The Week in Review

Monday, April 21, 2008

Two Philosophy Professors Headed to Wash U.

Philosophy professors Roy Sorensen and Julia Driver will be leaving Dartmouth for Washington University at St. Louis at the end of spring term. The married couple have admitted increased salary and the opportunity to work with graduate students to be the deciding factors in their decision. The two distinguished scholars in their field will be occupying senior positions at the university. Washington University has also hired 14 other faculty members in the philosophy department as part of efforts to expand the department. The two admit to the strength of Dartmouth’s undergraduate program, but the possibility of working in a graduate program offered more opportunities for research and collaboration. In addition, the professors’ sons will be allowed to attend the university for free, or have a majority of their tuition paid by the college if they choose to go elsewhere. Faculty of the Dartmouth philosophy department declined to comment on the situation. Students hold these professors in high regard: Driver specializes in ethics and moral philosophy, teaching classes on those subjects. Sorenson specialized in the philosophy of language, with a special interest in conundrums like vagueness. Both were popular amongst students.

Student Life Committee Presents Findings...

It is truly disappointing that more people aren’t taking to heart the oppressive and unfair nature of the Greek system. It’s disheartening to know that the only place students can go to hang out with friends is a fraternity that offers free alcohol, but when there, they don’t have control over their surroundings. That’s why the college created the SLC—the Social Life Committee—to create social spaces where students won’t have to pay for alcohol and can control how the space is run. Essentially, this is the College’s attempt at social engineering. Maybe that might sound unrealistic, but free beer where one has control sounds great. That’s a perfect reason to support the SLC because they are there to make unreality into reality. This has been the College’s agenda since the Student Life Initiative, which was also a departure from reality, like the SLC.

Unfortunately, on Tuesday, April 1, the Committee’s panel event only had 20 people in attendance. Perhaps, the 800 students, who signed the petition last term to create the committee thought the panel event was an April fool’s joke. Regardless, the college is hiring professionals to perform a culture audit this term. The committee is trying to form focus groups for these professionals that will represent the whole student body. Hopefully, those focus groups will have many freshmen and unaffiliated students; it is not fair to see what the Greeks have to say because they have control of all the social spaces right now. It doesn’t matter that approximately 60% of eligible students are affiliated.

Acceptance Rate Falls

For the applicants for the class of 2012, acceptance rates at Dartmouth fell to a record low at 13.2%, declining 2.1%from last year’s rate of 15.3%. According to Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid Maria Laskaris ’84, 2,190 students were offered acceptance to the college, 400 of which were accepted through the Early Decision process. The College predicts approximately 1,080 students will matriculate; however this year could be different: Harvard and Princeton recently eliminated their Early Decision programs, so applicants that would have been accepted then are now in the applicant pool with the rest of the College’s applicants. Academically, the class of 2012 outdid their 2011 predecessors; 38.5% were valedictorians and 11.3% were salutatorians of their high schools. The class of 2012 is also more diverse, with 944 students, or 43%, identifying as a student of color. Applicants are expected to increase for the class of 2013. In the first few months of 2008, the number of high school students who have come to tour the college has nearly doubled since last year, a promising trend that signifies increased interest in applying or matriculating to our College on the Hill.

AoA Suit to go to Trial in November

The Association of Alumni suit will go to trial this November. The case will be presented in Grafton County Superior Court under the wholly original title, “Association of Alumni of Dartmouth College v. Trustees of Dartmouth College.” The trial will likely last 5-7 days. Bruce W. Felmly and Richard C. Pepperman will represent the defendant against Patrick E. Donovan of the plaintiff. Those with further interest in legal nattering can look up Case Number 07-E-0289 via New Hampshire’s judicial system.

Black Womanhood

The Hood Museum of Art recently debuted “Black Womanhood: Images, Icons, and Ideologies of the African Body,” an exhibit showcasing the work of African, European, American, and Caribbean artists. The tripartite exhibit presents centuries’ worth of portrayals of black women: “Iconic Ideologies of Womanhood” features traditional African art from tribes across the continent, “Colonizing Black Women: The Western Imaginary” simultaneously presents and condemns the over-sexualized mystique that Western cultures placed on black women, and “Meaning and Identity: Personal Journeys into Black Womanhood” highlights works of contemporary black female artists. These contemporary pieces constitute much of the exhibit. Many carry heavy political overtones, commenting on inequality still all too present in the modern world. South African artist Zanele Muholi addresses racial and gender inequality but also fights for acceptance of black lesbians in her 2003 photograph entitled “Sex ID Crisis.” “The preservation and mapping of our herstories is the only way for us black lesbians to be visible,” Muholi said of her work. Hanging in the center of the exhibit is Nandipha Mntambo’s Balandzeli, a sculpture of the feminine body whose construction entirely of cowhide rendered it one of the most striking pieces of all.

“Black Womanhood” will be on display until August 10.

Cannon May be Buried Under Memorial Field

Some pranks are just too good not to brag about. One alumnus with a particularly egregious tale decided the time had come to reveal the results of his extracurricular pursuits, before he succumbed to his final illness. And that’s how a World War I cannon came to be discovered under the stadium at Memorial Field.

It seems that in the 1960s, the Vermont Veteran’s Home had a cannon displayed outside their building that has been missing for many decades. During a football game this fall, a visiting alumnus casually mentioned this, and that the cannon could be found under their feet. Hanover Police officer Richard Paulsen has verified that there is an ammunition carriage half buried in mud and ice beneath the stadium, and a professor of geophysics has jumped into the fray by volunteering the future class time to locate the rest of the artillery piece using special equipment.

The authority figures in this story have been quick to caution that, despite the nostalgic charm of this story, a student attempting a similar prank would be charged with theft if caught, and presumably would earn something other than a troupe of camera crews and a police officer eager to play Indiana Jones for their troubles.

Dartmouth Professor’s Wife Arrested

Dartmouth Professor Richard Granger and his wife Lean Granger are in hot water this week after Hanover police recently took into custody the latter for embezzlement. Mrs. Granger is accused of stealing over $300,000 from a church in Southern California, where she acted as treasurer and bookkeeper for the Newport Harbor Lutheran church while Professor Granger taught at University of California, Irvine. Sgt. Evan Sailor of the Newport Harbor Police told reporters Mrs. Granger is under suspicion for having written herself enormous and thoroughly illegal checks over her four years at the church. An investigation of her activity began late 2006; on March 27th, Mrs. Granger was detained, but opted to return to California and the Newport Beach Police Department instead of remaining in Hanover. Her pre-trial hearing is scheduled for April 14th and bail is set at $500,000.

As the W.H. Neukom Professor of Computational Sciences and Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Richard Granger also owns Caspian Scientific, LLC., a neuroscience consulting firm registered in New Hampshire. The investigation surrounding Granger’s wife has heaped misgivings on Caspian, which may have used funds from Mrs. Granger’s illicit activities. Orange County prosecutor Yvette Patko, in charge of the case, has refused to comment on whether Caspian is under official investigation. However, New Hampshire’s company registry states the business is “not in good standing,” adding further layers of suspicion to what may already prove disastrous for a member of our community.

On behalf of Dartmouth Director of Periodicals and Communications Services Laurel Stavis stated, “The College is distressed to hear about this and our thoughts are with the family.” Further developments in the case should clarify whether and where guilt lies and how the College must deal with the results.

Debate Places Second at National Competition

At the end of March, the College’s policy debate team, officially known as the Dartmouth Forensic Union, traveled to California State University at Fullerton to participate in the National Debate Tournament. This year the topic for the competition concerned whether or not the United States federal government should establish a policy to constructively engage with the Middle East.

The three-day competition was involved and grueling, with the two teams from Dartmouth spending entire days debating. Nevertheless, their work was rewarded when the team of seniors Kade Olson and Josh Kernoff made it past the preliminary rounds of the tournament, and Olson placed within the top twenty individual speakers at the tournament. The final part of the tournament consists of a series of single elimination rounds, with the seeding determined by win-loss records in the preliminary debates. Kernoff and Olsen rose from their fifteenth-seeded position to defeat all of their opponents, including Harvard, the University of Kansas, and the University of Michigan, until the final round in which they battled Wake Forest University. Unfortunately, WFU bested our team this year, leaving Dartmouth in second place. Kernoff and Olsen were, however, optimistic, saying that next year’s debaters have plenty of potential.

Shirts Document Experiences with Sexual Assault

On April 2 the Dartmouth Sexual Assault Awareness Program again decorated the Collis Center with colorful t-shirts, each of which bears an anonymous student’s experience with sexual abuse. The Clothesline Project, as the display is known, aims to bring people face-to-face with the tragic reality of sexual assault, a fact rarely mentioned but still all too present. The Clothesline Project originated in Cape Cod in 1990 as a local undertaking to raise awareness of sexual assault. The movement spread across the country throughout the 1990s, and it is now a nationwide event that takes place every April, the month that has been officially designated as Sexual Assault Awareness Month since 2001.

The contents of the shirts vary. Some describe their creators’ experiences of rape or sexual abuse, while others are not as specific: “AN ORIFICE IS NOT AN OPPORTUNITY,” one shirt reads, while another states “Every time I walk past your house, I wonder how many girls have been raped there.” Several of the shirts also describe sexual assault and rape taking place on Dartmouth’s campus, debunking an all-too-widespread belief on campus that sexual violence “just doesn’t happen here,” as one ‘10 put it.

“I saw a whole spectrum of reactions, from surprise to people in tears to people saying how important it is and that they appreciated that we took the time to do that,” commented Rebel Roberts, interim director of the Dartmouth Sexual Assault Awareness Program. Roberts also stated that a third of all women in the 18-22 demographic will be sexually assaulted, a number which awareness-raising campaigns such as the Clothesline Project hope to lessen in the future.

The Clothesline Project will be on display in the Collis Center through Wednesday, April 16.

Nonie Darwish Speaks

Nonie Darwish renewed campus debate over the extent and effects of militant fundamentalist Islamic groups with a speech in the Collis Common Ground on April 9th. Growing up in Cairo and Gaza, she experienced Muslim culture in the Middle East firsthand and witnessed the destructive effects of radical Islam on society. She later converted to Christianity and now writes and speaks publicly on the dangers of militant Islam.

From this perspective, Darwish decried fundamentalist Muslim groups and the damage they cause at all levels of society. She noted that in addition to influencing leaders of Arab countries, radical Islam also affected the social mores of all parts of society around her. Darwish went on to state that radical groups have stifled political reform in Arab nations, threatening and assassinating proponents of change and liberalization. Tying into this, she claimed that leaders of Arab nations manipulate radical Islamic sentiment to direct the populaces’ attentions away from problems within their own countries and toward Israel and America. As support, she cited a survey of Egyptian citizens listing Israel as their primary problem, despite widespread unemployment and poverty.

Although outcry against the speech was far more subdued than the campus’ reaction to a similar speech made by Robert Spencer against Islamo-Fascism earlier this year, some students still took offense to Darwish’s statements. Shamis Mohamud ‘08, vice-president of Al-Nur, was quoted as saying “The Muslim community was troubled by the arrival of this controversial speaker. We are concerned that aspects of our religion were misrepresented, and we are looking forward to a dialogue with the organizers of the event and any other interested students.”

The Week in Review

Article Tools

Related Articles