Newsweek editor discusses economy in PPE lecture
The Institute for Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (PPE) launched its Lampert Lecture Series in February with an address by Newsweek International editor Fareed Zakaria, who offered a compelling examination of the economic crisis.
    Besides his Newsweek role, Zakaria regularly contributes to the Washington Post and hosts a foreign affairs program on CNN Worldwide called Fareed Zakaria GPS.


Fareed Zakaria speaks to members of the Colgate and local communities in Brehmer Theater.  (Photo by Seth Greene '11)

    Stanley Brubaker, PPE director and professor of political science, said Zakaria was the perfect speaker for the institute’s exploration of “Liberal Democracy and its Limits.” The mission of the PPE is to provide a forum for students and faculty to engage in public affairs and facilitate the connection of diverse disciplines.
video iconSee an interview with Fareed Zakaria
    “I thought his lecture offered many insights to which we will return in various projects the PPE will be sponsoring over the next couple of years,” said Brubaker.
    In his lecture, Zakaria offered insight on how the economic crisis happened. Zakaria took the audience back to 1979, a year he said signifies the end of the old world and beginning of the new. In that year, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, a move that ultimately led to its breakup. After the Soviet Union’s collapse, there was only one economic model, that of the United States, the remaining superpower.
    Zakaria cited another event in 1979 that changed the global economic landscape. Margaret Thatcher became prime minister of Britain, and she introduced deregulation, tax cuts, and a laissez faire approach to economics. The reforms allowed money to move freely in the market.
    The third factor that Zakaria pointed to was the technology revolution. With the prevalence of television, anyone could immediately find out what was happening and what it was like in the rest of the world, which led to a decrease in price disparities.
    All of these factors led to the creation of a single global market accelerated by technology. He said that in the past two decades, we have created a world where everyone is connected but no one is in control. Now we are entering an unusual geopolitical moment — the first truly global economic crisis.
    Zakaria concluded that the only way to save the global economy is for the world’s nations, including the United States, to come together and coordinate financial policies. Otherwise, a historian in the future could look back on this crisis and remark that just as the world opened up, the United States shut down.
    “The U.S. succeeded in its great mission — it globalized the world. It just forgot, along the way, to globalize itself,” said Zakaria.
— Megan Foley ’09

National Teach-In events fuel campus discussion
A National Teach-In on Feb. 5 provided a forum for professors and students to have a dialogue about global warming. The conversation was geared not only toward promoting awareness, but also to propose actions that individuals and the campus as a whole can take to combat climate change.
    Robert Turner, professor of economics and environmental studies, and Ian Helfant, associate professor of Russian, gave a lecture titled “Colgate: Where do we stand? What should we do?” It was one of more than a dozen sessions held on campus.
    Turner and Helfant are members of the Environmental Council, a group of faculty, staff, and students charged with analyzing and advocating projects to improve environmental sustainability at Colgate.
    The professors explained in their lecture that the three big areas of greenhouse gas emissions on campus are heating, electricity use, and transportation. Turner said there is no real motivation to curtail electricity usage on campus because the cost per kilowatt hour is very low. But, he added, most of that electricity comes from hydropower, which helps keep carbon dioxide emissions low.
    Colgate employs a wood-chip–burning heating plant using regional waste wood chips to provide steam heat to the majority of the campus. By burning 20,000 tons of wood chips (a renewable, carbon-neutral resource) annually, Colgate avoids consuming the equivalent of 1,000,000 gallons of fuel oil each year.
    A task force organized by the Student Government Association (SGA) is looking into various transportation options, including improving the campus shuttle system and exploring biofuel options, as well as creating a ride-sharing system. The SGA has several task forces that are part of its campus carbon-neutral campaign.
    “It’s finally come to the point that people realize that our current consumption is not sustainable. We need to do something to change this,” said Christov Churchward ’10, who gave a presentation titled “Opportunities for student involvement and political action.”
    The National Teach-In was part of the 13 Days of Green, a series of campus environmental events leading up to the eighth annual Green Summit on Feb. 13.
    After attending several lectures, Megan Cronin ’10 said she felt motivated to join in the environmental efforts on campus. “The National Teach-In made me think that there can be a vehicle for change and that I need to get behind it,” she said.
    Cronin also was one of a number of Colgate students who attended Power Shift 2009, a student rally on Capitol Hill Feb. 27 demanding government action on climate change.
— Brittany Messenger ’10

Documenting a Russian social experiment online
It was one of the most enduring social experiments of the Communist era: since the revolution of 1917, Russian families from various backgrounds have lived together in urban communal apartments. Colgate professors Alice Nakhimovsky and Nancy Ries, with colleagues from around the world, have created an online museum to systematically document this unique lifestyle through pictures, video clips, articles, and artifacts.


The story of Nina Vasilievna (left) and Anna Matveevna (right), who have lived in the same communal apartment in Russia for almost their entire lives, is one of the many that are featured on the website Communal Living in Russia: A Virtual Museum of Soviet Everyday Life.   (Photo by Ilya Utekhin)

    The site Communal Living in Russia sprang from images and ethnography posted to the Internet by Ilya Utekhin, an anthropologist at the European University in St. Petersburg. With a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), Utekhin, Ries, Nakhimovsky, and Cornell’s Slava Paperno spent two years building an enhanced site that features video, photographs, original essays, recordings of interviews, and more.
    Nakhimovsky, with her background in Russian language and culture, prepared translations while Paperno, who hails from Russia, used his computer expertise to build the website. “We collaborated — not just on every word, but on every period and comma,” said Ries, who wrote many of the essays.
    The impact of the project has been profound. Peeking into kitchens and living rooms has opened a window on historically relevant, intrinsically moving first-person narratives by Russians who lived through landmark moments of the 20th century.
    “We strived to capture something of a disappearing way of life, thus creating a durable record of a social era and institution that is vanishing,” the team wrote in its final NEH report.
    This year, students and scholars in America, Europe, and Russia are using the site to satisfy coursework and curiosity. You can, too, at http://kommunalka.colgate.edu.

Promotions
Provost and Dean of the Faculty Lyle Roelofs announced that the Board of Trustees has approved the following promotions, effective July 1. Continuous tenure and promotion to associate professor were awarded to: Luca Caminati, Romance languages and literatures; Kevin Carlsmith, psychology; John Crespi, East Asian languages and literatures; Lesleigh Cushing, religion and Jewish studies; John Palmer, educational studies; Naomi Rood, classics; Bruce Rutherford, political science; Peter Scull, geography; Kenneth Segall, physics and astronomy; and Natalya Stolova, Romance languages and literatures.
    Promotion to full professor was given to Morgan Davies, English, and Adrian Giurgea, English/University Theater.

Analyzing gender imbalance in economics
Larry Summers, director of the National Economic Council for Barack Obama, has taken heat for speculating about women’s capacity to excel in technical careers. His own field, though, is also pretty technical and presents some of the same issues for women’s achievement. A study of students at Colgate reveals one possible source of the shortage of women in economics: grade sensitivity. “The Role of Grade Sensitivity in Explaining the Gender Imbalance in Undergraduate Economics,” by former Colgate economics professors Kevin Rask and Jill Tiefenthaler, was published in Economics of Education Review (December 2008).
    The analysis looked at data from the transcripts of students from the graduating classes of 1989 through 2004. Especially in introductory courses, poorer grades were more likely to discourage women from taking further classes in economics. Ironically, this meant that most of the weaker students in the higher-level courses were men, and that women who ended up majoring in economics had a higher overall GPA than the men.

Preparing global leaders through the Benton Scholars Program
The first class of Colgate’s Benton Scholars has jumped into building skills of global leadership through specially tailored coursework and educational experiences. The four-year program, founded by Dan Benton ’80, was developed as a model for how a liberal arts education can fully prepare students to think, act, and create in an increasingly diverse and global world.
    “Dan Benton’s vision was driven by educating people to become experts in globalization, knowing that the world has changed so dramatically and people have to understand what it is to be living in [different countries],” explained President Rebecca Chopp.


President Rebecca Chopp listens to a Benton Scholar student’s perspective during a Political Theology class discussion.  (Photo by Andrew Daddio)

    The scholars were invited to participate based on their demonstrated ability to think and lead and their passion for making a positive impact on the world.
    Like all Colgate students, Benton Scholars determine their course of study, as well as choice of major and activities. The program is meant to be an enhancement, with specific activities designed to bring new perspectives to their experiences on campus and throughout their lives.
    In the first year of the program, the scholars live together in one of the university’s first-year residence halls and take one class together each semester. This year, their fall first-year seminar, Political Theology, was team-taught by program adviser and political science professor Tim Byrnes and President Chopp; this spring, they are taking Core 152: The Challenge of Modernity, with philosophy professor David Dudrick.
    Joshua Smeltzer ’12 described the Political Theology course as an “academic wake-up call,” saying “Professor Byrnes and President Chopp taught us how to critically analyze material and produce our own opinions.” He added, “The drive to produce knowledge is the first step toward being a global leader, and for the rest of my academic career, I’ll be indebted to them.”
    So far, the Class of 2012 scholars have visited a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Ithaca, went to a Russian Orthodox Monastery in Jordanville, and learned about the history of Chapel House with its director John Carter.
    During the sophomore year, the scholars will be challenged to explore the connections between global issues and the local community, so many of their outreach activities will be through the Upstate Institute. They will also host a Global Challenges Symposium, where a guest will speak on a theme and scholars will deliver presentations that identify the connections between the theme and their chosen majors.
    As juniors, they will continue to study their chosen theme during a trip to an off-campus study site of their choosing. In this year, they will also become engaged in mentoring relationships, both with Colgate alumni and incoming Benton Scholars.
    In the capstone senior year, the scholars will take a senior seminar together and review how the themes of the program emerged over their years at Colgate. They will also articulate the impact of their experience in public presentations.
    Throughout the program, the scholars will help choose visiting speakers, such as working closely with Colgate’s president on the implementation of the Global Leaders Lecture Series. They have the opportunity to meet with those speakers. Additionally, they will travel to meet with major leaders in business, politics, and philanthropy, including Benton.
    The next experience for which the Class of 2012 scholars are preparing is a 10-day trip to Russia at the end of May. Led by professors Nancy Ries and Tim Byrnes as well as Associate Dean of Academic Programs Raj Bellani, the group will attend educational seminars and explore Russia’s cultural background.
    “It is hard to foresee exactly what the Benton Scholars Program will entail in the coming years,” said Erin Nash ’12, “but one thing is for sure, it will help to positively define our time here at Colgate and will prepare us to be successful global citizens.”

Colgate’s Model African Union team excels at conference
Members of the Colgate Model African Union team took full advantage of an opportunity to broaden their worldview at a recent conference in Washington, D.C. The team attended Howard University’s annual Model African Union conference and performed extremely well, distinguishing itself from more than 20 participating colleges.
    During the conference, students had to formulate, present, and defend proposals that support the interests of their respective countries and benefit the rest of Africa. To be successful, students had to be aware of the political, economic, and ideological status of each country.
    “Before you go to a conference, you not only have to read up on the country you are assigned, but also what’s going on in the whole continent,” said Mayra Gamez ’09.
    Professor Mary Moran, faculty adviser to the group, noted that the students gain as much as they give. “Students who participate in it really get the experience of seeing how international diplomacy works,” said Moran, who is a professor of anthropology and Africana and Latin American studies. “The map of Africa really comes alive for them.”
    Louis Mensah ’11 credited Model AU as having a significant impact on how he approaches academic work. During a conference, students will debate and critique proposed resolutions, down to the word. This experience conditions students to carefully articulate their work as well as have the confidence to publicly defend it, Mensah explained.
    Students must put personal opinions and beliefs aside and take on the interests of the country they represent. This often becomes one of the most intellectually rewarding aspects of the experience.
    “I can lecture about the fact that there are fifty-three countries in Africa all day, but when students begin identifying each other as Zambia or Somalia, and really critique and evaluate each other’s performance in staying in character as a representative of that country, it takes on a new reality for them,” said Moran.
    In addition to performing well over all, individual team members received top honors. Leah Montre ’10 won the Committee Leadership Award from the Committee for Social Matters. Mensah received Honorable Mention for the Outstanding Delegation Award in the Peace and Security Committee.
    Finally, Malik Wright ’09 was chosen to be chair of the Committee on Union Government, and, based on his leadership, was chosen by the faculty advisers to be vice chair of the Assembly of Heads of State.
— Megan Foley ’09

Studying native cosmologies in Mexico
Students in the extended study course Field Methods in Archaeoastronomy traveled to Mexico over winter break, soaking up information during guided tours while producing data of their own.
    The 11 students visited Mexico City’s National Museum of Anthropology and History and the ruins of Teotihuacán and Tenochtitlan, as well as other sites. They also conducted survey work for Professor Anthony Aveni near the ruins that focused on embedded stones that were placed in 16th-century colonial churches.


Professor Tony Aveni and Brooke Schechner ’09 collect data on a church with embedded Aztec sculpture during a Mexico extended study course in January.  (Photo by Joseph Eakin)

    Aveni and a colleague, Eleanor Wake of the University of London, believe the stones’ placement may have something to do with encoding information about native cosmologies. The students’ work will help test that hypothesis.
video iconWatch Prof. Aveni speak about the trip to Mexico
   When they returned to campus, the students continued the research relating to their field experience. They will present their final results at the end of the semester, according to Aveni, who is the Russell Colgate Distinguished University Professor of astronomy and anthropology and Native American Studies.
    Aveni, who helped develop and is now considered one of the founders of the field of archaeoastronomy, has done extensive research in Mexico, as well as Peru, Israel, Italy, and Greece.


Syllabus

PHIL 216: Existentialism
MWF, 10:20-11:10, Lathrop 215
David Dudrick, Associate Professor of Philosophy

Course description: This course introduces students to existentialist thought via an examination of its 19th-century origins and 20th-century manifestations. Among the topics to be considered are existence, freedom, subjectivity, and absurdity.

On the reading list: Camus, The Stranger; Cumming, The Philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre; Descartes, Meditations; Dostoevsky, The Grand Inquisitor; Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling; Nietzsche, The Gay Science; Pascal, Pensées

Key assignments/ activities: Bring questions and, most importantly, objections and new ideas to class. Weekly postings to Blackboard engage with some idea in the readings either individually or after small-group discussion. Two papers, a midterm, and a final exam.

The professor says: I want students to take away the idea that it is worthwhile to pose the deep and abiding questions facing human beings — e.g., What is the meaning of life? Does anything have meaning? How should I live in light of these questions? — even if we can have no absolute certainty with respect to the answers. Too often students are under the impression that if there is no way of proving one answer to be the correct one, then the question isn’t worth asking. I want them to see that each can come to reasonable answers, even if other reasonable people would disagree with those answers.

Students say:
– “I’m getting a better understanding of myself for myself. That in itself is great.”
– “The most important thing I got out of this course was the ability to make thoughtful, logical objections to a claim. I feel more educated after every class lets out!”

Live and learn



Rebecca Gildiner ’09 arrived in Israel two days after the conflict in Gaza began last December, when she participated in the Jewish National Fund’s alternative break trip. Although she was only 18 miles outside of missile range, Gildiner said she did not let the circumstances hinder her plans.
    The behavioral neuroscience and women’s studies dual major from Cherry Hill, N.J., reflects:

“We painted neighborhoods, worked in a soup kitchen, did forest cleanup, and worked on a farm. The language barrier didn’t stop residents from coming out to greet us and offer us what little they had — coffee, oranges, or cookies. Being thanked by these strangers made our work that much more meaningful. We completed all of our projects, and didn’t change our itinerary, for the most part.
    “We had hoped to go see the progress of the indoor playground project [for which the students fundraised before the trip], but we couldn’t because rockets were falling in Sderot. Also, toward the end of our trip, our tour guide had to leave because Israel Defense Forces called upon thousands of reserves — that’s when it really hit us that we were in a place where war is a reality.
    “A highlight was spending time with a family from Sderot who came to the hostel where we stayed in Arad for a peaceful Shabbat. They ate dinner beside us and played soccer with us. Seeing them get such pleasure out of things that we take for granted — enjoying a dinner and being able to run around a field without fear of a missile dropping — put things in perspective for us.
    “The rest of the country outside the Gaza territory was peaceful. I traveled with a friend after the program, and I began to understand Israeli life — people go on as usual. I was aware of my surroundings at all times, but I spent more time enjoying the beautiful country than worrying about my safety.”