News
Nathaniel Tok Peak Associate
Cecile Favron / News Editor Henry Tran / Assistant News Editor
November 20, 2017 news@the-peak.ca
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Cecile Favron / News Editor Henry Tran / Assistant News Editor
News
Cecile Favron News Editor
A UNIQUE JOB AN ICONIC LOCATION AN UNFORGETTABLE SUMMER
Become a PARLIAMENTARY GUIDE Applications due January 12, 2018 This summer, be part of the action at the Parliament of Canada. Find out more and apply online at
lop.parl.ca/guides
news@the-peak.ca
Henry Tran Assistant News Editor
Opinions
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Zach Siddiqui / Opinions Editor
November 20, 2017 opinions@the-peak.ca
TEACHING TROUBLES
BAD ENERGY Writing-intensive? Maybe. Feedback-intensive? Maybe not
Maxwell Gawlick / The Peak
Writing: consistently graded, rarely taught The education we get on writing essays fails to meet the expectations placed upon us Aaron Richardson Staff Writer Writing has been an integral part of my experience at SFU. From 300-word responses to 20-page papers, my writing is a tool professors use to assess my understanding of a topic — and I’m sure the same can be said for many SFU students. As I’ve progressed through my degree, and begun to take upper division classes, the expectations placed on the quality of my writing has increased. That increase in expectation is not a surprise by any means. However, what is surprising is how little writing instruction is present in classes.
on writing. According to SFU, “courses that require written assignments but do not provide explicit instruction on writing would not qualify as W courses.” Although these might sound like effective methods for a writing course, in my experience, this does not directly translate in-class. Over the course of my degree, I have taken seven classes designated as writing intensive. In many classes, W designation or no, learning how to write is a secondary goal compared to learning what to write about: the primary subject matter of the class. Because of this, the prescribed feedback portion of the class takes the form of only scarce comments on papers. In many of the supposedly writing intensive classes I’ve taken, the comments have nothing to do with writing, but are instead related to how well the student understood the topic of the paper. This is entirely understandable. But if a class is going to be labeled as writing intensive, then it needs to start spending more time on teaching us how to write. The best way to improve writing is through a process of
The feedback often has much less to do with writing than with how well the student understood the topic. At SFU, students are required to take six credits of classes designated as writing intensive (W). There are several criteria that a class must meet for it to be classified as writing intensive. Some of which include the presence of adequate feedback, revision, and a course where much of the content involves instruction
trial and error, with feedback and a series of revisions. When the classes that are intended to teach students writing fail to meet these criteria, it becomes a problem. This is especially true if writing is continually used as a grading tool, and if the expectations continually increase year after year. One W class I took that did do the job right went through the process of writing an experimental paper. The assignments throughout were short versions of the sections of an experimental paper (introduction, methods, results, discussion), and a final project bringing them all together. In another class, they divided writing instruction and the course content between the tutorials and the lecture. The lectures taught the content of the course, while the tutorials were primarily aimed at teaching us how to write and edit our work. Teaching students how to write is certainly possible, and effective when done properly. The issue is that this is not typical for W classes, and classes that are not writing intensive have no obligation to teach writing in any form at all. While it would certainly be too much to enforce writing requirements on non-W courses, classes that are intended to teach writing should have the criteria enforced, or have further criteria placed on them. If this is not possible, more programs should have a solid portfolio of W options. Either way, SFU’s writing education has a long way to go before it can meet students' needs.
Written by Zach Siddiqui You know that person. The one whose mood ring grows fangs and starts hissing every time they put it on. The toxic friend who’s full of bad energy. It’s not any particular person. The role sort of shifts around, the way Jonesy from 6teen flips jobs every episode. Sometimes, it’s even you. That’s why we should try to remember that, when we’re dealing with a friend who’s being frustrating and petty as balls, we should hate the bad vibes, not the player. (Though, of course, there are exceptions. Some people just really do inherently suck.) Bad blood can turn fun interactions and events with friends into exercises in defusing a landmine. When a squad member is being a li’l shit, sometimes you just have to be gentle yet firm: tell us what’s wrong and we’ll support you, but give me unnecessary lip one more time and I will personally destroy you. That sort of thing. Whatever it takes, exercise the bad feelings without being an enabler.
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Opinions
Eva Zhu Peak Associate
Eva Zhu Peak Associate
Zach Siddiqui / Opinions Editor
opinions@the-peak.ca
Arts
Alex Bloom / Arts Editor
November 20, 2017 arts@the-peak.ca
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DIASPORIC DESIGNS
Local lifestyle brand Afro.ditie Creative discusses their vision, celebration of culture, and their designs The company’s founders touched on the subject of cultural appropriation, as well as how they hope to educate people on other cultures Alex Bloom Arts Editor Afro.ditie Creative is a Vancouverbased company that seeks to engage in a conversation about culture through fashion. It was started by Ayodeji and Anastasia Akintemi as a way of expressing and sharing both of their cultures. As stated on their website, Afro.ditie was “born from the desire to embrace and celebrate love, culture, beauty, and life.” It goes on to say that “[They] are on a mission to bridge cultural gaps through fashion.” The Peak spoke with Ayodeji and Anastasia about their vision, their brand, and culture. Anastasia began by explaining the significance of the name Afro. ditie Creative: “Culture is so many things . . . so for us, [Ayodeji] being from West Africa and me being European — I’m Greek and Portuguese [and] from [Canada] — living in this kind of western culture . . . [we] have these other experiences from our family origins. Afro.ditie is basically celebrating our cultures.” This is very clear in the name Ayodeji also added, “The reason we say ‘Creative’ is to not pigeonhole ourselves into just fashion. It’s just [that] fashion is the medium we’re using to engage that conversation . . . We have a lot of other passions as well. We wanted to leave the opportunity to bring things under the umbrella of what we do with Afro. ditie, but fashion is the main one, and a big part of what we’re doing right now. We’re passionate about food, we’re passionate about music, [and] we’re passionate about dance. There are a lot of artists that we collaborate with who [also] have those passions. We bring the fashion,
[they] bring whatever it is they do, and we do something beautiful.” He also said, “We’re inspired by other people’s creativity as well.” In the past Afro.ditie has collaborated with dancers, models, DJs, and makeup artists to put on various visual presentations of their work. When they launched their clothing line at Gastown’s The Basement, Suyalife catered the event, bringing their delicious Nigerian street food to the venue. Afro.ditie’s designs are inspired by both Ayodeji and Anastasia’s cultural backgrounds. For example, they work with Nigerian prints and motifs, such as their “Wazobia Warrior” concept. As Ayodeji stated, “The word ‘Wazobia’ is made up of three different words from three of the main tribes in Nigeria. So in Wa-ZoBia, the ‘Wa’ means ‘come’ in Yoruba, ‘Zo’ means ‘come’ in Hausa, which is another tribe, and ‘Bia’ means ‘come’ in Igbo. Essentially it means ‘come, come, come’, so the idea behind that is these tribes coming together [in] unity, to make it work in the country called Nigeria. Then we took that, because symbolically the message resonates with us, ‘let’s come together in humanity’, we’re all here together . . . let’s celebrate our strengths, our diversity, and help one another, because if we know that we have a lot more in common than [we do] different, we’ll actually listen to each other, and spread love.” The warrior part was added as an expression of passion. “Fight for justice, fight for unity, fight for love . . . that’s why we added the warrior part, too.”
As their designs draw inspiration from multiple cultures, they are mindful of cultural appropriation and take care to be respectful of all the cultures that influence their work. As Ayodeji noted, “Our pieces that we come up with flow through that [collaborative] creative process, so one look today might seem more African, but that doesn’t mean our entire look is going to be that way. The whole idea behind our brand is sharing culture, acknowledging culture, but giving room to share and learn from each other’s cultures.” Anastasia also added, “We have people wondering because we have white models wearing our clothes, but we’re not just making clothes for a certain ethnic group. We’re coming together in our creative energy to create this art form for everyone.” Ayodeji went on to say, “We live in a call-out culture . . . sometimes we just want to call people out to feel better about ourselves — sometimes it’s justified, absolutely [but] sometimes it swings a bit too far.” He said, “Going back to why we do what we do . . . we use [our designs] as an opportunity to educate people.” One of the main goals in regard to Afro.ditie’s vision is to bring people together and teach them something they didn’t know about another culture. On November 18, Afro.ditie participated in an event called The ART of ART: A Westcoast Formal, which was a fundraising gala for Youth Unlimited, an organization that works to help at-risk youth. At the event, Afro.ditie collaborated with professional dancers and makeup artists
Ayodeji and Anastasia started Afro.ditie to bring people together through fashion. to create a performance showcasing their clothing. When asked why events like this are important to them Ayodeji said, “A lot of [at-risk youth] are people who just need a community around them essentially, and at Afro.ditie we do believe that we all need a community around us . . . Part of our message with Afro. ditie is sort of like ‘hey, we are actually part of this larger community called humanity so we actually have a lot in common. Lets come talk together, embrace each other, learn from each other, and not try to dominate each other. Let’s love each other . . . and just make ourselves stronger.’”
Photo courtesy of Afro.ditie Creative “In the sense of this organization, Youth Unlimited, [there are] these kids who may not necessarily have this community around them, whatever their life circumstances are, and they provide that opportunity for them through mentorships, partnerships, programs, you name it. The heart of what they do is something that resonates with us, so it really made sense for us to be a part of that in whatever way we could.” Afro.ditie will be participating in Vancouver’s inaugural African Fashion Week in February, which will coincide with the release of their new fashion line. You can purchase their clothing either through their website or at The Basement in Gastown.
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The Wazobia Warrior is more than a design, it's a philosophy.
Photo courtesy of Afro.ditie Creative
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Arts
Alex Bloom / Arts Editor
arts@the-peak.ca
A L B U M REVIEWS
MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE
WRITTEN BY GRACE ROSE AND EVA ZHU
TURN OUT THE LIGHTS BY JULIEN BAKER
Julien Baker is one of those rare artists who uses music as a personal diary, giving listeners a glimpse into her struggles and triumphs through heart-wrenching lyrics and exemplary guitar playing. She got her start on Bandcamp, eventually re-releasing her debut album Sprained Ankle by 6131 Records. It contains nine simple songs that would no doubt make you cry. Her sophomore LP, Turn Out the Lights, was released by Matador Records and is still as beautifully sad as her previous work, but with sleeker production and more confidence. You might even find yourself relating to her songs on heartbreak, depression, and questioning her faith as a queer Christian. Musically, this album is full of songs that start off soft then crescendo into powerful belts. “Appointments,” “Turn Out the Lights,” and “Sour Breath” are examples of this. Overall, if you enjoy indie-folk music that’ll give you a good cry, Julien Baker is your girl. – EZ
BOOMERANG BY JIDENNA
Writer's Exchange 4x5
Many know him as "the classic man," but Jidenna is continuing to expand beyond one genre. He seamlessly fuses together Nigerian high life, dirty south hip hop, and Afrobeat vibes to create an EP that spans the sonic African diaspora. Releasing four new songs and two remixes from his debut album The Chief, it's a mix of old and new for both returning, and new fans of his music. The title track is a laidback jam that makes you want to both hang out by a pool with an icy drink and dance late into the night. It's a funky mix with a little something for everyone, while simultaneously pushing the boundaries of hip hop. – GR
Whether you're interested in the theory of communication, or dance, or both, this piece is for you.
Photo courtesy of SFU Woodward's
SFU alumna Vanessa Goodman presents world premiere at SFU Woodward’s Wells Hill is a multimedia-based project that explores the works of Marshall McLuhan and Glenn Gould Tessa Perkins Peak Associate In this exciting new dance work that took three years to make, SFU Woodward’s Cultural Program has partnered with Dance House and SFU’s School for the Contemporary Arts to present the world premiere of Action at a Distance’s Wells Hill as a special Celebrate Canada 150+ event. Action at a Distance is the dance company created by SFU alumna Vanessa Goodman who is also the artistic director. Goodman was the recipient of the 2013 Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award, and her works have been presented at dance festivals locally and across the country. Goodman’s goal with Action at a Distance is to foster dance works that reflect the human condition and to use dance to explore our contemporary experience. She strives to create immersive environments, and I think Wells Hill has achieved just that.
Inspired by the work and writings of Marshall McLuhan and Glenn Gould, two Canadian icons, Goodman has created a work that combines themes of technology and communication. McLuhan and Gould’s philosophies and their work changed the way we think about and consume art and information. Their ideas provide the basis for this intelligent, provocative new multimedia work. In a preview video, the McLuhan quote “All media work us over completely” flashes on the screen before his voice becomes part of the sonic landscape of the work. The immersive experience is enhanced by exceptional lighting design by James Proudfoot, video projections by Ben Didier, Milton Lim, and Vanessa Goodman, costumes by Diane Park, and sound composition by Scott Morgan (Loscil) and Gabriel Saloman. Seven dancers bring the work to life: Bevin Poole, Lara Barclay, Karissa Barry, Dario Dinuzzi,
Bynh Ho, Arash Khakpour, and Alexa Mardon. Related events are also being presented in the lead-up to the show: a discourse on Glenn Gould hosted by composer and SFU faculty member Owen Underhill on November 18, a discourse on Marshal McLuhan hosted by UBC professor Richard Cavell on November 25, and a lecture titled Marshall McLuhan and the Global Village: What effect is globalization having on the arts in Vancouver? on November 21 also hosted by Cavell. Each performance will include a pre- or post-show talk featuring Goodman in conversation with Cavell. For anyone interested in communications, music, or the way that we interpret and consume media, this dance piece is sure to be full of thought-provoking content. Wells Hill will be presented by Dance House, SFU Woodward’s, and SFU’s School for the Contemporary Arts at the Fei and Milton Wong Experimental Theatre located in the Goldcorp Centre for the Arts from November 24–26.
MUST-SEE EVENT Reel Causes
Written by Alex Bloom
Reel Causes is a series of film screenings thats deal with real-world issues. On Thursday, November 23 at 7 p.m. ( just prior to the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence) Reel Causes will be showing the documentary A Better Man at the Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at the Goldcorp Centre for the Arts. The documentary explores why women and girls face so much violence and abuse. The documentary focuses specifically on Attiya Khan and her efforts in getting
her former abuser to own up to his actions and begin on the road towards reconciliation. As mentioned on the SFU Woodward’s website, there is a content warning as the film features domestic abuse. The film screening aims to raise awareness and support for We Can BC and Battered Women’s Support Services. After the screening, the floor will open for a Q&A where local activists will discuss the issues presented in the film. Admission is $15.
Sports
Andrew Ringer Sports Editor
Aaron Richardson Staff Writer
Andrew Ringer / Sports Editor
November 20, 2017 sports@the-peak.ca
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Sports
Lauren Mason Peak Associate
Andrew Ringer Sports Editor
Andrew Ringer / Sports Editor
sports@the-peak.ca
Humour
Janis McMath / Humour Editor
November 20, 2017 humour@the-peak.ca
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Humour
Janis McMath / Humour Editor
humour@the-peak.ca
Humour Student puts up lost posters of himself, offers reward to anyone able to help him find purpose Written by Brenda Luies Illustrated by Reslus Layout by Timothy Chow With the grey clouds casting a grey shadow over our grey school, it’s a shock that anyone even gets out of bed anymore. One student has realized — probably much like the rest of us — that while his physical body makes his way to the oh-so-cheerful SFU campus, his soul has wandered off somewhere on the astral plane and is nowhere to be found. In response to this dilemma, he has decided to reach out to the good Samaritans of SFU for help.
November 20, 2017
A 25th-century analysis of 21st-century movies Hello class of 2465, and welcome to Anthropology 233. As you all already know, most of the records of 21st-century culture and civilization were completely destroyed by the asteroid Bruce Willis failed to stop in 2018, and the nuclear war triggered by the US president’s tweets in 2017. Luckily, we will be analyzing material from a very rare flash drive from the distant year of 2020. The flash drive contains 30 university assignments, 3TB of porn (0.0000003 XB), and a collection of what people of the 21st century called “IMDb’s lowest-rated movies” — anthropologists still do not fully understand what this phrase means. But, now that we have access to movies which we believe were the masterpieces of that period, we can analyze them in hopes of understanding the people of that strange era.
Written by Ahmed Ali Illustrated by Emma Wu Layout by Timothy Chow
3. The Emoji Movie (2017)
The people of 2017 didn’t have sex clones, instant orgasm electrodes, or automatic reproduction. Unfortunately, their usage of coitus was for a combination of both pleasure AND reproduction.
Before humans made movies, there was an earlier civilization of them called ‘Egyptians’ who made a unique language consisting of symbols called “hieroglyphics.” With this in mind, we can understand how smart our 2017 humans must have been to create an advanced form of this symbol language — and turn that into a film for their viewing pleasure. Their lust for intelligent stimulation from their entertainment knows no bounds.
The student has requested help through a lost poster, and is asking for help from anyone able and willing to. The poster has the word “LOST” written across it in capital letters and the ink is blotted from what seems to be tears. The student is seeking help to find himself, as he has apparently “lost himself in the shitshow that is life.” The area allocated for a photo on the poster is just a large question mark with a quote below that reads, “I can’t recognize the person looking back at me when I stare into the mirror.”
2. Fantastic 4 (2015)
The offered reward for helping this lost soul out is stated as “my life could serve to be a cautionary tale, or a funny story you tell your friends, but I have nothing to offer as a reward because my wallet is as empty as this shell I call a body.” The poster was not signed, but many sources have reported that the guy that’s been sitting in front of the pond yelling at the fish while throwing the ‘lost’ posters into the air is the supposed lost soul who posted the flyers.
Awful movies deciphered by an anthropology class in the year 2465
1. 50 Shades of Grey (2015)
This movie — an artistic feat — shows how the courtship rituals at the time worked. Additionally, we know this film must be amazing because pornographic content during that era was free and much more explicit than the movie . . . yet the movie still drew people in with its subtle yet ingenious take on coitus. If the movie was bad, why would it be so successful given the free competition? Logically, it only makes sense that this movie was considered a masterpiece of the time.
The poster states that he was last seen somewhere between “Adamantly telling the barista at Starbucks that I have nothing to lose as she asks me if I’m sure that I want a venti cup full of espresso shots” and “crying in one of the bathrooms on the fifth floor of the AQ only to hear someone taking a wet shit in the stall next to me between sobs.”
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The film and its symbols are continued to be deciphered to this day. We are sure we have sequenced at least seven of the most common ones. Forget about the Egyptians and hieroglyphics, this is a language far more advanced than any we've ever seen.
At this time in history, the concept of superhero movies was just beginning to gain traction. We are unsure of the realism of the films as they seem to conflict with so many established timelines and knowledge of early humans. Regardless, this film gives us insight into how humans performed science and how they bonded with one another. We are now aware that humans were apparently capable of building interdimensional travel and altering their DNA to perform unusual feats such as bonding despite having no personality to connect to other people. Truly, early humans were pioneers in working together.
4. Adam Sandler This isn’t one movie, but is instead the life of the legendary performer people called “Adam Sandler.” This man was a legend for numerous reasons, the most significant being the consistency of his films. You see, all his films were very similar, yet he made SO many of them. He must’ve been a very amazing man to make over 75 films with such subtle differences which still kept audiences enamoured for so long. Even after the apocalypse, Adam Sandler continued to make films. No other performer could ever top this. Other great directors were only able to make a few similar films — Sandler made more than we can comprehend.
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