September 2006

Snow in Shanghai

Monday evening, I got to meet students from all around the globe, fill up on an assortment of appetizers and learn that winters in Ohio yield more snow than in Shanghai.
I experienced these things at the Intercultural Speed Meet, the first event to kick off UD's Unity and Diversity Stop Hate Week.
The Intercultural Speed Meet, held on Kennedy Union field, was organized by UD's Center for International Programs and based on the concept of "speed dating."
"Instead of meeting people for the purpose of dating, the idea here is to meet and learn from people of various cultures," said Amy Anderson, center director.
I learned new facts about China, including Shanghai's weather, from student Zhenyu Xu. He shared with me his interest in skiing.
"Shanghai does not get much snow, so I am looking forward to the winter here for skiing," Xu said.
As we chatted with different people each round, we discussed things we have in common or family traditions. We also sampled from the long buffet of foods from each continent. I enjoyed a tasty Mexican spread with guacamole, sour cream and olives, as well as a sweet Middle Eastern dessert that tasted like cake and honey.
The Intercultural Speed Meet, which may become an annual event, gave me the chance to meet students from China, India and Peru as well as the U.S. who I may have otherwise never known.

by Caroline R. Miller ’07 9-28-06

Sounds delicious

Improvisation is something music professor Mark Brill knows well, and it isn't just about syncopation and downbeats. It's also a philosophy he brings to his cooking, the kind that makes his pasta taste better because of the Puccini playing in the background.
Brill's specialty, ethnomusicology, examines music in its cultural context. "We go to all corners of the world, not just cities but also into small villages," he said.
Well, they can't be in the field without sampling the local cuisine too. That happy combination -- music and food -- has resulted in The Ethnomusicologists' Cookbook, which combines recipes from around the world with essays about the links between food and music. Brill contributed a mole recipe he brought back from Oaxaca, Mexico, where he had been researching liturgical music.
Should there be a second edition, Brill has another recipe in mind, iguana in pipian sauce, a Mayan sauce found in Mexico's Yucatan region.
"It's lighter than the mole. Iguana is tasty. I have a whole cookbook on iguana recipes."
Interviews with the book's editor, Sean Williams, aired this month on "A Chef's Table" on WHYY in Philadelphia (RealPlayer version) and "Good Food" on KCRW in Santa Monica, Calif. (Windows Media, RealPlayer; starts just after the 24:00 mark.)

by Matthew Dewald 9-28-06

More than hip-hop

Burnt Sugar isn’t a dessert; it's a concoction of jazz, punk, rock and R&B.
“I’d like to say we never play anything the same way once,” said Dayton native, journalist and musician Greg Tate. The founder of the New York-based "arkestra," Tate stopped by the Marianist Learning Center to give the lecture “More Than Hip-Hop: Black Music & Culture in America” as part of Burnt Sugar's UD Arts Series residency programs this week.
Tate reminisced to the audience of mornings when he would wake up in Dayton to find prominent civil rights activists or members of the Black Panthers “floating around getting coffee and oatmeal in the kitchen.” He also discussed how hip-hop music and culture have gained mainstream acceptance since the 1980s.
“Hip-hop journalist — that’s something you can put on your tax return. That’s a credible profession,” he said.
Burnt Sugar: The Arkestra Chamber performs at 8 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 30, at Boll Theatre.

by Anna Sexton ’07 9-28-06

Mug shots

A woman stares straight ahead, wide eyes drenched in powder blue eye shadow, the blood smeared across her face slowly seeping onto her tattered prom dress. A few feet away a woman displays the brightly etched female pirate tattoo on her arm as she smiles at the camera through a thicket of black bangs.
These are just some of the images to be found at ArtStreet Studio D, adjacent to ArtStreet Café, in Mark “The Cobra Snake” Hunter’s exhibit of candid photos.
The photos are grouped in fours, showing spectators a theme captured in different ways. One section highlights tattoos, while another concentrates on hands – hands waving in the air at a concert and hands with unicorns painted on red fingernails.
The exhibit is on display through Oct. 6 and is free and open to the public from 8 a.m. to midnight weekdays, noon to 6 p.m. Saturdays, and noon to midnight Sundays. A panel will discuss the images today at noon.

by Kathleen Miller ’07 9-27-06

Separate lives

"I wanted to write a legal thriller with a mythic structure. So readers will find that there is a strong resemblance between the characters in my book and the characters in Star Wars."
This is how Kermit Roosevelt, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School and the great, great grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt, described his novel, In the Shadow of the Law, during Monday afternoon's discussion in the Heck Courtroom. Roosevelt came to Dayton to receive the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, which recognizes writers whose books address themes of peace as a solution to conflict.
Roosevelt said he wanted to highlight the problem lawyers face when their professional lives are separated from their personal lives. He said if lawyers submit to this separation, they sacrifice their moral judgment in favor of legal judgment, which can be dangerous.
"As lawyers, we should be worried about the sacrifice of independent moral judgment," Roosevelt said. "If you submerge yourself into your professional identity, your actual self will wither and die."
When asked by a member of the audience what the solution to this problem is, Roosevelt said pro bono work helps lawyers maintain their morals by reconciling the two selves to create a complete lawyer.

by Kathleen Miller ’07 9-20-06

A timeless formula, free food = happy students

As they do every fall, alumni leaders gathered on campus last weekend for their annual meeting. NAA board members, Reunion Weekend co-chairs and alumni chapter representatives reconnected with campus, discussed current initiatives and planned for the year ahead.
This year, the alumni chapter presidents brought a little something extra with them: regional foods for the students. Boston alumni brought clam chowder and served it in the San Francisco chapter's sourdough bread while the aroma of New York-style pizza drifted over from nearby. Hundreds of students came to ArtStreet Saturday afternoon for a taste.
Click the photo for a slideshow of highlights.

by Matthew Dewald 9-19-06

Resisting tyranny

No matter the tyrant -- a spouse, a state or a character like Humbert Humbert from Lolita -- each is a bit seductive because of the partial truth tyrants reveal.
"I realized that my students could understand this interpretation of Lolita especially because of their own experience," said Azar Nafisi, author of Reading Lolita in Tehran. She talked about her memoir and the Iranian students with whom she discussed literature and life during an afternoon session with UD students and faculty. The session was followed by a public lecture as part of the Diversity Lecture Series.
During one of those reading sessions in her living room in Iran, a student asked why sad and tragic stories make us happy. "Is it not sinful to feel pleasure when reading about something so terrible?" Nafisi wrote of the student's question.
A similar question was posed to Nafisi during the UD session: Is it a struggle to find pleasure in writing about something terrible, something oppressive?
Nafisi responded with the power of imagination and storytelling. "As human beings, that's all we have: to resist all the cruelty of life, to say that we have not let it capture us, that we have captured it."

by Michelle Tedford 9-14-06

Disarm with charm

This Sunday, millions of Americans will meet Tom Rock ’88.
Rock (left) and his partner, Terry Cosentino, start their televised adventure at 8:30 p.m. EDT on CBS's "Amazing Race 10" as 12 teams race through 13 countries toward a $1 million prize. Rock and Cosentino, who have been dating for two years, are described by the show as "feisty, fun-loving and full of laughter"; however, they reveal in a CBS pre-show interview that they intend to disarm their opponents with charm and, like puppet-masters, "cut their strings off."
"But we'll be nice and we'll be friendly," Rock adds.
Rock also explains how he trained -- in only three weeks -- for the race. "I started to wear a backpack to work every day. I actually walked from my apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan to my job in Morningside Heights."
Rock is director of admissions at Teachers College, Columbia University, in New York City and worked in the UD admission office from 1988-1991. The perennial public relations major asked if he could wear UD clothing on the show. The answer from producers was no. He did say, though, that he would mention UD as many times as he could.
The show airs at 8 p.m. each Sunday. More details are available on Reality TV World.

by Michelle Tedford 9-14-06

Saving cities, building houses

Last month, UD staff traded in their computers and desks for paintbrushes and power tools. As part of their first service outing, 18 staff members from enrollment management helped put up drywall and spread gravel with Habitat for Humanity.
Sharon Wright, who organized the Aug. 30-31 events, said, "We like working as a staff and doing things together. It is nice to be able to work with your hands and take a break from the office.”
UD information technology staff also volunteer with Habitat. Jim Mielcarek, who initiates service outings for his staff, said, "I always wanted to get involved with Habitat for Humanity as a student, but never seemed to have the time. Since graduation, I've realized there's never enough time, but it's important to make some for serving our community."
“Since service is so big at UD, it's important for the staff, too,” said Wright, who plans to continue such office service outings. UD recently ranked third in the national "Saviors of our Cities" list for universitywide commitment to community revitalization and civic engagement.

by Sarah Barnidge ’07 9-13-06

Paper cranes

Lettuce, rice, corn and colorful paper were set on tables across from a curious crowd. No, this wasn't Chipotle but an origami and sushi demonstration held at ArtStreet recently.
Students from the Sugiyama Women's University in Japan enrolled in UD's Intensive English Program taught many UD students the right way to practice the Asian arts of paper folding and sushi rolling. Eight young women dressed in kimonos sat two at a table, as students and faculty gathered around.
Instead of the usual raw fish, ham and eggs were used to make the sushi. Paper cranes sprang to life from the students’ practiced fingers.
Masahide Kasahara, professor of intercultural communications for Sugiyama University, enjoyed seeing his students apply their advancing English knowledge to communicate with UD students. He said that Dayton is a great location for the language program. "In Dayton it's rare for them to see other Japanese. It's a very good thing for them to learn English," he said.
Kasahara said that Sugiyama has been sending students to UD for four years, and next year the program will extend their stay in the United States from one month to six months. The students stay with host families in the Dayton community while attending classes on campus.
"It's a beautiful thing, a lot of nature," student Saori Komatsuki said about Dayton. "I like the country."

by Johnnie Kling ’09 9-12-06

Atomic art

Delicate circles too finely filigreed to be etched by an artisan's hand are revealed when diatoms -- single-celled algae with a hard shell -- are placed under the environmental scanning electron microscope. This image, which shows each diatom at about 120 microns wide, barely greater than the width of a human hair, was captured in the Nanoscale Engineering Science and Technology Laboratory in the Science Center. The NEST Web site updates its images monthly, including strands of asbestos, the delicate skeletons of radiolaria (marine protozoa) and a material of the future, carbon nanotubes.

by Michelle Tedford 9-8-06

Poetry shocks

I hate poetry.
However, this semester I signed up for Modern Poetry, with much trepidation.
The first day of class exploited my fears with terms such as sestina and dramatic monologue and poets such as Frost and Yeats. I walked from class discouraged that I would never be able to understand or appreciate the tricky meanings behind each poem.
But then I started reading the poetry of Ezra Pound and I made a shocking discovery: I actually liked his poetry. Even more shocking was that I not only understood the meaning of his poetry, but that I could appreciate the poetry for what it symbolized.
In a two-line poem, which would once have seemed random and meaningless, I now see the faces of strangers that blur into beauty amidst the backdrop of a dark train station:
“The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet, black bough.”

by Kathleen Miller ’07 9-7-06

Back to school

Peek in on a softball game, climb a wall at RecPlex, attend an ArtStreet concert and take a stroll along the brick pavers at Marianist Hall in this virtual tour created by UD's Media Production Group. The video highlights some of the newest campus buildings, giving you a view of where today's students are learning and living. (Requires Windows Media Player.)

by Michelle Tedford 9-1-06

In her words

Photographer Julianne Burling ’'08: "I took the photo while in Kumba, Cameroon, with UD's cultural immersion program. I was actually just going to take a picture of the tree in the background, but the little boy excitedly ran into view so that he could have his photo taken. He posed perfectly, and I love the photo. He is holding a stick and an old tire, the toys of Kumba's young. They run down the streets spinning the wheel with the stick.
" I love this photo because this little boy, no pants and an oversized shirt, is standing high, chest out, and grinning wide with his toys by his side. He is happy and proud. ... That's what I want people to see when they look at the photo."
"Cameroon Life" by finance and economics major Julianne Burling is on display in ArtStreet Studio D as part of an exhibition of works by current ArtStreet residents. The exhibit runs through Sept. 15.

by Matthew Dewald 9-1-06

Scavenger hunt

College education began for 30 freshmen before classes even started.
On Wednesday, Aug. 15, the Berry Scholars Class of 2010 participated in a scavenger hunt that began at Kennedy Union and ended at ArtStreet. Students hiked UD's terrain while deciphering clues and solving riddles about campus landmarks.
Student leaders organized the scavenger hunt to familiarize first-year scholars with campus offices such as the bursar and health center. The goal of the activity was to ease apprehensions of the incoming students.
The Marianist tradition of community was emphasized throughout the three-day Berry Leadership Institute as students participated in community-building activities coordinated by upper-class Berry Scholars student leaders.
"I wanted to be a student leader for this institute because of the many opportunities the Berry Scholars program has given to me," senior Erin Moosbrugger said. "I wanted to be able to help create a program for incoming students to make them aware of these opportunities and the importance of taking advantage of them."

by Anna Sexton ’07 9-1-06