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FACULTY Q & A AT ISSUE SCRAPBOOK June Cross’ The fad for memoirs Nobel laureates and double life | 4 and blogs | 5 world leaders | 8 VOL. 32, NO. 2 NEWS AND IDEAS FOR THE COLUMBIA COMMUNITY SEPTEMBER 29, 2006 EVENT SERIES ALUMNI AFFAIRS WLF Opens COLUMBIA with Stiglitz LAUNCHES MAJOR Forum FUNDRAISING By Mary-Lea Cox CAMPAIGN he Nobel Prize-winning By Marcus Tonti economist Joseph Stiglitz remembers entering a oday Columbia University bookstore in Taiwan some launched a $4 billion T20 years ago and wondering how fundraising campaign in he would feel if he saw a pirated global style, with simulta- copy of his latest book on the Tneous events in New York, London shelves. Although he knew all the and Hong Kong. arguments in favor of protecting The campaign seeks to add $1.6 intellectual property, he also knew billion to Columbia’s endowment, the costs to the public good of with special emphasis on financial restricting the transfer of ideas. aid and faculty support across the He decided that on balance he campuses. Also sought is $1 billion would prefer to see a pirated ver- for new and renovated facilities and sion of his book—and was pleased $1.4 billion for spendable support of when he indeed found one. programs throughout the University. The former World Bank chief Increasing alumni engagement is economist, who is now a University another explicit campaign goal. Professor at Columbia, delivered this President Bollinger, joined by anecdote to a packed audience gath- several University trustees and ered in Roone Arledge Auditorium for the start of this year’s World $425m earmarked for Leaders Forum, on Sept. 18. Columbia College and The event also kicked off Stiglitz’s SEAS financial aid tour for his new book, Making Globalization Work, the follow-up other campaign leaders, presided to his 2003 bestseller, Globalization at the New York event, which took and Its Discontents, in which he sav- place at Columbia Law School. aged the International Monetary “How can we, in our time, do the Fund for pursuing policies in Africa work needed to lift up generations and Latin America that have created of Columbians yet to come?” asked an even wider disparity between rich Bollinger. “To answer that question and poor countries. requires the collective commitment The need to reduce that disparity of a University campaign, one as is still Stiglitz’s obsession, but he has ambitious as the academic ambi- now moved on to practical solu- tions it will make possible.” tions. Acknowledging the change in Bollinger’s words were beamed focus, Stiglitz told the Columbia via satellite link to audiences in audience that his book title says it all: London and Hong Kong. The “It says that globalization is not London group was joined by Provost working very well, but it also con- EILEEN BARROSO Alan Brinkley, and the Hong Kong veys the sense of optimism that group by Vice Provost for Inter- there are practical, concrete things PROFESSOR TURNS JOURNALISTS INTO HEAVYWEIGHTS national Relations Paul Anderer and we can do to make it work better.” political scientist Xiaobo Lü. Reform of the intellectual prop- The New York Times journalist and journalism school professor Sam Freedman is a pro at coaxing books out of seasoned The launch event also featured erty regime to achieve the right bal- journalists and at teaching them how the publishing industry works. The stats say it all. In the 15 years since he started his a panel discussion, “What Don’t ance between profitability and the book-writing seminar, his students have produced 21 books; another 16 are under contract. And now he is also filling the We Know?” Several Columbia pro- public good is one such measure. rather large shoes of James Carey, the long-serving CBS Professor of International Journalism who passed away in May. fessors—maternal and fetal health Freedman is teaching Critical Issues in Journalism, a course developed by Carey to explore the social role of journalism from continued on page 8 legal, historical, ethical and economic perspectives. Another hefty task, but the packed lecture halls prove he’s up to it. continued on page 8 CONFERENCE Integrating Eastern and Western Medicine By Dan Rivero Integrative Medicine Program and Tibet House the key presentations. U.S., brought together researchers and scholars After spending several days engaging in deep Barefoot for a change, scientists and religious from the Indo-Tibetan tradition with leading conversation and admiring the tranquil moun- scholars meditated together, contemplated the Western scientists in the fields of longevity, tain setting, participants agreed that meditative, words of the Dalai Lama, and spoke of a regeneration and health to discuss advances in yogic and related practices have the potential to modern scientific revolution at last week’s the profession and to work on creating a enhance both psychological and physiological conference on integrative medicine, held at program of collaborative research. On Thursday, well-being. the Menla Mountain Retreat in the Catskills. Sept. 21, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama Moreover, recent preliminary research sug- The conference, cohosted by Columbia’s wrapped up the conference with a response to gests that there may be surprisingly extensive, continued on page 6 www.columbia.edu/news 2 SEPTEMBER 29, 2006 TheRecord RECENT SIGHTINGS MILESTONES DAVID BLUM, an adjunct professor at the Graduate School of Journalism, has been named editor in chief of the Village Voice. The Graduate School of Journalism has appointed SHEILA CORONEL as the inaugural director of its newly opened Toni Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism. Coronel is an award-winning investigative journalist well known for her coverage of the Philippines govern- ment during times of corruption and upheaval. PIERRE FORCE, chair of the Department of French and Romance Philology and head of Columbia’s Maison Francaise, has been named Chevalier de l’Ordre National du Mérite (the French National Order of Merit). A specialist in 17th-and 18th- century French intellectual history, Force is the author of works on Moliere, Pascal and Adam Smith. CAROL GLUCK, George Sansom Professor of History, has received Japan’s highest civilian honor, the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Neck Ribbon, in honor of her contributions to the development of Japanese stud- ies and her promotion of cultural and scholarly exchange between Japan and the United States. Former Washington environmental official NILDA MESA has been appointed as Columbia’s first director of environmental stewardship. She will be working closely with students, faculty and staff to implement practical programs to conserve resources and to pro- mote a culture of environmental awareness. MIT’s Technology Review has named LIAM PANINSKI, assistant professor of statistics, as one of the year’s 35 outstanding innovators under age 35, for his use of statistics to decipher electrical signals from the EILEEN BARROSO brain—work that is bringing “mind reading” closer to HITTING THE GROUND RUNNING becoming reality. If you happened to be in the vicinity of Riverside Park at an unusually early hour on Thursday, Sept. 7, then you may have seen a group of run- EDITOR’S NOTE ners whizzing by.This year, over 800 students, administrators and faculty participated in President Bollinger’s 5K Fun Run. The event marked the fifth An article in the last issue reporting on Columbia’s Columbia run held by Bollinger, who discloses that he often exercises on Columbia’s indoor track or around the Central Park reservoir. “It’s a high participation in New York City’s Summer Youth energy activity that’s relaxing,”he said in an interview with Runner’s World two years ago. In fact, not all participants were in it just for fun; some were Employment Program should have included the members of the track and cross-country team, and a few were also getting in shape for November’s New York City Marathon. Nevertheless, a good detail that 80 percent of the students were placed at time was had by all, including the volunteers—athletes, faculty and staff—from the Office of Intercollegiate Athletics and Physical Education, who sup- Columbia University Medical Center, which also ported the runners along the way. President Bollinger held his first Fun Run on October 3, 2002, the day of his inauguration. administers the program. What is a satyr doing reclining on the edges USPS 090-710 ISSN 0747-4504 of Lewisohn Lawn? Vol. 32, No. 2, September 29, 2006 Dear Alma’s Owl, In 1907, Pan came to Columbia. Calling Pan Published by the “a very remarkable work of art,” Daniel Chester Office of Communications I was sitting on the ledge near Dodge Hall and Public Affairs sipping my iced tea the other day, when I French encouraged McKim and landscaper spied with my little eye what I thought was a Frederick Law Olmsted to create a setting for satyr next to the bushes. What, pray tell, was him in “The Grove,” a park at the north end of t: 212-854-5573 it doing there? campus. At that time, the statue was also a f: 212-678-4817 — Statue Ponderer fountain: the lions’ heads on its green granite base spouted water into a reflecting pool sur- Columbia Record Staff Dear Ponderer, rounded by a pink stone exedra. In 1959, Pan’s quiet grove would be covered Editor: Mary-Lea Cox Graphic Designer: Scott Hug That’s no ordinary satyr: it’s the Great God over with Mudd, and Columbia considered Staff Writer: Dan Rivero Pan whose adventures have included travel, selling him—either to a museum, a municipal- University Photographer: Eileen Barroso disrobing and a narrow escape from a smelter. ASK ALMA’S OWL ity or for scrap metal.