Dot Comic | Eshan Mitra and Brendan Hainline
Fruitopia | Andy Kim
Hippomaniac | Mat Becker