As part of the groundbreaking health care package passed last week, Congress voted on March 25 to pass legislation that included a significant overhaul of college assistance programs.
Student debt has been ballooning!
Halfway through this semester, I’d like to take inventory of two of The Argus’ most relevant sections—Wespeaks, and our new Op-Ed section. Why? Because these are your—the reader’s—sections.
In the spirit of Halloween, Death Match, or Undead Match, as I’d like to call it, is tackling the sacred collegiate canon of zombies.
Every June, we pop-watchers get excited for the appearance of summer jams: eminently catchy nuggets o’ fun that get overplayed egregiously without anyone minding.
This semester The Argus is bringing you our first Op-Ed section.
Plans to construct the new Molecular and Life Sciences facility have been indefinitely postponed, according to the Wesleyan Student Assembly (WSA) Report from the Board of Trustees Retreat as revealed at the WSA’s public meeting last Sunday night.
Failure to Comply violations have more than doubled in recent years, according to a 2007 mid-year report issued by the Student Judiciary Board (SJB) at the end of last semester. But despite recent tensions between students and Public Safety (PSafe), it is SJB policy shifts that lie at the heart of the violation influx.
Associate Provost Paula Lawson passed away suddenly on Sunday, according to an all-campus e-mail sent Monday morning by Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost and Professor of Chemistry Joseph W. Bruno. The cause of her death has not been publicly revealed.
Public Safety (PSafe) shut down two parties on campus this past weekend. The Middletown Police Department (MPD) arrived with a K-9 unit at 40 Fountain Avenue on Thursday, an uncanny presence in the wake of MPD’s clash with University students on the avenue last May.
In the wake of this summer’s bureaucratic reshuffling, it was announced on Friday that Dean for Diversity and Student Engagement Danny Hiroyuki Teraguchi will leave the University at the beginning of October. Teraguchi has worked at the University since 2006.
While students will likely spend the upcoming week thinking of little else besides tests and textbooks, Kira Akerman ’10 will be putting the final touches on her grass-covered sculpture, to be displayed in Saturday’s first-ever Feet to the Fire Festival. The Festival intends to bring together students, local scientists and artists to address the consequences of global climate change through interdisciplinary artwork.
5. Pepper Potts’s character is too multifaceted for just two hours and 20 minutes.
4. The electromagnet in RDJ’s chest appears to have sucked away all traces of plot connectivity.
Culture and identity are common themes—tenets even—in the art of dance. That said, choreographers are often faced with the challenge of emotionally engaging the audience in order to connect them with what is often unfamiliar subject matter. Last weekend’s spring faculty dance concert, “The Energy Which Remains,” focused heavily on both subjects, but blended them with the broad human themes of passion and struggle to create moving, captivating narratives.
I’ve been trying to stay away from mash-ups, but The Hood Internet has done it again and turned a relatively mediocre rap song into your new favorite dance track.
I’m just gonna go ahead and call this as this year’s “We Are Your Friends.” Jacksonville’s Black Kids are already just about as catchy and adorable as up-and-coming indie bands get, but the early-MGMT disco-pop stylings of The Twelves gives their viral single just the edge it needs to catch your ears and keep you dancing at the next Tomb party.
Ok, we decided it was time to prove this section isn’t just an indulgence of my ardor for “sick” remixes. This week’s rare b-side captures the Swedish songster’s almost-better-than-the-original cover of Paul Simon’s best little song about middle-aged loneliness ever.
Media criticism, humor and a career in radio were just a few of the topics addressed by National Public Radio host Peter Sagal and producer Doug Berman ’84, who spoke to a packed audience of University students, faculty and alumni last Wednesday night in Beckham Hall.
In the wake of last year’s electro-dance explosion came a wave of dime-a-dozen Simian Mobile Justice-style DJ collectives. But Guns’n’Bombs’s Johnny Love and Filip Turbotito (of Ima Robot) still manage to distinguish themselves in a genre that’s running out of bass lines to sample. Be sure to pick up this free download of “Crossover Appeal,” a track that tinkers with ambient beats before launching into a hard-hitting rhythm that will make your speakers break a sweat.
M.I.A’s “20 Dollar” already rips off the Pixies and New Order in the best possible way, so its makes sense that mash-up all-stars The Hood Internet take the track that extra step your ears beg for and splice it with the actual New Order song (“Blue Monday”). The result is a spacey electro romp that’s the perfect light-dimming number at your next dance party.
While the original version of the song leaves some production value to be desired, hip-hop remix extraordinaire edIT adds just the right snarling beat to The Grouch’s gut-punch flow. Warning: some of you may find the lyrics a little too close to home.
Blending passion, wit and expertise, "Jubilee," the University’s annual Black Cultural Show, put a festive note at the end of Black History Month last Saturday night. The sold-out performance filled Crowell Concert Hall with an eclectic audience, with attendees ranging from President Michael Roth to residents of Traverse Square.
Take a walk around the Wesleyan campus, and you’ll likely pass by gender-neutral bathrooms, queer jargon pamphlets and posters for student-of-color art shows, reaffirming the University’s trademark political correctness and multiculturalism. But a peek inside the new Center for Film Studies screening room last Monday night revealed a montage of overt sexism, gratuitous violence and cultural parodies—all to the delight of a cackling room of student viewers.
The Top Five failed inaugural Top Five topics.
It’s a sunny January L.A. afternoon, and the view from a loft office in a television studio on an industrial street in Hollywood beckons you to sip an iced latte on a café terrace. But inside, amidst the clutter, there are more serious matters to attend to, as two of today’s most successful television producers sit down for a business briefing.
“We have no other choice—socialism, or SMASH!” This call to revolution was not made during a campus rally, but rather is a line from “SMASH!”, a play read on Monday night by the all-student Playwrights Repertory Company at the ’92 Theatre. The reading was held in honor of playwright and screenwriter Jeff Hatcher, who was in residence at the University Dec. 3 and 4.
There are a lot of honors and awards one can pursue as a college student, but a Grammy typically isn’t one of them"unless you’re Skye LoGuidice ’09. The singer-songwriter, who goes by the stage name Skye Claire, received the phone call of a lifetime from her promoter in late October, informing her that she had received preliminary Grammy ballot nominations in three categories.
Last Saturday night, as many University students were changing into costumes for Eclectic’s annual Halloween party, a different kind of transformation was taking place inside Crowell Concert Hall. Behind its doors, legendary pianist and composer Randy Weston created music that crossed cultural and temporal boundaries and no doubt transformed the way audience members listened to music.
If there’s one thing that hip-hop/electronica extraordinaire RJD2 will teach you, it’s that nothing gets in the way of a good beat. And no one knows this better than the throngs of students who filed into Beckham Hall last Thursday night to see the internationally-acclaimed DJ spin.
After spending the past 15 years apologizing for guitar rock, Radiohead has finally made the "Pablo Honey" they meant to. With the Oct. 10 release of their seventh album, "In Rainbows," came the portrait of a band that has finally come full-circle with both its sound and its identity.
Although Halloween is a month away, costumed students crowded Eclectic last Saturday for what was arguably the most anticipated concert of the semester, the return of Wes alum band MGMT. However, the audience’s patience was tested as technical difficulties and miscommunication delayed the show until the early hours of the morning.
It’s a Friday night, no, a Saturday morning, and a hard bass line from electro heroes Justice makes the room pulse. You feel it in the floor, you feel it in your teeth. There’s little room to dance, but that’s not stopping anyone. You’re covered in sweat that mostly isn’t yours, or maybe it is, depending.
It’s a Friday night at the CFS Cinema, and David Byrne has got a tape he’d like to play us. The Talking Heads frontman clicks on a drum machine cassette, bobs his head meekly, and strums the first chords of the band’s classic, "Psycho Killer."
If as an eager-eyed prefrosh you went to a party at Wesleyan this year, then you’re familiar with our 2007 Spring Fling headliner, TV on the Radio. At the very least, you danced in some state of inebriation to their ubiquitous, “Wolf Like Me.”
Belly Boat
A melodic piano/accordion songwriter duo; band members Silvie Margot Deutsch ’09 and Zoe Ruth Cusmus Latta (RISD ’08) say, "We started playing together when our high school boyfriends collectively dumped us, and we started learning to play Amélie songs and playing them on the street to forget our unrequited love."
Editor’s Note: As prefrosh, we’re sure you heard all about the University’s renowned film program, including our weekly Film Series. Here are some of last year’s highlights and Wesleyan student favorites.
• Jessica Sanders ’99 screens her Academy Award-Nominated documentary After Innocence, featuring her interviews with seven exonerated ex-convicts.
• Pulitzer-Prize Winner Jhumpa Lahiri reads at the CFA, causing a stir when hundreds of fans are turned away from a sold-out reading.
Profiles small ensemble “ardj”
At the mere mention of a music recital, many University students may cringe, haunted by childhood memories of stuffy auditoriums, over-eager parents and sadistic symphonies. Few, however, may conjure up images of delay/compressor programming and interactive audience recording.
If you’ve been to a party at Wesleyan this year, then you’re familiar with this Spring Fling’s headliner, TV on the Radio. Or, at the very least, you’ve danced in some state of inebriation to their ubiquitous, "Wolf Like Me." Not so ubiquitous, however, are fellow Spring Fling performers Deerhunter.
Profiles Wesleyan Spirits (an all-man a cappella group) and BEAR HANDS (a band comprised partly of Wesleyan students).
Won’t be able to fit Acting I into your class schedule? Musical tastes too obscure? Fear not, rising freshmen. The music and comedy groups profiled here are just a tiny fraction of student-run arts groups on campus. Most improv, sketch comedy, and a capella groups hold auditions every fall or at the beginning of each semester.
For most Wesleyan students, and college students in general, the pop culture catchphrase "I want my MTV!" died a long time ago. With shows like "TRL" and "MTV Cribs" pandering to the corporate music industry and image-obsessed pop stars, it’s no surprise that, except for the occasional guilty pleasure, liberal arts students thumb their noses at the mention of the network.
Name: Ben Seretan/The Cowardly Lionel. Group type: Mostly solo with electric guitar (still loud!!), sometimes acoustic (banjo?!), a lot of times with friends helping me out on drums or whatever I decide on a whim.
Profiles music group Jock Jams.
A career-driven woman watches her marriage fall apart, becomes isolated from her children, and weathers the scorn of the public. The plot details sound ripped from today’s tabloids, but "Fanny Kemble’s Lenox Address," a one-woman play performed Thursday, March 29 at the Russell House, tells a story firmly rooted in the past.
Profiles improv group Gag Reflex.
Name of Band: Belly Boat
Band Members: Silvie Margot Deutsch ’09, Zoe Ruth Cusmus Latta (Rhode Island School of Design ’08)
Name of group: Quasimodal, no, not Quasimodo, we ain’t no bell ringers, shoot.
Duality is perhaps the most apt word to sum up the skill and mindset of author Yael Hedaya, who spoke last Tuesday at Russell House in the Contemporary Israeli Voices Series. In her four-part lecture, entitled "Love is a Four-Letter Word: How My Life Changed My Writing and My Writing Changed My Life," Hedaya spoke on the dichotomy of the sexes, the struggle between romance and intellect, and life as an Israeli and an American.
Name of Group: The High Lonesome. Group Type: Old Time Folk String Band
Name of Group: The New Group. Group Type: 1) A cappella 2) Professional Curling Team
Name of Group: The EBB and The Flow. Group Type: Hip-Hop Funk. Group Members: Michael Berger ’08 – vocals, Christina Boyd ’10 – vocals, Jess Myhre ’09 – vocals, Dave Eastman ’07 – guitar, Jake Gold ’09 – keys, Luke Mecklenburg ’07 – bass, Christian Komecki ’08 – drums.
Name of Group: Cardinal Sinners. Group Type: A Cappella. Group Members: Emily Evnen ’10, Claire Kalambay ’07, Emilie Phelps ’07, Sara Maeder ’08, Mairead Maguire ’10, Veronica Slaght ’07, Breen McDonald ’10, Eliza Jones ’07, Rachel Kiel ’07, Cory Baldwin ’09, Margaux Weisman ’09.
It’s common knowledge that there’s no lack of student arts groups on campus. For those times you’re left deciding on whether to see the band at Eclectic or the one at Alpha-Delt, or when the closet a cappella enthusiast in you yearns to know the difference between Vocal Debauchery and New Group, The Argus is introducing a weekly column profiling two campus performing arts groups. Keep reading, and you’ll never have to wonder about that show you never made it to.
Though rain and other campus events led to two postponements, the spirit of Duke Day persevered when it finally came to fruition on the sun-kissed afternoon on Saturday, Nov. 11. Following the paths winding into the WestCo courtyard, one glimpsed clusters of students sprawled on blankets, sharing beers, and playing board games as various musical groups performed near Weshop.
The average Friday night on campus consists of students either stumbling around hallways in some stage of inebriation or attending the film series; on a productive evening, perhaps both. But on Oct. 9, many adventurous and eager students descended below Westco into the hollow space affectionately known as the Westco Cafe.
As the first speaker in the Wesleyan Writer’s Series, Peter Blauner ’82 shared parts of his sixth novel "Slipping Into Darkness" to an audience gathered in Russell House on Wednesday. Between reading passages from his book, Blauner spoke of wanting to portray characters driven by passion.
A man stands in front of the dirt mounds of a ubiquitous Beijing construction site. His dark suit fits him well. He squints, chin tilted upwards, a quiet smile of pride and optimism shaping his cheeks. A briefcase anchoring each hand intimates importance—perhaps he is a businessman; or, as suggested by his posture and the halo of polluted urban sky, he is the embodiment of the dutiful Chinese official.