Writer and Environmental Activist Jenny Price to Give Reading on Campus

Posted on January 23, 2013 by Cristal Steuer

Jenny Price

Jenny Price, writer and environmental activist, will give a reading as part of the Working Writers Series on Thursday, Feb. 7 at 7:30 p.m. in Rehm Library at the College of the Holy Cross. The event, sponsored by the College’s Creative Writing Program and environmental studies, is free and open to the public.

Price is a writer, Los Angeles Urban Ranger, and research scholar at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Center for the Study of Women. She writes about the environment, Los Angeles, environmentalism, gun control, the Malibu beach wars, and public space.  Author of “Flight Maps: Adventures with Nature in Modern America” (Basic Books, 1999) she’s written for numerous media outlets including GOOD, Sunset, Believer, Audubon, The New York Times, and Los Angeles Times, and writes “Green Me Up, JJ” a not-quite advice column for L.A. Observed. With the Urban Rangers art collective, she has conducted such projects as Downtown L.A. Trail System and Public Access 101: Malibu Public Beaches; has led workshops in the U.S. and abroad; and has been a resident artist at the Orange County Museum of Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art. She gives frequent tours of the concrete Los Angeles river, to emphasize its central importance to L.A.’s past, present, and future.

She has taught at UCLA, the University of Southern California, and Antioch-Los Angeles; has been a Guggenheim fellow and two-time NEH fellow; and was the Anschutz Distinguished Fellow in American Studies at Princeton University in fall 2011. She has an A.B. from Princeton, where as a biology major she studied the white-winged trumpeters of the Amazon rain forest; and a Ph.D. in history from Yale University, where she studied the plastic pink flamingos of the American grasslands.

She is currently working on a new book titled “Stop Saving the Planet! & Other Tips for 21st Century Environmentalists.”

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Holy Cross Presents the Seelos Film Series for Spring 2013

Posted on January 21, 2013 by College of the Holy Cross

Seelos

The following films will be shown at the Seelos Theater at the College of the Holy Cross.  All films are free and open to the public on a first-come, first-served basis.  For additional information, please call the Seelos Theater Box Office at 508-793-2455.

“Bully”
Wed., Jan. 23:  Showings at 3 and 8 p.m.  Rated PG-13.  Starring Alex Libby, Ja’Maya Jackson and Kelby Johnson. With studies showing that nearly half of all school children have been bullied at one time in their lives, this eye-opening documentary takes you into the lives of five children, who find themselves victimized by a bully. The film also shares stories from the victims’ families as their children try to deal with these problems.

“Wuthering Heights”
Fri., Jan. 25 and Sat., Jan. 27:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated NR.  Starring Kaya Scodelano, James Howson and Solomon Glave.  This film takes a different look at the classic novel. The audience meets Heathcliff, who is taken in by a rich family in England, is abused by his foster brother and becomes deeply obsessed with his foster sister, Cathy.

“Looper”
Wed., Jan. 30:  Showings at 3 and 8 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis and Emily Blunt.  In 2074, time travel is invented and crime bosses use it to send their victims back in time where they are shot by a Looper, who gets paid in silver.  But when it’s “time to close the loop” the real adventure begins.

“Lawless”
Fri., Feb. 1 and Sat., Feb. 2:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Tom Hardy, Shia La Beauf and Guy Pierce.  Three brothers are trying to run a successful bootlegging business during the Prohibition era. But angry agents, gangsters, the mob, and a preacher’s daughter, make it a lot tougher than planned.  

“Farewell, My Queen”
Wed., Feb. 6:  Showings at 3 and 8 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Diane Kruger, Léa Seydoux and Virginie Ledoyen.  This drama portrays the last days of monarchy during the beginning of the French Revolution. The story is told by Sidonie Laborde (Seydoux), the Queen’s reader, who won’t leave the side of her Queen, Marie Antoinette (Kruger).

“The Perks of Being a Wallflower”
Fri., Feb. 8 and Sat., Feb. 9:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated PG-13.  Starring Logan Lerman, Emma Watson and Ezra Miller.  A “must-see” movie about adolescence and coming-of-age, the film follows Charlie (Lerman), a shy kid who wants to be like everyone else, as he befriends two high school seniors, Patrick (Miller) and his stepsister Sam (Watson).

“Anna Karenina”
Wed., Feb. 13:  Showings at 3 and 8 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Keira Knightley, Jude Law and Aaron Taylor-Johnson.  Set in 19th-century Russian high society, an entanglement of affairs changes the lives of many. Anna Karenina (Knightley) tries to put lives back together while her own is falling apart.

“Brave”
Fri., Feb. 15 and Sat., Feb. 16:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated PG.  Starring Emma Thompson, Kelly Macdonald and Billy Connolly.  Awarded a Golden Globe for “Best Animated Feature Film,” this Disney movie takes place in Scotland with the very talented and independent Princess Merida, who defies tradition and her mother, by entrusting a witch and making several wrong choices.  In the end, she must use her strength and courage to make everything right again.

“The Other Son”
Wed., Feb. 20:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.  Rated PG-13.  Starring Emmanuelle Devos, Pascal Elbé, Jules Sitruk, and Mehdi Dehbi.  As Joseph Silberg (Sitruk) prepares to join the Israeli army, he learns that he was switched at birth with Yacine Al Bezaaz (Dehbi ), a child of a Palestinian family.  With both families shattered by the news, only their values, beliefs and hopes can help them through.

“Seven Psychopaths”
Fri., Feb. 22 and Sat., Feb. 23:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Colin Farrell, Woody Harrelson and Sam Rockwell.  Marty Faranan (Farrell) is a struggling writer trying to finish his screenplay, “Seven Psychopaths.”  Complications with his friends—including a dognapping, a violent gangster, thugs, and a shootout in the desert—makes finishing the screenplay a little easier.

“A Royal Affair”
Wed., Feb. 27:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m. Rated R.  Starring Alicia Vikander, Mads Mikkelsen and Mikkel Boe Folsgaard.  This historical drama revolves around a Queen (Vikander), who is married to the mentally ill King Christian VII of Denmark, but falls in love with their royal physician, Struensee (Mikkelsen).  Together, they start a revolution.

“Argo”
Wed., Mar. 13:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m. Rated R. Starring Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston and John Goodman.  This film received two Golden Globe awards for “Best Picture” and “Best Director” (Ben Affleck). Based on true events, this deeply moving drama takes place in 1979 as militants storm the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in retaliation for the nation’s sheltering of the recently disposed Shah. With six fugitives hiding, Tony Mendez (Affleck), a CIA specialist, devises a very different plan to get them out of Iran.

“Skyfall”
Fri., Mar. 15 and Sat., Mar. 16:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated PG-13.  Starring Daniel Craig, Javier Bardem, Judi Dench, and Naomie Harris. Another action-packed James Bond thriller, this time Bond (Craig) investigates an attack on M16 headquarters, a plot by former M16 operative Raoul Silva (Bardem) to humiliate, discredit and kill M (Dench), as revenge against her for betraying him.  With action happening around every corner, this movie will keep you at the edge of your seat!

“The Master”
Wed., Mar. 20:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Joaquin Phoenix and Amy Adams.  This drama examines the world of Freddie Quell (Phoenix), a WWII veteran struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder syndrome.  He meets Lancaster Dodd (Hoffman), a cult leader who tries to help him work through his problems, but Quell becomes a little too involved with the cult. 

“Flight”
Fri., Mar. 22 and Sat., Mar. 23:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Nadine Velazquez, Denzel Washington and Carter Cabassa.  Nominated for two Academy Awards, this drama takes you flying with “Whip” Whitaker (Washington), a pilot who becomes a “hero” for saving 96 lives after a plane crash. The plot deepens when an investigation is launched and the audience learns more about the troublesome findings of the crash and Whitaker.  

“Lincoln”
Wed., Apr. 3:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.  Rated PG-13.  Starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field and David Strathairn.  Produced by Steven Spielberg and nominated for 12 Oscars, this biography covers the last four months of Lincoln’s life including the hardest decision Lincoln ever had to make:
end slavery or end the war.

“Killing Them Softly”
Fri., Apr. 5 and Sat., Apr. 6:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Brad Pitt, Ray Liotta and Richard Jenkins.  In this “kill-or-be-killed” crime thriller, Jackie (Pitt) is a mob enforcer who is called in to clean up a mess after an underworld card game robbery.  The heist starts a chain of events whereas if you know too much, you’re out.

“Life of Pi”
Wed., Apr. 10:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.  Rated PG.  Starring Suraj Sharma, Irrfan Khan and Adil Hussain.  Nominated for 11 Oscars, this fantasy adventure revolves around Pi (Sharma) and his survival after being stranded on a boat in the Pacific Ocean with a very unusual boat guest, a Bengal tiger!

“The Hobbit”
Fri., Apr. 12 and Sat., Apr. 13:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated PG-13.  Starring Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen and Richard Armitage.  Take a journey with Bilbo Baggins (Freeman) and a group of dwarves as they attempt to reclaim their stolen mountain home.  With many obstacles to conquer along the way, including giant spiders, goblins, sorcerers, creatures, and even a dragon, the adventure requires much courage and strength from Bilbo.

“The Sessions”
Wed., Apr. 17:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring John Hawkes, Helen Hunt and William Macy.  Based on a true story, Mark O’Brien (Hawkes) is a journalist and poet, paralyzed from the neck down by polio and has breathed with an iron lung much of his life.  He’s very accomplished in all aspects of life, except for one.  With the help of his priest, therapist and a sex surrogate, he journeys into manhood.

“Ruby Sparks”
Fri., Apr. 19 and Sat., Apr. 20:  Showing at 7 p.m. Rated R. Starring Paul Dano, Zoe Kazan and Annette Bening.  This romantic comedy revolves around Calvin Weir-Fields (Dano), who creates an imaginary girlfriend named Ruby Sparks (Kazen), who comes to life through Calvin’s writing.  As only Calvin has the power to control her, things get pretty complicated for the couple.

“Silver Linings Playbook”
Wed., Apr. 24:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence and Robert De Niro.  Pat Solitary (Cooper) is just released from a mental health facility and moves back in with his parents after finding out that his wife has left him.  He enlists help to try and get his wife back, but love intervenes.

“Django Unchained”
Fri., Apr. 26 and Sat., Apr. 27:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz and Leonardo DiCaprio.  Set in 1858, Django, a freed slave, teams up with a bounty hunter, to free his wife, who is enslaved by a brutal Mississippi plantation owner.

“Les Miserables”
Wed., May 1:  Showings at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.  Rated PG-13.  Starring Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, and Amanda Seyfried.  Winner of a Golden Globe award for “Best Motion Picture,” and based upon the 1862 French Novel, Jean Valjean (Jackman) is released from prison and becomes a new man with a very successful life.  It’s fate when he meets the very ill Fantine (Hathaway) of which he promises to raise her daughter, Cosette (Seyfried).

“This is 40”
Fri., May 3 and Sat., May 4:  Showing at 7 p.m.  Rated R.  Starring Paul Rudd, Leslie Mann and Maude Apatow.  A comedy sequel to the film “Knocked Up,” the movie continues to follow the lives of Pete (Rudd) and Debbie (Mann) as they turn 40 and deal with jobs and raising children.

By Christine Gemme

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Yale Professor to Lecture on Burial Rites in Modern Fiction

Posted on January 21, 2013 by Danielle Kane

Lewis

Pericles Lewis, an expert on literary modernism at Yale University, will give a free, public talk titled “Burial of the Dead in Modern Fiction,” on Tuesday, Feb. 12 at 4:30 p.m. in Rehm Library, Smith Hall at the College of the Holy Cross.

Lewis will explore the treatment of death rituals in the work of authors such as James Joyce, Marcel Proust, Virginia Woolf, Joseph Conrad, D. H. Lawrence, Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann, and William Faulkner. Rethinking the secularization thesis as it has been applied to modern fiction, he will explore the fascination with Pagan and especially Homeric accounts of death as an alternative to Christianity, and the awareness of the potential of the novel form for ironic treatment of rites surrounding death.

Lewis, formerly professor of comparative literature at Yale University, has been named founding president and professor of humanities at Yale-NUS, a new liberal arts college opening in Singapore, in partnership with Yale University and the National University of Singapore. He has published three books: “Modernism, Nationalism, and the Novel” (Cambridge University Press, 2000), “The Cambridge Introduction to Modernism” (Cambridge University Press, 2007), and “Religious Experience and the Modernist Novel” (Cambridge University Press, 2010). He is the editor of the Cambridge Companion to European Modernism (2011) and 20th-century editor for new editions of the Norton Anthology of World Literature (2012) and the Norton Anthology of Western Literature (2013).

Lewis’s talk, presented by the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture at Holy Cross, is one of the Deitchman Family Lectures on Religion and Modernity. To learn more about McFarland Center events and to find lectures online, visit www.holycross.edu/mcfarlandcenter.

About the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture:

Established in 2001 and housed in Smith Hall, the McFarland Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture provides resources for faculty and course development, sponsors conferences and college-wide teaching events, hosts visiting fellows, and coordinates a number of campus lecture series. Rooted in the College’s commitment to invite conversation about basic human questions, the Center welcomes persons of all faiths and seeks to foster dialogue that acknowledges and respects differences, providing a forum for intellectual exchange that is interreligious, interdisciplinary, intercultural, and international in scope.  The Center also brings members of the Holy Cross community into conversation with the Greater Worcester community, the academic community, and the wider world to examine the role of faith and inquiry in higher education and in the larger culture.

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‘Church is on a mission with indoor playground in Lisle’

Posted on January 20, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

In an article in the Chicago Tribune, Mathew Scmalz, associate professor of religious studies at the College of the Holy Cross, commented on the nature of the Grounds for Hope Café, an indoor playground and coffeehouse located in Lisle, Ill. Featuring climbing structures, a toddler playhouse and a treehouse slide, the café is owned and operated by the Trinity Lutheran church of Lisle.

Though some café-goers are surprised to find that the space is church-owned, Schmalz noted that Grounds for Hope is a prime example of an attempt by various churches to connect with the public. “All Christians in all denominations are feeling like they have to do something different,” he said. “Things like this, that respond to more of the kinds of things that people need in their daily lives are sort of the wave of the future,” he continued.

Since founding the Grounds for Hope Café in 2010, Trinity Lutheran has welcome 6,000 new families in an effort to bolster the local community.

This ‘Holy Cross in the News’ item by David Cotrone ’13.

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Holy Cross Students Chronicle Their College Experiences in Blogs

Posted on January 18, 2013 by

Choosing the college that’s the right fit for you can be a challenge, but hearing from other students can help you make an informed decision.

One of the ways to learn more about Holy Cross, and get the student perspective, is to visit me.holycross.edu. There you’ll find approximately 20 students blogging about their time on the Hill, as well as juniors sharing their study abroad adventures as far away as Russia and China.

Want to get even more information about Holy Cross? You can keep tabs on life at the College through various social media outlets:

  • “Like” the College’s official Facebook page, and connect with other students and alumni.
  • “Follow” Holy Cross on Twitter and receive the latest news, event information, commentary and more.
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Holy Cross to Lead Discussion on Conflict Between Vatican and Nuns

Posted on January 17, 2013 by Danielle Kane

The College of the Holy Cross will hold a panel discussion on the current conflict between the Vatican and the leadership community for American nuns on Tuesday, Feb. 5 at 4:30 p.m. in the Rehm Library, Smith Hall, at the College. The event, sponsored by the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture, is free and open to the public.

Last year, the Vatican released a critical report on the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, an umbrella organization representing 80 percent of American nuns, citing “serious doctrinal problems” and “radical feminist themes incompatible with the Catholic faith.” The report alleges that the nuns have focused too much on social justice issues such as poverty and have not taken a strong enough stance against same-sex marriage, abortion and the ordination of women. It appointed a team of U.S. bishops to overhaul the sisters’ governance and programs. The sisters rejected the takeover but have voted to open dialogue with the bishops and Vatican to seek a resolution.

The panel discussion at Holy Cross will consider the contributions of Women Religious in shaping American Catholic life, the changes that have taken place since Vatican II, and what strategies they have in place to move forward. Marybeth Kearns-Barrett, director of the Office of College Chaplains at Holy Cross, will moderate. The panelists are:

Sr. Donna Markham, vice president of behavioral health services at Catholic Health Partners in Cincinnati. Sr. Markham is a past president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious and former prioress and general councilor of the Adrian Dominican Congregation. She holds a Ph.D. in clinical psychology and has consulted at Mercy Hospital in Chicago, and served as special assistant to the president at Georgetown University.

Sr. Jane Morrissey, co-founder and executive director of Homework House, Inc., a free after-school tutoring and mentoring program for at-risk students with three sites in Holyoke and Springfield, Mass. A sister of Saint Joseph of Springfield, Sr. Morrissey is a former president of her congregation and has worked among the poor in several Latin American countries and closer to home in Springfield. She has studied at Oxford University and the Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies in Toronto and earned her doctorate in English from the University of Massachusetts.

Learn more and watch lectures online at www.holycross.edu/mcfarlandcenter.

About the Rev. Michael C. McFarland, S.J. Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture:

Established in 2001 and housed in Smith Hall, the McFarland Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture provides resources for faculty and course development, sponsors conferences and college-wide teaching events, hosts visiting fellows, and coordinates a number of campus lecture series. Rooted in the College’s commitment to invite conversation about basic human questions, the Center welcomes persons of all faiths and seeks to foster dialogue that acknowledges and respects differences, providing a forum for intellectual exchange that is interreligious, interdisciplinary, intercultural, and international in scope.  The Center also brings members of the Holy Cross community into conversation with the Greater Worcester community, the academic community, and the wider

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‘Long history of US school shootings means Obama is right, NRA is wrong’

Posted on January 16, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

In an opinion piece for The Christian Science Monitor, Jack Schneider, assistant professor of education at the College of the Holy Cross, wrote about the country’s long history with school shootings and advocated for stricter gun laws. The piece was published immediately following President Obama’s press conference announcing plans to reduce gun violence.

“The first school shooting, in fact, is older than America,” Schneider wrote. “It took place in 1764 when four Lenape warriors shot a Pennsylvania teacher in front of his students. Since then, motives have varied, but the effect has always been similarly grim.”

He continued, “What the public needs to understand is that school shootings are tragically not a new problem caused solely by recent social or cultural shifts. This is an old problem, and the historical record is littered with stories of firearms ending lives in classrooms. But as those guns have gotten bigger, faster, and more accurate over the years, their death toll has become greater. And still many Americans ache for a past in which guns protected liberty and did no harm. But that past is imagined.”

“Many of Mr. Obama’s proposals will meet with hard resistance in Washington, backed by a powerful NRA lobby,” he wrote. But leaders in Congress with the moral courage to take on the gun issue must act now…”

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Kristine Maloney.

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Holy Cross Students to Examine College Admissions at Public Policy Symposium

Posted on January 16, 2013 by

On Jan. 26, more than two dozen Holy Cross students will explore college admissions policies as part of the seventh annual Presidential Scholars Public Policy Symposium on campus.

The annual symposium provides an intellectually challenging forum for Presidential Scholars to explore issues of public policy with their peers. Previous topics have included global warming, U.S. immigration, global health issues, domestic violence, genocide prevention and the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake.

All Holy Cross Presidential Scholars hold academic merit scholarships, most of which are awarded based on achievement in high school, ranging from music (Brooks Scholar), classics (Bean), and science (Clavius). Presidential Scholars also hold Gates Millennium Scholarships and are Charles A. Dana Scholars, who have demonstrated academic excellence, leadership, and character. Dana Scholars are selected from applicants who have earned a minimum 3.5 cumulative grade point average and have been recommended by faculty.

This year, the Presidential Scholars will consider a fictional college’s admissions process. Bryan Engelhardt, assistant professor of economics, will facilitate the symposium and says students will consider the objectives of a variety of constituents — alumni, faculty, athletics, etc. — in assembling a class to enroll.

“We’ll be organizing the constituencies’ objectives into two different categories: hard constraints like a minimum number of students per class as well as softer goals like maximizing SAT scores,” he says. “Using the different constituencies’ objectives, the students will get to take on different roles, will read admissions files and then pick a class under a variety of different scenarios.

“For instance, how does a two-tiered process (early decision and regular admission) affect an incoming class? What differences occur when an admissions committee uses a more mathematical/operational approach to picking a class rather than voting by a show of hands?”

Beyond a closer look at the college admission process, this symposium will demonstrate how committees and voting rules, such as those used in corporate or government board rooms, determine important decisions and whether those decisions are optimal, Engelhardt says.

Participants in this year’s symposium come from all four class years and a wide variety of majors, including biology, classics, psychology, Russian and theatre.

The event is sponsored by the Dean’s Office and coordinated by Christina Chen, director of Academic Services and Learning Resources.

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‘The pros and cons of privatizing the lottery’

Posted on January 15, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

In a story about privatizing the lottery in Pennsylvania on WHYY’s Radio Times, Victor Matheson, associate professor of economics at the College of the Holy Cross, commented on the pros and cons of Governor Corbett’s controversial decision to contract with the Camelot Group, a U.K.-based private lottery company.

Noting that in the first year of privatization Illinois saw record lottery revenue, Matheson said, “Just because you privatize something doesn’t necessarily mean that’s some sort of silver bullet that solves all of your problems. You have lots of state lotteries run very efficiently and generating significant revenues being run by the government. Just because it’s being run by the government doesn’t mean it’s being run inefficiently. And it doesn’t mean that a private company can automatically, just by the magic of the marketplace, come in and generate significantly higher revenues.”

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Kristine Maloney.

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‘Young Adults Swapping Soda For The Super Buzz Of Coffee’

Posted on January 14, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

In a story on NPR’s Morning Edition, sleep expert Amy Wolfson, a professor of psychology at the College of the Holy Cross, commented on the results of a new study which finds that 18- to 24-year-olds are increasingly turning to coffee, rather than sodas, for a caffeine boost.

While coffee has recently been connected to a number of good health effects, it contains much more caffeine than colas, and, Wolfson warned, “There are absolutely negative implications” of drinking too much of it.

Noting studies that have linked caffeine consumption to decreased REM sleep, Wolfson continued, “We know that REM sleep is needed and has positive implications for memory consolidation and learning.”

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Kristine Maloney.

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Holy Cross to Host Business Ethics Symposium

Posted on January 14, 2013 by Cristal Steuer

The College of the Holy Cross will host an Ethics in Business Symposium on Thursday, Jan. 24 from 6 – 7 p.m. in the Hogan Campus Center, Jenks Suites B and C, which will engage participants in key ethical issues encountered in contemporary business. The symposium will launch a campus-wide Business Ethics Case Competition that will then send one team to the Intercollegiate Business Ethics Case Competition at Loyola Marymount University in San Diego, Calif., in May, to compete against 30 teams from around the world. Students should pre-register for the symposium by emailing prebusiness@holycross.edu.

“More than a third of the College’s graduates work in business,” explains Karen Teitel, associate professor of economics at the College. “We believe students should have an opportunity to learn about the types of ethical dilemmas they will encounter when they enter the workforce.”

Bruce Weinstein, Ph.D., “The Ethics Guy,” will serve as keynote speaker during the symposium, which will kick off the competition at the College. A champion of both emotional and ethical intelligence, Weinstein is the creator and host of 60-Second Ethics, and is a select contributor to Bloomberg Businessweek Online’s Management Blog. For his latest book, “Ethical Intelligence: Five Principles for Untangling Your Toughest Problems at Work and Beyond” (New World Library, 2011), Weinstein was recently awarded a Silver Medal from ForeWord Reviews’ Book of the Year Awards.

“The symposium will help students explore basic human questions of meaning, morality, and mutual obligation in a business context,” says Teitel. “Developing ethical standards and identifying a strategy to address ethical dilemmas as they arise, is important in the development of our future leaders.”

Originating in 1989, the Intercollegiate Business Ethics Case Competition is the nation’s oldest and most recognized business ethics tournament, and is judged by ethics officers from local companies and other ethics authorities. Last year, Holy Cross sent a team of three students—Juliana Biolsi ’12, Cassandra Mederios ’12 and Lauren McCarthy ’12—to Bellevue, Wash. The team was one of four finalists out of 16 undergraduate and graduate teams, with Biolsi winning the 90-second ethics challenge.

Any Holy Cross student can participate in this year’s Business Ethics Case Competition. Students have until Feb. 1 to register as a team for the College-wide competition, which will take place on Feb. 23.

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Professor Golijov is 2012-13 Composer-in-Residence at Carnegie Hall

Posted on January 14, 2013 by

Osvaldo Golijov, Loyola Professor of Music at Holy Cross and one of the most prominent and frequently performed composers of our time, will continue his season-long residency as holder of Carnegie Hall’s Richard and Barbara Debs Composer’s Chair with a series of events over the next several months.

A major highlight of Golijov’s Carnegie Hall residency took place in November and December when he guided the citywide “Voices from Latin America” festival.

In an interview before the festival, Golijov told Playbill Arts that it would feature “music that immediately resonates in some part of the territory of your own soul, of anybody’s soul. It is music that transcends time and place. I couldn’t be happier, knowing that we are bringing this festival to the people of New York City.”

Golijov recently spoke about the festival, the upcoming events at Carnegie Hall, and how Holy Cross changed the course of his career and, indeed, life.

1. What are you most looking forward to as the Richard and Barbara Debs Composer’s Chair at Carnegie Hall?

“Part of what I was looking forward during this season has already taken place: The Festival that we curated with the Carnegie Hall Artistic team and with Gilberto Gil, Chucho Valdes and Gustavo Dudamel, brought to this temple of music and to the people of New York two months of the most astonishing music that has emerged from Latin America in the last 50 years. Being part of that was one of the greatest joys of my musical life.

“And bringing the St. Mark Passion to the main hall in March, sung with a choir that includes 120 high school students from different areas of New York is an emotion hard to describe, but I’ll try: I’ve always loved and admired Verdi’s monumental Requiem. He was able to create a transcendental work of the highest artistic caliber, and at the same time a work that is known by heart by so many people all over the world. It is a work that transcends what we know as ‘classical music,’ a treasure that crosses cultures and belongs to all of us. I aspired to the same, even if I am aware of the difference in talent between Verdi and I. It is a good feeling to know that the St. Mark Passion continues to be performed across the world and will now be sung by young people of New York and hopefully will be continued to be sung and heard after I’m gone.”

2. How has your teaching at Holy Cross influenced your own creative work?

“Would I have undertaken the writing of the Passion if I had been teaching at a conservatory or another college? Absolutely not. The truth is that teaching at Holy Cross is what gave me the courage write the Passion. Teaching at Holy Cross, therefore, determined the course of my life as a creator.

“Teaching here — I should say learning here — together with the memory of a reproduction of Rembrandt’s ‘Jeremiah lamenting the fall of Jerusalem’ that I remembered hanging in the kitchen wall of my great-grandmother were the determining factors of my saying yes to write the Passion. Once again, let’s differentiate the talent. But having said that I consider Rembrandt the greatest Jewish painter of all times, especially in what he expressed in that particular painting. He was not Jewish. But he lived among the Jews and was able to observe and paint a truth about Judaism that no Jewish painter equaled. I grew up Jewish among my Catholic friends in Argentina, and then came to teach here at Holy Cross. I realized I was in the same situation as Rembrandt, and that gave me the courage to go for it — the hope that I could at least reveal a little truth about Christianity that comes from this unique perspective.”

3. What does a typical day look like for you now?

“It is, from the outside a very boring routine but from the inside exhilarating and frustrating according to how work goes: Right now I am on sabbatical at Holy Cross, so mornings are for writing, then I like to swim at noon, then more writing or orchestrating, listening to music, studying a score, or sometimes watching a Barcelona soccer game, then bugging my wife and children and then cooking dinner, which I love, because it gives pleasure and, unlike a piece of music, takes a short time to do. The last decade I was on the road a lot for performances, trying to help orchestras and other groups to master the idiosyncrasies of my musical language, but this past year I decided to travel as little as possible, only if there is a very big concert, or premiere or a recording.”

4. What music are you currently listening to?

“Right now Jimi Hendrix, Miles Davis in his electric period and Beethoven’s late sonatas and quartets.”

5. What inspires you?

“I used to be inspired by people, to conceive of music as a theater of sounds. These days I am more intrigued by nature, and by music not so much as a ‘personal expression’ but as an expression of the universe of which we are only a small part. It is a big change for me and not an easy one, but it came naturally with age.”

6. What is the best part of your work?

“Of course it is very beautiful when you go to a rehearsal with an orchestra, or a string quartet, or to a recording of a soundtrack, and everyone feels that there are some moments of powerful emotion, or beauty. But nothing compares to the gut realization that you have alone at the piano, when you know that you found the right chord, or theme to express what you were searching for.”

Look for a cover feature on Golijov in the Spring 2013 issue of Holy Cross Magazine.

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Cantor Art Gallery to Display Southeast Asian Textile Exhibit

Posted on January 9, 2013 by Cristal Steuer

ikat

The Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Art Gallery at the College of the Holy Cross will feature an exhibition of Southeast Asian textiles titled “Transnational Ikat: An Asian Textile on the Move” from Jan. 24 – March 1, 2013. The exhibition is curated by Susan Rodgers, the W. Arthur Garrity Sr. Professor in Human Nature, Ethics and Society in the sociology and anthropology department; with research assistance from student docents Hana Carey ’13, Tricia Giglio ’14, and Martha Walters ’14. The curator and docents will give an opening talk titled “Transnational Ikat: Fieldwork Discoveries about an Asian Textile on the Move” on Thursday, Jan. 24, from 4:30-5:30 p.m. in Rehm Library. An opening reception will take place in the gallery following the talk from 5:30 -7 p.m.

Indonesian weavers are known for a technique called ikat, which means “to tie” or “to bind off.”  When a warp or weft is stretched on a frame, strands of palm leaf or raffia are used to bind bundles of thread together to form patterns, or motifs. These include stylized animals, plants or images of spirits. When the threads are dyed, the bindings resist the color and subtle patterns emerge before the cloth is woven.

With funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the dean’s office, Rodgers and her students conducted fieldwork in Bali, Indonesia, and Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia in the summer of 2012 to explore the exhibition’s themes. At Threads of Life NGO in Bali, the team learned the ikat dyeing and tying processes, focusing on natural dyes. They also performed interviews with traditional weavers working at the Tun Jugah Foundation, Kuching. The Foundation was established in 1985 to “preserve and promote” the arts and folklore of the Iban people of Sarawak and has a special interest in preserving knowledge about the Iban’s great pua textiles.

According to Rodgers, “Southeast Asian ikats are among the world’s greatest cloth arts and are very much ‘textiles on the move’ today — moving across borders from Southeast Asia to other parts of the world, moving from ritual use to American fashion wear and other marketplace forms, moving from Asian villages to international museums and art collecting circuits.”

This exhibition of ikat cloths from Indonesia and Malaysia displays over 40 of these remarkable textiles, both in their deeply ceremonial forms and in their vibrantly commercialized versions. The exhibition focuses on ikats from eastern Indonesia, Sumatra, Sulawesi, and Malaysia’s Sarawak and will highlight five historical examples of ikat textiles donated in 2010 by Anne and John Summerfield to the Cantor Art Gallery’s permanent collection.

Reservations for guided tours of “Transnational Ikat” for Holy Cross classes, groups, and off campus visitors are available by contacting Paula Rosenblum, gallery coordinator, at 508-793-3356 or prosenbl@holycross.edu.

In conjunction with the exhibition the team jointly authored a website that offers an overview of their research experience as well as an in-depth view of ikat textiles today. The website will be launched January 24, 2013 and will be accessible at the following address: http://college.holycross.edu/projects/ikat/index.html.

EVENTS

  • Thursday, Jan. 24, 4:30 – 5:30 p.m., Rehm Library: Talk by curator Susan Rodgers and student docents, “Transnational Ikat: Fieldwork Discoveries about an Asian Textile on the Move”
  • Thursday, Jan. 24, 5:30 – 7 p.m., Cantor Art Gallery: Opening reception
  • Thursday, Feb. 14, 4 – 5 p.m., Rehm Library: Carla Jones, associate professor of anthropology at the University of Colorado, Boulder, will give a talk titled “The Edge of Modesty: the Ethics and Aesthetics of Indonesian Islamic Fashion.” The event is sponsored by the sociology and anthropology department and the Asian Studies Program.

Continuing in the Cantor Resource Gallery through March 1: Community Threads: Seven Hills Saori Weaving Project

The Saori Weaving Project at Seven Hills began several years ago when a few individuals took classes with Mihoko Wakabayashi, an artist and proprietor of Saori Worcester, and the organization then became a Saori pioneer coaching site.  Seven Hills purchased accessible and adaptable looms and staff members completed the full Saori beginners course to become Saori Coaches. The “Community Threads” exhibition is the result of many hours of weaving, sewing, planning, serendipity, creativity and community collaboration between Seven Hills and the Cantor Art Gallery, College of the Holy Cross.

Gallery Information

Founded in 1983 through the generosity of Iris & B. Gerald Cantor, the Cantor Art Gallery serves both as a venue for a changing series of historical and contemporary public exhibitions, as well as a vital resource for Holy Cross faculty and students, linking exhibitions to the broader liberal arts curriculum.

The hours for the Cantor Art Gallery are Monday – Friday, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. and Saturdays 2 – 5 p.m. Located in O’Kane Hall, 1st Floor, College of the Holy Cross, 1 College Street, Worcester, Mass., 01610.  Visitors needing assistance with handicap accessibility should contact Public Safety at 508-793-2011. Admission to the gallery is free.

For additional information please call 508-793-3356 or visit the Gallery’s website.

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‘Holy Cross helps Worcester students get in shape’

Posted on January 9, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

Get Fit Day

Nearly 2,000 Worcester third through eighth grade students packed the Hart Center at the College of the Holy Cross yesterday to watch the women’s basketball team take on Brown University as part the team’s “Get Fit with the Crusaders Day.” 

The goal of the program is to use basketball as a tool to talk about health and physical fitness.
Head Coach Bill Gibbons told reporter Katelyn Tivnan his players are role models for the young fans.  “It’s never too early to start thinking about eating right, getting off the computer, and getting outside for fresh air and exercise,” said Gibbons.

Jeff Oliver, head strength and conditioning coach at the College, who gave a halftime presentation with Dietitian Kathy Eagan said, “The most important time to learn about nutrition and fitness is at a young age.” 

Holy Cross beat Brown 83-66. 

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Cristal Steuer.

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Sher ’81 Receives Praise for Revival of Odets’s ‘Golden Boy’

Posted on January 9, 2013 by

The latest theater production directed by Bartlett Sher ’81 is once again making critics sit up and take notice.

After wowing theatergoers and reviewers with, among others, “The Light in the Piazza,” “Awake and Sing!,” and Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “South Pacific,” which earned him a Tony award for best director of a musical, Sher is drawing rapturous reviews for his production of Clifford Odets’s “Golden Boy.”

John Lahr, senior drama critic of the New Yorker, calls it “impeccable” and named it the best theater production of 2012. ” ‘Golden Boy’ deserves, and will win, a bag full of Tony Awards,” he writes.

The production, which tells the story of a young man who must choose between a career as a violinist or boxer, is playing at the Lincoln Center Theater at the Belasco through Jan. 20.

Check out some more reviews of the production, and what critics have to say about Sher.

“Mr. Sher directed a similarly galvanizing production of “Awake and Sing!” for Lincoln Center Theater several years ago. The skills he evinced in that rewarding revival are on view here, too: a knack for making Odets’s vernacular language feel like fresh mint instead of stale corn, and a gift for cutting to the emotional quick of a conventionally structured melodrama.” — Charles Isherwood, The New York Times

“Four out of four stars. Bartlett Sher directs a stellar cast in this dazzling production. … Director Barlett Sher, who has helmed superb productions of American classics ranging from “South Pacific” to “Joe Turner’s Come And Gone,” has once again compiled a first-rate cast and captured the excitement and emotional resonance that make such works timeless.” — Elysa Gardner, USA Today

“Five out of five stars. Sher’s crackling revival restores its place in the canon of great works we should see more often. … How does Sher do it? He hires the best around and listens to the language — and he couldn’t have picked a finer group of character actors and rising stars. — David Cote, Time Out New York

“Except for a 1964 musical version that starred Sammy Davis Jr., “Golden Boy” hasn’t been seen on Broadway since 1952. Now Lincoln Center Theater has brought it back to the Belasco Theater, where the play was first performed 75 years ago, and given it a production of the utmost splendor and compulsion. Watching it is like standing in front of a blowtorch.” — Terry Teachout, The Wall Street Journal

“Under less astute direction, the dialogue and action might have seemed dated and melodramatic, but Bartlett Sher’s nuanced direction leaves no corner of the stage in shadow. He gives the play the same inspired guts as his previous staging of Odets’s “Awake and Sing!” for Lincoln Center Theater a few years ago. ” — Rex Reed, The Observer

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‘Second Time With Obama Not As Thrilling As Before’

Posted on January 8, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

Daniel Klinghard

Daniel Klinghard, associate professor of political science at the College of the Holy Cross, talks to the Associated Press about why President Obama’s second inauguration isn’t as exciting as the first.  “When it’s your first (inauguration), you’re new and people are only seeing the potential in you,” Klinghard said. “By the time the second one rolls around they’re used to your voice, they’re used to you saying certain kinds of things.”

The story ran in nearly 300 media outlets across the country including ABC News, the Boston Globe, CBS.com, the Houston Chronicle, the Huffington Post, the Miami Herald, NPR, and Salon.com. 

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Cristal Steuer.

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‘Lou Holtz gives Catholics a pep talk, encourages them to “come home”‘

Posted on January 8, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

In a post for The Washington Post’s On Faith blog, Mathew Schmalz, associate professor of religious studies at the College of the Holy Cross, comments on the Catholics Come Home ad campaign, and in particular, the spot featuring retired football coach Lou Holtz, which aired during the BCS Championship game between Alabama and Notre Dame.

“The Lou Holtz piece was encouraging and optimistic. It drew upon strong and recognizable themes in American Catholic life. It was sincere and heart-felt” he wrote. “It was also inadequate to the challenges now facing the Catholic church.”

“I would not dismiss the efforts of Catholics Come Home, nor would I doubt the sincerity and good-will of those who have contributed to its work,” he continued. “But I do wish they would consider another spot. There would be a group of Catholics–laity, religious, and clergy. They would look into the camera and say: “We’ve heard that you’ve left home. Let us know why. We’re here to listen.”

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Kristine Maloney.

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‘How badly will the lockout really hurt the NHL? Maybe not much’

Posted on January 7, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

In a Yahoo! Sports story about this year’s NHL lockout coming to an end, Victor Matheson, associate professor of economics at the College of the Holy Cross, commented on the long-term economic effects of game stoppages and lockouts.

Having researched strikes in the NFL, NBA and NHL, he said there was little to no impact on the leagues’ bottom lines. “Attendance and viewership bounced back essentially 100% immediately. At least the first evidence we have suggests no long-run effect at all.”

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Kristine Maloney.

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Second Annual Campus Wide Multifaith Prayer to Celebrate Faith Traditions at Holy Cross

Posted on January 7, 2013 by Cristal Steuer

community-prayer

When students return to campus in January, the chaplains’ office will hold the College’s second annual Campus Wide Multifaith Prayer to celebrate the rich faith traditions that are represented at Holy Cross. Students, faculty and staff are invited to gather and participate on Tuesday, Jan. 22 at 4 p.m. in Mary Chapel.

“Starting the second semester in a community multifaith prayer is a way of saying we welcome and affirm the presence of all people regardless of faith in the Holy Cross community,” shares Marybeth Kearns-Barrett, director of the chaplains’ office. “When we pray together we are reminded of not only our differences, but also what we share in common, our desire to be part of one human community living in harmony with all of creation.”

The prayer will be led by Rev. Philip L. Boroughs, S.J., president, and members of the Holy Cross community representing their respective faiths will also read or sing prayers from their traditions.

Virginia Coakley, assistant chaplain and director of Protestant and ALANA (African-American, Latin American, Asian-American, and Native American heritage) ministry, who helped develop last year’s prayer service and presided with Fr. Boroughs, says the multifaith prayer is a very tangible way to affirm, include, and welcome the Holy Cross community as active participants in a prayer experience on campus.  “Finding ways to bring the entire community together as equal participants in a prayer/worship experience is significant and attests to the College’s commitment to having a more diverse and inclusive campus,” she explains.

Tina Chen, director of academic services and learning resources, who attended the service last year says, “the inaugural community prayer was both a significant choice by Fr. Boroughs to mark his first official days as our new president and a meaningful invitation from campus ministry to students, staff, administrators and faculty of various faiths.  I was moved and inspired by the meditations, prayers, and objects from rich worship traditions around the world shared with us by a diverse group of readers.”

Caner Dagli, assistant professor of religious studies, recalls how surprised he was by the student turnout. “It was a packed house,” he says.  “It is not easy to get into any serious depth when it comes to each religious tradition in so short a time and when so many traditions are being represented, but it is good for the life of the College for there to be an awareness of other faith traditions and for an atmosphere of respect and appreciation to be fostered.”

A reception, with foods from around the world, will follow in the Loyola Ballroom.

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‘Notre Dame football’s rise paralleled Irish-Americans’ societal ascent’

Posted on January 7, 2013 by Holy Cross in the News

In articles by the Indianapolis Star and Catholic News Service, Edward O’Donnell, associate professor of history at the College of the Holy Cross, offered insight on the parallels between Notre Dame’s rise as a football powerhouse and the rise of Irish-Americans.

In advance of the national championship game between Notre Dame and Alabama, O’Donnell observed that the history of Notre Dame football mirrored Irish-Catholics’ struggle for acceptance in the U.S. “In the first 60 years of Notre Dame football from the 1920s to the 1970s … it meant a lot to Irish Catholics. This national football team reflected a lot of Catholic aspirations to upward mobility and this inferiority complex that a lot of Catholics, especially Irish Catholics, seemed to carry with them,” O’Donnell said.

“Notre Dame kind of becomes this representation of ‘we can beat you guys. We’re getting our slice of the American dream and no one’s going to take it from us. We’re able to knock off your very best—Princeton, Harvard, Army, USC—and to be able to do so year after year,'” he added.

This “Holy Cross in the News” item by Kristine Maloney.

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