WesLive: Wesleyan’s Community Blog

Steve Almond ’88, author of the popular book Candyfreak, mourns the death of many regional candy bars in America in his recent mouth-watering essay, “Remembrance of Candy Bars Past” in the Wall Street Journal. He writes that only a dozen such regional candy concerns remain while the rest have been gobbled up or eliminated by “the massive consolidation that has shaped the modern confectionary industry.”

Almond notes: “Thousands of candy bars have disappeared along the road to consolidation, including such recent delicacies as the peanut butter-and-chocolate pods known as Oompahs, the treacherously chewy Bit-o-Choc, the glorious, nougat-and-caramel-filled Milkshake, and the Bar None, an ingenious marriage of peanuts and wafers dipped in chocolate. Also gone (but not forgotten) is the curiously alluring Marathon Bar, a braided rope of chocolate and caramel whose wrapper featured a ruler on the back.”

Almond acknowledges the survival of a handful of candy makers such as Palmer Candy in Sioux City, Iowa, producer of the Twin Bing; the Idaho Candy Company in Boise, Idaho, the creators of a cocoa-flavored marshmallow concoction called the Idaho Spud; and Annabelle Candy, in Hayward, Calif., producers of the chocolate-marshmallow Rocky Road for 60 years.

Almond then offers a mini-history of popular American candy bars, sure to make those with a sweet tooth yearning for more.

Experience a kaleidoscope for your senses with delectable food from around the world; a breathtaking Balinese dancer; rocking music; sultry salsa lessons; and soothing massages.

Wesleyan University’s Green Street Arts Center is celebrating its fifth anniversary and the great success of the After School Arts and Science Program. Our first silent auction, A Feast for the Senses, will be held on Thursday, February 18, 2010 from 6-9pm. All proceeds will support the After School Program and its Scholarship Fund.

We’d like to invite you to attend.  Tickets are $50/person and can be purchased by calling 860-685-7871.

In conjunction with our event in February, we are running an exciting online auction featuring tickets to Broadway shows, a tour of ESPN, art work by Keiji Shinohara, Sasha Rudensky, unique experiences such as dinner with President Roth, Dar Williams Concert tickets and more. You can join in the action here! Bidding is now open! Check the site for updates daily. With your help, each dollar raised will directly support the students in our After School Program and our Scholarship Fund.

Information on both the online auction, as well as the silent auction at Green Street on 2/18 can be found at: http://www.wesleyan.edu/greenstreet/auctionbenefit20101.html.

If you have any questions, please call (860) 685-7871 or email us at gsac@wesleyan.edu.

We thank you for your support!

In the February 1, 2010 issue of The New Yorker, Carlo Rotella ’86, the director of the American Studies Program at Boston College, profiles U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. (The full text of the article is only available online to subscribers.)  The writer points out that President Obama has allotted Duncan more than 70 billion dollars in federal economic-stimulus funds to hand out to the states—more money than any Secretary of Education has had before him. Duncan has exceptional leverage with this stimulus money and his close relationship with Obama, which dates back to when Duncan worked in Chicago..

Rotella writes about Duncan’s childhood on the South Side of Chicago, his passion for basketball, and the after-school program his mother ran and continues to run in North Kenwood-Oakland. Duncan attended Harvard and then played professional basketball in Australia before returning to Chicago. Rotella examines Duncan’s working career in Chicago and his tenure as C.E.O. of the Chicago Public Schools, and he interviews several critics of his policies. Rotella also considers the rules by which the stimulus finds will be awarded to states and considers the legacy of No Child Left Behind. Rotella writes: “Many people who voted for Obama are finding out that on education, as on other issues, he is more of a centrist than they ever imagined. They are realizing, too, that Duncan, for all his idealism, is also the guy who got along just fine with Mayor Daley.”

Rotella also writes about playing basketball with Arne Duncan on The New Yorker web site.

Tags: alumni, Arne Duncan, politics, writing

Lecture by Meghan O’Sullivan, Professor of International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Monday, February 8

8:00 pm

Russell House

The involvement of the United States in both Iraq and Afghanistan has been longer, and harder, than many people anticipated.  Is this due to the inherent difficulty of the challenge undertaken?  Or was it the result of certain policies and decisions made over the course of the past six or seven years?  Professor Meghan O’Sullivan’s talk will focus on a few key decisions, their origins and their impact on the trajectory of subsequent events, and what they mean for the future.

Meghan O’Sullivan is Jeane Kirkpatrick Professor of International Affairs at Harvard Kennedy School and a Member of he Board, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.  She was Special Assistant to President Bush, serving as Deputy National Security advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan. Prior to that appointment Professor O’Sullivan was on the National Security Council staff as Senior Director for Strategic Planning and Southwest Asia.  She is author of Shrewd Sanctions: Statecraft and the State Sponsors of Terrorism (2003) and a volume edited with Richard Hass, Honey and Vinegar: Incentives, Sanctions, and Foreign Policy (2000). Professor O’Sullivan received her BA from Georgetown University and PhD in Politics from Oxford.

Last fall, I had the opportunity to see a screening of a unique film called Universal Signs.  The film is considered a foreign language film as it is all done in American Sign Language with English subtitles.  My own interest lies in years of working with the Deaf community, however, my husband, a filmmaker, had a completely different perspective.  We entered into a conversation on the experimental nature of the film including use of color, shot selection, score, editing, and sound. Not long after, I decided that Wesleyan would be a great place to screen the film.  Our facilities are gorgeous and we have a ready audience of budding filmmakers and a sizable population of students who take American Sign Language during their time here. I have the great fortune to work with some of those students in their Self Instructed Language Program.  The students and I worked together to bring the film here along with the filmmakers, Ann Calamia and Catherine Miller.  After the film, there will be a Question and Answer followed by a Meet and Greet in the Goldsmith Family Cinema lobby with refreshments donated by Tschudin Chocolates and Sweet Harmony Cafe and Bakery.

Please join us. The event is free with a WesID and $5 for all others.

Curious about the film? Check them out at http://www.universalsignsmovie.com.

Wesleyan  is hosting a presentation of the United Nations Human Development Report by the U.N. Head of Research, former Wesleyan Professor Francisco Rodríguez. The presentation, titled “Overcoming Barriers: Human Mobility & Development” will be held on Friday, Feb. 5 in the Memorial Chapel at 4.30 p.m.

The 2009 Human Development Report  explores the implications and consequences of migration beyond and within borders around the globe. Dr. Rodríguez’s presentation will challenge common misconceptions about the impacts of migration on development, focusing on the ways in which mobility can foster human development and how well-designed development policies and programs can improve the effects of migration.

Susan Gzesh P’11, executive director of the University of Chicago’s Human Rights Program, and Michael T. Klare, foreign policy correspondent to The Nation, will also speak. This panel will offer unique insights into the many complicated and interconnected issues faced by migrants, cities, and nations in a world of increasing fluidity.

The Human Development Report is an annual publication from the UNDP that seeks to place people and communities at the center of policy and advocacy concerns in the development process. This event will be an opportunity for individuals who are passionate about international public policy and human development to come together at Wesleyan.

The presentation is sponsored and organized by Impact Humanity, with many thanks to the Office of Student Activities and Leadership Development, WSA, the Usdan University Center, and Wesleyan World Wednesdays.

This event is free and open to all with no ticket required. A reception in the Daniel Family Commons will follow the event. Entry is on a first come, first served basis.

For more information, visit http://www.wesleyan.edu/stuact/undp.html or http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=272971741335.

Tags: events

The Senior Class Officers, in conjunction with various members of University Relations, have organized a special Senior Speaker Series for the month of February. The series will take place as a part of Senior Survival Month, and will feature the following parent and alumni speakers:

Mark McKinnon P’11. – Sunday, February 7

Award-winning media and political consultant for U.S. Presidents and political leaders

Marta Kaufman P’10 – Sunday, February 21

Co-creator and executive producer of the Emmy-award winning sitcom Friends

Lexy Funk ’91 – Sunday, February 28

Co-founder of the very successful clothing and apparel company Brooklyn Industries

The Senior Speaker Series is sponsored by the Alumni Association and will take place every Sunday at 3 p.m. in the Daniel Family Commons.

Haiti Benefit Concert poster

Friday, Feb. 5^th

Duchampion, Fly Machine, Linus

10pm, Psi U

Thursday, Feb 11^th

Acapella for Haiti Relief

7pm, Memorial Chapel

$4 Friday, $3 Thursday, $6 for both. Tickets in Usdan, Monday–Friday, 12–1pm.

Tags: benefit, concert, haiti, music, relief

Below is an excerpt from the CFA Blog, written by Director Pamela Tatge:

There are a number of events on campus this week and next that will help to bring into focus what is going on in Haiti right now.  We are so fortunate to have faculty who can share their personal and scholarly understanding of this magnificent country with us as we try to grapple with the present-day horror and the necessities of the future.

If you have never seen Professor Gina Ulysse (Anthropology, African-American Studies and FGSS) perform before, you must.   I can guarantee that those who have will be flocking to see her again, so I suggest that you plan to arrive early this Thursday night when she performs her dramatic monologue Because When God Is Too Busy:  Haiti, me and THE WORLD.    We have moved the event from the CFA Hall to Memorial Chapel so that we can accommodate a larger audience.

To read more, visit the CFA Blog.

"Restrepo" filmmakers Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington

On Saturday, Jan. 30, Restrepo, a documentary about the Afghanistan war co-directed by Sebastian Junger ’84 and Tim Hetherington, received the grand jury prize for a domestic documentary at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.

Junger and Hetherington spent a year with part of the U.S. Army’s 173rd Airoborne Brigade in Korengal Valley, known as the deadliest valley in Afghanistan, and as a stronghold of al Queda and the Taliban.

Indie Wire recently interviewed the two filmmakers and said that the documentary “may be one of the most experiential and visceral war films you’ll ever see. With unprecedented access, the filmmakers reveal the humor and camaraderie of men who come under daily fire, never knowing which of them won’t make it home.”

In the interview, Junger said: “We were granted complete and almost unlimited access by the US military, and despite having shot very sensitive footage – civilian casualties, dead American soldiers – we were never censored in any way. Our biggest obstacle was gaining acceptance by the men themselves, though after a couple of trips that no longer seemed to be an issue. Without the trust and outright friendship of the men in the platoon, this film would not have been possible. Both Tim and I were seriously hurt during the course of the year in the Korengal – Tim broke his leg, I tore my Achilles tendon – and our physical welfare was probably the gravest threat to the completion of the film.”

New York Times article on Restrepo and other documentaries at Sundance