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(03/05/24 11:00am)
Ever since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Asian Americans have become the target of racism and hate crimes. We have become numb to the numerous accounts of violence against Asian American communities, especially elders. On March 16 2021, eight people at three massage parlors were shot to death at the Gold Spa in Atlanta, six of whom were Asian. All but one was a woman. In the gunman's words, his actions were "not racially motivated," but caused by "sexual addiction." Deeply hurt and in disbelief of such a tragedy, I became interested in the aspects that made Asian American women particularly vulnerable to media sexualization.
(03/05/24 11:00am)
Famous for her synthesis of scientific knowledge and Indigenous wisdom, Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer stands at the forefront of modern ecology. She holds a doctoral degree in plant biology and currently works as a State University of New York Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental Biology. Kimmerer is also the author of “Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Moss” and “Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants.” In recent years, “Braiding Sweetgrass” has become well-known for elevating the use of Indigenous teachings alongside traditional scientific knowledge. The overarching metaphor in the book compares the three strands of braided sweetgrass to three essential elements of understanding the natural world: scientific knowledge, Indigenous knowledge and knowledge of the plants themselves. Her writing has given over 300,000 readers access to a new understanding of how they can better understand the world around them.
(03/05/24 11:00am)
Two years into the Russo-Ukraine War, the University re-created the “Unissued Diplomas” exhibit, displaying students who lost their lives as a result of this invasion. The University displayed the exhibit almost one year ago, created by Ukrainian graduate student Sofiia Tarasiuk MBA ’24 and Prof. Irina Dubinina (RUS), but since the war has yet to conclude, Tarasiuk worked with Ukrainian graduate students Kamila Haieva MBA ’25 and Yuliia Stelmakh MBA ’25 to re-install the exhibit.
(03/05/24 11:00am)
Before I began to write this article, one of my professors had given me the suggestion to use ChatGPT to create a title for this piece. I did not do that, and will be very offended if you think I did. However, I did decide to give ChatGPT a chance and typed, “Can you please create a title for a school newspaper article which features three interviews with professors at Brandeis University discussing the potential benefits and drawback of ChatGPT in their respective fields of study and the classrooms in which they teach in?” In response, I got:
(03/05/24 11:00am)
In 1975, Leslie Martin ’76 was sprawled on her bed in her dorm reading a copy of The Justice when she learned that founder and publisher of Penthouse Magazine, Bob Guccione was going to be named Brandeis’ Publisher of the Year.
(03/05/24 11:00am)
As college admissions decisions are being released, Brandeis has been abuzz with campus tours and upcoming admitted student days. The University works very hard to curate a specific image for all prospective students during these events, showing them the nicest buildings and sparing no expenses. However, as first-year students begin their Brandeis journeys, they are often disappointed, causing many to consider alternative higher education pathways, including transferring to other institutions.
(03/05/24 11:00am)
Museums and stolen objects
(03/05/24 11:00am)
The Brandeis Concert Series is an incredible and rare opportunity to see free live music every weekend in the Slosberg Recital Hall. The series includes both student and faculty performances with a diverse line-up including jazz, chamber singing, a Ghanaian drum and dance ensemble and never-before-seen pieces that were composed by Brandeis students, faculty and alumni. Upcoming performances include Hypercube, a Brandeis original composition, on Mar. 2 and Evan Hirsch’s piano recital on Mar. 8, with various other performances on Mar. 16, 17, 23 and 24.
(03/05/24 11:00am)
To the readers who have enjoyed my museum reviews in the past, thank you! I am happy that there have been so many opportunities through The Justice that have allowed me to talk about art in a way that I usually wouldn’t. However, in my time going to many of these museums, including the Museum of Fine Arts, the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I have found a particular trend in the structure and the purpose of the museum that I find interesting. I would like to define my meaning of worship in this paragraph. When I say worship, I am describing the actions of the devout museum goers. When I went to see an exhibition at the Met in December 2023, I saw many people standing and ambulating around the art, but I saw even more with jaws wide, hands over mouths and speechless “ohs” spilling from their mouths. Yes, art is beautiful, important and meaningful and I would probably be very upset in a world without art, but museums inspire us to look up at art, placing it beyond us in a way that is to separate us and the art.
(02/13/24 9:59pm)
Context:
(02/13/24 11:00am)
In the last couple of years, the discussion surrounding the use of artificial intelligence in academic settings has been a point of contention. For some students, AI has been a source to generate ideas and act as personal editors, while professors have mixed feelings of its usage. While many have embraced the convenience that AI offers, Peizhao Li Ph.D. ’24 was recently awarded the $55,000 Graduate Research Fellowship Program from the National Institute of Justice for his research to better understand bias in artificial intelligence and machine learning and to better regulate its potential discriminatory impact.
(02/13/24 11:00am)
In the coming days of Feb. 13 through Feb. 17, the thought-provoking and moving immersive art installation, “Deconstructed Anthems: Massachusetts” will be debuted at the Cyclorama in the Boston Center for Arts. “Deconstructed Anthems” is a series of exhibitions created by artist, professor and Director of the Poetic Justice Group at Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab Ekene Ijeoma. Ijeoma, whose background is in technology and interaction design, develops multimedia artwork designed to expose the inequities that riddle the United States and challenge his audience to change them. Through “Deconstructed Anthems,” Ijeoma depicts the immense scale of mass incarceration, as well as the gross racial disparities ingrained in the U.S. carceral system. Each site-specific iteration of “Deconstructed Anthems” uses data from the U.S. Department of Justice, combined with conceptual, multimedia art, to give voice to the over 1.5 million (disproportionately Black) individuals incarcerated in the U.S. since 1925. Ijeoma’s exhibit highlights the hypocrisy of the U.S. being the “land of the free” while having such high incarceration rates by centering the installation around the classic “Star Spangled Banner.” The exhibit combines an algorithmic composition programmed by Ijeoma and numerous musicians who methodically omit notes while playing “Star Spangled Banner” to reflect the escalation in national incarceration rates from 1925 to the present. Ijeoma achieves this by using a custom piano “retrofitted with hardware and software programmed to hold down keys at the same rates in the composition as a pianist is playing it.”
(02/13/24 11:00am)
In November 2023, Brandeis’ Division of Business and Finance released their financial statements for the 2022-23 school year and hosted a town hall meeting to walk through the data. They emphasized working on increasing transparency. While undergraduate net tuition, housing/dining and use of the endowment are relatively stable due to decreasing graduate enrollment, they predict a challenging stretch ahead to hit fundraising goals.
(02/13/24 11:00am)
According to an article from Gettysburg College, the average person will spend around 90,000 hours of their life working. While this is a depressing statistic for many, Dr. Ed Boyden showed how these hours can be used to put good in the world during a Feb. 8 guest lecture hosted by Brandeis Effective Altruism. According to their website, effective altruism is a “social movement that aims to find the best ways to help others through the use of evidence and careful reasoning.” In the past, Boyden worked on neuroimaging technology and its numerous applications in healthcare. In addition to being a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boyden is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and an investigator at both MIT’s McGovern Institute and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
(02/13/24 9:54pm)
Incredible inventors and their illuminating inventions
(02/13/24 9:57pm)
On Feb. 6, the students of the course “Black Brandeis, Black History” (AAAS) led a teach-in about Angela Davis ’65 at the Mandel Center of Humanities Forum. The teach-in — which centered the life and activist work of one of Brandeis’ most famed alumni — prompted student and audience discussion about the University’s public treatment of Davis. The overwhelming sentiment was that Davis’ work has historically gone unrecognized by the University and is only acknowledged in a performative context. One student commented on Davis not being invited to speak at the 75th anniversary weekend. Another criticized the University's tendency to pick and choose which causes to align itself with depending on what is most “in vogue” and uncontroversial at the time.
(02/13/24 9:58pm)
Accessible infrastructure and quality accessibility support services are essential for a campus to be inclusive and welcoming to students with disabilities. However, the University has been slow to implement more accessibility renovations and to staff the Student Accessibility Support Office. This board believes that helping students with disabilities thrive on campus needs to be a higher priority for the administration. Brandeis often advertises itself as an institution that champions social justice and fosters a diverse student body. However, an inaccessible campus demonstrates that more progress is needed in order to honor these values.
(02/13/24 11:00am)
Following their outstanding performances on the track and on the fencing strip, TJ Carleo ’26 and Calla Lee ’25 were honored as Judges of the Week. The title is bestowed on various student-athletes at the University for notable accomplishments in their respective sports.
(02/13/24 11:00am)
On March 16, 1966, tragedy struck the Brandeis community as the lives of two were taken at the center of campus. Graduate anthropology students Elgin N. Annis, 25, and Dora Roslow, 22, took off from Hanscom Field in Bedford in a small airplane. They spent some time flying around the Brandeis campus, before clipping the plane on the roof of the Goldfarb Library and hitting a tree. It was said that there were between 30 and 40 witnesses. The airplane then crashed into the concrete embankment of the reservoir and caught on fire. This man-made reservoir was in the same location as the current Usdan Student Center, which was opened in 1970.
(02/13/24 11:00am)
February is notable as a month-long celebration of Black history and culture. However, it should be noted that our regard of the celebration must not only be reserved for twenty-eight days, but rather for the entire year. Recently I have reflected, not only on history, but on the stories unfolding now, right here at Brandeis. In an attempt to make a small difference I am shining a spotlight on the contributions of Black Brandeisians. I am documenting who they are and how they are making a positive impact on the Brandeis community.
