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(04/14/14 6:01am)
I wish I could capture what I felt as a high school senior quickly approaching graduation and directly contrast it with what I am feeling now as I am about to graduate from Duke. I remember I was completely numb to high school because I was so possessed by my expectations for the future. Now, it’s laughable. I, like many of you, was obsessed with the abstract idea of college. And, now with some hindsight perspective, I realize I was mostly fascinated by the idea of being part of an ancient, idealized institution more so than college itself. My fantasies of college consisted of me sitting in a leather chair, reading a big book and wearing oxfords. The ideal image I created for the future wasn’t because of my love for intellectualism or leatherwear, but because these were the images I associated with being part of an institution necessary to legitimize my existence.
(03/31/14 8:59am)
On Thursday, March 27, a 17-year-old student from Southeast Raleigh High School named Selina Garcia was released from prison after being held there for 21 days—long after a judge ordered her release—because the state foster care system couldn’t find a place for her. Why was a 17-year-old girl being held in an adult prison for three weeks in the first place? She got into a fight on a school bus. What was so special about this fight that landed Selina in prison? Well, nothing. There were absolutely no reported injuries or damage. The official charges Selina pleaded guilty to were “disorderly conduct and communicating threats.”
(03/17/14 6:14am)
I grew up in a working-middle class neighborhood where all of the houses looked exactly the same, a handful of people had college degrees and most led average, comfortable suburban lifestyles. Throughout elementary school, all of the mothers would gather in the cul de sac with lawn chairs and chitchat while watching the kids play. It is probably a familiar image: Mothers staying home, caring for children, cooking and cleaning. This was the norm that remained unquestioned. In this context, standards for success were clear. Stable families with two children and no talk of divorce was the ideal that made people the happiest, and what I, and my young neighbors, would one day aspire to.
(03/03/14 11:24am)
Most of the discussion surrounding a Duke woman’s decision to participate in pornography has focused on the feminist and gendered implications of being involved in a sex work industry, but we have neglected to mention the economic structures that influence such decision-making. The fact of the matter is, when thinking about career options and economic viability, women are forced to operate in a different framework than men.
(02/17/14 11:24am)
When I think of the impacts of special interest groups on democracy, I typically only think of the electoral impacts. I think of the millions of dollars opaquely poured into campaigns and strategy groups and how that translates into Election Day results. I never think about the impacts of campaign finance on drinking water. But, in North Carolina, where 82,000 tons of coal ash leaked from a Duke Energy pipe into the Dan River—a river that is the water source for several cities in Virginia and North Carolina, I can’t help but draw the connection.
(02/03/14 12:50pm)
My first year at Duke, I enrolled in a class with the Center for Documentary Studies that would mold my college experience. It didn’t introduce me to professors, internships or leadership positions. Instead it introduced me to a little old man at a march in downtown Raleigh. It was the first time I had been to Raleigh. It was cold and overcast, yet, for some reason, thousands of people had decided to assemble with the North Carolina NAACP for the annual Historic Thousands on Jones Street march. I talked to people with clipboards about voting against North Carolina’s Amendment One, which defined marriage between one man and one woman. People told me how proposed voter ID legislation would make it especially difficult for low-income people, people of color, seniors and students like myself to vote—essentially functioning like a new-age Jim Crow. But what left the most lasting impression was a conversation I had with this little, fiery, old man.
(01/08/14 9:08am)
Jan. 1, 2014 marked an extremely difficult day for the 1.3 million people who lost their unemployment benefits, but this wasn’t the only new legislation targeted toward those living in poverty. In North Carolina, the GED test, which was formerly administered by the nonprofit American Council on Education is now under the control of a public-private partnership with Pearson VUE, the largest for profit testing agency in the United States. The changes in administration will prove to present many difficult obstacles for North Carolinians trying to take the GED test—most of these low-income, minority citizens. Access to postsecondary education is commonly recognized as the most viable way to establish middle class earnings. A GED diploma is an important tool for advancing education and technical skills, leading people to better opportunities.
(12/09/13 9:05am)
Last year I had the opportunity to travel to South Africa as part of the DukeImmerse Freedom Struggles program, which studied the history of the civil rights movement in the United States and the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa. Our first official outing of the program was visiting Constitution Hill, the site for the highest court in the country. After arriving at the location, I immediately was overcome by the power of those involved in the anti-apartheid struggle. The location, which was formerly a prison for some of the country’s most renowned political activists including Mahatma Gandhi, Walter Sisulu and Nelson Mandela, now represents a place for solidarity and democracy.
(12/06/13 1:53pm)
After publishing a column questioning the working condition and workers rights policies at DKU, I received an email from Nora Bynum, the former director of global strategy for DKU who is currently on sick leave. In the email, she asked if I “had a chance to look at the brief report that [she] prepared for the Academic Council last year which spoke about workers rights and wages in perhaps a more balanced way.” I don’t know what exactly was insinuated with the phrase “more balanced way.” Perhaps she was suggesting I had a particular agenda when questioning the details of working conditions at Kunshan, or maybe she wanted to give her fair, removed, unbiased perspective on the situation as the vice provost for DKU.
(11/22/13 5:34pm)
In September of this year, The Chronicle reported that Duke paid for three Chinese journalists to visit campus in Durham and get a clearer picture of how the University operates in the United States. The article was then updated to reflect that it was actually Duke Kunshan University which paid for the Chinese journalists’ visit, thereby establishing DKU as a financial institution separate from Duke University. This may seem like a reasonable, unsurprising decision—DKU’s operation is substantive enough to demand its own finances, and the context DKU operates within is dramatically different from Duke in Durham. Some of the reasoning behind other financial and governing decisions concerning DKU, however, seems less intuitive. And as institutional control becomes more removed from Duke, it becomes more difficult to determine if our DKU leadership and Chinese partners will make decisions with the same institutional values we uphold in Durham.
(11/08/13 9:22am)
On Tuesday night, America watched as Bill de Blasio defeated Republican candidate Joe Lhota by a landslide in the New York City mayoral race. The city has lived through 20 years of Republican rule, skyrocketing housing prices and the advent of stop and frisk—a political environment that left de Blasio perfectly poised to claim a Democratic victory. But as recent as July, de Blasio’s victory was far from certain. Most major polls showed former city council member Christine Quinn as the clear frontrunner. She would become the next mayor of New York, and we were all sort of OK with it.
(10/25/13 9:00am)
When Duke announced the construction of Duke Kunshan University in the Jiangsu province of China in 2010, our University community was left with many unanswered questions. Some of these questions include: How would faculty be mobilized, how sustainable would the research be, if the program is targeted toward English speaking Chinese students, would there be enough incentive for Chinese students to pay Duke tuition without the benefits of living abroad, would Chinese students pay Duke tuition given the much lower cost of attendance at Chinese universities and what sort of intellectual freedom could Duke students and faculty exercise? Now it’s October 2013, and the Duke in China reference sheet, which was last updated in 2012, said the campus would open in the 2013-2014 school year pending the approval of the Chinese government. Yet, we are still without answers.
(09/27/13 11:00am)
There is a primary election going on right now and a municipal election in a few weeks. It’s probably safe to say most of us don’t know much about it. Contrary to the popular belief of some Duke students, we do indeed live in Durham, North Carolina, and, if we are going to act like we are real stakeholders in the community—which we are, we need to start paying attention. There isn’t some massive rallying call and Nancy Pelosi isn’t sending you emails telling you “she needs you”, but these elections probably affect you and your daily routine more than any election at the federal level.
(09/13/13 11:40am)
For my first two years, I felt like attending school at Duke was totally manageable. I had a hefty financial aid package with a few federally subsidized student loans to cover the cost. It wasn’t the ideal situation, but it was doable. Then, in June, two months before the start of a new semester, I was informed that I didn’t qualify for any financial aid package or federally subsidized student loans. With the summer coming to an end, I, like 60 percent of my college-attending peers, felt trapped. I didn’t have time to transfer to a more affordable school and didn’t want to leave Duke, so I decided the best solution was to accelerate my graduation by a year and take out a massive, private student loan. I felt a sense of crippling guilt. I felt helpless. Student loans seemed like this necessary evil 38.8 million of us just willingly accepted as we watched our debt rise and interest rates double. The only conversations surrounding student loan debt involved Senator Warren’s plan which suggests students borrow money at the same interest rates the Federal Reserve lends to bank. But sadly, 0.75 percent interest on tens of thousands of dollars feels like putting a band-aid on a wound. It’s time we as college students start having serious conversations about one of the only movements that adequately tackle this crisis: strike debt.
(08/30/13 9:30am)
Aug. 28, 2013 marked the 50th anniversary of the historic March on Washington, or what Martin Luther King, Jr. referred to as the time to “rise from the dark, desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of social justice.” Given the fact that the anniversary march was titled “The National March to Realize the Dream,” we can all agree that this sunlit path remains overshadowed by stand-your ground laws, Voter ID laws, gentrification, stop and frisk—the list goes on. However, the real “dream” of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the civil rights movement—a dream that is complicated and multidimensional, but combines racial justice with economic equality and anti-war sentiments—has been pushed aside and replaced by the messaging of folks from John F. Kennedy to Glenn Beck who often quote a single line of King’s 1963 address—messaging that conveniently dovetails with a political agenda. The march has been watered down to “I have a dream that one day my four little children will be judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” By doing so, our nation’s leaders can ignore cries for economic equality and justice, and promote the idea that people are in a color-blind, level-playing-field society where they can be judged solely by their character.
(07/01/13 10:18pm)
Recess writer Adrienne Harreveld spoke with the incoming director of the Center for Documentary Studies, Wesley Hogan, about her past work, her decision to come to Duke and her vision for CDS.
(07/01/13 6:14pm)
The history of Duke Presidential houses follows a path of personal taste, political motive and professional preference that sprawls far past Campus Drive, literally. Throughout its history, Duke reserved residences for faculty and administration.
(04/11/13 9:16am)
Professor Stephen Jaffe, Mary and James H. Semans Professor of Music Composition, has made numerous concertos, recordings and compositions. His music has been performed by world-renowned symphony orchestras. But on April 14, audiences can hear the world premiere of his new composition “Southern Lights” performed by Durham’s own symphony orchestra.
(03/28/13 8:21am)
The mention of a “documentary arts” gallery brings to mind a few familiar elements: arranged photographs, maybe some small flat screens playing short films or a set of headphones accompanying an audio piece. More unexpected would be recreations of a Mormon teenage girl’s bedroom or a locker filled with a stripper’s glittery high heels and fake eyelashes. Duke’s MFA program in Experimental and Documentary Arts (MFA|EDA), whose inaugural graduating class will show their thesis works throughout Durham until Apr. 14 as part of MFA|EDA 2013, embraces the unexpected by making a home for—and often blending—both artistic paradigms.
(02/21/13 10:26am)
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are not always on top of the music world, but they’re always up to speed. Through their long career—they released their first album in 1983 and have released 15 subsequent albums—Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds know how to adapt their style to the sounds of the times. In the 90s they released rock ballads like those of R.E.M. and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, and in 2009 when bands like Vampire Weekend and Arcade Fire were making it big, they imitated the popular multi-faceted chamber orchestrations. Now the band has ventured into the dream pop, dream rock and even the slightly avant-garde as popularized by artists like Sharon Van Etten and continued by other old-timers Tom Waits and John Cale.
