cuny.edu/news • C ITY U NIVERSITY OF N EW Y ORK FOUNDED 1847 • June 2004

ATAGLANCE Callers Flood‘Citizenship Now!’ Hotline John Oliver Killens he torrent of phone calls to “Citizenship Now!,” the immigra- Celebrated at Medgar T tion hotline set up jointly by the 1 Evers Conference City University of New York and the New The multi- York Daily News, began a full half-hour talented Black before the five-day program officially author John began on April 26. Oliver Killens Before that Monday morning was over, was honored the volume of calls had overwhelmed the at Medgar Daily News phone system, causing it to Evers College, crash briefly. By Friday evening, the 80 where he volunteer experts assembled to provide taught, at the help and advice to almost 6,000 callers 7th National —a rate of about 120 per hour, two per Black Writers Conference, of which minute. he was a co-founder. See page 8. “It just goes to show you the lack of information out there,” said Hostos Explorers Club of N.Y. Community College Professor Allan Honors CUNY Team Wernick, who coordinated the hotline on Colorado Peak initiative. Wernick, an attorney, is chair- 2 man of the CUNY Citizenship and A CCNY- Immigration Project, and also writes a BCC team of column on immigration for the Daily Chancellor Matthew Goldstein, rear at right, visited the hotline at the Daily News as volun- faculty and News. teers helped almost 6,000 callers. student “We knew there was a demand for a researchers service like this,” said Martin Dunn, staff, faculty and students from the Law through this special outreach program.” studying deputy publisher and editorial director School. They were joined by lawyers and Last November, CUNY initiated a clouds in the of the News. “But even we have been paralegals who specialize in immigration series of special seminars in immigration Colorado surprised by the overwhelming response.” and naturalization matters for the Legal law for staff from district offices of state, Rockies has Citizenship Now! added phone lines and Aid Society, the city and county bar asso- city and federal officials; more than 50 been awarded additional CUNY volunteers for the ciations, and several nonprofit legal service staffers signed up for the first series. the Explorers Club Flag Award. second and succeeding days to meet the providers. Telephones were staffed from 9 According to Hershenson, the intent is to See page 5. demand. am to 7 pm daily from April 26 through develop a series of seminars to equip local “The response to the call-in proves once April 30. staff to give precise, correct, current New Edition of 17C and for all that immigrant New Yorkers “CUNY has historically welcomed answers to immigration questions. Pamphlets on Women want desperately to become citizens,” many generations of immigrants who have The need for such services in a city from Trustee O’Malley Wernick said. “But the process isn’t easy. looked to higher education opportunity where about 40 percent of the residents 3 as their ladder to upward social and eco- are immigrants is nowhere more clear Kingsborough Complicated rules, the inefficiency of the nomic mobility,” Chancellor Matthew than at Hostos Community College’s Community government’s immigration offices and the Goldstein wrote, inviting colleges to lend Immigration Clinic. College lack of information keep many from get- their experts and expertise to the pro- “Today I’ve seen more than 25 people,” Professor of ting naturalized.” gram. “Every day, your college helps Myriam Rodriguez, the clinic’s assistant English and Vice Chancellor and board secretary Jay immigrants realize their dreams in numer- director, said on a recent afternoon. Chair of the Hershenson proposed the citizenship call- ous ways. I believe we can build on our “Every day I see more people than the University in to Dunn, who enthusiastically longstanding record of contributions day before, and now they’re coming from Faculty Senate embraced the idea. Volunteers included different countries. It’s not just Hispanic Susan people, it’s people from Pakistan, Trinidad, O’Malley has Morocco, Russia — everywhere.” just published an edition of early CUNY Intellectual Property Policy is Approved Most of the people Rodriguez sees have 17th-century pamphlets on such he New York State Public Employ- increases the royalties faculty members already been to a lawyer, paid their money, topics as gossip, spousal abuse, and ment Relations Board has upheld receive on work they create during their and received nothing in return. “Not the cross-dressing. See page 9. T policies adopted by the City employment.” pro bono lawyers,” she stresses, not the Three Performers University in 2002 that govern the The March 26 decision ruled that, ones who offer their expertise without ownership of intellectual property at the under the CUNY-PSC contract, the union charge. “The only problem with the pro Leave Mark in Circus, 19-campus public college system in New waived its right to collective bargaining on bono lawyers is that they sometimes have 4 Dance, Met Opera York City. A three-member appeals panel this issue. The University’s prior copyright too many cases to help anyone else.” Danette Sheppard is one of three in Albany issued the ruling on March and patent policies, which had been in Rodriguez said most people who con- notable debutantes in the perform- 26th. effect since 1972, were adopted and tact the Hostos clinic want to become cit- ing arts who remind us that CUNY The revised policy, which was adopted amended by the Board of Trustees with- izens, or to secure admission for a relative, is the “Arts & Entertainment” uni- by CUNY’s Board out collective or to get green cards. The volume of visi- versity. Seen here with ringmaster of Trustees in The full decision of the Public bargaining. tors has been up recently because “right Kevin Venardos, she recently November 2002, CUNY began now the INS is being a little bit tougher, became the first featured vocalist in was challenged Relations Board can be found at working on the and people are more aware. They’re look- Ringling Brothers Circus’s 134-year during its drafting (cuny.edu/news). revised intellec- ing for more information.” history. See page 12. in 2001 by the tual property Those worries don’t affect Rodriguez, Professional Staff policy in the fall who was born in Puerto Rico, but, as she Congress, the union representing faculty, of 2000 when Chancellor Goldstein con- said after a recent full day of work, “I like which asserted that the matter was sub- vened a committee to review and update to help people with these problems. I ject to collective bargaining. CUNY’s copyright and patent policies. believe everyone has the right to come “I’m very gratified by the decision,” said The committee received comments from here and look for what we call the Frederick Schaffer, general counsel and several CUNY groups, including the American Dream.’” vice chancellor for legal affairs to the University Faculty Senate, the Professional Wernick urged immigrants to not Board of Trustees. “The revised policy is Staff Congress and individual faculty become discouraged in their quest for cit- more favorable to the faculty than the members, and held two public forums on izenship. “The benefits are too great, the University’s earlier policies. It greatly the issue before the policy was adopted. rights too precious,” he said. FROM THE CHANCELLOR’S DESK Reflections on the Season of Caps and Gowns

By Chancellor Matthew Goldstein but also trepidation. examples bodes well for future grads. In and/or night jobs, parental responsibili- ach year at this time my What will become of the student survey, 80 percent of students ties—it is nearly impossible to choose mind turns to the upcoming our graduates? What in the health sciences—both associate’s from the many stories we have to tell. I ECommencements across our “new beginning” are they and bachelor’s degree recipients—found a could fill pages with inspiring stories of campuses, and what Commence- embarking upon? For job in their field. The numbers are even fabulous grads, and I encourage you to ment really means to us at insight, I turn to previ- higher for earners of a bachelor’s degree watch for the Summer issue of CUNY CUNY—collectively and to our ous graduating classes in education, over 90 percent. (This leads Matters, with its annual feature on some more than 32,800 students poised and their experiences. to particularly satisfying projections for of the most remarkable members of the to graduate this year. It is a time According to one education majors when we consider that Class of 2004. All their stories point not filled with hope and promise, survey of past gradu- this year CUNY education students only to how hard they have worked but marked by a sense of accomplish- ates, 80 percent of asso- achieved the highest pass rates ever on what promise they hold. ment and personal pride. It is the ciate’s degree recipients their state license exams.) In keeping with that promise, I will long-anticipated outcome of years of hard and more than 90 percent of bachelor’s Of course, not all students immediately refer to the Greek philosopher Plato to work, balancing jobs, families, and com- degree recipients from CUNY were pursue employment. Many who com- point us in the right direction for thinking munity obligations with classes and employed within a year and a half of mence will continue their education, about Commencement. In The Republic, assignments, while overcoming difficult graduating. Of those employed graduates, whether by transferring from a two-year to he wrote, “The direction in which educa- obstacles to forge a path to personal suc- 90 percent of associate’s degree holders a four-year program or by going to gradu- tion starts a man, will determine his future cess or a better life. and 80 percent of bachelor’s degree hold- ate school. In fact, 50 percent of associate’s life.” I take this to mean that education As I reflect on what a defining moment ers are working right here in New York degree recipients and 27 percent of bache- sets a person on a path of future learning, this is in the lives of our students, I pause City. Further, CUNY degree holders lor’s degree recipients go on to further opening doors for them—literally and over the word “commencement” itself. So working in New York City are likely to be education within six months of earning imaginatively. I believe that is doubly true often we think of Commencement as an working in the area they were trained their degrees. The University sends four- of the men and women graduating from ending, a culmination of achievement in—for example, nearly 72 percent of year graduates not only to its own excel- CUNY, who have truly “made their begin- after two, four or more years in school. bachelor’s degree holders work in jobs lent Graduate Center but to other fine ning” and determined their future. But Webster’s defines commencement they specifically trained for at CUNY. schools; this year we have students going to Twenty years from now, many CUNY thus: not only finishing a course of aca- Even in today’s economy, half our four- Harvard, Columbia University, and the grads won’t necessarily find themselves in demic study, but also “to have or make a year grads are earning $35,000 or more a University of Michigan, just to name a few. the place they imagined on this beginning.” Graduation in turn is defined year and a half after graduation. As our dedicated faculty know, CUNY Commencement Day. But they will find not only as receiving an academic degree And what are those students doing? has more than its share of truly astound- themselves in a good place nonetheless, but also as passing “from one stage of We know that through initiatives like the ing students. Considering that most of with the skills, talent, and imagination it experience, proficiency, or prestige to a CUNY Big Apple Job Fair alone, our grad- them reach the dais on Commencement takes to press even further forward. In the usually higher one.” uates find jobs at companies like MetLife, Day in the face of great odds—immigra- lifelong pursuit that is education, I wish Naturally, then, Commencement at Bear Stearns, Memorial Sloan-Kettering, tion complications, language barriers, all of our upcoming graduates the best of CUNY carries with it not only excitement and UPS. And looking at two majors as financial difficulties, long hours at day luck on a fantastic new start. Fleeing Civil War, Sending Back a Medical Center Adapted and expanded here is a story from foot-tall trees that had to be preserved. Walking through “Study With the Best,” the 30-minute TV “They spent weeks developing the shapes the model in his imag- magazine, now in its third season, that high- through preliminary models.” The final, or ination, Maldonado lights CUNY’s wide array of outstanding presentation, models were submitted to a says, is quite emotion- faculty, remarkable students and alumni, jury, which included “a number of archi- al, and he makes no and major University academic initiatives. tects, experts in their field, who judged effort to hide his satis- The lively, fast-paced series (CUNY-TV the different solutions.” faction. “Our students Channel 75, Sundays at 8) is aimed partic- One of the student competitors had have become very ularly at prospective CUNY students. good reason to be swept up in the proj- humanitarian.” ect. As a Salvadoran seven-year-old, “One thing I learned bout a year and a half ago New York William Valdez loved to draw and paint, from my grandpa is not to City College of Technology’s so both his grandparents suggested he forget where you’ve come A Agustin (Tim) Maldonado, a think about architecture. Later, however, from. It’s always good to professor of architectural technology, got a in 1995, Valdez fled to the U.S. from the give back,” says Valdez. call from Florida “from a very close friend, civil war to join his father, a florist in New “You have only one a 79-year-old gentleman who happens to be York City. chance sometimes, and a philanthropist. His name is David King.” After some employment as a florist and you take it or leave it. I A Long Islander, King was calling from landscaper, Valdez was encouraged by his decided to take it not just a Tampa hospital where 15 doctors and 10 wife, a teacher, to go for an architectural because of my country, nurses were about to drive down to El degree. He came to City Tech and found but for the thousands of Salvador to perform surgery in the coun- students “were happy here.” Now a sopho- people that we will help William Valdez and his design for a Salvadoran medical center, try, still reeling from the devastation of an more, Valdez says he was “very lucky” to with this medical center.” for which ground will be broken this year. Photo, A. Maldonado. 11-year-long civil war. The war took about land in Maldonado’s class. “I love the way 75,000 lives and left the local healthcare he visualizes everything as an architect. system in ruins. (A series of big earth- He encouraged me to be better, little by Board of Trustees quakes caused further damage.) little, and challenged me.” The City University of New York King told Maldonado he wanted to And the winner was…William Valdez! Chancellor Matthew Goldstein build a new medical center for such good “The fact that William was from El Benno C. Schmidt Jr. samaritans, who eventually treated 5,000 Salvador made it a dream come true,” says Chairman Vice Chancellor for University Salvadorans for everything from cleft Maldonado. “He was able to take native Relations and Secretary of the Valerie L. Beal Randy M. Mastro palates to blindness. King soon called elements, native colors…and incorporate Board of Trustees Jay Hershenson John S. Bonnici Hugo M. Morales again: “Tim, I would like you to donate them into his design.” He adds, “When John J. Calandra Kathleen M. Pesile University Director of your services and design this project for David King saw William’s model, he fell Wellington Z. Chen Carol Robles-Román Media Relations: Michael Arena us.” Maldonado was delighted to sign on, in love with it. ‘That’s what we’re going Editor: Gary Schmidgall Kenneth Cook Nilda Soto Ruiz but he told King, “I want to get the to build!’” Writers: Drew Fetherston, Rita Rodin Rita DiMartino Marc V. Shaw College involved. City Tech has tremen- “I was very excited,” Valdez recalls of Photographer: André Beckles Joseph J. Lhota Jeffrey Wiesenfeld dous assets, wonderful people who are his victory. “The first thing I did was send Graphic Design: Gotham Design, NYC really caring.” an email to my grandparents with a pic- Articles in this and previous issues are available Agnes M. Abraham Susan O’Malley at cuny.edu/news. Letters or suggestions for future Soon the professor’s students were ture of the model. They were jumping Chairperson, Chairperson, stories may be sent to the Editor by email to Faculty Senate [email protected]. Changes of address busy conceptualizing their designs for the and crying; my grandmother was so excit- Student Senate should be made through your campus personnel office. 20-acre site, which boasted several 100- ed she couldn’t talk over the phone.”

2 CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 Ranks of Distinguished Professors Grow by Six

“ he Board of Trustees looked to dozen other institutions, including a Harvard undergraduate. A Ph.D. CUNY’s own faculty when it ele- Columbia, Queens, and Lehman Colleges, obviously being beside the point, T vated six eminent and productive in previous years). A major contributor to he never got one. scholars and teachers to the rank of the fields of Hispanic, Latin American, Describing Kripke’s eminence, Distinguished Professor the Graduate Center’s Executive at its February meeting. Officer for Philosophy, John Congratulating a Greenwood, has said, “His name world-renowned histori- will be remembered when other an of mathematics, a contemporary philosophical lumi- well-known Latin naries are long forgotten, and his American author, an present reputation outshines acclaimed philosopher, everyone in the New York area, a widely published which is itself now recognized as a geometer, a leading world center (if not the world cen- authority on such toxic ter) in philosophy.” substances as lead paint John Jay College and Graduate and silicosis, and the Center historian Gerald Janos Pach founder of a new school Markowitz has established his pre- of thought in criminolo- eminence with research on the his- The Hungarian-born and educated gy, Chancellor Matthew tory and sociology of environmental tox- Janos Pach, professor of computer science Goldstein said, “They ins. A leading figure in the field of the his- at City College and the Graduate Center, exemplify the high- tory of public health and environmental is one of the world’s foremost experts in Isaac Goldemberg caliber faculty the pollution, Markowitz’s most recent book, combinatorial and computational geome- University is committed Deceit and Denial: The Deadly Politics of try. His book Combinatorial Geometry to hiring in all academic areas.” and Jewish literature through 22 books Industrial Pollution (California), was wide- (Wiley, co-authored with P.K. Agarwal) is Joseph Dauben, who arrived at and more than 650 articles and reviews, ly acclaimed. It examines the lead paint the standard in its field. Notable among Lehman College from Harvard in 1972, Goldemberg is perhaps best known for his industry’s knowing exposure of the areas in which he has made outstand- has become a leading scholar of the histo- ground-breaking novel, La vida a plazos Americans, particularly children, to toxic ing contributions is geometric graph theo- ry of mathematics, notably with his two de don Jacobo Lerner (1977), which has substances. In the same vein is his Deadly ry, an emerging new discipline at the bor- classic biographies, George Cantor: His enjoyed multiple printings and transla- Dust: Silicosis and the Politics of Industrial derline of computer science and discrete Mathematics and Philosophy of the Infinite tions (in English as The Fragmented Life of Disease in 20th-Century America mathematics. (Harvard) and Abraham Robinson: The Don Jacobo Lerner). (Princeton, co-authored with David Pach is the author of more than 170 Creation of Nonstandard Analysis Goldemberg, who is Founder and Rosner). papers, is on the editorial board of six (Princeton). Director of the Latin American Writers In recommending Markowitz, President technical journals, and has taught and His international scholarly ties are Institute, which is based at Hostos, has Gerald Lynch noted performed extensive. As reported in CUNY Matters been described by Professor Julio Ortega his years of service research in last fall, Dauben’s 15 years of exploration of Brown University as “the most impor- at John Jay — he Canada, of Chinese mathematics led to the rare tant Latin American writer in New York.” arrived in 1970 — France, honor, for a non-Chinese, of an Honorary The subject of several biographical and notably as chair of Germany, Professorship in China’s Institute for the bibliographical volumes, Goldemberg’s the College’s Great Britain, History of Natural Science. His editorial more recent novel El nombre del padre Thematic Studies Hungary, and leadership of Historia Mathematica in the (2001) was a Latino bestseller in the U.S. Program, which Israel. “In addi- 1980s helped to make it the leading jour- A relative newcomer, philosopher Saul uses team-teaching tion to Prof. nal in its field. Dauben, who received a Kripke came to the Graduate Center last and interdisciplinary Pach’s incredi- Lehman Teacher of the Year award in year after retiring from his endowed chair initiatives to pro- ble profess- 1986, is also the Executive Officer of the at Princeton. The jewel in the crown of mote critical think- ional output,” M.A. Program in Liberal Studies and his career—which commenced at the ripe ing. Lynch also says CCNY Director of Interdisciplinary Studies at age of 14—is the Schock Prize he won in praised Markowitz’s President the Graduate Center. 2001. Awarded by the Swedish Academy history of the Gregory The poet, playwright, novelist, and crit- of Sciences, it is the humanities equivalent College, Educating Williams, “he ic Isaac Goldemberg has risen rapidly of a Nobel. While a high school student in for Justice, published has been a from instructor to professor of humanities Nebraska, Kripke wrote a series of papers in 1990 and coming tireless and at Hostos Community College since his that transformed modal logic, then went out in a new edition dedicated arrival in 1999 (he previously taught at a on to lecture MIT graduate students while this year. Jock Young teacher.” Professor of Sociology Jock Young, from John Jay College and the Graduate Center, is the Report Cites High-Rent Homes of City Nonprofits newest comer to CUNY, having been until last year head of the Centre for onprofit services in New York City percent of the $50 billion annual expendi- By any measure, nonprofits are an Criminology at Middlesex University in are marked by “service gaps in rapid- tures by nonprofits in the city, although important sector of the metropolitan Great Britain. Young, who earned all three Nly changing, low-income communi- only 11 percent of the city’s population economy. They employ more than of his degrees at the London School of ties and outlying residential neighborhoods, resides in those neighborhoods. Low-end 528,000 workers, which is more than Economics, is the author of more than and an over-concentration of facilities in neighborhoods hold 63 percent of the pop- double the number of jobs in manufactur- 175 books, refereed articles, and book downtown commercial sites,” according to ulation, but nonprofits there account for ing, slightly more than all employed in chapters. the New York City Nonprofits Project’s sec- only 23 percent of expenditures. finance, insurance and real estate com- His best-known work is The New ond report. Data revealed gross imbalances However, certain nonprofit services— bined, and just 5 percent below the num- Criminology (1973, co-authored with Ian between “affluent/upper-income” neighbor- immigration help, social services, commu- ber working for all levels of government. Taylor and Paul Walton), which sparked a hoods and those characterized as “concen- nity development, crisis intervention and Over the past decade, employment in new school of thought now called “new- trated poverty/lower-income.” religion-based agencies—were found to be nonprofits rose by about 25 percent, com- realist criminology,” which holds that The Nonprofit Project, which has been better represented in low-end neighbor- pared with about 4 percent overall more importance should be placed on the collecting and analyzing data since 1999, hoods. More than 44 percent of immigra- employment growth. The sector is also an suffering of crime victims and that more is based at CUNY’s Graduate Center. Its tion services were located in those neigh- important employer of women: 68 per- emphasis should be placed on commu- directors are John E. Seley, professor of borhoods. More than 45 percent of the cent of its workers are women, who make nity-based crime-prevention strategies. geography and urban planning at Queens city’s social service nonprofits were locat- up 53 percent of the city population. A more recent book by Young, The College and the Graduate Center, and ed there, as were more than half of the Blacks, who make up a quarter of the Exclusive Society (1999), critiques recent Julian Wolpert of the Woodrow Wilson community-development agencies. population, account for 35 percent of the developments in public policy, especially School of Public and International Affairs However, the affluent neighborhoods in nonprofit workforce. Hispanics, however, the growth of penal systems during a at Princeton. the city, with just 3 percent of the popu- were found to be under-represented, with period of reduced public support for the Nonprofits located in high-end neighbor- lation, were home to from 7 to 12 per- 17 percent of the workers and 27 percent disadvantaged. hoods, it was found, account for almost 62 cent of agencies in these categories. of the population.

CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 3 Think Big but Plan Small, CBS Pro Tells Students at Media Conference

hink big. Plan small. piece of paper,” he said. “Plan your life six in a small town with cable TV, would That, in its briefest form, was the months, a year, two years, five years, ten be able to see him at work. Planning T advice CBS correspondent Byron years, up to that target.” alone couldn’t accomplish everything Pitts offered to the more than 650 atten- Executive Vice Chancellor Louise he hoped for, he said; a dedication to dees at CUNY’s Fourth Annual Student Mirrer presented a special achievement hard work also was necessary. Media Conference, held in February at award to Pitts, the keynote speaker at the “Talent is over-rated,” Pitts said. “It the Graduate Center. Pitts—who has cov- February 20th conference, which featured isn’t enough to be good…I work with a ered such major stories as the September panel discussions, seminars and a job fair host of people who are far more talent- 11 attack on the World Trade Center, the with recruiters from more than 40 media ed than I, far more attractive—and in wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Elian outlets. It was co-sponsored by CBS News my business, looks matter—certainly Gonzalez case and Florida’s presidential and the Office of University Relations. better educated. But I have not worked election recount—spoke with feeling Pitts overcame not only poverty but with many who have worked harder, or about his rise from poverty to media two early problems that should have kept who have been clearer about what prominence. him out of television journalism: stuttering their plan was.” “I was born and raised in East and illiteracy. The first was solved at age Pitts encouraged students who Baltimore,” Pitts told the audience. “I’m 12 in a Baltimore special education pro- might have suffered from the same the youngest child of a single parent. My gram, the second was solved by the time misfortunes that had beset him. “These mother had her first things toughen,” he said. Byron Pitts speaking at the fourth annual child at 16. She had “I’m of the belief that Student Media Conference. me before she fin- New CUNY School for the Fourth Estate you have a tremendous ished high school. I Approval of a new CUNY graduate school of journalism was expected at the advantage over anyone good days along the way. I’m not where I am proud of where I May Board of Trustees meeting, and a search for its founding dean is already you’ll face in graduate want to be, but I’ve come a long way come from, I am under way. The new school, which was proposed by Chancellor Matthew school, anyone you will from where I started.’” proud of who I Goldstein, is expected to open in the summer of 2005 in Midtown Manhattan, face in your professional Summing up his own career and the am…I am a witness accept 50 students in the inaugural class, and eventually serve 200 students. life, because there is a level hopes of his listeners, Pitts said, “You can that all things are of mental toughness that be successful if you are focused, if you are possible.” you have to have to survive disciplined, if you are willing to invest the Possible, that is, with hard work and a Pitts began studying at Ohio Wesleyan those kinds of life experiences.” time.” Then he concluded, “I’m grateful lot of planning. Pitts recommended that University, where he earned a B.A. He also urged future members of the for my professional experience, and let me his student listeners immediately decide He nonetheless thought big and aimed Fourth Estate not to get discouraged be a witness that if Byron Pitts of East where they wanted to be in their careers high—for a national correspondent’s job, when the job does not go well. “Say, Baltimore can make it, anyone—every- at age 30, age 40, age 50. “Write it on a in part so that his grandmother, who lived ‘Today was indeed a bad day, but I’ve had one—in this room can make it.” 7th Black Writers Conference Honors John Oliver Killens ohn Oliver Killens was a legendary National Black Writers Conference at Brath and Richard Wesley. Macmillan and Elizabeth Nunez. novelist, playwright, essayist, teacher, Medgar Evers in 1986. Collaborative support came from In preparation for the Conference, Jmentor and activist, as well the found- That conference also marked the Medgar Evers College, CUNY’s Office of many Medgar Evers faculty used either ing chairman of the Harlem Writers Guild moment when Percy Sutton conceived of Academic Affairs, the Schomburg Center, Youngblood or The Cotillion (the only and vice-president of the Black Academy the John Oliver Killens Chair. Since then, and The New York Times. Killens novels now in print) as required of Arts and Letters. He was also writer-in- the Chair has supported a writers’ work- Killens advocated the depiction of the novels in their English courses. Essays residence at Medgar Evers College for shop and is currently supporting a work- Black family in a positive light, and he from Black Man’s Burden were used as several years until he died in 1987 (he was shop for elder African Americans who insisted that artists and writers accept part of the required readings for depart- born in Macon, Georgia in 1916). While came of age during World War II. social responsibilities. Although a writer in mental exams. Two MEC faculty, there, he led a writer’s workshop and co- The seventh National Black Writers many genres, he is best known for his nov- Professors Carlyle V. Thompson and founded, with Distinguished Professor of Conference devoted its attention to the els Youngblood and And Then We Heard the Steven Nardi, and one English major, English Elizabeth Nunez, the first legendary Black literary eminence himself Thunder (1962), which became a Pulitzer Bianca Jacobs, presented papers at the on March 25-27. This represented a nominee. Both are partly autobiographical. Conference. A former Medgar Evers pro- coming full circle, a collegiate celebration Youngblood,Killens’ landmark novel of fessor (now at Penn State) and author of of one’s own. The Conference opened social protest, follows the Youngblood Liberation Memories: the Rhetoric and with a keynote speech on Killens by family of Crossroads, Georgia, from the Poetics of John Oliver Killens,Keith award-winning journalist Gil Noble. turn of the century to the Great Gilyard, came to speak about why Killens Sponsored by the Center for Black Depression. And Then We Heard the has not been anthologized. Literature at Medgar Evers, the Thunder concerned racism in the military The Center for Black Literature, estab- Conference opened at the Schomburg and was based on his service in the South lished at Medgar Evers in 2003, builds on Center for Research in Black Culture in Pacific. Killens’ other novels include Sippi the strength of previous National Black Harlem and continued at the College, and The Cotillion: or One Good Bull Is Half Writers Conferences and was developed with readings, a cultural program and the Herd (1971) also nominated for a to increase the public’s knowledge and panel discussions on the role of culture Pulitzer. Great Black Russian: A Novel on appreciation for Black literature. It con- and politics in Black literature, the literary the Life and Times of Alexander Pushkin venes conferences, symposia, workshops, works of John Oliver Killens, and his role was published posthumously in 1989. and seminars related to the study, teach- as writer and activist. He helped to organ- Killens was also an essayist—notably ing and discussion of Black literature. ize Black and Caucasian workers for the with his acclaimed 1965 collection, Black Upcoming events include a multicultural Congress of Industrial Organizations in Man’s Burden—and a playwright and bookfair on June 19 at Medgar Evers, and the late 1940s. screenwriter. He co-authored the screen- the North Country Institute and Retreat Among the participants were a diverse play for the 1960 film Odds Against for Writers of Color, from July 18 to 22 in roster of writers, poets, scholars and actors Tomorrow and wrote the screenplay for upstate New York. The public is also who had been friends, colleagues, mentees the 1969 Slaves. His papers are now encouraged to listen to the National Black and devotees of Killens. Among them were housed at Emerson University in Atlanta. Writers Radio Series, “Writers on Writing,” Quincy Troupe, Tony Medina, Woodie He also collaborated with and/or men- which airs Sundays, 7-7:30 P.M. on 91.5 King, Elizabeth Nunez, Ossie Davis, Arthur tored a legendary list of authors including FM in the studios of Medgar Evers College. John Oliver Killens in the office in his home, Flowers, Nelly Rosario, Kenjii Jasper, Obery John Henry Clarke, Maya Angelou, Amiri For more information about Center where he wrote all his books. The photo was Hendricks, Brenda Wilkinson, Ruby Dee, Baraka, Alice Childress, Sarah E. Wright, events, contact its director, Professor taken by his wife, Grace Killens, a resident Staceyann Chin, Louis Reyes Rivera, Nikki Giovanni, Louise Meriwether, Brenda M. Greene at 718 270-6976 or of Brooklyn. Abiodun Oyewole, Farai Chideya, Elombe Walter Dean Myers, Audre Lorde, Terry [email protected].

4 CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 MATTERS IN Two Major Alumni BRIEF Gifts to Queens College CUNY Team Honored for Cloud “ here was no money for education,” appeared. He will continue writing fiction Tsays Virginia Frese Palmer of her Research in Colorado Rockies on his Guggenheim. childhood, “so college wasn’t an option The multi-media artist Sol’Sax,a lec- until Queens College came along.” She turer in art at Medgar Evers College, is grabbed that option, earned a 1942 B.A. well known for his complex and richly in media studies, then a Columbia M.A., symbolic sculptural installations that join and went on to a long career as a speech contemporary African-American culture pathologist-therapist. Along the way she and Yoruban traditions of West Africa. married Gordon Palmer Jr., co-founder Distinguished Professor of English of a company that produced precision- Grace Schulman, of Baruch College, is a engineered electronic components. well-known figure among the poets of Now widowed, Frese Palmer says she is Gotham and will use her fellowship to intent on making it “possible for other add to her already considerable oeuvre. students to get the Leo Treitler emigrated to the U.S. in 1938 high-quality edu- and became an eminence in music history, cation I received.” teaching at several top-rank institutions, She started with a Storm Peak Laboratory expedition leader Edward Hindman helps his student col- Chicago, Berkeley, and Brandeis among $1 million gift in leagues show the Explorers Club flag. them. At the Graduate Center he rose to 2001 to her alma Distinguished Professor of Music. The topic mater’s Speech he venerable Explorers Club of New York recently presented its Flag Award of his Guggenheim proposal is not narrow: and Hearing to a CCNY-BCC team of faculty and students for their study of clouds at “A Study of Discourse about Music.” Center and T the 10,525-foot-high Storm Peak Laboratory in northern Colorado last The seventh Guggenheim, the choreog- Women and Work January. rapher Yin Mei of Queens College, is fea- Program. Now, For 14 years the eminent weather expert Edward Hindman,a professor of earth tured on page 12. Virginia Frese Palmer with another $2.5 and atmospheric science at City College and the Graduate Center, has been leading million gift ear- teams of CUNY students and colleagues on expeditions to the Laboratory to study New Radio Studio Opens marked for the “B” Building (one of the winter-time atmospheric phenomena and cloud pollution. campus’s original, Spanish-style struc- This year’s expedition included his CCNY colleagues Teresa Bandosz (chem- at Brooklyn College tures), she sets a Queens College record istry) and Beth Witt (civil engineering), as well as his former student and CCNY hanks to the generosity of an old grad, for alumni giving. alumnus Neal Phillip, who is a professor of chemistry and Bronx Community THiman Brown (‘34), and a young one, At a festive dedication ceremony on College. Four BCC students and five from CCNY rounded out the team, which Al Tanger (‘01), Brooklyn College was April 16, the building—which once was on Storm Peak for two weeks. able to inaugurate a brand-new state-of- housed the New York Parental School for Why go to Colorado? “If you want to study clouds and whether they are dirty,” the-art radio studio on April 14. Boys and now is home to the Dean of says Phillip, it helps to be able to “step outside the lab and be in a cloud. If we Brooklyn College Radio (BCR, 1090 Students and many student services—offi- wanted to do this kind of work in New York, we would have to use an aircraft, AM), which has been broadcasting to the cially became Virginia Frese Hall. which would be very expensive.” campus for 35 years, is now ensconced in The day before, April 15, ceremonies This kind of research environment would leave anyone with a taste for skiing on, Whitehead Hall in three fully sound- were held to mark the naming of a plaza well, cloud nine. During the first three days of the team’s stay, students were pro- proofed studios, each sporting industry- adjacent to Rosenthal Library in honor of vided with ski equipment and taught basic techniques so they could ski down from standard Wheatstone Radio Arts R-90 Edwin M. and Judith Cooperman (both the lab to their base camp at 6,000 feet. mixing consoles. Class of ‘64), who have donated $1 mil- “The field experience enhances self-reliance,” says Hindman, “since the around- Brown produced and directed some of lion to the College. Welcoming these the-clock measurements require on-time shift work, because the mountain-top and the most famous radio dramas in history major gifts, Queens President James valley measurement sites require them to learn to ski, and because their observation (Dick Tracy, Grand Central Station, Muyskens said of Frese Palmer and the skills can be severely tested by the sometimes hostile weather.” Inner Sanctum Mysteries, and others), Coopermans, “Their gifts build a bridge On their return, the students and teachers worked on preparing reports on their and Tanger is chairman of Marlin Broad- between the past and future of the finds for delivery at scientific conferences. casting. Their gifts, said Brooklyn College’s College and reinforce the impact of this President Christoph Kimmich, will allow unique institution.” students to “gain real-world experience using the best equipment…I look forward Brainy City Tech Student the U.S. at age ten from the Indian state Banner Year for CUNY to hearing the results.” of Punjab. Guggenheim Fellows “Brooklyn College now has one of the Wins Poster Competition He came to City Tech with computer nicest college radio stations in the New ity Tech junior Manpreet Singh, science in mind, but in his first semester he John Simon Guggenheim York City metro area, a facility that rivals C seen here with his mentor Professor was lured to biology awards by a class of TFoundation’s announcement of new some of the professional radio stations Laina Karthikeyan, recently won a Karthikeyan’s focused on cell biology (the fellows in April gave the City University I’ve worked in,” said Assistant Professor national neuroscience research poster focus of her research is the molecular more than the usual reason to celebrate. Martin Spinelli of the Department of competition at a conference in San basis of inherited diseases). “What I like Seven of its teachers—ranging from Television and Radio, where he heads Diego. Singh has been exploring a neuro- about doing research is that you can work adjunct to emeritus—were given 2004 radio studies. BCR’s programming can logical disorder called dystonia, which by yourself, which is relaxing. I hope to fellowships, among the most prestigious, also be heard on the World Wide Web. causes sufferers to make involuntary make a real contribution in the future to and highly competitive, in the nation. Visit the station’s Web site at www.brook- abnormal muscle contractions that cause cancer or AIDS research,” says Singh. Susan Choi, an adjunct assistant lyncollegeradio.org. twisting and repetitive movements. Karthikeyan and Singh recently estab- professor of English at Brooklyn “A mutation has been found in a gene lished the Biology Seminar Club on College, was appointed for work in of most people diagnosed with dystonia campus, which they hope will expose fiction. Born in Indiana and raised in childhood,” says Singh, who came to students to the work of health-related in Texas, Choi has been a staff researchers and facilitate the presentation writer for The New Yorker.Her of their work to their peers. debut novel, The Foreign Student City Tech offers qualified students (1998), was widely acclaimed. opportunities to assist faculty members in Distinguished Professor Emeritus research. Two NIH-funded programs in of English and Comparative which Singh participated—Research Literature Angus S.J. Fletcher, Initiative for Scientific Enhancement and who taught at the Graduate Dual Bridges to the Baccalaureate—are Center, will be using his fellowship designed to increase under-represented to study temporal representations minorities in biomedical research. in poems of the environment. “Quite recently I turned down a very Ernesto Mestre, who is an assis- good job offer from a leading biotech tant professor of fiction at Brooklyn company in California,” says Karthikeyan. College, was born in Guantánamo, “Teaching is instant gratification. . .With Cuba, and was raised mainly in research, it can be years before you know Miami. The author of The Lazarus the results. I feel lucky to have made a Rumba,his latest novel, The Second Prof. Laina Karthikeyan and Manpreet Singh career doing both.” Death of Unica Aveyano, has just Student on air in the new studio at Brooklyn College.

CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 5 Of Timba, Classic Bel Airs &“Papa’s” Finca —

By Pedro Pedraza, Centro Researcher & Exchange Programs Director to the music of timba and salsa, the post-revolutionary educational system, and the Jews and the Chinese of Cuban descent. fter a visit to Cuba in 1986, arranged by the Centro de Estudios Puertorriqueños, The students, who represented the tremendous cultural and human diversity that is City University’s then Chancellor Joe Murphy asked Dr. Frank Bonilla, the founding the City University, learned as much from each other, living together at La Casa, as they A director of the Centro, to begin an exchange program with the University of did from Cuba itself. A get-together on their return led to the idea of sharing their expe- Havana and other cultural, academic and research institutions in Cuba. The program was riences on a web site. With grants from the Centro and the Puffin Foundation, adjunct expanded in the early nineties to include other parts of the Caribbean, and three years professor Maria Finn, who taught part of the intersession course, produced the site, titled ago it was combined with our exchange program in Puerto Rico, Intercambio. “The Crocodile, Letters from Cuba” with the assistance of one of the students, Scott Up until two years ago this exchange was between faculty and graduate students Larson. Visit it at www.centropr.org/exchange/cuba/.The essays generated by the 2003 undertaking research projects or some type of collaboration. On occasion the exchange trip can be read in full on the site. [CUNY Matters has drawn from these colorful, prob- was among writers, painters, film directors, musicians or other intellectuals. Fortunately, ing and perceptive “Letters from Cuba” in the features presented here. — Ed.] about four years ago travel regulations to Cuba were expanded to allow academic This past January the course was again conducted with La Casa, but on the Hunter exchanges by undergraduates. As a result, two years ago the Centro joined with Hunter side a new partner has joined the collaboration, with the Latin American/Caribbean College’s Education Abroad Program to create a January intersession course open to stu- Studies Program providing the academic credit. It is our hope, and that of Program direc- dents throughout CUNY. tor Dr. Michael Turner, that these courses become a fixture This course was created in collabora- at CUNY, for it puts our students on par with those from tion with Cuba’s premier cultural insti- U.C. Berkeley, Johns Hopkins and NYU, who are currently tution, La Casa de las Americas, in also participating in Casa courses. Havana, and offered an intense three We are now organizing a summer course there on Cuban weeks of immersion in Cuban cultural, music; the deadline for applications/matriculation has been social and political history in January extended to June 11th. For further information, or questions, 2003. The principal writing assignment contact Rachell Arteaga at [email protected]. was to focus on a particular aspect of Cuban life and culture, and the essays that resulted explored a wide range of For “Letters from Cuba” on the Jews of Cuba, topics—from baseball, classic car culture, the Martha Stewart of Cuban Cuisine, prostitution, culinary history, and the Black Market Birthday Cakes, and Cuban commercialization of Ernest Hemingway Baseball,visit www.cuny.edu/news.

Model Student Enjoys CUNY’s student delegation is gathered in La Casa’s Haydee Santamaria Art Gallery. In front, from left: Amena Black, Classic Models Elizabeth Lee; middle row: Dawn Everline, Ericka Arroyave, atelyn Mikuliak’s postcards north Nga Lee, Scott Larson, Nadira Narine; back row: Michael Dox, Kbegan, “I’m not in Cuba; I’m in Casa professor Yey Villalvilla, Alana Weston, Jesús Hernández- Heaven.” It wasn’t the lively club life of Garcia, Centro Exchange Programs Director Pedro Pedraza, Havana, resounding with salsa, timba, Kate Mikuliak, Brooke Greene, Rachell Arteaga, Casa employee and son, of surf resounding off the “Chino,” and Hunter resident director Mary Bitterauf. sea-walls of the Malecón, or its atmos- pheric historic architecture that left her in bliss. It was the cars. runs about $107,” Mikuliak says, “while las Americas,” Everline recalls. “There she the foundation for Cuban culture. They Mikuliak, a Hunter College student one from a Polish Lada is $15-$20.” stood with blank look, almost emotionless. were and are the ones who are primarily who just returned from a modeling stint The remarkable Cuban ethnic mix of I wondered what she was feeling.” concerned with family issues. Now these in Paris, adores classic American cars, a Hispanic, African, and Caribbean When Everline, a Lehman College concerns have expanded outside their passion first sparked by an affair with an Mikuliak found reflected in the island’s Latin American-Caribbean studies major, homes, into the streets of Havana, into older man, then deepened by a stint automotive life, producing not a few visu- heard Hernandez remark, “She committed the classrooms, onto the driver’s seats working in an automotive restoration al enigmas. “I never saw a Packard,” she suicide in 1980, around the anniversary of of forklifts.” Haydee Santamaria’s life, garage in her native Philadelphia. She recalls, but “I noticed its signature swan the Moncada invasion,” she was bowled Everline adds, helped her grasp that even turned down a fashion modeling job hood ornaments attached to almost every over. “‘What!’ my soul screamed.…Then I “womanhood and its struggles are univer- in Japan one summer to work on old cars. type of car.” Mainly, she was awestruck by began to wonder if her life was any differ- sal. This bond is being empowered by the “Chipping rust and plunging parts in tubs the “sheer numbers, variety and condition” ent from that of Maria, our cook, or my women of the revolution.” of kerosene might not be glamorous, but I of “these incredible ‘maquinas’: ‘57 Chevy own. I knew that I must change my loved it,” she says. Bel Airs, the classic American car…’50- [paper] topic to Womanhood and the The Flashy, Mikuliak explains that she was in white ‘54 Chevys with their great windshield Revolutionary Spirit.” walls-and-chrome heaven because, thanks visors and cute tire skirts… magnificent Soon Everline was immersed in the Vulgar Timba to a four-decades-old economic embargo old Buicks sporting huge engines and Casa archives, getting to know more eing from a typical Colombian family, imposed by the U.S., “50,000 to 60,000 distinctive ‘ventiports.’” about Haydee’s place as one of the hero- BErricka Arroyave says “music has been classic cars are kept roaming the island by Two things saddened Mikuliak, though. ines of the anti-Batista revolution. a huge part of my life.” She remembers a resourceful population.” With her fine “I noticed that no women are involved” in Santamaria was praised by Castro in his her mother singing and dancing salsa as eye for details on and under the hood, she the car culture. “Cars in Cuba are passed famous “History Will Absolve Me” for her she cooked sancocho in the kitchen and soon learned what geniuses at mix-and- from fathers to sons.” And her weak courage after she was captured and tor- the constant sounds of Eddie Palmieri, match Cuban repairmen have become. Spanish made it hard to get into profound tured during the ill-fated attack on a Ruben Blades, and Willie Colon. “A carb from a ‘57 Chevy, for instance, car talk with proud owners. Still, Mikuliak, police barracks at Moncada on July 27, A junior at Queens College, Arroyave’s who counts her intersession trip “the best 1959. Also at Moncada, both her brother love of salsa encouraged her travel to school-travel experience” she’s ever had, Abel and her fiancé were killed. Cuba. She was, in particular, “eager to says it “re-energized my love of cars. Everline’s first informant was the direc- learn more about timba, a new style of Just thinking of the conversations I tor of La Casa’s Women’s Studies depart- Afro-Cuban music that is a cross between could have had makes me want to ment. “Why did she commit suicide?” she Cuban son and salsa.” Luckily, the very jump a flight to Havana with a asked, and Luisa Campuzano cited a first day she met a musicologist at La Spanish language book, some divorce, a severely handicapped son, and Casa, Yey Diaz de Villalvilla, who was brand new vintage spark plugs the memories of the murders. “Isn’t that more than happy to direct her to those and a gallon of car wax.” reason enough?…But no one knows for wise in the ways of timba and to clubs sure why.” where it was on full display. Probing a Seeking possible answers in the chang- “Timba is a mixture of son, rumba, rap, ing “place” of women in Cuban society, jazz and rock,” Arroyave says, “and it Heroine’s Suicide Everline focused on interviews with two emerged in the 1970s, while Hispanics in awn Everline’s letter, titled “Women older women, a librarian and her cook, New York were creating salsa. Los Van Dof the Revolution,” was sparked dur- and, for a different generational perspec- Van and Irakere were the pioneers, and A classy model, Kate Mikuliak (from an ad ing a visit to the Museum of the Revolution tive, the cook’s grand-daughter. the leader of Irakere, Chucho Valdes, in Jane Magazine, photo Mark Alesky) and led by La Casa Professor Gerardo Hernan- Concluding her letter, Everline writes, coined the term in the late 1980s.” Erricka a classic Buick shot by her in Havana. dez. “I began to focus on a picture of Hay- “Everyday life is a revolution.…It has also learned about timba star José Luis dee Santamaria, the founder of La Casa de been women who have traditionally been Cortès, aka “El Tosco,” whose coarse lyrics

6 CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 Hunter Centro Students’ “Letters from Cuba”

—“tosco” means coarse in Spanish — Gregorio, who had been Hemingway’s about Cuban social problems, Arroyave boat hand. Gregorio, however, died last says, “brought timba to a new level.” year at the age of 104.” Arroyave interviewed a musicologist at A visit to Hemingway’s former estate Cuba’s Center for Investigation and outside Havana, Finca Vigia, is equally Development of Cuban Music, Neris dispiriting. Tourist buses arrive in a crum- Gonzales, who “described timba as flashy, bling neighborhood at “a tall, worn, white complex, sophisticated and vulgar all at security wall.” The entrance fee (plus $5 for the same time.” Gonzales laughed “when I taking still pictures, $10 for video) does not asked her if race, social class or gender even include entry into the finca. “Visitors were problems when dancing to timba.” are left to poke around the home’s exterior, Neris replied, “Cubans don’t care if you looking in doors and windows.” The finca’s are poor or rich, male or female, black or gift shop, Coverdale notes, is “devoid of his white; they only care if you know how to works…just more pages on Che Guevara, dance.” No surprise, then, that when Fidel Castro and socialism.” Arroyave walked into her first timba club, Coverdale’s visit to the famous site the Tropical, the first words of “a really that inspired The Old Man and the Sea Billboards with political messages are a common sight in Cuba. Hunter student Nadira cute Cuban” were “Quieres bailar?” leaves him bemused and cynical. “It’s Narine poses in front of one that says, “Imperialists, we have absolutely no fear!” Instantly she felt she was among friends. strange that one can visit a place so cen- The music, she recalls, “was intensely tral to Hemingway’s life and find so little Tough field work on the subject in work in the glitzy, Las Vegas-style post- rhythmic, very aggressive and boisterous. It of Hemingway. Cubans don’t study his Havana included a rumba session in Plaza colonial period, when Cuba was a tourist was as if all the instruments were challeng- writing in school, and to many his name is de Armas. “It was an amazing experi- playland for Americans. ing each other on which could play the obscure: ‘He’s a writer, right?’” ence…I still have the rhythm stuck in my Pedro Pedraza, the Center’s director of loudest.” She says “timba plays a huge role Coverdale sensibly concludes, “the only head: tun bum bum tun.” “You may even exchange programs, put Lee in touch with in Cuban society,” and she is convinced “it way for me, or anyone, to find Alphonso Lam (cousin of Wilfredo is more than a mere new style that in time Ernest’s, or any artist’s, spirit after Lam, Cuba’s Picasso), whose family will be forgotten.” This not least because they have passed is through his tree is part Chinese. Also a mem- timba’s lyrics contain “subtle references to immortal items: his works, his art.” ber of one of the old Chinese the problems of Cuban society… [Timba] Assocations, Lam took her on a is serious, and offers food for thought.” surprising tour: “I was flabbergasted Searching for the at the sight of ‘El Barrio Chino’ in Hemingway’s Legacy Roots of Salsa Havana,” she recalls. he letter from Jesús Hernández- Soon she was conversing with (For a Price) TGarcia should be accompanied by a Cuban-born but pure Chinese uba’s charm is hard to resist,” says a CD. For the Hunter College honors in Cantonese, then meeting with CAndrew Coverdale, whose letter program student, who also plays per- the member of the Lee family focuses on how one of the most famous cussion for salsa bands in the city, Association, Li San, who’d emi- U.S. authors, Ernest Hemingway, fell headed south to answer the questions, grated more than 50 years ago. under its spell. Coverdale, a May 2003 “What is salsa? Where did it come Four hours examining dozens of Hunter grad in media studies, tells of from?” And he also wanted to plunge tin ossuaries in a Chinese mau- Hemingway first stopping in Havana in into the old debate: is salsa Puerto soleum turned up nothing, but 1928 with his pregnant wife en route to Rican or is it Cuban? then success came as documents about her grandfather, Chung Key West, then of his frequent trips back “Spending three weeks in La Justo, at left, and his back-up men, are among many street Lap Lee, were found under the for marlin fishing and “the Cuban lifestyle Habana was an edifying and fantastic musicians who keep pedestrians in Havana swaying to a beat. and warm inhabitants.” experience,” he says. The history of false identity he had purchased, A favorite hangout for “Papa” was La salsa, he concludes, does begin “here, in Manuel Fong. Such subterfuge Floridita. “He liked to sit at this bar in the the island known to many as The Pearl of be lucky and catch a bacunao ceremony was necessary because Chinese immi- city’s old town and eat seafood, drink the Antilles.” It emerged from the son, a on the Plaza…Even walking down the grants did not have legal status. daiquiris (which were invented there)” folkloric music whose beat is maintained Malecón, you will bump into two or three On her return home with copies of the and people-watch American tourists. by the clavé, two sticks tapping together, guys chilling on the seawall playing son.” documents, Lee was a little disappointed Most of and the rumba, an African- Cuba is a musician’s paradise. “Cubans that her own huge emotions over the dis- Coverdale’s based music known for love music,” Hernández says. He inter- covery were not shared by her dad. “His letter (its full such dances as the bacunao, views a street musician named Justo (seen reaction was calm, with a smile on his title: “Hem- yamb˙ and guaguanco. at left), who explained: “When a child is face.” For her, though, the escape from ingway, a “Guanguanco is a dance born, we dance; after church, we dance; winter may have turned into something Commodity”), where the whole body after dinner, we dance, at weddings and more: “An immense history about the in fact, is moves; it is the predecessor even at funerals, we dance; salsa goes Chinese in Cuba has yet to be told and devoted to wry of the popular salsa dance.” everywhere a Cuban does.” perhaps observations on Hernández explains that some day I how “Heming- modern salsa is in fact the Tropic Escape— will return way’s mystique result of a very complex Family Discovery and com- persists in fusion of styles that began plete what I Cuba.” Selling when Cuban music came to unter College geography major Nga feel is my the writer’s the U.S. in the 1940s with a HLee admits her foremost desire in duty.” legacy, he wave of immigrants. “Salsa is heading for Cuba was “to be in a tropical observes, “is a the commercial name given island in January and to see the beauty way to make a to this music as it developed and culture of an island forbidden to us living.” His old in the barrios of New York by our government.” But when she room at the City in the mid-1960s. It is arrived, a melancholy fact in her family Hunter Ambos a fusion of Cuban son and history began to nag in the back of her adjunct Mundos hotel, rumba, American jazz and mind: her grandfather had long ago aban- teacher for where he often Puerto Rican bomba, plena doned his wife and son, Nga’s dad, and the Cuban bunked, is now and música jíbara.” A major emigrated from China to Cuba. Could trip, Maria a museum. contribution to his Babel of Lee, who was raised in New York’s Finn Dom- “For years visi- musical tongues came with Chinatown, find any traces of his exis- inguez, tors could pay an influx of Puerto Ricans in tence on the island? has edited Research led her to learn about two a new lit- an extra $10 Andrew Coverdale, at Hemingway’s the 1950s. Hernández cred- major waves of immigration from China, erary anthology of and sit and famed Finca Vigia; he’s mimicking the pose its Tito Puente largely for one in the 19th century to work in the famed writers who have written about what speak to a man “Papa” struck in one of his last photos the “salsa explosion” of the sugar fields after the abolition of slavery, Columbus called “the most beautiful country named before he left Cuba. 1960s. then another in the early 20th century to that human eyes have ever seen.”

CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 7 Highlights from CUNY Disabilities-Awareness Month

strong commitment to enabling and the myriad ways that it currently chaired by Don Davidson students, faculty, and staff with ensures computer access to students with (LaGuardia) and Syd Lefkoe A disabilities to excel in their stud- disabilities and on plans for offering even (Queens), did so, and it produced a ies, research, and work was displayed on more services in the near future. report with recommendations in all college campuses, following Chancellor Queens College’s contribution was a such areas as facilities, curricula, Matthew Goldstein’s announcement that Legislative Breakfast on April 23 attended technology and employment. April would be CUNY Disabilities by local state legislators, City Council The complete report and links to Awareness Month. members, and other borough, city and other CUNY and external resources Many events highlighted some of the state officials. It focused attention on a are available on the Committee’s University’s talented students, faculty and variety of disability-related issues and on developing web site, access.cuny.edu. staff with disabilities, as well as those whose some of the legislative work done togeth- This site also links to the main area of research is in the disability field. er. The event also honored those CUNY CUNY portal’s “Statement on Notable among these gatherings was a leaders who help to empower more than Accessibility” and describes the Disabilities Awareness celebration at 9,000 CUNY students with disabilities. ongoing partnership with University Baruch College led by its Computer Center LaGuardia Community College pre- Dean Mike Ribaudo and CUNY/CIS for Visually Impaired People.The Center’s sented a panel on “The Deaf Immigrant’s related to technology and web director, Dr. Karen Gourgey, joined with Experience” that featured four deaf access for people with disabilities. Douglas Sussman, Deputy Director for CUNY grads from Ukraine, Pakistan, In talking about the Focus Group Government and Community Relations China and Brazil. Author Rose Pizzo Report, Mirrer summed up the for the Metropolitan Transit Authority, came to campus to discuss her book University’s commitment, which is to unveil a new advertising campaign, Growing Up Deaf: Issues of Communi- so necessary to the success of the “Working Together for Visually Impaired cation in a Hearing World, and the College faculty, staff and student efforts: People,” which will promote programs and also arranged a bus trip to the American “We are pleased to celebrate the services for those with disabilities. Sign Language Festival at Union County considerable talents and abilities of At the same event John Jay Professor College in New Jersey. CUNY students with disabilities, the of Government Ruth O’Brien, author of Efforts to improve University services accomplishments of CUNY’s world- the recent book Voices from the Edge: in this area began well before April. In class faculty and staff with disabili- Narratives on the Americans with December 2003, Executive Vice ties, the leadership of the University’s Disabilities Act (Oxford University Press), Chancellor Louise Mirrer requested that distinguished alumni with disabili- spoke of real-life experiences of those the University Faculty Senate hold a focus ties, and CUNY’s cutting-edge with disabilities since the act became law. group on disabilities issues to identify research that is dramatically Pip, Dr. Karen Gourgey’s guide dog, calmly reflects Information was also given on CUNY problems and recommend solutions. The improving the quality of life for on the new campaign poster unveiled by the MTA’s Assistive Technology Services (CATS) UFS Committee on Disabilities Issues, co- New Yorkers with disabilities.” Douglass Sussman. Photo, MTA. City Tech Unveils Career Manual for Students with Disabilities has just produced like JAWS (Job Access With Speech). Studies in Howard University’s School of a career-selection The need for an all-CUNY compilation Education in Washington, D.C., Walker is manual, was recognized when a similar manual a renowned authority in the field of dis- Identifying devoted solely to City Tech degree pro- ability rights. She encouraged City Tech to Options that can grams (compiled by Soudabeh Shayesteh enlarge the reach of its campus manual, now be accessed and Charlotte Rubin and including infor- and through funds at her disposal she on the CUNY mation aimed at students with disabili- offered to partially support the new and website. ties) was well received by College stu- expanded Identifying Options. This manual dents, faculty, and counselors. Shayesteh “Students should have a portable tool highlights every and Rubin also researched and designed to assess where they fit in when selecting CUNY associate Identifying Options. a career,” Walker said. “Students with dis- and certificate One of the parties who applauded the abilities need to be aware of all the feasi- program. Each original City Tech manual was the distin- bilities, but simultaneously they need to program is iden- guished educator Dr. Sylvia Walker, who be aware of all their options.” tified on a sepa- began her college studies at City Tech. To access Identifying Options go to rate page and Long legally blind and for several years www.citytech.cuny.edu, click on Students, includes its completely without sight, Walker went on then on Student Support. Access from the curriculum, the to earn degrees from Hunter and Queens CUNY website (www.cuny.edu) is by colleges that Colleges, then a doctorate from Columbia clicking on Current Students. For further offer the major, University. information about Identifying Options, Student Support participant Gary Hutchinson peruses Identifying prerequisite skills Now the director of the Center for contact Faith Fogelman at 718-260-5143 Options with assistive technology and the help of Technology and abilities, Disability and Socioeconomic Policy or [email protected]. Coordinator Charlotte Rubin. potential jobs awaiting its grad- o every CUNY student the uates and other moment comes, sooner or later: information. Other sections in Identifying John Jay Report to Bishops on Abuse T finally deciding what career path Options offer students with disabilities to follow. For students with disabilities—a valuable information on campus accom- ore than two-thirds of the 4,392 Catholic priests accused of sexually abusing rapidly growing student community—the modations and resources (listed by type minors between 1950 and 2002 were pastors or assistant pastors, according to a decision can be affected by many addi- of disability) and lists of organizations Mnational study recently conducted by faculty at John Jay College of Criminal tional factors—knowing which modes of with a history of hiring individuals with Justice. The study, commissioned by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, came from technology for serving particular disabili- disabilities. surveys in 195 dioceses (representing more than 97% of the nation’s diocesan priests) and ties are available on a given campus or in Identifying Options will be periodically 142 religious communities with about 83% of all priests in religious orders. prospective work sites, for example, or revised to reflect the most current data. Based on estimates of the number of active priests, the study concluded that about 4% which professions and good corporate citi- “The manual will soon be available in of priests had been accused. In all, 10,667 individuals—80% of whom were male—alleged zens have a history of hiring the disabled. alternate formats such as tape and Braille,” that they had been abused by priests. More than a quarter of all complaints, involving In an effort to respond to the chal- says Director of Student Support Services almost 3,000 victims, were lodged against just 149 priests. lenges facing students with disabilities— Faith Fogelman, who supervised the com- John Jay was selected to conduct the study by a review board created in 2002 by the and all other CUNY students—the pilation of the manual. “It will be a valu- Bishops’ Conference. The mandate was to examine the number and nature of sexual Student Support Services Program at able resource for all students, potential abuse allegations against priests from 1950 to 2002, to collect information about the New York City College of Technology, the students, career/guidance counselors and alleged abusers and their victims and to assess the financial impact on the Church. office which assists its disabled students, parents.” In the near future the site will be The entire study is available online at the John Jay College website: compatible with voice activated software, www.jjay.cuny.edu/churchstudy.

8 CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 BOOK TALK OF THE CITY Women’s Place in Society — Convening in a wine bar for serious gossip was not Two New Historical Retrospects invented by “Sex in the City.” One of several original title pages repro- Idiot Custom v. Sweet Reason in Jacobean England duced in Custome Is an Idiot. t was 1620, and King James was furi- Merry When Gossips Meet and A Whole wife beating, which was ous about a serious social problem. He Crew of Kind Gossips. In both, a group of legal and fairly common in I leaned on the Bishop of London to women are chatting away in the Jacobean early modern England. make his preachers thump the pulpits of equivalent of a wine bar and reminiscing Among proverbs of the the city vehemently and bitterly on the about courtship, pregnancy, husbands, time revealing acceptance subject. The outrage? — all these women and good times had. Think “Sex in the of it that O’Malley cites is who were going about dressed like men. City,” circa 1609. “The language of Tis this: “A spaniel, a woman, After all, did not his estimable Merry is marvelously bawdy,” O’Malley and a walnut tree, the more “Version” of the Bible specifically state, writes. they’re beaten the better they be.” “The woman shall not wear that which Falling in the category of “pamphlets Accompanying the texts are extensive pertaineth unto a man”? (As to what that praise women while undercutting notes setting them in context; the 1609 Deuteronomy 22:5 says next — “neither them,” says O’Malley, is the 1620 Apology Apologie alone evokes 339 of them! In an shall a man put on a woman’s garment” for Women; or, Women’s Defence. Its main Afterword to the volume, which was sup- — James was apparently not exercised. argument is that women are superior to ported by several PSC CUNY grants and But then, his intimacies with prominent men because they are more virtuous, even a CUNY Collaborative Grant, Professor young male courtiers were by 1620 a though they are “the weaker vessels” and Esther Cloudman Dunn of Smith notorious subject of court gossip.) their bodies are “an Asia, full of delights.” College writes, “Thanks to O’Malley’s In due course, to please the King a Along the way, however, the author, appreciative introductions and rich pamphlet titled Hic Mulier; or, The Man- Christopher Newstead, does make the for- explanatory material, today’s readers Woman appeared from an anonymous ward-thinking observation that women’s of both sexes can read these novel, author of puritanical mind, the joke of “want of employment corrupts the bravest entertaining, and serious pamphlets the title being that the Latin masculine spirits.” In other words, O’Malley writes, with the understanding and pleasure women “hic” (instead of the feminine “haec”) “women would be fit rulers if only they they deserve.” and the attitudes modifies “mulier” (Latin for “woman”). were permitted to rule.” The distinguished scholar of English toward them in early modern Hic Mulier is a diatribe attacking cross- The other pamphlet included is the Renaissance literature, Arthur F. Kinney, England. Susan O’Malley’s six texts make dressing, calling women who do so “Apes similarly titled An Apologie for Women, has also welcomed the edition: “We still a valuable contribution to such a project.” of the City.” Such women, who were “of which appeared in 1609 to argue against have much to learn about the lives of all degrees, all deserts, and all ages,” com- mit “grosse adultery with their Gewgawes,” and fathers and husbands Now, Voyager: Three 19th-century Women Travelers were urged to “close your liberall hands” and stop funding these “deformities.” rior to the 20th century, domestici- tion and emigration were creating mobile, transatlantic traveler of the Americas, A week later the same publisher— ty was in countless ways a women’s racially hybrid populations.” Each writer, important for her interventions and publishers have always flourished during P prison. In many parts of the world she argues, blended themes from explo- reconfigurations of the discourses of war, culture wars—brought out a rebuttal it still is. It took considerable courage for a ration literature and various autobiograph- medicine, and imperialism.” She clearly pamphlet, possibly by an erudite, cheeky woman back then to choose simply to be ical genres to reconfigure racial and was a woman with no problems of low law student at the Inns of Court: Haec- peripatetic. When Walt Whitman began national identities and issue a call for self-esteem: “I do not deny…that I am Vir; or, The Womanish-Man. This pam- his “Song of the Open Road” with “Afoot social action. pleased and gratified when I look back phlet proceeds to offer a lively debate and light-hearted I take to the open road,/ Fish’s study of Nancy Prince and her A upon my past life.…I am not ashamed to between Hic Mulier and Haec Vir over Healthy, free, the world before me,” you Narrative of the Life and Travels of Mrs. confess…that I love to be of service to whether custom or reason should prevail definitely sense it was a guy thing. Nancy Prince, which enjoyed three edi- those who need a woman’s help.” on the cross-dressing issue. Hic Mulier Borough of Manhattan Margaret Fuller, whose Summer on the asserts that “Custome is an Idiot; and Community College Professor of Lakes, in 1843 (1844) draws Fish’s atten- whosoever dependeth wholely upon him, English Cheryl J. Fish has just tion, shares with Prince and Seacole “a without the discourse of Reason, will… published a study of three 19th- desire for reform, anger at injustice, and become a slave indeed to contempt and century women who boldly tres- activism grounded in cross-cultural analysis.” censure.” passed on the world beyond the Fish particularly emphasizes Fuller’s “analy- “When is custom warranted and when kitchen dooryard: Black and sis of the hardships faced by frontier women does it obscure reason?” That, writes White Women’s Travel and a concern for the Native Americans Kingsborough Community College Narratives: Antebellum who had already been driven away.” Professor of English Susan Gushee Explorations (University of In a closing coda, titled (with a bow to O’Malley, is the time-honored question Florida Press). All three not only Huck Finn) “Lighting Out for Other posed by these two pamphlets, which traveled widely but also Territories,” Fish writes that “through their appear in her new edition, “Custome is described their travels in cultur- mobile subjectivity and activism all three an Idiot”: Jacobean Pamphlet Literature ally and politically significant women offered significant revisions in the on Women (University of Illinois Press). publications: Nancy Prince, a arenas of education, religion, medicine, We are considerably more relaxed than Boston-born African-American citizenship, and human and women’s King James was about cross-dressing, who would travel to Jamaica “Colored Immigrants Seeking Homes in the North,” by rights.” She closes by asking the reader to but the Hic Mulier v. Haec Vir contest and later live for nine years in W. L. Sheppard, illustration for Harper’s Weekly in 1867 picture Prince, Seacole, and Fuller on between custom and cool-minded Russia; Mary Seacole, a freeborn (courtesy The Library Company of Philadelphia). board ships: “Ships conveyed each of cost/benefit analysis is still very much woman of color from Jamaica, them to live and work productively in with us—most obviously as Americans go whose travels ranged from territories far from home, and in the case about deciding whether the custom of Panama to the Crimea (where she was tions (1850, 1853, 1856), left her admir- of Fuller, a shipwreck on her return from denying marriage to couples of the same refused as a nurse by Florence Nightingale); ing the author as a “survivor” who dis- Italy to New York in 1850 brought her to sex is idiotic or reasonable. and Margaret Fuller, the white New played “outspoken defiance” in “the face her final resting place at sea.” O’Malley, who is also Chair of the Englander and Transcendentalist, who of all kinds of dangers.” Fish examines Fish, by the way, wryly chooses as the University Faculty Senate and an ex officio reported on her travels to the Great Lakes. how Prince drew on the Bible and mis- epigraph for her coda the vow of Huck member of the CUNY Board of Trustees, “To participate meaningfully in the sionary discourse in her attempt to Finn’s which exhausted authors often has gathered six pamphlets published public sphere and to articulate more just change emigration policy and the lives make and, not infrequently, later break: between 1609 and 1620 that shed light public policies, these women journeyed to of former slaves. “There ain’t nothing more to write about, on the sometimes fierce early 17th- outposts of conflict and imperial expan- Mary Seacole, half-Creole and half and I’m rotten glad of it, because if I’d a century debate that raged over the role of sion,” Fish says. “They trespassed at sites of Scottish, published her Wonderful knowed what trouble it was to make a women in early modern British society. empire and war, and they showed up at Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands book, I wouldn’t a tackled it and ain’t Included in the collection are Tis nationalistic crossroads where emancipa- in London in 1857. Fish sees her “as a agoing to no more.”

CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 9 ‘Global New York: The Lower East Side’: Museum Exhibit By Jack Salzman agreed to put together an exhibition that Fortunately, the Hunter History Kossar’s; then, finally, standing on Strauss Professor of History, Hunter College would open in April at the Museum of Department had been engaged in discus- Square, looking at the shrouded Jewish ast April, 150 people crowded into the City of New York (MCNY). sions about ways to better engage our stu- Daily Forward building and Wing Shoon the ballroom in Gracie Mansion to As we left the meeting, I recall mum- dents’ interest in the study of history. Here Restaurant, once The Garden Cafeteria. L hear Mayor Michael Bloomberg bling to Barbara Welter something like, “I was an opportunity to have them not only The following Sunday I took a different proclaim “Immigrant History Week.” must be out of my mind! How am I going think about what history is, but to actively group around the Lower East Side. Among those present were Commissioner to get this done?” She responded with a engage in a consideration of the past—to In the ensuing weeks, I returned several Sayu Bhojwani of the city’s Office of wry smile that said all that needed to be become historians themselves. times with groups of three or four students; Immigrant Affairs, Kathleen Benson, said: “You asked for it, you got it, now do The question became: which students more often they headed for the Lower East Curator of Community Projects for the it.” But what was “it”? I wasn’t even sure. and how many? Then I got lucky. I had Side on their own. Some students brought Museum of the City of New York, and The only thing I knew for sure was that I been asked to teach an Honors College digital cameras or point-and-shoot cameras; several representatives of Hunter College, had about three months to organize an seminar, “The Peopling of New York,” for others were provided disposable cameras. including President Jennifer Raab, Dean exhibit that would be appropriate for a colleague on leave. I thus had access not Initially, the intention was to have each Judith Friedlander, History Chair Barbara “Immigrant History Week.” Although all only to students in my Hunter seminar, student select an image from MCNY’s Welter and myself. of us were interested in looking at the but to Honors College students in its collection and to recreate that image. Mayor Bloomberg also drew attention to neighborhoods of the newest New Cross Campus Project. Joined by a stu- But that did not prove to be the best “Global New York: The Lower East Side,” Yorkers, it was obvious that there was no dent in my 300-level course and a Hunter way to have them learn about the Lower an exhibition just about to open at the single neighborhood that might represent MFA student, these students became my East Side. So each student was assigned a Museum of the City of New York. Thirty- all the others. For April 2004, we decided, own Riises and Byrons. street and a particular site, and each was five of its 37 images and captions were we would focus on the Lower East Side. About half the students began one asked to both read about and photograph created by CUNY Honors College stu- It was a story worth thinking about and overcast Sunday afternoon with a tour led the site. They also were asked to photo- dents--21 in the Hunter Honors College, trying to tell on MCNY’s walls. Moreover, by a dynamic young professional guide, graph what most interested them. 14 from those at the other senior colleges. the Museum was the right place to tell this Michelle Nevius. We started on the corner As the students were creating their Three months earlier, the six of us story: its renowned holdings of photographs of Essex and Delancey Streets and slowly Lower East Side images, they were also present at Gracie Mansion, joined by by Jacob Riis and the Byron Company, made our way from street to street—past writing about their experiences doing so. Susan Henshaw Jones, President and taken at the end of the 19th century and in the Essex Market and the new P.S. 20, Alex Neustein provides a view shared by Director of the Museum of the City of the early 20th century, would provide an with the statue of Lenin atop the apart- many of his fellow students: “My first New York, had met to discuss what essential opening to the story. All we need- ments known as Red Square in the back- impression of the Lower East Side was Hunter College, indeed all of CUNY, ed, of course, were contemporary counter- ground; down Orchard and Hester Streets; that the historical artifacts—the Forward might do for “Immigrant History Week.” parts to those of Riis and the Byrons to past Guss’s Pickles, Seward Park High Building, Seward Park High School, the By the time the meeting was over, we had bring the story up to 2004. School, and a quick stop for a bialy at Eldridge Street Synagogue and Guss’s

Public Privacy distinct minority A of objects radi- ate a sharp emptiness of presence. Glasses lost or broken vibrate with micro-melodra- ma—their singularly tailored, perfect indi- vidual usability mak- ing the accidental tragedy of their estrangement and subsequent downfall all the more heartbreaking. Abandoned makeshift beds convey a stab at scraping together a momentary claim to a few square feet of public privacy for what snatches of time can be had. I always feel invasive in their presence, some kind of patronizing observer who can’t help but clumsily re-objectify the disengaged Young Woman on personalities caught in the remains. East Broadway — Lisa Deutsch, Hunter College his young woman interested me Tbecause of her style. I had been able to discern a particular style among the Graffiti on Doorway, younger people in the crowds I was walk- Suffolk Street ing through, and she perfectly exempli- raffiti artists are the urban shamans fied this look. The brightly colored furs on Gof our day. Like cave walls of ancient Williamsburg Bridge the leather coat stood out. She allowed times, the street walls are where the spir- his view of the Williamsburg Bridge me to take her picture, but would not its of our time are put on public display. was taken from the corner of give any further information, such as her From the smallest patch to block-size T Delancey and Essex Streets. The magnifi- name or what she was doing. She was murals, politics, love, curses and verses, cent structure was opened on December very shy about the whole process. you can find it all; just read the writing on 19, 1903, and immediately had a pro- — Rosa Squillacote, Hunter College the wall. — Gad Zehavi, Hunter College found effect on the demographics of the Lower East Side, enabling the Jews of the area to migrate to Brooklyn. The couple seen here highlights how the ethnic com- Blumenthal’s Judaica Shop position of the neighborhood has t one point, Zelig Blumenthal’s store, 13 Essex Street, was one of many Judaica shops changed. During the last quarter of the A that lined Essex Street between Grand Street and East Broadway. Today it is one of the 20th century, the number of Asian immi- few stores of this kind. It maintains a collection of dusty, but artfully displayed, prayer shawls grants swelled. As a result, the borders of (talaitim), prayer books (siddorim), and religious texts (sefarim) in the front window. Because Chinatown expanded. The contrast with of the many changes in the types of businesses that now line Essex Street, such as the Chinese the past is vivid. The aura of the Lower noodle and dumpling shop presently next door to Blumenthal’s, the remaining Judaica shops East Side has definitely changed. are often referenced as relics from a past when the Lower East Side was a flourishing and — Yan Kuznetsov, Baruch College vibrant Jewish neighborhood… —Bracha Feit, Queens College

10 CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 Manhattan,closer to the people who by Honors Collegians come and go. Funds for Inner-City Math, Transport Pickles—were lonely and isolated testa- Sometimes, on the historic journey of a Among Grants to CUNY Researchers ments to a neighborhood that is deserted poor immigrant moving uptown, he and disliked by most who lived in it…But, remembers where he started: all the way s part of a $10 million grant from the National Science Foundation to a three- to me the neighborhood is beautiful and downtown on the Lower East Side. And school consortium, the Graduate Center will conduct two unique projects its history important.” maybe being remembered, in whatever A aimed at improving mathematics education in inner city schools. One will For my seminar, the students were light, is enough.” organize parents and other community members in low-income neighborhoods to help reading a substantial number of works, It all started to come together. reform math education in their schools. The other will identify aspects applicable to ranging from Jacob Riis’ How the Other Kathleen Benson and I selected 17 mathematics of the ‘cultural capital’ that low-income minority students bring to school. Half Lives to Bella Spewack’s The Street vintage images from the MCNY collec- The Graduate Center will also participate in the shared activities of “Metro Math: and Michael Gold’s Jews Without Money tion, and we began to look at hundreds The Center for Mathematics in America’s Cities,” a five-year multi-disciplinary partner- to Hasia Diner’s Lower East Side Memories: of images created by our 21st-century ship with Pennsylvania and Rutgers Universities and school districts in New York City, A Jewish Place in America. The Lower CUNY documentarians. We selected one Philadelphia, and Newark. Taking part will be a diverse faculty of experts in mathemat- East Side provided them with an occasion image by each, plus four more we really ics, mathematics education, cognitive science, urban studies, and urban education. to think about the past, and the nature of did not want to leave out. We ran into Calling it “an investment in Americans’ ability to travel more safely and efficiently change: What are the boundaries of the some obstacles when the digital images in the years to come,” U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Y. Mineta recently Lower East Side? When did Chinatown were blown up to 16 x 20 inches, but announced a $900,000 grant to the University Transportation Research Center begin to expand? What happened to the these were overcome. The students com- (UTRC), based at City College. The grant is in support of advanced research for the inhabitants of Little Italy? Just what is the posed their own captions, which were planning and management of regional transportation systems. Lower East Side of history, of memory, of sent to the Museum. As Mayor Bloom- Distinguished Professor of Civil Engineering Robert E. Paaswell, who directs myth, and of legend? berg was announcing “Immigrant History UTRC, said the grant brings the amount of money received by the Center since its Another student, Lisa Tagliaferri, medi- Week” at Gracie Mansion, the last of the inception in 1988 to more than $20 million dollars. It’s also the latest funding by the tates on just such questions: “Amid the photographs and captions was being DOT, which awards close to a million dollars annually in competitive grants to the pedestrians of the Lower East Side I installed. UTRC, a leading resource for the transportation industry in the northeast region. sometimes find myself in a vacuum. Professor Paaswell has taught and headed transportation centers at SUNY-Buffalo The exhibit will remain at MCNY until Another kind of city life. Barren streets, and the University of Illinois, and he was also formerly CEO of the Chicago Transit Labor Day (the Museum is at 103rd Street desolate of people, trash being tossed fur- Authority, the second largest system in the U.S. and Fifth Avenue and open Wed.-Sun. 10- ther downtown by the wind. If this is the Following is a sampling of grants recorded at recent Board of Trustees meetings: 5).Captions here have been adapted from Lower East Side, then maybe I’m not sure those in the exhibit. The full captions and BOROUGH OF MANHATTAN • NYS Education Department to J. what the people who romanticize it are several more photos with captions can be COMMUNITY COLLEGE Vazquez and D Shanahan, talking about. Or maybe the Lower East accessed at www.cuny.edu/news. — Ed. • NSF to P. Wilkinson and M. Cohen: Curriculum and Teaching: “New York Side lies somewhere closer to the heart of “Computer Science, Engineering and City Bilingual Education Technical Math Scholarship Program.” Assistance Center.” ($546,391) ($396,000) LAGUARDIA COMMUNITY COLLEGE BRONX COMMUNITY COLLEGE • Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to Punjabi • NYC Department of Human C. Cunningham, Academic Affairs: Resources to J. Ravenell: “History “Early Childhood High School Grocery Department, for “Poised for Success.” Initiative.” ($1,612,304 ) Deli & Cold ($756,826) • Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to • U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban C. Sylvan, Academic Affairs: “Inter- Drinks Development to J. Juechter and M. national Partnership High School.” unjabi Grocery is Seliger: “Hispanic Serving Institutions ($813,280 ) Plocated on East Assisting Communities.” ($165,000) LEHMAN COLLEGE 1st Street, across the BROOKLYN COLLEGE • NYS Education Department to A. street from the well- • U.S. Dept. of Interior/National Parks Rothstein: “GEAR-UP College for known Katz’s Service to M. Schreibman: “Jamaica Me.” ($135,372) Delicatessen. This Bay Wetlands: A Status Report.” NYC COLLEGE OF TECHNOLOGY tiny deli is particu- ($150,000) • NYS DEPARTMENT OF EDUCA- larly interesting • NIH to Z. Huang: “Se-Derivatization TION to E. Maldonado: “Math, because it has been of Functional RNA’s for Structure Writing and Critical Thinking built into a former Study.” ($229,500) Enhancement through Supplementary tenement. When one CITY COLLEGE Instruction and Faculty Development.” enters it, one feels immediately limited by the size of the establishment, but also over- • NIH to J. Tarbell: “Wall Shear Stress in ($390,965) whelmed, and perhaps tempted, by the aroma of the curry that one never thinks about the Cardiovascular System.” ($270,473) • U.S. Department of Education to E. the families once cramped in here.…Next to the cash register, there is a variety of • NIH to E. Gresik: “Regulation of Rojas: “Learning Communities.” Indian snacks, and behind the counter there are Indian films.… Punjabi represents one Branching Morphogenesis of Salivary ($364,051) of the many ways in which the Lower East Side is changing, particularly in its smells, as Gland.” ($239,625) QUEENS COLLEGE people of various cultures establish themselves. — You-Young Kim, Hunter College THE GRADUATE CENTER • NSF to A. Beveridge: “Collaborative • Defense Advanced Research Projects Research: A Digital Library Collection Agency/Raytheon to R. Haralick: for Visually Exploring U.S. Demo- Wing Shoon “Clutter Detection.” ($112,500) graphic and Social Change.” ($389,072) • NIH to G. Herman: “Image • NIH/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Restaurant Processing in Biological 3D Electron Institute to R. Bittman: “Structural ew York City neigh- Microscopy.” ($312,500) Properties of Membranes.” Nborhoods change, in HOSTOS COMMUNITY COLLEGE ($353,950) the words of Joan Didion, • U.S. Department of COLLEGE OF STATEN ISLAND “with the deceptive ease State/ONR/DOD: “Providing • National Science Foundation to N. of a film dissolve.” On the Instructional Support and Financial Yang: “Nanofabricated Photosensitive Lower East Side, buildings Incentives for Minority Students to Polymers for Controlled Cell Manipu- are torn down, construct- Pursue Careers in International and lates in 2D and 3D.” ($100,000) ed, and revamped at a Diplomatic Service.” ($798,712) YORK COLLEGE dizzying rate, often in con- HUNTER COLLEGE • NIH to L. Johnson, Natural Sciences: junction with each new • PHS/NIH Division of Research “Electronic Spectroscopy of wave of immigration. The Resources to J. Raab, President, and R. Porphyrins.” ($227,868 ) Garden Cafeteria, at 165 Dottin, Biological Sciences,: “Research • NIH to L. Levenger, Natural Sciences: East Broadway, on the same block as the renowned Jewish newspaper, The Forward, Center in Minority Institutions: Center “Eukaryiotic t-RNA End Professing by served kosher dairy meals to Jewish intellectuals from 1911 to 1983. It was the set- for Gene Structure and Function/AIDS RNase P and 3-tRNase.” ($210,857) ting for the story, “The Cabalist of East Broadway,” by Nobel Laureate Isaac Bashevis Infrastructure Grant.” ($1,752,967) Singer, a frequent patron (as was Forward editor Abraham Cahan). Today, the Wing Shoon restaurant occupies this site. The nearby Forward Building still stands and is Visit www.cuny.edu/news for profiles on faculty researchers even getting a facelift. — Shannyn Morse, City College and details on other grants and awards.

CUNY MATTERS — June 2004 11 The ‘Arts & Entertainment’ University: Debuts in Circus, Dance, Met Opera anette Sheppard knows two things “Smokey Joe’s Café,” “Best Little 155th Street. In her honor, the circus Dvery well. One is the Bronx Whorehouse,” and “Ain’t Misbehavin’.” bused 30 members of the current Community College campus, from which Finally, in 2000, Sheppard, with her choir, all robed up, to perform the she graduated with a pre-pharmacy parents’ financial support, dropped all National Anthem. major in 1995, and where her mother, her part-time work and focused totally Now totally immersed in circus Ellen Hoist, directs the Licensed on her stage career. Last year the big routine, Sheppard rode an elephant Practical Nursing Program. Then, for time—or rather the Big Top—beckoned, through the snow and into the several years after graduation, Sheppard when she won a Ringling Brothers and Queens-Midtown tunnel in the worked part-time as a secretary in the Barnum & Bailey Circus audition. On annual procession. Her week involves BCC security office. the Circus’s recent New York visit, she 12 shows, sometimes three a day, Sheppard also knows that she was made her March 18th debut as the first each one involving six costume born to be a singer on a stage—or in featured vocalist in its 134-year history, changes, including one drop-dead, front of a chorus line of ten elephants. introducing acts with a mix of soul, jazz, black-and-pink $10,000 number. She’s known this at least since age 15, and hip-hop beats. Among her moments After the last clown shuffles off, when she stunned the large audience at in the spotlight is an up-tempo jazz Sheppard heads for her spacious a Manhattan high school talent show number she sings for ten elephants, apartment on the 58-car Ringling with a clarion rendition of “And I Am aptly named “The Elephant Club.” train in Long Island City (it’s too long Telling You I’m Not Going” from Her big voice ranges from bass to to park in Manhattan). “It’s wonderful Dreamgirls. Since then Sheppard, now first soprano, a dexterity picked up in work,” she says. “You have to stay Danette Sheppard performing at Madison Square 36, has toured Europe in “Jesus Christ her formative years in the choir of focused and be ready when you hear Garden in her debut as Ringling Brothers’ first Superstar” and the U.S. in such shows as Memorial Baptist Church on West that next curtain call, ‘Show Time!’” featured vocalist.

his fall Professor of Drama, own dance ual.” She also plans to complete the TTheatre and Dance Yin Mei company in third part of her Nomad trilogy, titled at Queens College makes her 1995, which Oracle Bones, which concerns the earli- debut as a Guggenheim Fellow. garnered wide est known Chinese texts that were But, then, she has been making acclaim. Her inscribed on animal bones. The preced- debuts from a very young age, first major ing parts of Nomad focused on the giving street performances as a work, Empty Japanese tea ceremony and on two of member of the Little Red Guard Tradition/City Asia’s fabled rivers, the Ganges and the during Mao’s Cultural of Peonies,was Yellow River. Revolution in the late 1960s. “It inspired by the Yin Mei has been sharing her cross- was a chaotic time,” she recalls. flowers that cultural perspective with Queens stu- “Sometimes there was no school, were banned dents since 1992, teaching such courses because teachers had been sent during the as Traditional Chinese Dance, I Ching away.” And so she danced. Yin Mei performing at U.C.L.A. on a tour of her work titled Asunder. Cultural and the Art of Dance-Making, and After some time in a Hong Revolution. Contemplative Practice and Modern Kong company, Yin Mei like Martha Graham’s or Mark Morris’s. Another great leap for Yin Mei, who Dance. The winner of two College came to New York, earn- But her eagerness to hew to Chinese has taught at Queens since 1992, is the Innovative Teaching Awards and two ing an MFA at New cultural elements in her dance and bur- Guggenheim award in dance. The Presidential Research Awards, Yin Mei York University and geoning choreography kept her on her $38,000 (matched by the College), she sums up her credo: “I don’t treat dance plotting a segué into own path. says, will allow her to “go to China to alone as high art. It’s not only about modern dance with an Her great leap forward, as they used do research into ancient Chinese movement. Skill is easy; to become a established company to say in China, was the creation of her sources of language and interpretive rit- full person with awareness—that’s hard.”

ery few (if Pi Smith certainly can, though she will all further performances.) television. She is not short on one sine Vany?) can say have to add quickly that she never had “It’s a silent but prominent role,” qua non for an actress, conviction: “I they made their to open her mouth. says Smith, who landed the part after a have a very strong presence…I will do it Metropolitan Opera On March 15, Smith, who trans- friend recommended her to the casting all because I can.” One of her teachers, debut on the eve of ferred to CCNY from communications director for the production, which was Prof. David Willinger, observed, “Pi, in their college gradu- study at Fordham to pursue her dream widely acclaimed and featured the her atypicality as a student returning to ation. City College of an acting career, played a party guest reigning Finnish soprano Karita Mattila college after a career in the business end theater major and handmaiden to the really scary step- as Salome. She aced the one audition of the entertainment industry—she was daughter of King Herod, in a new pro- because, thanks to her CCNY studies, a segment producer for NBC’s local duction of Richard Strauss’s Bible-based “I was able to walk in prepared and Weekend Today show—is in fact a typi- Pi Smith in her opera Salome. (Banker—and center-box with a great concept of what was cal City College Theatre Program stu- costume for Salome owner—J. P. Morgan was so horrified by expected of me.” dent…All kinds of people are welcome at the Metropolitan the opera’s 1907 Met premiere that he After graduation, Smith hopes to to—and do—partake in the our rich Opera. successfully demanded cancellation of pursue opportunities on stage, screen or classroom and performance offerings.”

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