Volume 45 Issue 27 [5/12/2011]

STUDENTS OCCUPY STATE CAPITOL P. 5 NATIVE AMERICAN TRIBES: THE FIGHT FOR RECOGNITION P. 12 LIPSTICK NINJA P. 22

Thursday, May 12, 2011Vol. 45 Issue No. 27

Teachers, students and scholars weigh the value of Yiddish in the modern age

2 | Thursday, May 12, 2011

Public Discourse

Compiled by Ana Nicasio & Nick Paris

“Being Middle Eastern, it means a lot to me. It doesn’t mean it’s the end of all terrorism, but it brings a lot of peace to the families who suffered from the impacts of 9/11.”

SHADI ARJMANDFIRST-YEAR, OAKESUNDECLARED

“I think it’s great that the evil deeds he did are over, but I don’t rejoice his death. I also

think people from our generation don’t really understand its significance, because

we were so young.”

JULIANE PEITHMANSECOND-YEAR, COLLEGE TEN

PSYCHOLOGY

“It’ll be interesting to see what happens between the U.S. and Pakistan. I’m upset at how his death has been paraded, but this will probably re-elect Obama, which I’m cool with.”

DAVID MANSKETHIRD-YEAR, STEVENSONSOCIOLOGY/PHILOSOPHY

“I think to the victims it may have brought closure, but for the rest of the nation there’s

a huge difference. Some disagree while others celebrate — the spectrum is huge.”

NESTOR RIVERAFOURTH-YEAR, KRESGE

LEGAL STUDIES

STAFF

EDITORS-IN-CHIEFRyan AyersJulie Eng

MANAGING EDITORSJulia ReisAlejandro Trejo

COPYMolly Kossoff, chiefLauren BalianVeronica GloverNicole HardinAlison KernRachel Singer

PRODUCTIONTess Goodwin, design directorRosa CastañedaHilli CiavarelloBreeze KanikulaSamved Sangameswara

CAMPUS NEWSRyan Mark-Griffin, editorSarah Naugle, editorLaurel FujiiAna NicasioEmiliano O’Flaherty-VazquezArianna Vinion

CITY NEWSNikki Pritchard, editorMikaela Todd, editorRosela ArceChelsea HawkinsMark RadBruce Tran

SPORTSAsa Hess-Matsumoto, editorSamved SangameswaraEli Wolfe

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENTBlair Stenvick, editorMitchell BatesHanna Toda

COMMUNITY & CULTUREMichael Mott, editorMikaela Todd, editorAysha BilalTyler Maldonado

OPINIONS & EDITORIALSBlair Stenvick, editor

WEBTimothy Lindvall II, developerJenny Cain, editor

PHOTOGRAPHY & ILLUSTRATIONMorgan Grana, editorLouise Leong, editorMatt BobletRachel EdelsteinSal IngramMuriel GordonKyan MahzoufBela MessexNick ParisToby SilvermanMolly SolomonPrescott Watson

ADVERTISINGRyan Ayers, managerPrescott Watson, assistant managerMalia BradleyAlex Lattin

BUSINESSBrittany Thompson, managerTommy Palmer, assistant manager

MARKETINGRosie Spinks, managerMitchell Quesada

Public DiscourseHow much do you care about

Osama bin Laden’s death? Explain.

ABOUT US

City on a Hill Press is pro-duced by and for UCSC students. Our primary goal is to report and analyze issues affecting the student population and the Santa Cruz community.

We also serve to watchdog the politics of the UC adminis-tration. While we endeavor to present multiple sides of a story, we realize our own outlooks influence the presentation of the news. The City on a Hill Press (CHP) collective is dedicated to covering underreported events, ideas and voices. Our desks are devoted to certain topics: campus and city news, sports, arts and entertainment, and community and culture. CHP is a campus paper, but it also provides space for Santa Cruz residents to pres-ent their views and interact with the campus community. Ideally, CHP’s pages will serve as an arena for debate, challenge, and ultimately, change.

CHP is published weekly by the City on a Hill Press publish-ing group from the last week of September to the first week of June, except during Thanksgiv-ing, winter and spring quarter breaks.

The opinions expressed in this paper do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the staff at large, or the University of California.

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Table of Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS

P. 4 A Changing UC: Former Student Unable to Enrollby Arianna Vinion

P. 5 23 UCSC Students Arrested at State Capitol Rally by Laurel Fujii

P. 6 UCSC Campus Election Guideby Staff

P. 7 Cornel West Visits UCSCby Ryan Mark-Griffin

P. 8 Event CalendarCompiled by Tess Goodwin

P. 14 THROUGH OUR LENS

by Toby Silverman

P. 12 NATIVE AMERICANS DEFYING

LABELSby Chelsea Hawkins

P. 10 NEW GENERATION RECLAIMS YIDDISH

by Eli Wolfe

ONLINE EXCLUSIVE: UCSC RANKED A TOP 10

SURF COLLEGEby Samved Sangameswara

Illustration by Louise Leong Illustration by Rachel Edelstein Toby Silverman Sal Ingram

P. 9 Free Comic Book Day Comes to Santa Cruzby Mark Rad

P. 16 UCSC Juggling Club Works to Gain Recognitionby Eli Wolfe

P. 17 UCSC to Host Tennis NCAA Tournamentby Samved Sangameswara

P. 18 Review: Fey Keeps Us Laughing, Lions Keep Us Cryingby Blair Stenvick & Hanna Toda

P. 19 Community Chest: Mollie Murphy Spreads Awareness of Genocideby Aysha Bilal

P. 22 Column: On Vanity and Mirrorsby Rosela Arce

P. 23 Editorial: Violating a Culture: The UC and Native American Remains

Editorial: UC’s Stance on Student Journalists Hampers Good Reporting

Cover photoillustration by Louise Leong & Morgan Grana

Corrections:In the April 28 article “The Last American in Rwanda,” funding came indirectly from Ante Up For Africa.

In the May 5 article “Santa Cruz Wicca Community Celebrates Days of Fire, Fertility,” the chalice contained an ordinary blade.


Campus

A Changing UC

By Arianna VinionCampus ReporterPROFILE

Name: Lizzie BernardYear: Third-year former film & digital media majorPredicament: After being unable to get more than a total of three courses in four quarters in her major, Bernard opted to leave UCSC.

Third-year driven to drop out due to lack of classes

Photo courtesy of Lizzie Bernard

No one said college was easy — but challenges should be faced in classrooms, not while trying to get into them. Lizzie Bernard had the latter problem.

Bernard was a third-year film and digital media major from Stevenson when she decided not to return to UC Santa Cruz for this current spring quarter.

Bernard had completed all of her general education require-ments when she left UCSC, but had only been able to get three classes for her major in four quarters.

She was never able to get into any upper-division classes.

“What I was paying and the quality of the education wasn’t worth it anymore,” Bernard said. “I couldn’t get the [classes needed] for my bachelor’s degree, and I felt like I was wasting my time.”

Feeling overwhelmed and unfocused with a full load of classes, coping with personal problems and aching under the strain of the economy, Bernard had gone to part-time status this past fall to ease her load.

At UCSC, enrollment time is determined by how many credits you have completed — the more, the better. Because she was taking less units, Bernard’s enrollment times only got worse, making it even more difficult to get into the classes she needed.

“Another problem I have with UCSC is I haven’t been able to explore what I want to do, be-cause I can’t get freaking classes, because I always get shafted on my enrollment time,” she said.

Since Bernard was able to en-roll in so few classes, her ability to select courses and a major best suited for her preferences was significantly hampered.

After so many quarters of full classes and overflowing wait lists, she decided to cut her losses and regroup — a decision her family fully supports.

“My mom said that she didn’t really want to give the UC system the money anymore because it is ridiculous, all the fee and tuition increases,” Bernard said. “The other reason I’m taking the time off is that I need to figure out myself. I need to figure out what I want to do.”

Bernard is a self-described “jack of all trades,” participating in campus radio station KZSC and Slugs in Fishnets, playing guitar and trumpet and delving into photography and acting. She often felt stifled at UCSC, and has been taking advantage of her new freedom of exploration.

She took a trip to New York with her new Rocky Horror cast, “Barely Legal,” and performed for the Rocky Horror Picture Show Festival as Magenta at the House of Blues in Atlantic City.

Right now Bernard is happy to explore. Despite her difficult experiences at UCSC, she said, getting a degree would be worthwhile, though she does not

think it will be from UCSC.“Everything is a big question

mark, really,” Bernard said. “I’m planning on going back to school

within a couple of years, maybe sooner, maybe later — I don’t know — but I’m definitely going to get a degree.”


Campus

Molly Solomon Sal Ingram

‘Books, Not Bombs’

UCSC STUDENTS JOINED the California Teachers Association (CTA) at the state Capitol as part of the CTA’s State of Emergency week of action.

By Laurel FujiiCampus Reporter

23 are arrested as activists rally at state Capitol over budget cuts

“Tax, tax, tax the rich — we can stop the deficit!”

Around 300 students, teachers and community activists encircled a statue of Christopher Columbus and Queen Isabella in the state Capitol’s rotunda as they chanted for a change in state budgetary priorities.

Roughly 60 UC Santa Cruz students joined teachers from the California Teach-ers Association union (CTA), community activists and other college students in Sacramento on Monday. Students from CSU Sacramento were expected to have a larger presence, but some UCSC students said they may not have been informed.

The rally over budget cuts and just taxa-tion of corporations and the rich ended with 68 total arrests, including 23 UCSC students. Despite the expectation of a larger turnout, fifth-year Melissa Cornelius said the mass arrest was effective in terms of publicity.

“They’re putting so many cuts on vulnerable people in the state, so I think the [mass arrest] was a beginning response to that,” Cornelius said. “It plays a role in bringing attention to the issue ... People don’t have to take state legislation if they don’t want to.”

Numerous CTA members from across the state did not teach on Monday in order to travel to Sacramento to participate in the rally and voice their opinions.

“If we don’t have [tax] extensions, there will be 35–40 kindergarten through third grade students per teacher in our district,” said second grade teacher Greta Benavides from South Whittier.

Kindergarten teacher Jessica Hobbs from San Francisco had a different reason to be there, as she marched in the sea of matching CTA light blue shirts reading “We Are One.”

“We need to change our tax structure where corporations and the rich are justly taxed,” Hobbs said. “That’d save our budget deficit situation.”

Around 200 CTA members were pres-ent, and six stayed and were arrested, second-year Noah Miska said. UCSC students said it was hard to occupy the Capitol, as the CTA members had multiple priorities and many were on the fence about staying.

“It was difficult to get a clear message from everyone on what they’d do,” Miska, who was arrested, said. “If everyone at the rally would’ve stayed we wouldn’t have been arrested.”

The majority of CTA members left after the hour-long rally when their permit to be in the rotunda expired at 6 p.m.

“They were using the imagery of what

happened in Wisconsin, but were lob-bying,” Cornelius said. “That’s not what happened in Wisconsin.”

The rally caught the eye of San Rafael City Council member Marc Levine. While most passersby clad in business attire walked through the crowd of activists without paying attention, Levine clapped with the beat of the chants and reminisced about his experiences protesting 16 years ago as a CSU Northridge student.

“I have awe and respect for them,” Levine said. “I’m here to support them.”

Neha Sobti, a community activist, came by bus from San Francisco. Sobit said she found activism of this nature important in general, as she’s pursuing a career in education, and on this day particularly, because she could afford to be there when others could not.

“I can use my body in place of teachers who can’t,” Sobti said, about rallying on a school day.

The activists who stayed past 6 p.m. continued chanting, “We’re doing this for your children.”

Miska said it had an impact on the California Highway Patrol (CHP) officers, who were more courteous than the police officers.

“[CHP officers] didn’t want to make eye contact,” Miska said. “They were just following orders.”

After the arrests, the activists were eventually taken to the county jail, where they were kept in holding cells.

“They were disgusting, like being in a public bathroom for seven hours,” he said.

The students were released the next

morning starting at 3 a.m., and Miska and Cornelius said they were thankful sup-portive students waited around for them.

Though first-year Adam Odsess-Rubin did not stay for the full occupation, he said

everyone’s presence was essential. “Unless students stand up, the govern-

ment will keep cutting,” Odsess-Rubin said. “That’s why I’m here. My education is important and I value it.”


Campus

ELECTION GUIDEUC

SC

RMEASURE 47: Student Government Fee Amendment

This referendum is meant to increase student voice.

If passed, Measure 47 will add an additional $1.50 to the current $7 student fee that is allocated to the UC Student Association (UCSA), a coalition of all UC student governments.

UCSA provides a space where every UC student can be repre-sented and students can collabo-rate together to face challenges like recent budget cuts, major suspensions and attacks on edu-cational quality.

The adjustment would affect students beginning fall quarter 2011.

While there would be an increase in the student fee — a difficult choice in this current economic climate — it would

benefit students by also providing more funding for campuswide events like disaster relief fund-raisers, rallies, teach-ins, educa-tional forums and conferences like the recent Womyn of Color Conference.

Out of the total fee payments, 33 percent would go toward covering the fee for students who couldn’t afford the increase.

The fee also helps support UCSA itself. Currently, 67 cents of the $7 fee pays for automatic membership to UCSA. The $1.50 increase would be enacted for all UCSC undergraduates, and will generate approximately $68,335.

MEASURE 48: Universal Access

Penned by Beth Diesch and Jeremiah Jimeno, the Univer-sal Access measure is a new $5 fee that will provide additional funding for support services, ex-panding transportation options, and any other project needed to improve accessibility for students with disabilities.

This includes the installa-tion of ramps, power-assist door openers and program-based changes like sign language inter-preters and captioning.

The fee is projected to produce approximately $244,980 in the academic year 2011–2012, the first year it is in effect. Allocation decisions will be based on col-laboration between the director of the Disability Resource Center and the campus Americans with Disabilities Act officer, who col-lect information from student need survey data and meet regularly with a small advisory of students.

The fee includes a return-to-aid component that requires 33 percent of all fees collected to be

contributed to help students who are on financial aid cover the expense of the fee. This will be approximately $80,843 per year.

MEASURE 49: Cultural Arts and Diversity

The Cultural Arts and Diver-sity Center proposed Measure 49 to establish a new $5.25 fee that would support student-directed cultural arts performances and campus-wide cultural organiza-

tions. These programs include UCSC’s award-winning Rainbow Theater and the African Ameri-can Theater Arts Troupe. A vote of yes on Measure 49 would cre-ate permanent funding for these programs and generate approxi-mately $234,486 in its first year.

Funds raised through this fee would be governed by a board of directors with a student majority, and would be used to bring in nationally recognized cultural performers and speakers to campus. These events would be free of charge and open to all students. In addition, this fee would support the purchase of state-of-the-art performance equipment to be used by cultural arts and diversity organizations in cooperation with the Stevenson Event Center.

The fee would begin fall 2011 and includes a return-to-aid component that ensures that 33 percent of all fees collected would be given directly to the financial aid office to cover the cost the fee for students on financial aid. The amount returned to financial aid would be approximately $77,380. per year.

MEASURE 50: More Voice, More Control, No New Fee

Measure 50 would alter an already existing fee referendum. Measure 13, which passed in 2005, enacted a fee of $3.20 per student, per quarter that goes to Student Media Council, which is comprised of representatives from all registered media organi-zations at UCSC.

As it is currently written, those funds go toward media equipment, software and facilities improvements only. Measure 50 would give Student Media Council more freedom in how to spend the already existing fees. It would not enact any new fees.

The money could then go toward advising, workshops, start-up costs and operating costs.

The funds collected from the fee totals $142,925 annually, and the end of the 2009–2010 fiscal year saw a remaining balance of $66,411.

Measure 50 is sponsored by the Students Union Assembly and endorsed by the Student Fee Advisory Committee, as well as City on a Hill Press, TWANAS, Banana Slug News and several other student media organiza-tions.

MEASURE 51: Measure 16 Amendment

Measure 51 proposes suspend-ing the collection of Measure 16, the Student Voice and Empower-ment Fee (75 cents per student, per quarter), passed in 2005. The measure proposes reinstating the fee at a reduced cost of 60 cents, in fall 2013 to avoid another surplus.

As the measure is currently

written, the funds are allocated according to a strict system of categorization.

Measure 51 would exclude these restraints in the reintro-duced fee and allow for more flexibility in where the money is spent.

“This fixed distribution of funds has been an impediment toward the successful recruitment of students on committees,” according to the measure overview provided by Lucy Rojas, assistant dean of student services.

For a breakdown of the current allocation of Measure 51, go to

cityonahillpress.com/ 2011elections.

Vote online at elections.ucsc.edu. Voting ends May 18 at 7:59 a.m.Visit cityonahillpress.com to see profiles of the Student Union Assembly candidates!

All ballot measures for spring 2011 campus elections, from 47 to 51, explained

“UCSA provides a space where every UC student can be repre-sented...”

“...[Measure 48] will provide additional funding for support services, expanding transportation options, and any other project needed to improve ac-cessibility for students with disabilities.”

“... [Measure 49] would support student-directed cultural arts performances and campus-wide cultural organizations.”

“Measure 50 would give Student Media Council more freedom in how to spend the already ex-isting fees. The money could then go toward advising, workshops, start-up costs and oper-ating costs.”

“Measure 51 proposes suspending the col-lection of Measure 16, the Student Voice and Empowerment Fee (75 cents per student, per quarter), passed in 2005.”


Campus

Keynotes and Bluenotes Internationally recognized scholar speaks at annual event

The atmosphere inside Class-room Unit 2 was tense.

Opening remarks had been made at UC Santa Cruz’s Speaker Blowout, and the stage was set for the main attraction of the evening: Dr. Cornel West.

Suddenly, a hush fell over the room and the side door on stage right opened. In strolled West, and up shot the audience. Ap-proximately 400 people were on their feet, clapping and cheering with the same enthusiasm col-lege students usually reserve for movie stars and rappers.

But West is a different kind of celebrity. Holding degrees from both Harvard and Princeton, West is an internationally known philosopher, author, orator and civil rights activist. He is best known for his work in social justice related to race, gender and class in American society.

Speaker Blowout is an annual event that aims to provide a space for students to be educated and informed about issues directly affecting access to institutions of higher learning.

Taking the podium, West be-gan his speech with a question.

“The most important question we can ask ourselves is, ‘What does it mean to be human?’”

This kind of Socratic ques-tioning was a frequent theme in West’s speech. Touching on issues of race, class, the legacy of white supremacy, gender and modern politics, West’s speech highlight-ed the progress that still needs to be made for social justice in America, and the importance of critical inquiry.

“We must come to terms with all forms of suffering,” West said. He urged the audience not to be satisfied with the status quo, and to remove themselves from the pursuit of material happiness. “Become misfits maladjusted to the indifference of the main-

stream,” West said. “From ‘bling bling’ to ‘let freedom ring.’”

West drew upon elements of African American culture in his discourse about social justice, referring to himself as “a blues-man in the life of the mind” and to the true nature of human ex-istence, complete with its beauty and atrocities, as “the funk.” West called those who work for social justice “participants in the funk.”

Before beginning his speech, West acknowledged SUA chair Tiffany Loftin in front of the crowd, calling her “the visionary leader.” Loftin, along with Engag-ing Education (E2) program co-ordinators Kalwis Lo and Sahira Barajas, were the driving forces behind booking West. Loftin said securing such a high-profile speaker was not an easy task.

“There were a lot of hurdles we had to jump over,” Loftin said. “But it was something I had my heart set on.”

Loftin said the main obstacle to bringing West to UCSC was

money. The total cost for the event was $30,000, and the SUA and E2 had to fundraise over half the cost after donating $12,000 out of their own operating budgets. E2 program coordina-tor Kalwis Lo described the trio’s fundraising strategy.

“We wrote a letter to every ad-ministrator and college provost, telling them about our event and what our intentions were,” Lo said.

While some people Lo, Barajas and Loftin reached out to did not provide financial support, others

offered use of facilities or moral support. Colleges Nine and Ten provost Helen Shapiro was one of the event’s biggest financial supporters, donating a total of $2,000.

“I think Cornel West is an im-portant voice, and the timing was good given [issues with graffiti] that have happened on campus,” Shapiro said.

By Ryan Mark-GriffinCampus Co-Editor

DR. CORNEL WEST speaks at Classroom Unit 2 on Friday, May 6. SUA and E2 coordinated the event.

Michael Mott

Please visit cityonahillpress.com to read the complete article.


Events

Compiled by Tess GoodwinEvent CalendarCAMPUSTHURSDAY, MAY 12• Special Event: SUA Elections.

Vote online at elections.ucsc.edu. Voting ends 7:59 a.m. on 5/18.

• Lecture: “Korea and the Silk Road” with Sarah Nelson. Humanities 1, Room 210. 4 to 6 p.m. Free.

• Lecture: “Asia as Method” with Kuan-Hsing Chen. Cowell Conference Room. 4 to 5:30 p.m. Free.

• Performance: Faux Shaux. Merrill Cultural Center. 7:30 to 10:30 p.m.

• Performance: International Playhouse XI. Stevenson Event Center. 8 to 11 p.m. Free. Event repeats through 5/15.

FRIDAY, MAY 13• Film: “Pan Dulce Friday:

A close look at Homeboy Industries.” Bay Tree Cervantes & Velasquez Room. 12 to 2 p.m. Free.

• Performance: “The Seagull.” Theater Arts Experimental Theater. 7 to 9 p.m. Current UCSC undergrads get one ticket free, $11 student/senior, $12 general. Event repeats through 5/22. See arts.ucsc.edu for schedule.

• Concert: UCSC Wind

Ensemble & Concert Choir. Music Center Recital Hall. 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. $6 youth/students, $8 senior, $10 general.

SATURDAY, MAY 14• Benefit/Sports: Relay for Life

benefit for American Cancer Society. East Field. 10 a.m. to 10 a.m. the following day.

SUNDAY, MAY 15• Concert: Rock N’ Roll on

the Knoll. Stevenson College Knoll. 1 to 4 p.m. Free.

• Concert: Big Band & Jazz Ensembles. Music Center Recital Hall. 3 to 5 p.m. $6 youth/students, $8 senior, $10 general.

MONDAY, MAY 16• Lecture: “Screening

Disabilities: Visual Fields, Public Culture, and the Atypical Mind in the 21st Century” with Faye Ginsburg. Porter College D-245. 6 to 8 p.m. Free.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 18• Celebration: Asian

American/Pacific Islander Heritage Month Cultural Celebration Night. Stevenson Event Center. 6:30 to 9 p.m. Free.

CITYTHURSDAY, MAY 12• Sports: Bike to Work/School

Day. Over 50 locations, visit bike2work.com for listings.

• Benefit: Bike Week. Santa Cruz Mountain Brewery. 12 to 10 p.m. $1 from every beer sold will benefit the Bike to Work program.

• Concert: Birdhouse, North Pacific String Band, Tumbleweed Wanderers. The Crêpe Place. 9 p.m. $8 advance, $10 door.

FRIDAY, MAY 13• Sports: Bike to Work week.

Samba Rock Café. 7 to 10 a.m. Free acai bowl & pastry for cyclists.

• Film: 10th Annual Santa Cruz Film Festival. Multiple venues, see santacruzfilmfestival.org for schedule and ticket information. Event continues through 5/14.

• Concert: Blind Willies. Streetlight Records. 4 to 5 p.m. Free.

• Performance: Sin Sisters Burlesque vs. Santa Cruz Derby Girls, Beaver Fever, Kim Luke & her Friendly Henrys. The Catalyst. 9 p.m. $15 advance, $25 door.

• Film: “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” Del Mar Theatre. 11:59 p.m. $6.50. Event repeats 5/14.

SATURDAY, MAY 14• Benefit: Friends of the Santa

Cruz Library Book Sale. Civic Auditorium. 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Free admission.

• Concert: Art Museums, Nodzzz, Deep Ellum. The Crêpe Place. 9 p.m. $8.

SUNDAY, MAY 15• Sports: Annual Bay to

Breakers. San Francisco. 7 a.m. to 12 p.m. Visit zazzlebaytobreakers.com for route map and more information.

MONDAY, MAY 16• Concert: Omar Sosa

Afreecanos Quartet. Kuumbwa Jazz Center. 7 p.m. & 9 p.m. $22 advance,

$25 door. 9 p.m. half price for students w/I.D.

TUESDAY, MAY 17• Concert: Eisley. Rio Theatre.

7 p.m. $12 advance, $15 door.

• Concert: 7 Come 11. The Crêpe Place. 8 p.m. Free.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 18• Concert: Yelle. Rio Theatre.

8 p.m. $15 advance, $18 door.

For a complete calendar of events, please visit cityonahillpress.com. Contact us at production@cityo-

nahillpress.com.


City

Free Comic Book Day Returns

At a time when superheroes are more visible online, on televi-sion and in movie theaters, what has happened to the comic book? For some, the comic book never died and is still a thriving source of entertainment. Held this past Saturday, the 10th Annual Inter-national Free Comic Book Day was a celebration of the comic book for those readers.

Comic book retailers also used this day to give a few summer previews. This year’s list of titles included the beginning of a new “Spider-Man” epic, a “Green Lantern” special edition, and a book featuring “Captain America” and “Thor.” Many shops in Santa Cruz had sales for their customers. Participating stores included Atlantis

Fantasyworld on Cedar Street, Comicopolis on Front Street and hundreds of retailers across the nation and internationally.

In 10 years, Free Comic Book Day has grown from a local event — starting in 2001 at a comic book store in Concord, Calif. called Flying Colors — to an international one.

“It’s one of the busiest days of the year,” said Neil Farris, owner of Hijinx Comics in San José.

Joe Ferrara, owner of Atlantis Fantasyworld, said he hoped people would recognize the entertainment value of comics. Atlantis Fantasyworld reaches out to kids at local elementary schools through a summer read-ership program, and has booked comic creators like Elisabetta Dami, author of the newly popu-lar young adult comic “Geroni-mo Stilton,” to speak at events.

“People’s perception of comic books is that they are collect-ibles,” Ferrara said. “Free Comic Book Day is a great way to celebrate the fun you can have in a comic book.”

On the UC Santa Cruz cam-pus, comic books have a well-represented readership. UCSC’s art department features a comic book drawing class and there is a comic book club at Kresge College.

“I’ve been reading comic books since I was a kid,” said Ben Cody, UCSC second-year and member of the Kresge Comic Book Club. “I wasn’t so into them in high school, but when I got to college, I found this really dedicated group of readers, and

I returned to comic books.”Cody, who was carrying a stack

of comics from Atlantis Fantasyworld on his way to Comicopolis,

said he sup-ports Free Comic

Book Day. Many people form very personal connections to their favorite books, he said, and the comic readership at UCSC is large.

Despite the poor economic climate of the last few years, comic sales have been booming

at shops in the Bay Area. For Ryan Higgs, owner of Comics Conspiracy in Salinas, the comic business is lucrative.

“Sales at the store have been pretty steady these past few years, despite the difficult economic climate,” Higgs said. “While I have seen a decrease in sales of monthly comics, the collected versions [trade paperbacks and graphic novels] have really boomed in the past half-decade, as well as sales of toys, statues and other items.”

For Ferrara, Free Comic Book Day is good advertising. It is targeted outreach that doesn’t get lost in the noise of a regular

advertisement, he said, and it creates goodwill between the community and the store.

“Who’s got a grand to spend on advertisements this year?” Ferrara said. “This is a better way to get out to the audience.”

With thousands of people coming out to support Free Comic Book Day in Santa Cruz area shops, the event was pro-nounced a success by many of the owners, whose shops stayed busy until close.

“We gave away 4,000 comic books, and had over 500 people in the shop,” Ferrara said. “It was the most successful Free Comic Book Day yet.”

By Mark RadCity Reporter

Stores see increase in sales during celebration of 10th annual event

Illustration by Bela Messex

“People’s perception of comic books is that they are collectibles. Free Comic Book Day is a great way to celebrate the fun you can have in a comic book.”

—Joe Ferrara, owner of Atlantis Fantasyworld

I


Feature

By Eli WolfeSports Reporter

After a few false starts, one student finally gets it right, eliciting cheers and applause from her classmates. Wielding a shard of yellow chalk in one hand and an enormous eraser in the other, Jonathan Levitow — UC Santa Cruz’s only Yiddish language instructor — holds his arms out wide and grins sheepishly, as if to apolo-gize for the small triumph enjoyed by his class.

“Yiddish is too difficult to be learned by human beings!” Levitow said.

Yet humans — at least Jewish humans — continue to learn it, as they have for the last thousand years. Originally the lan-guage of Jews in Eastern and Central Eu-rope, Yiddish spread across the globe on the tongues of Jewish immigrants, arriving in the United States in the 19th century as the spoken and written language of tens of thousands of Jews on the East Coast.

Following World War II, however, the Yiddish-speaking population of Europe was decimated. The adoption of Hebrew as the national language of the state of Israel dealt Yiddish a second deadly blow by de-nying it a homeland. In the United States, Jewish immigrants often neglected to teach their children Yiddish in an attempt to expedite assimilation, wiping out a pool of potential Yiddish-speakers in the course of a single generation.

Today, there is a popular misconception that because of all this, Yiddish is a dead language. While this statement is far from true, it is also not quite a lie.

Crippled by genocide and decades of bad luck, Yiddish survives in sizable pockets of speakers — mostly ultra-Orthodox com-munities of Jews and enclaves of aging na-tive speakers in New York — but lacks the cohesion or popularity needed to regain its stature as a daily language used by Jews at home and in public.

In 1970, the U.S. Census found almost 1.6 million Jews who spoke Yiddish as a home language. By 1980, that number had dropped to 315,953. In 1990, it fell again to 213,054. Between 2000 and 2007, the number of Yiddish speakers in America fell to 158,991 — almost a 90 percent drop between 1970 and 2007.

Despite its wounds, Yiddish continues to thrive in some circles. More than a dozen Yiddish programs have sprouted up in American universities in the last 20 years, according to a 2010 study by Dr. Zachary Berger entitled, “The Popular Language That Few Bother to Learn.” In the midst of budget cuts and slashed language programs, Yiddish has managed to take root at UCSC with only a handful of students and educa-tors.

Openly passionate about the language and the program, a small pocket of students and teachers are making a stand to preserve the cultural and linguistic heritage of a language they have come to love.

Introductory Yiddish was first offered at UCSC as a course in the Jewish studies program in spring 2010. Thirty students enrolled in the class — about six times the

Illustrations by Louise Leong

In a small classroom hidden at the end of the hall on the first floor of UC Santa Cruz’s social sciences building, six students and their instruc-tor struggle to say,“I like the weather today”in Yiddish. It sounds simple, but several students have already stumbled over the treacherous, paradoxical grammar.

number of students enrolled at the Yiddish program at Stanford, which is also taught by Jonathan Levitow.

Bruce Thompson, a lecturer for the his-tory and literature departments at UCSC, said one reason for the popularity of Yid-dish is the renewed interest many young Jewish students have had in reclaiming their cultural heritage.

“It’s a characteristic swing of the pendu-lum: The second generation wants to lose it, and the fourth generation wants to get it back,” Thompson said. “There’s a recogni-tion that there was a rich Jewish culture in Eastern Europe as well as a rich literature, and it did so much to shape modern Jew-ish secular culture and identity.”

Rachel Starr-Glass, a third-year Jewish studies major, said her family was original-ly from Eastern Europe. A major reason she decided to take Yiddish was so she would be able to explore her own cultural connections to the language.

“There’s so much Yiddish literature out there, and I feel like if I could have direct access to that, the whole world opens up,” Starr-Glass said. “There’s a whole Yiddish culture, and I want to be able to directly access that. My grandma speaks a little, and my brother. It’s in the family.”

Professor Murray Baumgarten, co-founder of the Jewish studies program at UCSC, said knowledge of Yiddish also al-lows students to access thousands of texts accumulated over the centuries that would have been lost to the ages if not translated into Yiddish.

“One of the things that marks Yiddish is the numerous number of texts of world importance that were translated into Yid-dish,” Baumgarten said. “I mean, political science, economics, literature — there was a great sense that Yiddish wanted to be

1.6MillionJews who spoke Yiddish as a

home language in 1970

158,991Jews who spoke Yiddish as a

home langauge in 2007

969Students enrolled in a four-

year college studying Yiddish in 2006

6Students enrolled in the one

Yiddish class offered at UCSC

336Students enrolled in a four-

year college studying Yiddish in 2009

By the Numbers

Statistics behind the disappearing Yiddish language

Teachers, students and scholars weigh the value of Yiddish in the modern age

“It’s a characteristic swing of the pendulum: The second generation wants to lose it, and the fourth generation wants to get it back.”

— Bruce Thompson, UCSC history and literature lecturer

in universities? How many of these people are native speakers?” Wex asked. “It’s a big problem because you’ve got some relatively capable people who are trying to immerse themselves in the language, but it gets harder and harder because there are fewer places to go.”

Jesse Kirchner, a visiting assistant professor of linguistics at UCSC, studied Yiddish throughout his graduate career. In discussing what might endanger a lan-guage like Yiddish, Kirchner drew parallels between Yiddish and other extinct or endangered languages.

“What has caused those languages to become extremely endangered are things that were done to break the connection between one generation and the next,” Kirchner said. “As long as something like that doesn’t happen, Yiddish can endure indefinitely.”

However, given that this generational break has already occurred with Yiddish, Kirchner could not predict whether it would survive as a spoken language.

“It’s safe right now because there’s a generation of speakers learning it,” Kirch-ner said. “But to project out further than that, the future is very much in question for all the other languages in the world — and that would include Yiddish.”

Although Levitow did not agree with the idea that Yiddish is a dying language, he did say that Yiddish culture has been made increasingly irrelevant in modern Jewish communities, especially with the adoption of Hebrew as the official spoken language of Israel and, consequently, the global Jewish community.

“To me it seems kind of obvious — the whole center of Jewish life changed,” Levi-tow said. “When I was a kid, if you went into the synagogue, people spoke Yiddish. Now, you have to make an effort to go out and learn it. It takes hard work.”

Starr-Glass’ glowing opinion of the class and Reb Yankel (the Yiddish title for Levitow in class) was echoed by her class-mate Ian Flanagan, a fourth-year history major.

“If there was one person [in the class] he’d still teach it,” Flanagan said. “He teaches the class — he doesn’t let the book teach the class. He’s so passionate about the course, but not overbearing.”

Flanagan said he has frequently en-countered people who do not understand that Yiddish is still a spoken language with vital communities around the world.

“A lot of people will ask, ‘Why are you taking Yiddish? Nobody speaks Yiddish,”’ Flannagan said. “But [Levitow] brought in Yiddish newspapers from New York, so it is prevalent in certain areas, in New York and European countries. If people understand that it’s still in use, it will come back.”

Levitow’s normally cheery face clouded over as he addressed the notion that Yid-dish had been left behind in the modern age.

“Here in California, you really get the sense that Yiddish is of another time,” Lev-itow said. “But in fact, it’s not true. There are a lot of people who still speak Yiddish — they make an effort to keep it going in their families. New York is a center, also Toronto, and Chicago and L.A. All places


Feature

connected to the larger world of Western culture.”

At UCSC, finding financial support outside the classroom has been integral for not only the preservation of the Yiddish language course but also the Jewish studies program that runs it. Founded in 2000, the Jewish studies program was given its start by donations from the Helen Diller Family Foundation, which allowed the program to establish a major, run independently of university funding, and hire faculty mem-bers like Yiddish lecturer Levitow.

Despite a rich literary tradition, some Yiddish scholars worry that even as the number of programs devoted to teaching Yiddish culture and literature at the uni-versity level increases, the actual number of speakers learning Yiddish outside of Hassidic or Charedi communities is drop-ping at an alarming rate.

A 2006 study by the Modern Language Association found 969 students enrolled at four-year colleges and graduate programs learning Yiddish. In 2009 (the most recent year available), that number dropped to 336. Although this drop is partly due to the drastic class reductions in one rab-binical academy and one state school, it still represents an enormous blow to the national Yiddish-speaking community.

Michael Wex, Yiddish scholar and New York Times best-selling author of “Born to Kvetch,” a humorous linguistic and sociological history of Yiddish and Jewish culture, said the plight of Yiddish is best reflected in the Jewish community’s sud-den interest in preserving Yiddish.

“There’s a very positive attitude towards Yiddish these days, and has been for a couple decades now — and that worries me,” Wex said. “When Yiddish was healthy and flourishing, everyone was ashamed of it and trying to hide it. Now it’s not very healthy and it’s become our legacy.”

Wex said symptoms of Yiddish’s poor health are evident in the popularity of Yid-dish phrase books that promise to teach readers exotic food words, cute endear-ments and juicy curses. Wex said these books promote a superficial knowledge of Yiddish that at best scratches the surface of Jewish culture, and at worst misinforms the reader.

“The interesting thing about Yiddish is that the number of people who know the difference between ‘fuck on’ and ‘fuck off ’ is tiny and diminishing,” Wex said. “I’m not a prig, but the Yiddish is wrong — a book that tells you how to ‘fuck on’ is absolutely useless.”

One of the most basic problems ob-structing Yiddish education is the lack of certified teachers. Berger cites the Yiddish Teacher’s Seminar in New York — which was closed in 1987 — as one of the last institutions to offer graduate students serious education as Yiddish instructors. Wex mentioned the article as he addressed pressing issues facing Yiddish advocates.

“Who is teaching the spoken language Continued on p. 20

where people speak Yiddish day-to-day.” The absence of an iconic, permanent

Yiddish-speaking community is some-thing author Wex believes is permanently stunting the growth of Yiddish.

“One of the big problems [with] teach-ing Yiddish is it’s very difficult to get any outside-the-class support,” Wex said. “You can’t say, ‘Well here’s a program where you can go to Yiddish Land during the sum-mer.’ It’s not the fault of anybody teaching Yiddish — it just doesn’t exist.”

Levitow said UCSC’s program is excep-tionally lucky to receive private funding, because more than almost anything else, steady cash flow is the necessary ingredi-ent for building a stable Yiddish-speaking community.

“The problem really is, in a nutshell, money,” Levitow said. “If you’re running a synagogue, an adult education program, you’re constantly trying to save every dollar you can. So do you hire somebody to teach Yiddish if there are only three students? What we really need are a few more millionaires who could fund Yiddish educational foundations that were stable and could count on funding.”

The Koret Foundation — one of the main donors supporting the program — gave the Jewish studies program a three-year grant to run a Yiddish course. But even private funding cannot guarantee a program’s survival. Last year, as the Yid-dish program was just starting up, UCSC’s Hindi/Urdu program lost its own private funding and was forced to close down.

In response to an email query, Koret Foundation communications officer Kirsten Mickelwait said she could not divulge grant information nor speculate on future support for the program. She did say UCSC’s program is the only one Koret funds specifically for Yiddish education.

For students like Starr-Glass, the uncertain future of the Yiddish program and Yiddish itself has had no effect on her enthusiasm to learn the language — in a large part thanks to Levitow’s class and teaching style.

“I love it, I really do,” Starr-Glass said. “His way of teaching is really natural, it’s conversation, and he’s funny — we’re laughing 75 percent of the class. There’s definitely a lot of grammar, the structure of sentences. But the majority of the time we learn by conversation and a lot practice reading and writing.”

For Michael Wex, learning practical conversation skills and grammar is the only efficient way to bring Yiddish back as a language of daily use.

“I think it’s important for the textbook to teach you unremarkable day-to-day ex-pressions,” Wex said. “When the plumber comes, you have to be able to tell him what’s clogged. If you can’t do that, you’re not fluent.”

Lecturer Thompson said there are a number of practical reasons to continue


Feature

By Chelsea HawkinsCity Reporter & Member of Duwamish Tribe

Nestled on the outskirts of Seattle in the middle of an industrial center, along an unimpressive stretch of

road, sits a cedar longhouse. If you didn’t know about it and if you don’t notice the panels of wood that peek through the trees, you may not even see it. It’s out of place among the yards of metal and lumber, but behind a set of double doors, a culture relegated to the “unidentifiable” thrives.

Rumbling inside this simple structure, traditions persist in defiance of a tumultu-ous history. Feet patter against wooden floors as the sounds of drums and throaty voices ricochet off the walls of the large, windowless ceremonial hall. Some after-noons, the smell of cooking oil and dough comes from a nearby kitchen, laughter and rowdy conversation flooding in along with it.

Leading into a main room, black and white photographs hang on white walls and hand-woven baskets and traditional jewelry sit on display — available for pur-chase, of course. But the proceeds will not be going to line some tribal chair’s pockets. Instead, the money will go to the legal fees the tribe must pay in order to apply for federal recognition.

Federal recognition fosters a “govern-ment-to-government relationship” be-tween American Indian and Alaska Native tribes and the U.S. federal government. Currently, there are 565 federally recog-nized tribes throughout the United States and approximately 1.9 million registered tribal members, according to the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Less than half of self-identified American Indians are regis-tered with a federally recognized tribe, ac-cording to the BIA’s 2005 American Indian Population and Labor report.

As of now there are only three ways a tribe can receive federal recognition: by an act of Congress, by a decision of the United States Supreme Court, or by proving a tribe can meet the requirements of the Federal Acknowledgment Process

regulations 25 CFR Part 83.The 25 CFR Part 83 regulation has

seven specific details a tribe must meet in order to gain federal recognition — most pointedly, proof of continuity in existence and continued “political influence or au-thority over its members.”

A notoriously expensive legal proce-dure, raising funds to cover the costs of lawyers, researchers and academics work-ing on a tribe’s recognition case is half the battle. And it’s a battle the Duwamish tribe has been fighting since 2001 after federal recognition was rescinded by the BIA when it was decided that the tribe had not shown historical continuity — a point of contention for those involved. Currently, the Duwamish tribe is working to appeal the previous decision.

In their defense, the Duwamish look to the Point Elliott Treaty of 1855, which details the rights and reservation the tribe was entitled to in exchange for land the city of Seattle now sits on. The treaty was never fulfilled by the government.

But the story of the Duwamish is noth-ing new. Tribes throughout the country have struggled to maintain and prove their existence — and continued survival — in order to obtain federal recognition.

There is one anomaly in the case of the Duwamish: They have a central meeting place, a cultural center where they can carry out endangered traditions. The Du-wamish tribe raised funds and purchased land in order to build the longhouse that has become central to the community.

But recognition issues are more than casinos and land, bigger than flashing lights and rolls of cash. Federally unrecog-nized tribes do not have access to the same economic or educational benefits federally recognized tribes do, they do not have the same authority over their cultural artifacts or land, nor do they hold the same politi-cal weight.

They are tiny fish among small fish in an even smaller pond.

Illustrations by Rachel Edelstein

Native communities try to make a place for themselves within a bureaucratic system

Arguing Against Academics

In December of last year, President Barack Obama backed the United Nations’ Declaration on Indigenous Rights and spoke on his support of Native Americans at the Tribal Conference held in Washing-ton, D.C. The Declaration was an official recognition of Indigenous sovereignty, and prior to December 2010 the U.S. govern-ment had not officially supported it, ac-cording to a Reuters article.

But while the president’s willingness to open up a constructive dialogue with Na-tive people is a step in the right direction, American Indians are still faced with high rates of poverty, crime, illness and suicide.

“They made a big show of it and that was beautiful, and yes, there were a hun-dred tribes there meeting at the White House but not one of them was a federally unrecognized tribe,” Valentin “Val” Lopez, the Amah Mutsun tribal chair, said. “And the unrecognized tribe has never been reached out to by the government.”

In Santa Cruz, the Amah Mutsun — a

sub-group of the band of Ohlone people na-

tive to the region — are federally unrecognized.

Less than an hour away, in San Jose, the Muwekma Ohlone tribe — like its sister tribe, Amah Mutsun, and Duwamish in Washington State — is embroiled in a struggle to receive federal recognition. The Muwekma Ohlone and the Amah Mutsun are subgroups of the Costanoan band of Indians. The Costanoan is a collection of tribes within the cenral coast.

Lopez explained the tribal history that led up to the Amah Mutsun’s current situa-tion and their fight for federal recognition.

The relationship that existed between Catholic missionaries and the Amah Mutsun was misrepresented in a survey of California Native Americans carried out in the early 20th century, Lopez said. The Amah Mutsun were considered absolved as a separate group and absorbed into the growing Latino population. Lopez asserts that historical documents from the Catho-lic Church as well as previous government

Less than half of self-identifiedAmericanIndians are registered with a federally recognized tribe.

1.9 million registered tribal members

565 federally recognized tribes throughout the U.S.

forgottenBut Not Gone


Feature

Continued on p. 20

“There’s a hell of a lot of historic trauma when you cannot have self-esteem, honor and respect for being an Indian.”

—Valentin “Val” Lopez, Amah Mutsun tribal chair

censuses challenge the survey. “It’s a goddamn lie,” Lopez said, his

voice quivering with rising frustration. “Our people have suffered greatly because of that.”

What stands between the Amah Mut-sun and federal recognition now is a lack of money and tribal politics that pit recog-nized and unrecognized tribes against one another.

“We’re just second-class Natives,” Lopez said. “There’s that psychological impact: You’re not Indian, because you’re not recognized, and that’s how many commu-nities look at us.”

UC Santa Cruz associate professor of American studies Renya Ramirez said that unrecognized tribes may be faced with individuals who do not believe they truly are American Indians.

“Unfortunately, within Native com-munities, there is an idea of a ‘real Indian,”’ Ramirez said. “It’s ironic that being rec-ognized by the federal government affects the way people see Natives.”

Lopez said that it was “unfortunate” that the government separated recognized and unrecognized tribes, and that this categorization is detrimental to all Native communities.

Due to their lack of recognition, tribes are denied programs that federally rec-ognized tribes would benefit from. This includes money for higher education, healthcare services, childcare services and cultural restoration and continuance. In addition, tribes like the Amah Mutsun do not have cultural centers or meeting places where tribal members can gather as a community.

Lopez said that without access to resources it becomes difficult to keep Native communities together as a result of financial insta-bility and a lack of opportunity.

Federally recog-nized tribes have access to job train-ing, social services, natural resources management and housing projects, among other social, educational and economic develop-ment programs. Tribes without federal recognition do not, and must provide for their communities without assistance.

“We had a guarantee from the govern-ment of tribal sovereignty regarding our religious practices, regarding the way we live,” Lopez said. “Without federal recogni-tion, we have none of that. And that to us is a total injustice.”

But what is in place now — and the tribes that are left chronicling their histo-ries and proving their legitimacy — is the

result of past government and academic practices.

Alan Leventhal, an anthropologist from San Jose State University, explains that Alfred L. Kroeber’s “Handbook of the Indians of California,” published in 1925, determined that the Ohlone people, “for all practical purposes, were extinct.” Kroeber was a father of modern anthropology and reputed professor at UC Berkeley, and his work, Leventhal said, has contributed to the misrepresentation of Ohlone people and their history.

When Leventhal was introduced to Rosemary Cambra 30 years ago, the tribal chairwoman of the Muwekma Ohlone, he said he was unfamiliar with California Indians and sought out Kroeber’s text.

“[Rosemary and I] went to the library and I pulled out Kroeber’s book and said, ‘The Costanoan group is extinct for all practical purposes. You must be from some other tribe.’ And she looked at me and said she begged to differ with me and Dr. Kroeber,” Leventhal said. “I was at an impasse. I could have said, ‘I don’t have time for this. Kroeber said you were extinct.’ Or I could apply my research techniques and try and obtain a database that would help the tribe.”

In his research and as he met members of the Ohlone tribe, Leventhal said he began to see the overlap in the stories of the Native community and documents gathered by linguists and anthropologists. The stories of the Muwekma were corrob-orated with the work of past academics.

Kroeber later retracted his claim that the Costanoan band of Indians was ex-tinct, Leventhal said.

Leventhal further explains that in addition to Kroe-ber’s errors, Lafay-ette Dorrington, a Sacramento Super-intendent, in 1918 argued against tribal nations’ need for land and, ultimately, federal recognition and assistance.

“Dorrington terminated 135 tribes with a strike of a pen,” Leventhal said. “Some of these things don’t show up in the history books.”

Leventhal said that there is a disconnect between popular perception of Natives and interest in indigenous affairs.

“If Indians do not talk about walk-ing in harmony with Mother Earth, then dominant society decides they don’t want to recognize these people,” Leventhal said. “If they don’t make necklaces, if they don’t wear feathers, if they don’t dance, then [it’s perceived] that they’re not real Indians

Amy Lonetree, associate professor of American studies at UCSC, said that

present-day American Indian issues are the residual effects of a his-tory of intoler-ance.

“For many of these communities, why they are not recognized is because of ongoing colonialism,” Lonetree said. “The great irony is that Native Americans were told there was no place for them as indig-enous people, yet everything about who they were as tribal people was being taken from them by scholars and budding anthropologists and hoarded.”

Lonetree de-scribes the Pacific Northwestern Tribal Canoe Journey — in which federally unrec-ognized tribes like Duwamish, Snohomish and Chinook Nations participate — as an example of reclamation of identity and a way for Na-tive communities to band together in spite of political factions.

“The U.S. government may have their criteria for who is Native, but we know who our native relatives are,” Lonetree said. “And they are indigenous and we recognize that, and we honor that.”

Michael Evans, the Snohomish tribal chair and a proponent of cultural educa-tion, has worked with youth from the Duwamish and Snohomish tribes promot-ing canoe culture as a way to overlook tribal lines.

“The canoe culture … brings people together and starts to unify the com-munity, and that’s what’s really needed,” Evans said. “There are lot of little tribes, but they’re so fractured that they haven’t banded together enough to push some big legislation.”

For people like Lonetree and Evans, the continuation of Native culture in defiance of whether a tribe is recognized or unrec-ognized is a sign of resilience.

“I feel strongly that culture and self-identity need to be perpetuated, and even though we are not federally recognized, we can still be Natives and First People,” Evans said. “And that needs to be pre-served. There is a lot of cultural heritage, self-pride.”

Anthropologist Jon Daehnke has worked extensively with the Chinook nation and is familiar with the difficulties that tribes face when they no longer have a political voice.

Daehnke said he has heard from mem-

bers of the Chinook nation that they are faced with an internal, emotional conflict.

“We were told we shouldn’t be Indian, but now the government is telling us we aren’t Indian,” Daehnke recalls being told by one member of the Chinook nation.

“This isn’t just about casinos, it isn’t about funding, it’s about identity,” Dae-hnke continued. “All of these legacies of colonialism don’t stop. It’s not settled. These legacies are still there, and they have real effects on people’s everyday lives.”

Lopez has seen the emotional effects a lack of federal recognition has had on his own family, and the issue is much deeper than money or land rights.

“One of my goals was to get us recog-nized before [my mother] passed. I failed to do that. She was born a recognized Indian and died an unrecognized Indian, and that right there is really painful,” Lo-pez said. “There’s a hell of a lot of historic trauma when you cannot have self-esteem, honor and respect for being an Indian.”

The Politics of Ownership

The fight for recognition comes hand in hand with a fight for claim over ancestral remains and funerary objects.

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), passed in 1990, requires that all institutions that receive federal funding — including museums and universities — catalogue the human remains and specified cultural objects that have been excavated and col-lected. The institution housing the remains is required to consult with Native Ameri-


Photography

THROUGH OUR LENS

Words & Photographs by Toby Silverman

Manhattan. Skyscraper National Park. Kurt Vonnegut probably said it cynically, but there is some peace and grandeur in these monolithic hulks of metal. Amidst throngs of people buzzing and pressing and plowing past me on the street level, I tilted my camera upwards. It’s quieter up there. I hiked 100 blocks, looking above me toward a silent forest of silver towers. Seven rolls of film later, I finished my journey, hundreds of these giants immortalized and tucked away in my pockets.

METAL MONOLITHS


Photography


Sports

Anyone would be envious of Chris Garcia’s hands. With them he can make a diabolo — also called a Chinese yo-yo — dance with electric leaps across a string. When juggling five balls, he keeps his hands at hip level, snap-ping each beanbag so it arcs just above his eyes before plopping perfectly into his other hand. Even at rest, he loosely bounces a fistful of markers in his hand, giving the impression that with just a flick of his wrist he can steal your breath away with a dazzling performance.

But on Friday morning, he did not have an audience yet. Walk-ing alone around the West Field House Gym, Garcia, the head of the UC Santa Cruz Juggling Club, was still making preparations for the third annual Santa Cruz Jug-gling Festival.

Hosted May 6–8 at the West Field House Gym, the free festi-val offered juggling workshops for beginners, a nature juggling walk, public exhibitions of world-class jugglers and a fire show on the beach.

Despite the attractions, the club website anticipated only 50 attendees. Garcia, a third-year Merrill student who has run the club for three years, said he did not expect a large turnout because juggling at UCSC does not have a consistently large community.

“[The UCSC Juggling Club] Facebook group says we have 100-plus people,” Garcia said. “But only three people showed up to our meeting last night. It varies — usually, later on in the quarter, people get busier with college.”

The UCSC Juggling Club was founded in 1984 as a nonprofit campus club open to jugglers of all skill levels. The club meets twice a week and puts on perfor-mances once a month downtown.

Garcia has been running the UCSC Juggling Club since he was a first-year. Garcia said because there is no intercollegiate jug-gling league, festivals and com-petitions are the primary ways collegiate jugglers participate in the community.

“There aren’t too many com-petitions for colleges,” Garcia said. “It would be kind of cool, but nobody organizes it. There’s

no community that organizes it, like [in] basketball.”

This year the club received a grant from UCSC to fly in guest performer and teacher Erin Ste-phens from Colorado.

Stephens said festivals allow college-level jugglers to develop relationships with other juggling clubs and learn from professional jugglers.

“A lot of college campuses that have a juggling club will often put on a juggling festival,” Stephens said. “That’s where a lot of festi-vals happen across the country.”

Stephens, who is a UCSC alumna and former member of the UCSC Juggling Club, said festivals are especially important for maintaining a strong juggling community because in her ex-perience, membership in clubs is prone to fluctuation.

“There were some years when it was pretty big — I mean like 15–20 [students],” Stephen-son said. “Then there were times you’d come and there were only four or five. It just depended on the time of year — usually the beginning has a lot of interest from new students, then it kind of peters off through the year.”

By Saturday, the event had attracted a score of jugglers — newcomers and pros alike — among them Matt Hall, Chris Garcia’s former high school teacher and a professional jug-gler.

Hall said Santa Cruz has tra-ditionally been a strong center for juggling culture.

“Santa Cruz is home to Ren-egade Juggling, which is one of

the first juggling prop makers — those guys have been around for 20 or 30 years,” Hall said. “And there’s always been a juggling club here at Santa Cruz.”

Hall, who won a silver medal in the 2003 International Jug-gling Championships, said even in Santa Cruz it was unlikely to find a large population of skilled jugglers. Hall said juggling gets exponentially more difficult with each new trick.

“For every ball you add, you decrease [the number of people who can juggle it] by a factor of 10 or 100,” Hall said. “So there may be millions of three-ball jug-glers, but the number of people who can juggle four balls is prob-ably in the hundreds of thou-

sands. Five-ball jugglers, now you’re talking tens of thousands.”

Hall praised both the club and festival, but harbored doubts as to whether the club could survive without the direction of a strong leader like Garcia.

“Chris is definitely the guiding spirit, the moving force behind this club,” Hall said. “If he goes away, I’d be surprised to see if it survives.”

Although Garcia admitted his club is mostly composed of novices, he said the club remains committed to bringing in new members. He said he hopes the juggling club will encourage those who have never juggled before to pick up the new hobby.

“You don’t need to know how to juggle or anything,” Garcia said. “You could just come and we’ll teach you and accept you into our group, as long as you show an interest.”

Inside the UCSC Juggling ClubCampus club sport survives without league, maintains bonds with global community

By Eli WolfeSports Reporter

Photos by Molly Solomon

MEMBERS OF THE UCSC JUGGLING TEAM hosted a weekend juggling festival. The West Field House was open to everyone, from experienced juggling enthusiasts to people learningforthefirsttime.


Sports

By Samved SangameswaraSports Reporter

This weekend the UC Santa Cruz men’s tennis team will begin its quest for the eighth Division III national title since 1989, and this year, the road to the top begins right at home. On Monday, UCSC was officially named one of the eight host sites of the regional round of the Division III men’s tennis tournament.

UCSC was named host of the re-gional round after finishing at the top of its region this year. In an unusual twist, the Banana Slugs won their region but finished behind Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (CMS) in the national rankings due to a loss to Washington University at St. Louis. The result is that UCSC will be one of the eight regional hosts, but CMS will host the final three rounds as the last eight teams battle for the top spot.

With the tournament approaching quickly, both the players and their coach, Bob Hansen, are thankful for the home-court advantage they will enjoy this weekend. While Division III tennis doesn’t benefit from the raucous home crowds or stadiums that Division I football and bas-ketball programs enjoy, sophomore Parker Larsen said the familiarity of playing on their own courts in front of their own fans is what the players will really benefit from.

“Being at home just creates a sense of comfort for the players,” Larsen said. “We practice there every day all year. It gives you an advantage and gets your opponents out of their comfort zone.”

Coach Hansen echoed this statement, emphasizing the importance of knowing the actual court on which the matches will take place.

“We’re definitely perfectly comfort-able on [our] courts,” Hansen said. “We know the speed of the courts and how they bounce. All of that stuff adds to your energy and focus.”

The team is grateful for these advan-tages because they know that the competi-tion this weekend will be difficult. Hansen said that the western region is “by far the hardest” out of the eight spread across the country. Three of the four teams playing at Santa Cruz this weekend are ranked in the top 10 in the nation, with the CMS Stags ranked third, UCSC ranked fourth and the Pomona-Pitzer Sagehens ranked eighth.

While the team prepares itself for the

UCSC Gets Home Court AdvantageMen’s tennis earns right to host regional round of NCAA tournament

SOPHOMORE PARKER LARSEN PRACTICES at the

West Field House tennis courts on April

27. Larsen, part of the team’s top doubles

duo, will be playing this weekend when UCSC

hosts one of the regional rounds of the NCAA

tournament.

Matchups

competition this weekend, the staff at OPERS and the athletic department are doing some preparation of their own. UCSC does not regularly host sporting events of this size, with the last time being the regional round of the NCAA men’s tennis tournament of 2008. The staff will be working to accommodate the increased number of visitors and participants in this weekend’s festivities.

This week has seen a flurry of meetings and conference calls between UCSC, the NCAA and delegations from the other three schools. Athletic director Linda Spradley said a serious amount of work went in before the tournament to set up the games and ensure that they run smoothly.

“People think it’s real easy, just sign a sheet of paper,” Spradley said. “It isn’t. It takes a lot of work — you put in a lot of hours. Once it gets going you can finally sit back and relax, but until then it’s a lot of work.”

With the tournament just two days away, the focus is shifting from the prepa-ration to the performance of the Slugs this weekend. If the Slugs want to make a run at an eighth national title, they will have to win both home matches this weekend.

UCSC will open by playing Pomona-Pitzer, who are ranked eighth in the nation. If UCSC beats them, the team will advance to play the winner of the match between CMS and the University of Texas at Tyler. With CMS expected to beat Texas-Tyler, the Slugs are anticipating fac-ing the Stags in the regional final.

UCSC has some history with CMS, having beaten them earlier this season to secure the top spot in the region. Howev-er, the players know that the early victory has only put a target on their backs for this weekend.

“[We have to] come in 100 percent and take out a team that is gunning for us,” Larsen said. “They’re going to be really fired up, wanting to take it to us, and we have to be ready to give it back.”

With a tough road ahead, the team remains confident that they are up to the task.

“Our kids are really committed,” Hansen said. “They’ve improved a lot this season, and they feel pretty good about where they are right now. I feel good about how deep their training has been, their commitment and how they’ve grown. I know they’ll come to play.”

UCSC

Pomona-Pitzer

Game 1Friday, 1 p.m.

Texas-Tyler

Claremont-Mudd-Scripps

Game 2Friday, 5 p.m.

Game 3Saturday, 3 p.m.

Winner of Game 1

Winner of Game 2

Prescott Watson


Arts & Entertainment

“BOSSYPANTS” REVIEW

By Blair StenvickArts & Entertainment Editor

The ‘Boss’ of Comedy and the King of the Jungle

Critiquing Tina Fey’s ‘Bossypants’ and Disneynature’s ‘African Cats’

“AFRICAN CATS” REVIEW

By Hanna TodaArts & Entertainment Reporter

Illustration by Muriel Gordon

Disneynature presents: a touching tale of the supreme cats of the lush plains of Africa and a mother’s love for her cubs in a cruel world of predators. This movie touched my heart. In fact, it touched my heart so much that it actually went past just touching it — it grabbed it with Freddy Krueger nails, ripped it out, punctured my aorta and did a jaunty Tahitian dance on it. I walked out of the theater craving Prozac and Xanax and any other substance that could possibly erase the horrifying story that had been burned into my brain.

While the film claims to be based on a true story, the “in-spiring” tale that Disney hoped to tell was entirely depressing

due to a severe lack of balance between the depicted optimism of a mother’s determination and the unforgiving cruelty of the wild. The film attempted to do a Hollywood animal version of a Lifetime Original Movie — a single mother trying to provide for her children.

But most of the time, the lion-ess and cheetah mother did not succeed. They did not overcome all odds and rejoice. Disney waved it away, justifying it by saying, “Hey, at least she tried. And that’s the circle of the life. It’s beautiful.” I doubt many would find inspiration in a cub surviv-ing an attack by a hyena and the lion of an opposing pride only to go back to her family to find that

she has a new stepdad who killed her brothers and sisters.

Samuel L. Jackson is pres-ent throughout the film with his blunt, in-your-face voice-over. But it was clear that Jackson’s narrative did not complement the plot and only disrupted the scenes the audience tried to pay attention to.

While the plot and narration were disappointing, the cin-ematography was impressive, as expected. Filmed at the Maasai Mara National Reserve of Kenya, the breathtaking scenes of the wildebeest migration remind viewers of the beauty of a world halfway across the globe. The thrilling image of the defined muscles of the lioness as she

hunts makes for more of a strik-ing visual than any Hollywood actor could provide. The most epic scene is filmed in a much more Animal Planet-like tone and portrayed a beastly show-down between the lion Fang and a crocodile.

In theory, this film had a lot of potential — a real-life version of “The Lion King.” However, the execution of the plot and the poor narration only pushed me closer to going through my old VHS tapes and watching the much happier, though slightly less accurate version of the kings of the animal kingdom.

In an interview with The Believer in 2003, Tina Fey called herself “more of a writer than an actor,” and if there was any doubt about her comedy writing skills on “30 Rock,” “Saturday Night Live” or “Mean Girls,” she cleared them up with her new memoir, “Bossypants.”

Fey has been in the public eye since she first started appearing in the Weekend Update segment of “SNL” in 2000, and “Bossy-pants” gives a good amount of insight into what her life was like both before and after becoming a celebrity.

From befriending a bunch of closeted gays at theater camp in high school to trying to

commiserate with her frightening coworkers at the YMCA while taking improv classes on the side, to dealing with “Teat Nazis” who insisted she breastfeed her daughter, Fey shows that her life is both remarkable and ordinary and uses her signature self-deprecating and witty humor to make it all entertaining.

One of the best chapters in the book is one called “Sarah, Oprah, and Captain Hook, or How to Succeed by Sort of Looking Like Someone.” Yes, it tells the widely-known story of how she blew up after impersonating Sarah Palin on “SNL,” but it also reveals that during that same week, she had to film Oprah’s guest spot on “30

Rock” and plan her daughter’s birthday party. With this, read-ers get a much more complete picture of what Fey’s life is like — and it makes her more likeable.

Fey also gives spot-on com-mentary on what it’s like to be a woman today, in or out of the entertainment industry. Femi-nism can sometimes be a drag, but Fey uses humor to her advan-tage, commenting on things like beauty standards by giving advice on “aging naturally without look-ing like time-lapse photography of a rotting sparrow.” And about the criticism she received for her portrayal of Palin, she smartly observes, “I am not mean and Mrs. Palin is not fragile. To imply

otherwise is a disservice to us both.”

And that type of humor and insight is what makes “Bossy-pants” a knockout. I’d have ac-cepted anything written by Tina Fey, but she exceeded my expec-tations by making her memoir less about herself and more about the world. Yes, she talks mostly about her own life, but it’s in a way that everyone can relate to and laugh along with.

In the introduction, Fey writes, “I hope you enjoy [this book] so much that you also buy a copy for your sister-in-law.” I don’t have a sister-in-law, but if I did I would strongly recommend it to her and everyone else.


Community & Culture

Community Chest

Mollie Murphy, co-president of the UC Santa Cruz chapter of STAND and a Crown College fourth-year majoring in sociol-ogy. She was one of a dozen students who participated in a die-in event on May 5 to bring awareness of the genocide around the world to the UCSC students.

City on a Hill Press: What is the die-in event and what is its significance?Murphy: A die-in is a visual demonstration, similar to a protest but a little bit less. Our group dressed in all black and

laid down on the ground, first on the College Nine and Ten lawn

for an hour and [now] at the Quarry

Plaza, with tombstones to symbolize all the deaths of the victims of genocidal crimes and mass atrocities. My tombstone said, “Hitler is alive in Darfur, in Sudan, and his name is Omar al-Bashir.” The idea behind that is that similar genocide crimes that happened during the Holocaust are happening in Sudan right now. [Sudan] is getting a lot less publicity and people are paying a lot less attention. It is meant to link that past, the Holocaust, to things that are going on today to raise awareness.

CHP: Why are you interested in spreading awareness about this issue?Murphy: I want to find a career in human rights, and this is an important human rights issue.

I’m concerned with how people across the globe are treated and respected. I think I chose this issue because it means the most to a huge amount of people. It’s a logistically complex issue, but an ethically simple issue. Nobody is for genocide. It’s hard to imag-ine that people would commit mass murders against each other. Eradicating the world of geno-cide is probably one of the most important steps to having global peace, global cooperation and respect between cultures.

CHP: Why do you think this is the best way to get people’s attention?Murphy: I think when people have a more visual kind of cue it’s a little bit more shocking and can hit home a little bit more. The idea is not to be abrasive or to guilt people. It’s just a state-ment, a vigil to bring people close to something that is happening far away, especially for students who live on campus or who never have really heard about these

issues. We are trying to make it easier to grasp in a lot of ways, and sometimes visual demon-strations help that.

CHP: How do you hope this will impact UCSC students?Murphy: We are hoping to cre-ate an atmosphere of solidarity between people in all countries, and to raise awareness and create

a compassionate energy towards people who have to face these crimes or these kinds of circum-stances every day. The hope is to get students here interested and get them to care about stopping genocide on the planet.

A series that takes a closer look at some of UCSC’s finest

By Aysha BilalCommunity & Culture

Reporter

Photo courtesy of Mollie Murphy

Please visit cityonahillpress.com to read the complete interview with

Mollie Murphy at cityonahillpress.com.


teaching Yiddish, but for the best reason, one should just ask the students studying it.

“Ask any of our students who are taking Yiddish about his or her experience,” Thompson said. “I bet you that the first response before the student says a word is a smile — a broad smile. With all due respect to all the other lan-guages that are offered at UCSC, you don’t get that same smile — but you get it with someone who’s learning Yiddish.”

Asked to elaborate on what students might gain from learn-ing Yiddish, Thompson hesitated, picking his words with care.

“I suppose it’s not only a feel-ing of accomplishment,” Thomp-son said. “But there’s also a special feeling of satisfaction that you’re keeping alive something that nearly died. It’s quite a wonder-ful thing that college students are really doing this.”

Fourth-year student Flana-gan said it’s frustrating to see the low enrollment in Levitow’s class, which he blames on the recent arrival of the program and its virtual invisibility on course registers.

“Nobody knows it’s being offered. Once I found out and I took it, I became the biggest cheerleader for it,” Flanagan said. “We have pride in what we’re learning because nobody else is studying it. It’s something unique

to me and I want to see more people speaking it.”

Starr-Glass said that although she is not sure how far she will take her Yiddish education, she would be interested in taking another Yiddish class if it were offered. But it was difficult to imagine learning enough Yiddish to make it the home language of her family, she said.

“I’m not really sure about that — it would be hard. I think I would have to move to a Yiddish-speaking community to do that,” Starr-Glass said. “When I have a family, I want Yiddish to be familiar to them. I don’t know if me speaking alone to them would be enough, but I want to pass it on to them.”

Wex said that in the ideal world, Yiddish would be taught not as a class, but as the language of instruction in an entire uni-versity.

“No single teacher, no matter how intelligent or gifted can [pos-sibly] cover it all,” Yiddish scholar Wex said. “There’s never one professor for a whole area. This is what you need in Yiddish, the idea of a university, one that cov-ers liberal arts, and social science, that really does run in Yiddish.”

Wex also noted that despite efforts to make Yiddish a secular language, the religious compo-nent is too vital to the vocabulary and structure of the language to

be excluded from study. Wex said without knowledge of the forms and rituals that defined Yiddish as a sacred language used by Jews for a millennia, a student could not achieve more than partial understanding of the language.

“I don’t think you can make this stuff work [by saying]... ‘Here are some dirty jokes, here are some insults you can sling at people,”’ Wex said. “You end up with a culture where all you can do is curse.”

By the end of Levitow’s two-hour class, nobody had uttered a curse, but the students had reviewed a quiz and covered several complicated grammatical constructions. Class was conclud-ed with the reading of two jokes from the textbooks. By the end of the first joke, class was over, but nobody wanted to leave until the second joke was finished.

Line by line, the second joke is read through until the last student read the final sentence, sound-ing out the Yiddish words before translating them into English. It takes a second for everyone to put together the translated joke, leading to a collective groan at the punch line. But Levitow beamed and bobbed uncontrollably on the balls of his feet, unable to hide his delight.

“I saw the light go on in your eyes!” Levitow said. “It was very exciting!”

Searching for Yiddish Land

ABOVE: Students realize the double entendre in a joke in Professor Jonathan Levitow’s Yiddish class.LEFT: Bruce Thompson, lecturer for the history and literature departments, classifiestheupcominggeneration’s interest in Yiddish as part of a cycle.

Photos by Prescott Watson

Continued from p. 13

Continued from p. 11

Continued on p. 21

Illustration by Rachel Edelstein

Forgotten But Not Gonecan tribes, and if the tribe files a request for the return of the remains and cultural artifacts, the institution must comply.

For federally unrecognized tribes, however, NAGPRA falls short. Under the law, pub-licly funded institutions are not required legally to return any remains or artifacts to a federally unrecognized tribe.

Federally unrecognized tribes are left relying on the goodwill of universities and museums that can voluntarily return objects and consult Native tribes. While the UC system currently con-sults Native American tribes on NAGPRA compliance issues, the relationship between the UC and federally unrecognized tribes is ambiguous.

Archaeologist and UCSC professor Judith Habicht-Mauche serves on behalf of UCSC as an advisor on NAGPRA to the UC Office of the President (UCOP), but refused to speak specifically on work the board handles. Only UCs in possession of artifacts that fall under NAGPRA law serve on the board.

“For security reasons, I don’t want to speak about the physical remains we possess,” Habicht-Mauche said.

Habicht-Mauche did confirm that UCSC was in possession of ancestral remains and artifacts. She did not detail where they were stored, what they specifi-cally were, or how many remains the university was in possession

of. However, under NAGPRA, the inventories documenting the artifacts in question are pub-lished.

As far as Habicht-Mauche knows from her work with the NAGPRA advisory group, a federally unrecognized tribe has not received remains or artifacts from the UC. However, with recent changes to NAGPRA, fed-erally unrecognized tribes may stand a better chance at obtaining ancestral remains and funerary objects.

“The new rules have loosened requirements to some degree, but even under the new law, NAG-PRA does not favor federally unrecognized tribes,” Habicht-Mauche said.

Even though the university re-fuses to speak in detail on items falling under NAGPRA, that does not satisfy tribes that do not have the right to rebury the remains of their ancestors now relegated to museum and university research facilities.

“The problem that the Amah Mutsun has is with any destruc-tive testing done to the bodies, because it’s against our religious beliefs,” Lopez said. “We still have our strong religious beliefs and the spirit can only pass to the other side when it is whole and complete. Whenever you do destructive testing … that means in the end that spirit can never be at peace.”

Lopez also said that the university was “not as open and


Feature

Forgotten But Not GoneContinued from p. 20

“The Costanoan group is extinct so far as all practical purposes are concerned ... The old habits of life have long been abandoned. The larger part of the century has passed since the missions were abolished.”

Source: The Handbook of the Indians of California, by Alfred Louis Kroeber

transparent” as it could be. Daehnke explains that when contextualizing the issue

of repatriation, the moral dilemma becomes apparent. “The ability of cultures to make decisions about their

deceased ancestors, that’s a pretty basic human right,” Daehnke said. “There’s roughly 80 percent of the known sets of human remains are still on museum shelves.”

Education as an Antidote

Tribal issues and the topics pertinent to indigenous communities do not often make the headlines. Recogni-tion issues and repatriation concerns are not necessarily high-profile, and often fall under the radar of those unaf-filiated with Native groups.

But amongst American Indian students, organizations and faculty at UCSC, there is a hunger for awareness. It is a swirling torrent, picking up speed and growing in size, that not only wants to see diversity in education, but also the inclusion of an American Indian and indigenous stud-ies program.

Rebeca Figueroa, a participant in the UC Inner-cam-pus Visitor Program, is a second-year anthropology and Native American studies major from UC Davis. Her last two quarters at UCSC have brought her to the American Indian Resource Center (AIRC), where she has col-laborated with director Carolyn Dunn to bring a Native American studies program to the school.

“Even though I identify as a Chicana, a lot of the issues we discuss within [Native American studies] relate to me,” Figueroa said. “We understand the issues that Native people are still fighting today, so I felt really close to that.

Everyone has a different story, but there is always com-mon ground.”

Currently, Figueroa is seeking outside funding for an American Indian studies program, and hopes to model the program’s evolution after the Jewish studies program. She argues that the importance of Native American stud-ies is because of the bridge between past and present, and how it has shaped indigenous communities today.

“We have to know that these people are still here, that it’s nothing of the past,” Figueroa said. “You go to a reser-vation and they still don’t have running water, and then you come here and all these people have the luxury that they’re lacking. Why are we here enjoying ourselves when there are people who were here before us that don’t have those rights?”

Figueroa also addressed the issue of federally unrec-ognized tribes and understanding the status of Native Americans as a topic in need of discussion.

“No one should have the power to say you’re not indig-enous enough,” Figueroa said.

Dunn, the director of the AIRC, said that indigenous studies would be the first step to addressing issues rel-evant to American Indian individuals, but it would also initiate cross-disciplinary conversations.

“With environmental studies, there is indigenous knowledge that has direct scientific exploration or expla-nation that we could be looking at,” Dunn said. “Looking at indigenous studies or American Indian studies, it’s a very holistic way, and it can cross boundaries into other academic disciplines.”

Indigenous studies is, for students like Figueroa, the next step in addressing the need for greater conversation on American Indian concerns, as well as increasing the presence of Native culture and knowledge on the campus.

“I find it interesting how [UCSC] claims to be very diverse, but it’s not very diverse at all,” Figueroa said. “The conference rooms are named after [indigenous people], and it’s funny that we can name things after people but you don’t see them here.”

But even while indigenous studies may be the first step to changing the perception and situation of American Indians, for now, federally unrecognized communities exist in political limbo.

“It’s recognition that your ancestors went through these struggles and in spite of that they’re still here, we’re still here,” said Mike Evans, tribal chair of the Snohom-ish and a cultural mentor to many Duwamish youth. “It’s about your history and having others recognize your his-tory, your culture. It’s something you hold dearly, and I’d hate to see that go away.”


Column

The faucet is running. My compact, powder and mascara are in my bag and that girl who just came in the bathroom door didn’t see a thing.

About two years ago, I began to feel the need to be more of a ninja in these types of situations while on cam-pus at UC Santa Cruz.

I began to pay more attention to my surroundings after an uncomfortable encounter in the Social Sciences 2 building.

A sweet-looking, button-nosed girl came up to me as I adjusted my makeup in the bathroom mirror and said, in a condescending voice, “You’re beautiful without makeup, you know?”

My first thought was, “Have you been following me? How do you know what I look like without makeup?”

I tilted my head and thought, “Wait, do you think I’m not being a good feminist? What does that even mean?”

Her words stung, and I didn’t really know what to say. I just shrugged my shoulders and probably made a funny face.

I hate to sound shallow, but I’ve always really liked makeup, especially during my adolescent years when I wasn’t allowed to wear it. It was a rush with blush.

There were so many bright blues and greens, all prob-ably with harmful ingredients that have aged me prema-turely.

I remember sneaking around with my friends and exchanging makeup that was, in my mother’s words, not for “niñas” (girls) in middle school.

At 12, I was hiding from my mother. Now at 21, I’m

hiding from hyper-critical students. The digits have switched, yet here I am. I just hate that I feel so self-conscious about people seeing my makeup ritual.

I even feel self-conscious about looking at myself.Next time you — men, women, and everything in

between and outside — go into a public restroom, look immediately in the direction of the mirrors. Someone just

flinched and played off adjusting their hair. I do it all the time.

I wouldn’t say I have a fixation when it comes to make-up. I just really like wearing it, and have an unfortunate glandular problem. That’s right. I’m a sweaty girl. By 2:30 p.m., half my face is an inch lower than the other side.

Like Photoshop, I get to work with my brush. I “restore” my image. It’s my little ritual.

By doing this, I risk confronting another Button-Nose.I’d like to know: What’s the difference between society

telling women what to do and a type of feminism that tells us what to do? It’s hard to please both my Beyoncé-look-loving side and Button-Nose.

At least I’m not the only ninja with this problem. My housemate was energetically telling me about having to

face this fear after running short on time in the morning.“Yeah, I put my makeup on,” she said with pride. “IN

PUBLIC!”Rebecca Walker, daughter of famous novelist Alice

Walker, dealt with a similar fear of judgment. In her book “To Be Real,” Rebecca Walker spoke about her experi-ences with her mother.

“Young women feminists find themselves watching their speech and tone in their works so as not to up-set their elder feminist mothers,” she said in the book. “Younger feminists definitely have a hard time proving themselves worthy as feminist scholars and activists.”

Though Rebecca Walker has been criticized for being self-righteous, she does make a point in saying that some have developed an overly standardized view of what femi-nism should be for everyone — not what feminism and empowerment means to individuals.

Feminist literature throughout the decades has pointed to the diversity among women’s wants and needs. More than half of the anthropology students in that Social Sci-ences 2 building could lecture Button-Nose on a thing or two about cultural relativity.

I’m not saying that there isn’t a reciprocal relationship. Outside the walls of UCSC, people are unfairly partial to “mainstream” looks, dolled-up faces and the latest season’s colors.

To be honest, I’m often one of those people who say, “You’re beautiful without makeup.” But why can’t it be both? Who am I to say what people should do?

Though I am an exceptionally good ninja, I’ll try not to flinch next time someone walks in on me staring at myself. Let’s be comfortable with ourselves, and let’s be comfortable with others’ choices.

A Rush with

BlushLooking at the secret cult

of makeup application

By Rosela ArceCity Reporter

Illustration by Matt Boblet

Next time you go into a public restroom, look immediately in the direction of the mirrors. Someone just flinched and played off adjusting their hair.


Editorials

Native Americans have a long history of oppression in this country. Their land was taken, their people murdered and their sacred sites corrupted, all for

the sake of building the United States. A new form of this old oppression is still happening, and the University of California is playing a role.

In this issue’s feature story, “Forgotten but not Gone,” it is confirmed that

the University of California, and UC Santa Cruz

in particular, is in possession of Native

American artifacts and burial remains.

The question of where

and what those

remains are is left unanswered.Keeping Native American remains is problematic for

a number of reasons. It means that graves were disrupted to obtain these remains, which is disrespectful to any culture. And to make matters worse, many Native Ameri-can tribes believe that disruption of burial sites can cause spiritual trouble.

Awful as this may be, it is technically legal. According to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatria-tion Act (NAGPRA), the government and institutions that receive government funding cannot be in possession of Native American cultural items. However, this legislation only applies to federally recognized tribes — and not all tribes have government recognition.

Tribes that aren’t federally recognized generally are on the smaller side and more difficult to document. But this shouldn’t mean that they don’t receive the same rights and respect as federally recognized tribes. For the UC, or any other institution, to hold onto these remains just because of a legal loophole is tasteless and inconsiderate.

The fact that information about what exactly we are in possession of is difficult to find makes this even more abhorrent, as people have a right to know what cul-tural crimes the UC is a part of. Schools have to release information about what they have under NAGPRA, but UCSC’s information is extremely difficult for the public to find. Even UC Berkeley’s Phoebe A. Hearst Museum has a

sidebar on its website with links to the NAGPRA inven-tory database; UCSC only has a compliance statement on their Office of Research website.

There’s no doubt that some would argue that the Native American remains are being used for research purposes and thus are needed. But no research is worth inflicting even more pain on a group of people who have already suffered at the hands of the U.S. government so much.

And what’s more, retaining these remains actually interferes with the UC’s main goal. It is supposed to serve as a way to educate all California students who meet certain academic standards, but it is doubtful that Native American students would feel completely comfortable supporting an institution that exploits their people. There is constant talk of the UC needing to become more di-verse, but this is one negative example of actions speaking louder than words.

Stanford University gave back Native American remains, including some from federally unrecognized tribes, in the 1980s. It’s time the University of California did the same.

It may be legal for the UC to hold on to federally unrecognized Native American tribes’ remains, but it certainly is not just. They should be given back to their rightful owners, and the cloud of mystery surrounding what exactly the UC has should be dispersed.

A UC Berkeley disciplinary panel concluded that student journalist Josh Wolf ’s presence in the November 2009 11-hour occupation of Wheeler

Hall was a punishable offense. Wolf, whose footage of the occupation was used in a “Democracy Now!” broadcast, recently graduated from the two-year journalism gradu-ate program at UC Berkeley and must now write an essay addressing university policy toward student journalists before he can pick up his diploma.

This “punishment” is blatantly patronizing. This disci-plinary action makes clear the administration’s insulting standpoint that student status supersedes journalistic status, sending the message, “You are merely a student — now go write an essay.” As if that was not enough, the subject of the essay is administrative action regarding student journalists. It is a twofold slap in the face.

Per recent action taken by UC Berkeley, only one thing can be derived — in the eyes of the UC system, student journalists are not journalists at all. UC administra-tion condescendingly declares that student status takes precedent over journalistic status, and imparts judicial processes on people who are operating as journalists while being enrolled as students.

The idea that student status negates journalistic status is absurd. Student journalists are journalists. And further, if any status should supersede another, U.S. citizenship and the national adherence to the First Amendment should trump student status and the student code of conduct.

As Nanette Asimov of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote, “Guilty verdicts for practicing journalism are the stuff of authoritarian nations and now, apparently, UC Berkeley.” This is a poignant summation that typifies the systemic issues facing student journalists in the UC sys-

tem, especially considering the current crisis hitting our universities and the numerous resistance efforts that have been, are currently and will continue to be taking place.

At the time that Wolf entered Wheeler Hall with his press pass displayed around his neck, 60 miles away, a re-porter for a UC Santa Cruz publication called The Project was in Kerr Hall with his press pass displayed around his neck, filming the 66-hour occupation.

Kenji Tomari was issued a restitution fee by the university administration. The restitution was eventually dropped, but only after Tomari spent more than a quarter fighting the university with the $944 charge hanging over his head.

As independently-funded publications that are entirely run by their membership, autonomous from the univer-sity, comprised of reporters wielding press passes, the question of which status supersedes the other is irrelevant – the two are autonomous spheres.

If journalists are afraid to report because they are not protected, we as a system are embarking on a path of self-censorship — an inherent contradiction to an intrinsic value of the free press.

UCSC Student Media has mobilized to alleviate this debilitating construct by working to establish a Universal Press Pass, which the administration would recognize, and grant journalists wielding these passes protection and officially recognize their function as journalists in that capacity. This is a step in the right direction, and would be in the university’s best interest. Both organizations have overlapping values — to educate and inform the public.

In President Obama’s White House Correspon-dents’ Dinner speech, he addressed the value of

journalists and reporting in these trying times. As the UC system — like America and the rest of the world — faces uncertain times ahead, his comments are especially applicable for journalists reporting on and in this dying system.

“In the last months we’ve seen journalists threatened, arrested, beaten, attacked and in some cases even killed simply for doing their best to bring us the story to give people a voice and to hold leaders accountable,” he said. “And through it all we have seen daring men and women risk their lives for the simple idea that no one should be silenced and everyone deserves to know the truth. That’s what you do. At your best that’s what journalism is — that’s the principle that you uphold. It is always important, but it’s especially important in times of challenge, like the moment that America and the world is facing now.”

The free press exists for a beautiful and paramountly important reason: “That no one should be silenced, and everyone deserves to know the truth.”

Obama gets it — why doesn’t the UC?

The UC continues government crimes against Native Americans

Sweeping a People’s Past Under the Rug

UC Policy on Reporters is ReprehensibleFreedom of the press applies to student journalists as well

Illustration by Muriel Gordon

Illustration by Matt Boblet

Volume 45 Issue 27 [5/12/2011]

Documents

Transcript of Volume 45 Issue 27 [5/12/2011]