October 21, 2004
DIRECTOR TO OFFER SNEAK PREVIEW OF FILM-FESTIVAL FAVORITE
A sneak preview of Brother to Brother will bring filmmaker Rodney Evans to campus on
Thursday, Oct. 28, to screen and discuss his award-winning feature before it opens in theaters
nationwide. The event, co-sponsored by the Center for Visual Culture and the English
Department, will take place at 5 p.m. in Thomas 110 and is free and open to all.
Brother to Brother stars Anthony Mackie (8 Mile, The Manchurian Candidate, She Hate Me) as
Perry Williams, a young African-American poet who struggles to come to terms with a gay
identity after he is rejected by his family. He meets an elderly poet, Bruce Nugent (played by
Roger Robinson), who shares his memories of the glory days of the Harlem Renaissance and
introduces the younger man to the hidden gay and lesbian subcultures of that milieu. The film
moves between contemporary and historic Harlem, interweaving Perry's struggles to forge an
artistic and sexual identity with Nugent's earlier, similar struggles alongside such Harlem
Renaissance luminaries as Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston.
Brother to Brother won a special jury award at the Sundance Film Festival and has swept top
honors at gay-and-lesbian film festivals nationwide. Variety praises it for the "depth and
intelligence it brings to issues of black politics and sexuality."
Evans, a graduate of Brown University and the California Institute of the Arts, also wrote and
co-produced Brother to Brother, whose screenplay won the Independent Feature Project's
Gordon Parks Award for Screenwriting.
SPEAKER TO OFFER ANALYSIS OF PRESIDENTIAL POLLS
As the presidential election draws near, the results of election polls are discussed daily in the
news media, but the average voter knows little about how such polls are conducted. On
Tuesday, Oct. 26, an expert on public-opinion polling and survey research will offer a peek
behind the scenes of this important adjunct to the democratic process. Temple University
Professor of Political Science Michael G. Hagen, who directs the Temple/Inquirer Poll, will
analyze the latest presidential poll of Pennsylvania voters and discuss what conclusions can be
drawn from it. His talk, sponsored by the Department of Political Science and the Civic
Engagement Office, will take place in Thomas 224 from 4:15 to 5:30 p.m.
"Professor Hagen's access to the most current survey and poll data will allow him to discuss
the latest information as we approach election day," says Associate Professor Marissa Golden,
chair of the Department of Political Science at Bryn Mawr. "His talk will be of interest to those
who would like to learn of the latest developments in the campaign."
As the director of the Temple/Inquirer Poll, Hagen works with The Philadelphia Inquirer to gain
accurate and meaningful polling data, which helps to predict which way Pennsylvania will
swing in November and the issues on which voters will base their presidential choices. Hagen
is also an expert in the art and science of polling, and in his talk will discuss the difficulties
that can lead to polling errors.
Hagen, the director of Temple's Institute for Public Affairs, will appear on PBS' The News
Hour's election-night coverage as the show's expert on Pennsylvania. Prior to his appointment
at Temple, Hagen directed the Center for Public Interest Polling at the Eagleton Institute of
Politics at Rutgers University. Recently he collaborated with Richard Johnston and Kathleen
Hall Jamieson on a book titled The 2000 Presidential Election and the Foundations of Party
Politics.
For further information, please e-mail Golden or call Lorraine Kirschner at x5332.
GUANTANAMOBILE PROJECT TO VISIT BRYN MAWR
Bryn Mawr audiences will be able to see and participate in an evolving documentary film when
the Guantanamobile Project visits the College on Friday, Oct. 29, at 2:30 p.m. in Carpenter
21. Filmmakers Lisa Lynch and Elena Razlogova will screen the documentary, which focuses
on the detention of uncharged prisoners in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; an
audience discussion with the filmmakers will folllow.
The Guantanamobile Project aims to raise awareness of the ethical, legal and political issues
surrounding more than 600 people whom the United States detained in the aftermath of
military campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. Most of the detainees have been held without
legal charges since late 2001; the Bush administration characterizes them as "unlawful
combatants" who are not entitled to the protections international law affords to prisoners of
war.
The project has two main components: a Web site that gathers news and information about
the detainees, and a documentary video. The video evolves as it is screened, incorporating
audience responses and concerns. It features interviews with key figures involved in the legal
struggles of the Guantanamo detainees, including the lawyers who successfully argued to the
Supreme Court that U.S. courts have jurisdiction to consider challenges to the legality of the
detention; activists; relatives of detainees; and the responses of people who encountered the
Guanatanamobile Project during a national tour last summer.
The Guantanamobile Project's visit to Bryn Mawr is co-sponsored by the Center for Visual
Culture and the Center for Ethnicities, Communities and Social Policy.
FRIENDS OF THE LIBRARY OFFERS BOOK-COLLECTING EXPERTS
Are your shelves overflowing with books on your favorite topic? Or do you wish they were?
The Friends of the Bryn Mawr College Library are sponsoring a daylong introduction to the
nuts and bolts of book collecting on Saturday, Oct. 30, in Wyndham Alumnae House.
Experts will offer advice on everything you need to know to become an accomplished book
collector, from how to track down hard-to-find pieces to how to care for your treasures and
how to find out how much your books are worth. There will even be an appraisal session, at
which David Bloom, vice-president for books, prints and manuscripts at Freeman's Auctions in
Philadelphia, will offer verbal estimates of the value of books that participants bring in for
review.
The program will also include a panel discussion on the basics of book collecting. The panelists
are Steven Rothman, an ardent book collector and president of the Philobiblon Club of
Philadelphia, and two prominent rare-book dealers in the Philadelphia area: Cynthia Davis
Buffington of The Philadelphia Rare Books and Manuscripts Company; and Janet Miller of An
Uncommon Vision.
Shelly Smith, a book conservator at the Conservation Center for Art and Historic Artifacts in
Philadelphia, will follow the panel discussion with a session titled "Book Conservation for
Collectors." Prior to coming to Philadelphia, Smith was a book conservator at the Huntington
Library near Los Angeles, and worked as a conservator at the University of North Carolina and
the Smithsonian Institution.
The keynote speaker for the day will be Priscilla Juvelis, one of the country's most eminent
book dealers, speaking on women as book collectors. Based in Cambridge, Mass., Juvelis
specializes in women's history and 20th-century book arts, and she is a past president of the
Antiquarian Booksellers' Association of America.
All events except a luncheon in the restaurant at Wyndham are free to Bryn Mawr students.
Cost of the event for the general public is $25, which covers lunch and up to five book
appraisals. For registration information, please call the Special Collections Department, Bryn
Mawr College Library, 610-526-6576, or see the event Web site,
http://www.brynmawr.edu/library/bookcollecting.shtml.
FORMER FOREST-SERVICE CHIEF TO DELIVER ROTHENBERG LECTURE
Mike Dombeck, who headed the U.S. Forest Service during the Clinton Administration and was
hailed by the National Wildlife Federation as "a living, breathing conservation hero," will
deliver this year's Bernard Rothenberg Lecture in Biology and Public Policy. His talk, "U.S.
Conservation Challenges: Are We Making the Right Policy Choices?", will take place on
Thursday, Oct. 28, from 4 to 5 p.m. in B21 Carpenter Library. The lecture, sponsored by the
Department of Biology, the Center for Science in Society, and the President's Office and is free
and open to the public. A reception in the Quita Woodward Room will follow the talk.
When Dombeck took the helm of the Forest Service, many saw the agency as an ally of the
timber industry, and his efforts to change the goals of the Service from commodity production
to ecosystem health made him a controversial figure. He presided over the development of the
Roadless Area Conservation Rule, which barred road construction in areas of national forests
where roads had not already been built. President Bush suspended this rule, which was bitterly
opposed by many conservative senators from Western states, on his first day in office.
Dombeck, who holds a Ph.D. in fisheries biology, started his career with the Forest Service in
1978. In 1989 he began serving as science adviser and special assistant to the director of the
Bureau of Land Management, and he became the acting director of the bureau in 1994; he
remained there until his appointment as Forest Service Chief in 1997. His work at the Forest
Service won him broad acclaim from environmentalist; among his numerous honors are a
National Wildlife Federation National Conservation Award and a Presidential Rank Award as a
Distinguished Executive.
Dombeck continued to pursue scientific research and writing throughout his career as a
government executive. He has authored, co-authored and edited numerous popular and
scholarly publications, most recently the book From Conquest to Conservation: Our Public
Lands Legacy (Island Press, 2003). He also continues to make frequent national and
international scientific presentations. He now serves as the Pioneer Professor of Global
Environmental Management and University of Wisconsin System Fellow of Global
Conservation. He is helping to lead the planning and development of the Global Environmental
Management Education Center at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point.
FOUNDER OF BMC ANTHROPOLOGY DEPARTMENT DIES AT 98
William R. Kenan Jr. Professor Emeritus of Anthropology Frederica Annis Lopez de Leo de
Laguna '27, the founder of the Bryn Mawr College Department of Anthropology and an
internationally recognized pioneer in the study of indigenous Alaskan cultures, died of heart
failure at her home in Bryn Mawr on Oct.6, three days after her 98th birthday.
De Laguna, who was known as “Freddy” to friends and colleagues, was the recipient of
countless awards and honors, including a Tlingit potlatch that later became the basis of
Reunion Under Mount Saint Elias, a 1997 documentary about her work. In 1975, she and
Margaret Mead became the first female anthropologists elected to membership in the National
Academy of Sciences. She later served as president of the American Anthropological
Association.
De Laguna was born in Ann Arbor, Mich., on October 3, 1906. The daughter of Bryn Mawr
philosophy professors Grace and Theodore de Laguna, she graduated from Bryn Mawr summa
cum laude in 1927 and was the winner of the prestigious European fellowship. She earned her
Ph.D. in anthropology in 1933 from Columbia University, where she studied with Franz Boas
and Ruth Benedict. She served as a field director of the University Museum in Philadelphia and
a soil conservationist for the U.S. Soil Conservation Service before returning to Bryn Mawr as a
lecturer in anthropology in 1938. She received the College's Lindback Award for Distinguished
Teaching in 1972 and she retired from Bryn Mawr as a chaired professor in 1975.
A distinguished scholar and leader of expeditions to Alaska, de Laguna began to do fieldwork
in Alaska in the early 1930s. In 1934, she published The Archaeology of Cook Inlet, Alaska,
which was reissued in 1975 by the Alaska Historical Society. She studied a variety of
indigenous cultures in Alaska and in Arizona before World War II, in which she served as a
lieutenant commander in the Navy WAVES.
After the war, she returned to Alaska to begin the work for which she is best known. Under
Mount Saint Elias: The History and Culture of the Yakutat Tlingit , her groundbreaking holistic
study of the archaeology, ethnohistory and ethnography of one culture, was published by the
Smithsonian Institution in 1972. It has been hailed as "one of the first of such studies of a
North American Indian society." De Laguna also authored numerous articles and papers as
well as three popular novels, an autobiographical work on anthropology and two books of
verse.
De Laguna donated to Bryn Mawr many archaeological and ethnographic objects that she
collected during the 1950s and 1960s while conducting ethnographic research in Alaska and in
the Southwest United States.
Friends report that de Laguna was an active scholar until the end. In the last month, she
founded her own press, and she had recently finished editing a book and revising her magnum
opus on the Tlingit for republication.
A memorial service is planned for Decempber.
ON CAMPUS: NATIONAL DENIM DAY, TREE DEDICATION, ETHNIC NOTIONS,
ADVERTISING AND BODY IMAGE, HALLOWEEN PARTY IN GUILD
Dressing Down for the Cure. On Friday, Oct. 22, a $5 donation to the Susan G. Komen
Breast Cancer Foundation will entitle staff to wear jeans to the office. Since 1996, Bryn Mawr
College has raised more than $5, 000 in aid for the Foundation through participation in Denim
Day. If you are interested in participating, please send a $5 check (payable to the Susan G.
Komen Breast Cancer Foundation) or bring cash to Human Resources. You will also be given a
pink ribbon to wear. Additionally, community members who participate receive a coupon for a
20-ounce fountain soda from Uncommon Grounds. Contact Deborah Harley at x5261 for more
information.
Tree and Bench to Memorialize GSSWSR Professor. On Monday, Oct. 25, the Bryn Mawr
Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research will dedicate an oak sapling and a bench
in honor of Jean Haring, a professor at the Graduate School from 1959 to 1976 and an
accomplished scholar of psychology. The tree and the bench, which will be placed in front of
the Graduate School, are funded by Barbara Grossman, a lifelong friend and protégé of
Haring's. The dedication will take place at 10 a.m. Contact socialwork@brynmawr.edu for
further information.
Critical Media Literacy Series Opens with Ethnic Notions. A new film series sponsored by
the Office of Intercultural Affairs will open Wednesday, Oct. 27, at 7 p.m at the Multicultural
Center, with the Emmy-winning documentary Ethnic Notions, which traces the history of "the
deep-rooted stereotypes that have fueled anti-black prejudice," says Director of Intercultural
Affairs Christopher MacDonald-Dennis. MacDonald-Dennis hopes the film will provide some
insight into a controversy that arose last year when guests at a Halloween party on campus
appeared in costumes that offended many members of the community.
Directed by Marlon Riggs and narrated by Esther Rolle, Ethnic Notions investigates and
chronicles stereotypes of African Americans in film, cartoons, songs, literature, advertisements
and popular consciousness, tracing pop-culture representations from the 1820s to the Civil
Rights period. Commentary by scholars probes the historical origins of these caricatures and
their effect on race relations in the United States. The film challenges viewers to examine
cultural representations with a critical eye.
According to MacDonald-Dennis, increasing awareness of the social and political issues raised
by cultural representations is an overall goal of the series. "The old adage is right —
knowledge is power — and without it, we are defenseless against the misinformation we
receive every day," he says.
Body Image Council Presents Award-Winning Lecturer. The Bryn Mawr Body Image
Councill will present a talk by Jean Kilbourne, titled "Slim Hopes: Advertising, Relationships
and the Obsession with Thinness," on Wednesday, Oct. 27, at 8 p.m. in Thomas Great Hall.
Kilbourne, a visiting research scholar at the Wellesley Centers for Women, is the author of
Killing Us Softly, a 2000 documentary about gender in advertising that was shown last
February as part of Eating Disorders and Body Image Awareness Month. The National
Association of Campus Activities has twice awarded her the title "Lecturer of the Year." Her
latest book, Can't Buy My Love: How Advertising Changes the Way We Think and Feel, won
the Distinguished Publication Award from the Association for Women in Psychology.
Kilbourne's talk is offered by the BIC as "a passionate and witty presentation on how
advertisers undermine female self-esteem and exploit disconnection in women's lives and then
offer food as a route to connection and even sometimes as a substitute for relationships." This
free event is open to all students and faculty as well as the general public. Contact
mollyheart@aol.com for more information.
Guild Ghouls Open Doors. Information Services will hold its annual open house and
Halloween party in Guild on Thursday, Oct. 28, from 3 to 5 p.m. Costumes and families are
encouraged but not required. The hosts promise friends, games, treats and tricks.