Original Article: http://dartreview.com/archives/2004/10/29/week_in_review.php
Friday, October 29, 2004
Y2K Bug Disrupts Sorority Rush
When hundreds of future sorority girls are placed in a hall, immediately preceding declaration of their preferences, mayhem ensues. Despite leaden sorority recruiting rules forbidding preference discussion, the girls conferred with ease. Unsurprisingly, the result was block-rushes of certain houses, thus disrupting historical trends. The crash of the computer that ran the rush program, and alleged communication breakdowns, also added to a particularly volatile rush season. Despite all this, the Class of 2007's Bid Night on Tuesday, October 19th concluded with 42 girls pledging Alpha Xi Delta, 48 girls pledging Kappa Kappa Gamma, and 48 pledging Delta Delta Delta. Local houses received slightly smaller classes; with 35, 43, and 38 girls pledging at Epsilon Kappa Theta, Kappa Delta Epsilon, and Sigma Delta respectively.
Fish Fires Up Dartmouth Profs
Former University of Illinois dean, Stanley Fish, struck a nerve during an English panel discussion last Monday. Fish summarized his May op-ed piece in the New York Times with a three part plan for professors: "Do your own job, don't let anyone else do your job, don't do anyone else's job." His attack on the subjectivity of college professors was not received well. Fellow panelists, Professors Irene Kacandes and James Murphy, along with several members of the audience, engaged in a heated debate with Fish, lambasting him as hypocritical and preaching the ideal of objectivity in the classroom. "Come to class, keep up in your discipline, correct your papers, keep office hours, and that's it," he argued. Many of the professors took Fish's comments personally. "We must leave the idea of professors as disseminators of truth behind," German professor Irene Kacandes said heatedly. Dartmouth professors Roger Masters and Donald Pease resented Fish's comments. Masters rejected the idea of objectivity in the classroom declaring that if a professor has a finding or opinion that would have an effect on society "he has a moral obligation to do something about it." "This may be appropriate for general [expletive deleted] sessions after class is over," Fish retorted, but not academic instruction. After hearing such blasphemy, Pease, noticeable disturbed, began to point and shout at Fish, accusing him of narrow-mindedness. The irate Professor was soon asked to sit down by panel moderator Allen Stam. Fish remained cheerful and confident through the tirade. "Our job is not to change the world but to analyze it," Fish said.
College Provides Video Games, Wild Times
It remains common knowledge that nothing is more likely to bring masses of Sponges and Wimpos together than television, alcohol, and sex. Hoping to prevent participation in the latter two as part of its 'alternative social programming' campaign, the Programming Board was keen to present Video Game Night at the Collis Common Ground. Squads of kids clustered about a flickering screen, fondling their respective joysticks, everyone's mute attention fixated on collecting assorted power-up mushrooms. The sheer ecstasy of being in the middle of such a jamboree was only intermittently broken up by the sheer number of choices offered to party animals: Do I stare at the empty pizza boxes, or watch the guy playing Grand Theft Auto in a corner? After such a wild evening it remains to be seen whether the Programming Board's next foray into student entertainment, Burlesque Night, will be tolerated by the notoriously proper Greek system.
She's a Witch: Burn Her!
Not feeling like enough of an outcast yet? Perhaps you should consider Wicca, the religion shared by lots of regular folks around the globe who find monotheism so passé. If this philosophy intrigues you, or you were just wild about the elves in Return of the King, then you'll be giddy in the knees to discover that there is now a place where like-minded Dartmouth Wiccanites can hang out. Started by Emma Sloan '05 and Kevan Grimaldi '04, a new society for Dartmouth's Wicca community hopes to dispel the myths and heal a few trees (provided they get permission from said trees). So far the group commands a following of four undergraduates, a figure that is expected to grow as skill level improves. The group adamantly maintains that it need not be feared: Wiccanians are nonviolent, and any magick (that's with a 'k') performed by members is for the benefit of nature or improving study skills. As a matter of fact, the only possible danger is to its members' immortal souls. Possible damnation aside, Sloan explains there is nothing in the rules of Wiccanism that says anything about a little vanity now and then, saying "At some point we'll have a spiffy name."
Wiccans Ruin Halloween, Make Children Cry
Witches are again plaguing the American hinterlands, as evidenced by the decision of the school district in Puyallup, Washington to cancel all Halloween celebrations. Ageless fears, once thought banished with the dawning of modernity, have returned to this relatively tiny hamlet and the thought of that unrivaled hex—the lawsuit—forced the district toward heathen appeasement. Braving the wrath of the powerful coven community, various parents and faculty have come together to express some shock and anger over the fact their tots will no longer be allowed to dress in costume or embark upon the traditional hallway parade under threat of severe lectures and possible internment to the corner by the local constable. "Let them have their thirty minutes of acting goofy and having candy," argued a ruffled Silas Macon, father of two. Moments later his Rutabaga garden was mysteriously set upon by gophers.
Journal of Blacks in Higher Education Now Enjoys Our Pages
Close readers of the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education who opened our fresshmen issue this year with preconceived opinions of the Review may have been surprised by our review of Dartmouth's best professors. Particularly, our praise for Professor Cook caught the attention of the Journal itself, which recently reported that the "Review has named William Cook, a professor of English who is black, one of the college's best professors." Over the years, the Journal's estimation of the Review has ranged (one might say it has even improved) from a source of "barrages of racial hate" (in 1995) to "an irreverently conservative newspaper that black students view as offensive and racist" (in 1999). Its most recent description drops the adverb and adjective clause, calling the Review merely a "conservative student newspaper." While we would shamelessly add that we have not lost our irreverence, we appreciate the JBHE's recent good-faith description of this newspaper.
City Mouse Makes Devastating Calls Against Country Mouse
Last week, the Columbia Spectator published an anti-Dartmouth diatribe by Kwame Spearman. Mr. Spearman labeled Dartmouth a "cow-school." It was not funny.
Columbia sucks.