○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ ○○○○○○○○ Matters A Newsletter for The City University of New York • Fall 1998 FROM A HENRY ROTH MEMOIR Call It Writing: “Streetwise” in the City: A City College Epiphany Language and Culture on the Beat en years before publishing his By Leslee Oppenheim tal theme of this initiative, developed by classic novel Call It Sleep in 1934 Director of Curriculum and Instruction, CUNY for the NYPD, from Police Commis- T to mixed reviews, Henry Roth (pic- Adult and Continuing Education, Office of sioner Howard Safir’s opening remarks: tured right at about that time) began his Academic Affairs police officers who know about the lan- freshman year at the City College of New guage and culture of the communities they York. In one of several volumes of mem- leven hundred new NYPD officers, serve, equip themselves with powerful oirs Roth wrote late in life under the um- day-old graduates of the Police tools for ensuring the safety and well-being brella title Mercy of a Rude Stream, he EAcademy, file into darkened audito- of themselves, their colleagues, and the devoted more than 150 pages to his colle- riums at four CUNY campuses on July 2. public at large. giate days. This volume, A Diving Rock on The crackle of a police radio can be heard. the Hudson, was published by St. Martin’s As the lights dim, the volume rises. In total he newly-assigned officers in the audi- in 1995 (Picador paperback, 1996), which darkness now, the graduates hear a Tence that day are about to plunge into was also the year he died at the age of 89. woman’s voice screaming rapid-fire Spanish their first command, where they will en- His college days began on an exultant at two police officers seated in a radio car. counter the unique sights and sounds of note: “How beautiful, how glorious, the Extremely agitated, she warns the officers the community and the atmosphere and first hour or two spent in the environs of her assailant is armed with a gun. A chase personalities of their precinct house. Im- CCNY was! An academic cornucopia it ensues; the situation rapidly escalates; mersed in this flood of impressions, they seemed, so bountiful and promising from shots are fired. will begin to form ideas about local ethnic the outside” that Roth said he was con- A dangerous situation—and it is made groups and develop personal ways of inter- vinced he had “made the right choice after even more perilous because, unfortunately, acting with the public. all” (he had turned down Cornell in favor to a C-minus average in [my] scholastic work,” the police officers do not speak Spanish. The Streetwise training was designed to of the City on a hill). But depression soon Roth wryly remarks in A Diving Rock.) Having truly secured the attention of the give new officers strategies for rejecting followed when—’twas ever thus on regis- Though his academic performance at rookie officers, a CUNY-led instructional ethnic stereotypes and bias by encouraging tration day—Roth found most of the City College was less than nondescript, team then proceeded to unfold unique, si- them to seek the guidance of culturally and classes he had planned to take were al- Roth learned the most important lesson of multaneous, day-long training sessions. linguistically knowledgeable colleagues and ready full. his life there. The events leading up to it Titled “Streetwise: Language, Culture and local residents, and by studying the lan- Roth graduated in the Class of 1928 are recalled from two poignant angles in the Police Work in New York City,” this program guage and culture of the community they (Emanuel Streisand, Barbra’s father, was closing pages of A Diving Rock. Here Roth is a first-time collaboration between CUNY serve. Each campus focused on one of a classmate), married and fathered two mingles a recreation of his debut as a pub- and the NYPD, and was based on the cam- three linguistic and cultural communities— children, and then spent many decades, lished writer (Part I) with a retrospect on puses of Bronx Community, Baruch, Mandarin Chinese, Haitian Creole, and (at first in Boston and then in Maine, working the moment from the end of his life, sixty LaGuardia Community, and Medgar Evers two campuses) Spanish speakers—and in various jobs such as woodsman, school- years later (Part II). Colleges. (A simultaneous training session drew on reality-based experiences of sea- teacher, attendant in a mental hospital, The scene is the classroom of a young focused on the African-American commu- soned police officers. and waterfowl farmer while suffering from Composition 1 teacher, Arthur Dickson, a nity and developed by John Jay College was Among the day’s sessions was one called one of American letters’ most famous Columbia Ph.D. student who went on to a offered at York College.) “Word of Mouth.” Officers were introduced long career in the CCNY English Depart- writer’s blocks. Enormous acclaim, how- The officers soon learned the fundamen- Continued on page 5 ever, came to Roth with the paperback ment. At a memorial service in 1962 he reprinting of Call It Sleep in 1964. The was recalled as a “stern professor” and one One Streetwise training video featured next year CCNY honored him with a grand impatient with such “educationist flimflam” as the newfangled notion of a “survey Officer Anthony Parisi in voiceover for presidential fête and bestowal of its this shot of him talking to a woman in course.” “No one was late twice” in his Townsend Harris Medal for “Notable Chinatown: “First I ask if they speak Achievement.” (“Notable achievement equal classroom. Roth’s impression was a bit English. If they don’t, I ask in Cantonese Continued on page 11 if they speak Cantonese. If not, I repeat the question in Mandarin. At least if I know what dialect they’re speaking, I can sort of work within my small 1999-2000 Budget Request framework of that language. I can also request a Mandarin-speaking officer. If you just say ‘Chinese-speaking’ and a Calls for Five-year Funding Cantonese speaker shows up, he’s no better off than I am!” he University's 1999-2000 Operating Budget Request of $1.4 billion, or 8.4% Tmore than the 1998-1999 appropriated level, was scheduled to be voted on by the Board of Trustees on Oct. 26, 1998. The Request was recommended by the Board's Committee on Fiscal Affairs following discussions at joint meetings of the IN THIS ISSUE Board's Academic and Fiscal Committees. The Request was proposed by Interim Chancellor Christoph Kimmich within the Ponder the accomplishments framework of a five-year budget plan and emphasizes standards, opportunity, ser- of this eminent political activist vice, and accountability. Last year, Governor George Pataki and the State Legisla- in an interview with her ture adopted a five-year capital plan for CUNY and SUNY. The operating Request biographer on page 7; learn this year includes mandatory increases for fixed costs (collective bargaining, infla- about the CUNY connections of tion) and a yearly 5% increase above these required costs. A public hearing on the this 20th-century master of the Request was held by the Trustees on Oct. 19. blue note and his brother on The University's budget is submitted to the Governor, the Mayor, the State Legis- page 5. lature, and the City Council for review and approval, as appropriate to the funding source. The full Request can be viewed at the CUNY website (www.CUNY.edu). ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 1 ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ BREAST CANCER PIONEERS AT CCNY Imaging the Enemy emarkable strides are currently sue to form images of its interior. Light being made by researchers at the transiting through tissues undergoes mul- RCity College Institute for Ultrafast tiple scattering that results in a loss of in- Spectroscopy and Lasers in the develop- formation. The team employs several tech- ment of optical mammography and tomogra- niques to sort out image-bearing photons phy methods for breast cancer screening. and discriminate against image-bearing, Tomography is a technique for imaging a multiple-scattered photons. cross-sectional slice of an object, like the Light also takes different amounts of human body, to reveal its internal structure; time to transit through different types of combining these slices produces a three- tissue (normal or cancerous, fatty or fi- dimensional image of the object. brous), even though the thickness may be This research uses light to image and the same. Alfano’s group exploits this dif- diagnose tumors in the human breast, a ference in transit times to highlight normal much less invasive and far less expensive and cancerous breast tissues, as shown in approach than x-ray mammography, cur- the accompanying figure. rently the most common screening method. X-ray mammography employs harmful ioniz- olor of light provides another key ad- ing radiation, cannot distinguish between Cvantage. The interaction of light with benign and malignant tumors, and is not tissues depends on the color of light and sufficiently effective in detecting tumors type of tissue. This now makes it possible, within dense, young breasts. Optical meth- for example, to highlight fatty tissue in the ods such as those being used at City College middle of an excised breast tissue speci- have the potential to overcome these limita- men from fibrous tissues adjacent to it. tions and provide diagnostic information This technique has the potential for use in Normal and cancerous breast tissues are compared above, imaged by pulses of near-infrared light pulses of utilizing the color of light. mapping out the distribution of fat, water, 150 femtosecond duration from a titanium/ sapphire laser.