Sep - Oct 2001 Issue

  Duke received $264,424,566 in charitable gifts in the fiscal year that ended June 30, with contributions from a record 89,852 donors, including 44,214 alumni, also a new high for the university. The total represents the second-highest philanthropic giving in Duke’s history, after the previous year’s record of $302,558,190.

Duke Chapel is a work of art. But it is no museum. There are no curator’s notes posted beneath the stained-glass windows to reveal their history, no commentaries beside the stone carvings to explain their symbolism. In some ways this is good: The Chapel is so rich in treasures that any attempt to annotate them on-site would end up wallpapering the nave with explanatory plaques.

Shimmering on a continent’s roof in the harsh sunlight of 11,400-feet altitude, Bolivia’s Lake Titicaca is both Earth’s highest big lake and South America’s largest. A jewel in many shades of blue nestled below a snow-capped crown of Andes Mountain peaks named for royalty, Titicaca stretches out in two parts on a lofty plateau—the Altiplano—that is as environmentally exotic as it is economically undernourished.

There is an interlude during each Sunday-morning service at the Assembly of God Tabernacle when the pastor invites his parishioners to roam around the sanctuary, welcoming visitors and greeting each other. I suppose it was at that moment on the day I first attended that I realized I had come to the right place.

At the John Jay College Theater in midtown Manhattan, this past spring’s attraction was Mnemonic. It is a play built on memory, “one of the last great mysteries,” according to a snippet of dialogue. Even before the stage action unfolds, audience members are challenged to remember where they were two hours ago, two weeks ago, a month ago, ten years ago.

It was my fourth day in Havana when the soldier took my visa and passport, asked me who was the woman with the empty vodka bottle, and suggested that conducting a filmed interview right across from a police station in a police state was perhaps not such a good idea. For the record, I had no idea that I was anywhere near a police station, and I had only noticed the vodka bottle about halfway through the interview.

Duke University can be easily found on various maps. It floats as a dot in the north-central part of a state map. It becomes clearer on a regional map, as the dot resolves itself into a larger square, sometimes with an accompanying square for Duke Medical Center. On a small city map, the squares double, one for East Campus, one for West. In its most highly resolved form, a detailed map shows streets and stadium, boundaries and buildings.

 

  By Peter BurianChair, Academic Council, and professor of classical studies

  Trailblazer • Honorable Actions • Not-So-Little Mistakes • Picture not Perfect • Good for a Change

  A new analysis conducted by Duke Medical Center cardiologists concludes that the incidence of potentially life-threatening clots forming inside stents—tiny mesh girders designed to prop open newly cleared arteries—is almost three times higher than previously reported.

 Two generations of Yohs, one of Duke’s most prominent families, will endow a professorial chair in the social sciences.The chair, the second Yoh Family Professorship at Duke, will be endowed at $1.5 million, with $1.125 million of it coming from the Yoh family. It is established by four members of the family in appreciation of their Trinity College education, with support from four other Yohs.

 As students were returning to their fall-semester routines, we asked them: Are you addicted to the Internet?National surveys suggest that young people in particular are spending much of their time online. Our results—the product of non-virtual conversations—suggested a similar picture.

 

 

 Feaver: students' choice for exceptional teaching.

  A noted civil-rights attorney, a leader in educational technology, a former professional basketball player, a health-care economist, the head of General Motors, a medical researcher, and a May graduate have been elected to Duke’s board of trustees.

 Back When We Were GrownupsBy Anne Tyler '61. Alfred A. Knopf, 2001. 274 pages, $25.

 Open Secrets: A Spiritual Journey Through a Country ChurchBy Richard Lischer.Doubleday, 2001. 239 pages, $22.95.

 Pratt: His school now bears his name

 Pericak-Vance: winner of Frances "Louis-D".

  Several revisions to Duke’s Alcohol Policy have taken effect with the start of the school year, including an amendment that states the university may notify the parents of students under the age of twenty-one when their student’s health or safety has been at risk.

 In an attempt to head off more serious problems when fraternity chapters are found guilty of judicial infractions, the Office of Student Development has begun notifying not only fraternity members, but also their parents and chapter alumni.