Spring 2020 VIDEOGRAPHER ON THE VANGUARD FRANCESCA TRIANNI ’11, JRN’13 DOCUMENTS A HUMANITARIAN CRISIS DETROIT ROCKS! NIA BATTS ’07 BRINGS GOOD HAIR AND GOODWILL Columbia TO HER HOMETOWN College BRIAN DE PALMA ’62 THE FAMED FILM DIRECTOR Today WRITES HIS FIRST NOVEL 100 YEARS of THE CORE Plato · Thucydides · Bach · W.E.B. Du Bois · Jane Austen · Raphael · Duke Ellington Le Corbusier · Ruth Crawford Seeger · Frantz Fanon · Molière · Patricia J. Williams Thomas Aquinas · Verdi · John Milton · Berg · Hannah Arendt · Andy Warhol · Ovid Schubert · Mary Wollstonecraft · Montaigne · Clara Schumann · John Stuart Mill Alexis de Tocqueville · Boccaccio · William Grant Still · Edmund Burke · Spinoza Reich · John Jay · Euripides · Saariaho · Thomas Jefferson · Berlioz · Al-Ghazālī Monet · James Madison · Louis Armstrong · Alex ander Hamilton · Aristophanes Aristotle · Rabelais · Michelangelo · Monteverdi · Augustine · Herodotus · Galileo Picasso · Ibn Tufayl · Pérotin · Goethe · Beatriz de Día · Sojourner Truth · Haydn Swift · Aaron Copland · Gandhi · Dostoevsky · Cage · Descartes · Charlie Parker · Woolf Rembrandt · Machiavelli · Aeschylus · Handel · Hobbes · Sophocles · Hume · Mozart Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw · Mahler · Vincent van Gogh · Fr ancisco de Vitoria Beethoven · Virgil · Jean-Jacques Rousseau · Bruegel · Adam Smith · Mussorgsky Shakespeare · Chopin · Marx · Bernini · Darwin · Cervantes · Wagner · Nietzsche Sigmund Freud · Stravinsky · Carl Schmitt · Fielding · Foucault · Jackson Pollock Josquin des Prez · Voltaire · Arnold Schoenberg · Lucretius · Robespierre · Apuleius Hegel · Sappho · Frank Lloyd Wright · Claude Debussy · Harriet Taylor Mill · Brahms Leonardo da Vinci · Elizabeth Cady Stanton · Puccini · Catharine MacKinnon Homer · Hildegard of Bingen · John Locke · Dante · Goya · Kant · Toni Morrison I support the Core because it is the cornerstone of lifelong curiosity, passion and engagement. “Elizabeth Kipp-Giusti CC’12 Photo by Tammy Shell When you support the Core Curriculum through the Columbia College Fund, you help to provide resources necessary to sustain a vital centerpiece of the College experience. Your gift symbolizes a commitment to this century-old foundation of a College education. MAKE YOUR GIFT AT COLLEGE.GIVENOW.COLUMBIA.EDU Contents features 16 Voices of Wisdom What’s it like to teach the Core? Eleven faculty members tell us it’s inspiring, intense and exhilarating. By the Editors of CCT 22 A Directorial Debut Videographer Francesca Trianni ’11, JRN’13 puts a human face on the Syrian refugee crisis. By Jill C. Shomer 26 “Range” and Higher Education Almost two decades after Lit Hum, a student and professor reunite to discuss fast versus slow learning. By Jill C. Shomer 30 Nia Batts ’07 Blows Away Expectations A Detroit entrepreneur reinvests in her hometown. By Anne-Ryan Sirju JRN’09 Contents departments alumninews 3 Within the Family 38 Spring into Action 4 Music to Our Ears 39 Message from CCAA President Michael Behringer ’89 6 Letters to the Editor How an essential aspect of the Core continues to resonate. 8 Message from Dean James J. Valentini 40 Lions The Core Curriculum, like the Grand Canyon, Monique W. Morris ’94, GSAPP’96; Kasia Nikhamina ’07; is “absolutely unparalleled.” Richard Maimon ’85; Isaiah D. Delemar ’93 9 Around the Quads 44 Bookshelf This year’s John Jay Award honorees, a Shakespeare in a Divided America: What His Plays Tell Centennial celebration on campus, the Audre Us About Our Past and Future by James Shapiro ’77 Lorde Community Space, Roar briefs and more. 46 Class Notes 34 Columbia Forum: Are Snakes Necessary? Just Married! by Brian De Palma ’62 and Susan Lehman Master of suspense De Palma’s newest project? 86 Obituaries His first novel. Michael I. Sovern ’53, LAW’55 88 Core Corner Our Core Centennial cartoon caption contest continues with an illustration by Dr. Ben Schwartz ’03, PS’08. Now on CCT Online CCT PRINT EXTRAS • Book excerpt from Monique W. Morris ’94, GSAPP’96 • Michael I. Sovern ’53, LAW’55’s video reflection Like Columbia College Alumni facebook.com/alumnicc View Columbia College alumni photos instagram.com/alumniofcolumbiacollege R.J. MATSON ’85 MATSON R.J. Follow @Columbia_CCAA “French vanilla chia seeds at JJ’s Place! Join the Columbia College alumni network We’re not in Athens anymore, P.” college.columbia.edu/alumni/linkedin The winner of our second Core Centennial cartoon caption contest is Tom McNamee ’99! Thank you for all your submissions. college.columbia.edu/cct This issue’s cartoon is on page 88. JÖRG MEYER Within the Family On the Centennial Beat e’ve crossed the midway point in CCT’s year of Core Centennial coverage. On the feature front, we’ve spoken with the W University’s president about the endur- ing importance of the Core, and done a deep dive into the origins of Contemporary Civilization, the curriculum’s inaugural course, launched in 1919. When considering our next big piece, it seemed like high time to go to the faculty members themselves, and to ask for their perspective on what it’s like to teach the College’s signature classes. Of course, this was in December; the professors were busy, in the midst of grading end-of-semester papers and preparing for final exams. But they graciously took time out for some thoughtful conversation. Faced with our icebreaker about how long they’d been teaching the Core, more than one confessed to being nervous when they started. But all have been teaching the curriculum for years, and some for decades. CCT is breaking a little new ground ourselves — we’re Featuring the They’ve stayed with it because teaching the Core is thrilled to be hosting our first event, an evening with famed Core: This issue, energizing and challenging, because it connects them to film director Brian De Palma ’62, here on the Columbia we highlight something greater than themselves, because of the stu- campus on Thursday, March 26 (college.columbia.edu/ faculty voices. dents and because of the opportunity to impart something alumni/events). The talk celebrates De Palma’s debut novel, lasting — an expansion of worldview; an introduction to Are Snakes Necessary?, excerpted on page 34. The twisty, the basic questions of human existence; the tools for a noirish book marks an apt next step for a man who’s made lifelong appreciation of art, music and literature. his career as a master of suspense. De Palma will be joined The enduring influence of professor on student can be on the 26th by his co-author, former New York Times editor seen more directly in our roundtable with writer David Susan Lehman; School of the Arts film professor Annette Epstein ’02, JRN’04, GSAS’04 and Julie Crawford, the Insdorf will moderate. Mark Van Doren Professor of the Humanities and former We hope to see you there! chair of Literature Humanities. The two met in the Lit Hum Meanwhile, if you haven’t yet submitted a Core haiku, seminar room almost two decades ago, and we got them there’s still time. And the latest installment in our Core together again to talk about Epstein’s latest book, Range: Centennial cartoon caption contest series can be found on Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World. The result- the back page. Submissions for both of them can be sent ing conversation, which originally appeared in our website’s to [email protected]. “Like Minds” department, discusses fast versus slow learning, We’re also putting out a call for readers to show us their and how embracing a liberal arts education might pay divi- LGBTQIA+ pride. Send your hi-res digital photo with dends over a quick commitment to a particular path. caption info to [email protected] (at least one person Elsewhere in the issue, we interview TIME videographer in the photo must be a College alum). We plan to run Francesca Trianni ’11, JRN’13, who recently made her direc- a selection of favorites in the Summer 2020 issue — the torial debut with the documentary Paradise Without People. first of what we hope will be many “billboards” showing The film, which sold out at DOC NYC 2019, offers a win- different sides of our vibrant Lions community. dow onto the Syrian refugee crisis through the eyes of two Spring Forward! women who have just given birth. We also learned how Nia Batts ’07 is bringing an impressive one-two punch of inno- vation and community impact to her hometown of Detroit: Her salon, Detroit Blows, has broken new ground with its all-inclusive approach to hairstyling, with a portion of sales Alexis Boncy SOA’11 going to support local projects by female entrepreneurs. Editor-in-Chief Spring 2020 CCT 3 4 CCT Spring 2020 Spring 2020 CCT 5 Letters to the Editor Columbia College CCT Today VOLUME 47 NUMBER 3 SPRING 2020 EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Alexis Boncy SOA’11 EXECUTIVE EDITOR Lisa Palladino DEPUTY EDITOR Jill C. Shomer ASSOCIATE EDITOR Anne-Ryan Sirju JRN’09 FORUM EDITOR Rose Kernochan BC’82 CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Thomas Vinciguerra ’85 ART DIRECTOR UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES COLUMBIA COURTESY Eson Chan Published quarterly by the Columbia College Office of Sources of Insight Alumni Affairs and Development for alumni, students, faculty, parents and friends of Columbia College. Thanks so much for the Core Curriculum origin story (Winter 2019–20, “First CHIEF COMMUNICATIONS Class”). Fifty years have passed since I took CC, Literature Humanities and Art AND MARKETING OFFICER Humanities. These three courses were among the most valuable experiences of my Bernice Tsai ’96 intellectual development in college. The other was organic chemistry, a foundation of my education and work as a physician. All four have remained at the core of my ADDRESS intellect throughout my adult life. Columbia College Today Columbia Alumni Center I have thought back to CC, Literature Humanities and Art Humanities thou- 622 W. 113th St., MC 4530, 4th Fl. sands of times. They ground me. They are a source of reflection and insight.