This is a big year for elections -- and not just on the national level. The current Wesleyan Student Assembly (WSA) elections include nearly twice as many candidates for freshman representative spots as last year, and the vote count is expected to reach 150 percent of last year’s total.
Professor of Economics Gary Yohe, a recent co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), was selected this summer to become a member of the newly formed New York City Panel on Climate Change (NPCC).
With the approach of November’s presidential elections, both the Wesleyan Democrats (WesDems) and the Wesleyan Republicans (WesRepublicans) are gearing up for this year’s pivotal election day. While the University is often known for its students’ political activism, it will be particularly heightened in the months leading up to November.
Thailand’s former prime minister, Samak Sundaravej, stepped down Tuesday after a constitutional court ruled he had violated the constitution by appearing several times as a guest on the cooking show he once hosted before becoming prime minister.
For the three years after he graduated high school, Kennedy Odede ’12 of Kibera, Kenya carried rocks between a train and a factory for a dollar a day. The work was tiresome and unrewarding, yet Odede’s parents -- like some 80 percent of the citizens of Kibera -- could not find jobs, and so Odede was also responsible for feeding his seven younger siblings.
While the new Muslim chaplain has been here for over two weeks now, her office gives evidence to the contrary. With no furniture, aside from three chairs in one corner, a computer and phone on the floor, an unstable, empty bookshelf and a name written in paper on the door, Chaplain Marwa Said Aly’s makeshift office reflects the haste in which she was hired.
Everything is coming up roses for the Low Rise apartments, as residents returned to campus to find the concrete courtyard filled with grass and flowers. Over the summer, new underground utilities were installed beneath Low Rise and 12,000 square feet of pavement was removed in the process. New grass and native plantings replaced some of the pavement for aesthetic and environmental reasons.
When Caroline Eisenmann ’12 first arrived at her room in the Butterfields, she was surprised to find out that her new hall mates would also be her classmates in her First Year Initiative (FYI) seminar, Personal Identity and Choice.
Andrew Walker ’09 is the kind of Wesleyan student that you can never catch without a smile on his face. I’ve never seen him frown, scowl, or even look slightly annoyed—and I challenge anybody to provide proof of the opposite. (It can’t be done.) Why does he always seem so happy? How did his hair get so pretty? What are the secrets of Andrew Kelly Walker? He sat down with me this Wednesday afternoon to flash a few smiles and provide some answers.
This fall, almost twice as many freshmen as last year are running for the WSA. Twenty-one students are competing for eight spots as freshmen representatives, while six students are running for five spots as at-large representatives.
The narrative covering the events of Fountain Avenue is currently being finalized. The narrative was compiled this summer by a working group that included WSA President Mike Pernick and several members of the school administration. It is based on the Public Safety Report, Public Safety video, written student accounts and the Middletown Police Report.
Mytheos: Your recent column (“Mytheology: Where is your Vanguard now?,” September 9, 2008, Volume CXLIV, Number 3) issues a warning to all egalitarian-minded budding political thinkers on campus, using Fountain Avenue as a model of what would result from the successful violent overthrow of our bourgeois parliamentarian government in a revolution spearheaded by Students for a Democratic Society and the Wesleyan chapter of the Communist Party USA.
I’ve never felt compelled before to write in to the Argus, but I feel there are many misconceptions and half-truths in Mytheos Holt’s latest column (“Mytheology: Where is your Vanguard Now?,” September 9, 2008, Volume CXLIV, Number 3) on the incidents at Fountain Avenue that occurred last May. My father was a professor at Wesleyan for over 30 years [Professor of Theater Fredrik deBoer], and I grew up on campus, so I have some insight into both the college and the community.
Every election, hundreds of thousands of college students lose the right to vote when they procrastinate on registering or requesting their absentee ballots. It doesn’t have to be that way.
Dear Argus, Every semester I am more and more shocked and appalled at your inability to check the “facts” you put forth in each of your many articles. As far as I understand, Ezra Silk, author of the article entitled “University ‘bends’ Foss Cross” (August 29, 2008, Volume CXLIV, Number 1), had no previous knowledge about any of the issues ze wrote about.
As some of you may or may not know, the narrative on the Fountain Avenue incident of last year is set to be released sometime this coming week.
Two massive works by photographer Wendy Ewald dominate the rear wall of the Zilkha Gallery and immediately capture the viewer’s attention, yet at first glance their subject is unclear and compels closer inspection. The assertive ambiguity of these images resonates with the tone shared by much of the work featured in “Framing and Being Framed: The Uses of Documentary Photography,” a compelling exhibition that explores how contemporary artists both utilize and critique the medium of documentary photography. As the first installment of “Eye of History: The Camera as Witness”—a series of exhibitions, talks and films hosted at Wesleyan this semester—the show opens at Zilkha today, Sept. 12, with a reception from five to seven p.m.
For most of us, the Playboy Mansion - that bastion of unabashed bimboism, old man lechery and rock & roll debauchery - is hardly synonymous with childhood magic.
Andre Aciman, the author of “Out of Egypt” and a professor at the Graduate School and University Center of the City University of New York, published his first novel in 2007. “Call Me by Your Name” successfully mimics the tone of Aciman’s academic subject, Proust.
“It is not often that we presenters get to be part of a work’s production,” commented Pamela Tatge, the director of the Center for the Arts (CFA). But that was exactly what happened with “Off the Beaten Path: A Jazz and Tap Odyssey,” which had its world premiere at the University last Friday, September 5. The work was commissioned by the New England Foundation for the Arts (of which Tatge is a member), a group that usually brings pre-existing performances to college campuses around New England.
Classes may finally be in full swing, but I hardly think that’s a reason to stop pretending we’re at Camp Wes. This week we've got quite a lot of cheery action, designed to keep your mind off the encroaching cold weather, regardless of whether you've found someone to make the nights less chilly. This week errs on the uplifting — though no less ironic — side, so if you've found yourself a cutie, these flicks are all perfect date movies (as if Wesleyan students DATE, har har har). If not, they’re still bound to send you out of the theater with a smile on your face.
If a resident of central Connecticut turned their radio to 88.1 FM, they might wonder if the Nutmeg State had suddenly transformed into an oasis of pan-cultural music without their knowledge. On Friday alone, listeners from Hartford to New Haven can tune in to a showcase of aural eclecticism: From a show hosted by and featuring creative Middletown youth to live break-beat mixing to a pair of Latin music shows, WESU radio specializes in an diverse mix of programming driven equally by University students and Middletown residents.
After a summer of preparation, Annie Paladino ‘09 is ready to be buried in the ’92 Theater next week. Paladino won’t be engaging in an act of escapism or some Blain-ian feat of endurance, though her task is about as challenging. She will be playing Winnie, the central character in Samuel Beckett’s “Happy Days” as part of her senior acting thesis.
If Conor Oberst has taught us anything - aside from the fact that sounding like a pigeon won’t stop NPR from heralding you as the next Bob Dylan…or Winona Ryder from wanting to date you - it’s that brooding one-man folk acts should be wary of the line that separates heartfelt from overwrought.
As part of an attempt to increase the national exposure of University athletics, the Physical Education Department has made a series of changes to its recruiting process. Chief among these was a decision last spring to create and institute a new departmental position, Recruiting Coordinator for Athletics, currently held by Head Coach of Men’s Lacrosse John Raba. Though he will continue in his role as head coach of the men’s lacrosse team, a position he has held since 1997, Raba has discontinued his role as an assistant football coach due to the increased time requirements.
34: Kills by Lisa Drennan ’09 during Friday’s volleyball match against Williams, breaking her own record of 33.
The women’s soccer squad came out full steam on Wednesday to capture their first win of the season, beating Mount Holyoke 3-1 -- the third straight year the Cards have defeated Holyoke.
For many soccer fans, the summer was both a delightful and depressing time. We had the pleasure of following a thrilling Euro Cup tournament, won in classy fashion by Fernando Torres and Spain. It featured unforeseen upsets, surprising breakout performances and most importantly, exhilarating matches. But such futbol euphoria proved to be fleeting.