Duke - Summer 2018 https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/issues/summer-2018 en Meet Clinique's marketing sage https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/meet-cliniques-marketing-sage <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>Arriving at Clinique’s sleek offices, headquartered in the General Motors building towering above Fifth Avenue in New York City, visitors could be forgiven for thinking they’d stepped inside some high-tech, space-age lab. The sleek offices are high-gloss modern, bathed in surgery theater lighting.</p> <p>It’s here that <strong>Cara Robinson M.B.A. ’98</strong>, vice president of global marketing, makeup, and fragrance for Clinique, directs strategy for the quintessential beauty brand. Her office is loaded with products notable for their familiar, simple, clean packaging and those opaque bottles filled with pastel-toned miracle workers. The walls, however, are adorned with several mementos and images. In one, the words “If Ruth Bader Ginsburg can show up every day, you can too!” are emblazoned alongside the eighty-four-year-old Supreme Court justice. That photo shares space with <a href="https://www.dpvintageposters.com/cgi-local/detail.cgi?d=12014">baseball legend Jackie Robinson in the iconic “Think Different” Apple Computer campaign</a>. She calls them “great subliminal daily reminders that keep me inspired.”</p> <p>As Clinique’s marketing sage, Robinson oversees one of the cosmetic sector’s biggest prestige players at a time when the industry is in the midst of fundamental change. Consumers, who once made their beauty findings at their local department-store counters, are now discovering indie brands on social media and through beauty influencers—and increasingly buying them online or at cutting-edge multi-brand retailers like Sephora and Ulta. Now after fifty years of counter dominance, Clinique, one of the stars in beauty conglomerate Estée Lauder’s galaxy of marques, finds itself in the position of having to introduce itself to a new generation while re-acquainting itself to its longtime beauty consumers. And for Robinson, who started at Clinique four years ago, that means “humanizing an iconic brand.”</p> <p>It all began in 1967 when Estée Lauder happened to read an article in <em>Vogue</em> that asked: “Can Great Skin Be Created?” Featuring Norman Orentreich, then dermatologist to the stars, the piece turned conventional wisdom about skincare on its head: One didn’t have to hit the genetic lottery to have a lovely complexion. Lauder, who launched her eponymous brand in 1946, joined with Orentreich and Carol Phillips, Vogue’s beauty editor, to create Clinique. A year later, the brand debuted with its now famous 3-Step Skin Care System.</p> <p>Clinique differentiated itself from the outset. For one, its dermatologist-guided program was the first that was both allergy-tested and fragrance-free. Clinique not only revolutionized skincare and cosmetics (it was the first beauty brand to make sunscreen a daily part of skincare regime)—but how they were sold, too. It was Clinique that popularized the Gift with Purchase (GwP), providing generous vials of its Dramatically Different Moisturizer, blushes, and lipsticks in snazzy reusable travel bags. The product of a brilliant marketing strategy, GwPs introduced new users to the brand and longtime customers to new products. It wasn’t long before Clinique expanded its offerings to include cosmetics, fragrance, and a men’s line.</p> <p>Legions of teens, their mothers by their sides, have been introduced to the concept of skincare at a Clinique counter. Numerous women remember Clinique Happy as their first fragrance and Black Honey, their first serious lipstick shade. And there’s the rub. Over time, Clinique in consumers’ minds has come to be viewed as either a starter brand or your mother’s brand. And that for Robinson, is both a blessing and a curse.</p> <p>“We don’t suffer from brand-awareness issues,” she says. “I think where we have some challenges is being part of the current consideration and really being perceived as relevant.” As she notes, “Millennials and younger consumers are not necessarily getting their information from their mother. If anything, they are informing their moms about what is new and what’s different.”</p> <p>Take Kylie Jenner’s Kylie Cosmetics. Largely fueled by Instagram and a massive hit with young customers, according to <em>WWD</em>, the brand hit $420 million in sales in just eighteen months—a revenue metric most cosmetic companies took years to achieve.</p> <p>“Broadly speaking, with a heritage brand,” says Larissa Jensen, beauty analyst at NPD Group, “you have a lot more history tied to what you’ve always done. Consumers are not as concerned with brand or their legacies as they are excited about discovery and trying new.”</p> <p>So, where does that leave a heritage brand like Clinique? “We were founded on the promise that great skin can be created,” says Robinson. “We still exist to ultimately create great skin. What will change is how we communicate with our consumer and our tone of voice with her—more relevant, engaging, and modern.”</p> <p>One of Clinique’s greatest assets, in Robinson’s view, is the authority and trustworthiness it has built with its consumers over decades. “I think a lot of brands are chasing the millennial consumer, and we do want to service that consumer as well,” she says. “But I think we also want to be true to who we are and who our core target really is.”</p> <p>Robinson is hardly daunted about the prospect of finding that sweet spot of being attractive to a broad customer base and a focused one. After all, she forged a rather unconventional path to the world of marketing in general—and Clinique in particular.</p> <p>A native of Washington, D.C., Robinson earned her bachelor of arts degree, majoring in Spanish language and culture, from the University of Virginia. She then spent a year teaching English as a second language in Puerto Rico. Along the way, she came to the realization that she wanted to shift gears and become a business leader. That meant getting an M.B.A.</p> <p>During her first year at Fuqua, Robinson met Ann Fudge, then president and general manager at Kraft Foods, a moment that helped set her own trajectory. Fudge came to Fuqua as part of the Distinguished Speakers series and, says Robinson, “it was the first time I’d seen and interacted with an African-American woman in business who was at such a senior level. Her speech was dynamic and authentic and, in that moment, I’d decided I wanted to intern at her company and that I also wanted to become an executive fellow.” Robinson achieved both goals.</p> <p>After graduating from Fuqua, Robinson returned to Kraft, working on the Maxwell House coffee rebrand. In 2000, she headed back to D.C., landing at Capital One. The bank, then just seven years old and with little national name recognition, was mostly known for its balance transfers and was looking to build the brand. Robinson worked on its “What’s in your wallet?” campaign. After three years, she concluded that the financial-services industry wasn’t all that interesting. She jumped at the opportunity to return to New York and move over to the beauty sector.</p> <p>While coffee and banking wouldn’t seem the prerequisites to steer a beauty brand into the twenty-first century, Robinson says one of the main things she took from her time at Fuqua was the ability to be a collaborative and conscientious leader. And, at Kraft, she honed her abilities to “focus on market research, advertising and communicating how to establish a brand with zero awareness into consumers’ minds.”</p> <p>Indeed, in some ways, the situation with Clinique is similar to the one she found at Maxwell House, as upstart Starbucks was on the rise. “That was taking a venerable brand and figuring out how to make it relevant.” Beyond that, “there is really a challenge from consumers about traditional Western ideals of beauty.”</p> <p>Unlike most beauty brands, Clinique has never been driven by celebrity. To that end, Robinson has been focusing on reinforcing Clinique’s message with its consumers about authenticity and trustworthiness. “What we’re doing is really going back to our roots in terms of the voice and how we speak to consumers.” Today’s consumers are exceptionally savvy but also wary when it comes to inauthentic products or histories, she says. “I think our challenge, something that we’re trying to figure out, is how do you capture the magic of our visual identity and that voice and that authenticity in a way that is compelling and relevant today. It’s an ongoing challenge.”</p> <p>Clinique has shifted away from traditional department- store counters to multi-stores like Sephora and Ulta in the U.S., collaborated with Google and Facebook, and launched a series of You-Tube tutorials. Still, Robinson says it’s important for Clinique to be true to its venerable history. “We want to do things the Clinique way, versus the way everyone else does it.”&nbsp;</p> <p><em>Perman is a journalist and author of three books, most recently, </em>A Grand Complication: The Race to Build the World’s Most Legendary Watch<em>.</em></p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-14T00:00:00-04:00">Thursday, June 14, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-main-images/ROBINSON-MAIN_0.gif" width="1900" height="900" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/author/stacy-perman" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Stacy Perman</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-photo-credit field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Photo Credit:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/photographers/yunghi-kim" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Yunghi Kim</a></li></ul></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> Yes <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue<section class="field field-name-field-sub-header field-type-text-long field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Sub-header:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Alumna Cara Robinson is working to keep the prestige brand relevant in a millennial-driven market. </div></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Cover Story </h3> <h3 class="field-label"> Homepage </h3> Thu, 14 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498226 at https://alumni.duke.edu https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/meet-cliniques-marketing-sage#comments Recently published books by alumni https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/recently-published-books-alumni <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p><strong>RECOMMENDATIONS</strong> from Rae DelBianco '14</p> <p>In her debut novel <strong><em>Rough Animals</em></strong> (Arcade Publishing), DelBianco makes a powerful entrance to the contemporary Western genre, weaving the poetic and laconic tale of a man on a meandering journey through the Utah wilderness. Here, she shares the works that have inspired her on her own writing journey.</p> <p><em><strong>Other Voices, Other Rooms</strong></em> by Truman Capote: A bittersweet coming-of-age that I’ll argue is the most beautiful work of Southern Gothic literature in existence. The earliest novel-length work of a literary legend, it holds none of Capote’s worldly pronouncements of his later works, its experiences freshly and purely sensory in the way that only our initial discovery of the world can be.</p> <p><em><strong>Sophie’s Choice</strong></em> by William Styron ’47: There are dozens of reasons to read <em><strong>Sophie’s Choice</strong></em>, but for any Duke aspiring writers, here’s another—Styron’s semi-autobiographical protagonist is a recent Duke grad in his early twenties who’s struggling to write in New York. When he’s told by an old publishing colleague, “Son, write your guts out,” it’s Styron speaking straight into your ear.</p> <p><em><strong>Jesus’ Son</strong></em> by Denis Johnson: A kaleidoscopically gorgeous set of linked stories for anyone who prefers books that plunge us into an atmosphere over those that take us on a linear track, filled with junkies and criminals and nobodies who find redemption in the bright cracks of their broken souls. The type of book that teaches us to see the light in the dark and the beauty in chaos.</p> <p><em><strong>Blood Meridian</strong></em> by Cormac McCarthy: Discovering this blood-soaked masterpiece in Professor Victor Strandberg’s contemporary lit class as a sophomore was one of those Duke moments that change your life forever. The next year, we did an independent study on "The Aesthetics of Violence in Cormac McCarthy," breaking down how beauty in prose can force us to look at brutality, and in turn formed the basis of my education as a writer. The rest is history.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong>WE ASKED</strong></p> <p><em>Chatting with Laurent Dubois, professor of Romance studies and history</em></p> <p>Over the past decade, Dubois has taught a course that explains world history, politics, and culture through the lens of the most beautiful game. This spring, just in time for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, his new book, <em>The Language of the Game: How to Understand Soccer</em> (Basic Books), operates as both a primer for the uninitiated and an insightful cultural exploration for the scarf-shrouded fan. Here, Dubois explains how his love for the game has invaded his academic work and affected his viewing habits.</p> <p><strong>How have you developed this entire series of scholarly inquiry around soccer?</strong></p> <p>My first work as an academic is about Caribbean history and French Empire. I wrote about the French Revolution and the Haitian Revolution in Haiti. But in the 1990s, the French World Cup team became this big symbol because the players were of such diverse backgrounds. It became a place where that historical experience of slavery, colonialism, immigration was talked about a lot. Some of the players became even quite prominent as voices talking about history and their history as people. So I connected with what they were doing around that, just because I was, during the same period, thinking about those issues.</p> <p>And then, in 2006, when the World Cup ended with Zidane’s head-butt in the final, I started writing an essay about that—I was in Paris at the time—about just what that meant. That evolved into this book called <em>Soccer Empire</em> that I published in 2010. That was really the nexus between my interest in the French Empire, history, memory, and soccer.</p> <p><strong>You mentioned Albert Camus and Vladimir Nabokov as players in the book. Is there something about soccer that makes it more of a writers’ sport?</strong></p> <p>I do think so. For one thing, it’s just that it’s so widely shared has just meant that you can go to Latin American literature, African, European. There are so many places in the world where this sport is so central. But I do think that it has drawn intellectuals often, and even in the book’s chapter on the midfielder, on “Total Football”—Dutch soccer was commented on by abstract artists, and architects, and ballet dancers. That’s maybe something that we’re not as used to in American sports culture, that there’d be this real sweep of cultural life around the sport.</p> <p><strong>So you have the stereotype of the jock that does not overlap with the academic. And in soccer, it’s all blended together a little bit?</strong></p> <p>There’s always that tension. When you teach sport at an American university, you often kind of get that question. Like, is this really academic? And I remember the first time I taught the [“World Cup and World Politics”] course, a Duke alumnus who had written about sport when he was here and has since written about sport, described being an undergraduate here—having sports dominate his life outside the classroom and never having it once come up in the classroom. I think it’s such a huge part of our culture that we also have to talk about it critically and in the classroom.</p> <p><strong>In one of the final chapters, you describe how, when you’re watching soccer, you’re rooting for storylines more than anything—you’d be happy if either team won. What is that like?</strong></p> <p>It’s funny, because<a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/118245/2014-world-cup-how-i-learned-stop-worrying-and-cheer-belgium"> I wrote a piece for <em>The New Republic</em> </a>about this Belgium-Algeria game that I watched. I’m Belgian originally, and I also have written a lot about Algerian soccer. I think the Algerian team’s very compelling. What I wrote about in that piece was that I figured out who I was rooting for, when someone scored a goal, by my reaction.</p> <p>But I do think there’s a lot of painfulness in a World Cup because, in a way, you will get attached to teams. Everyone loses except for one team. So there’s this way in which soccer is about joy, but it’s also a lot about tragedy, and loss, and that spectrum of emotions. And that’s the root of its power—the stories that it tells, and what those stories tell us about ourselves. That’s why it’s such an important form of culture.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong>BY DUKE ALUMNI &amp; FACULTY</strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.routledge.com/Activism-and-the-Fossil-Fuel-Industry/Cheon-Urpelainen/p/book/9781783537549"><em>Activism and the Fossil Fuel Industry</em></a> (Routledge Press) Andrew Cheon ’09 and Johannes Urpelainen</p> <p><a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/06/09/618573720/fact-based-novel-darwin-s-ghosts-explores-righting-ancestors-wrongs"><em>Darwin’s Ghosts</em> </a>(Seven Stories Press) Ariel Dorfman, Walter Hines Page Research Professor Emeritus of literature</p> <p><a href="https://www.amazon.com/College-Success-Stories-That-Inspire/dp/1939282373"><em>College Success Stories That Inspire</em></a> (Miniver Press) Steven Roy Goodman ’85</p> <p><a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/laughing-at-the-devil"><em>Laughing at the Devil: Seeing the World With Julian of Norwich</em> </a>(Duke University Press) Amy Laura Hall, associate professor of Christian ethics</p> <p><a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/john-hillen-what-happens-now/"><em>What Happens Now? Reinvent Yourself as a Leader Before Your Business Outruns You</em></a> (SelectBooks) John Hillen ’88 and Mark Nevins</p> <p><a href="https://trinity.duke.edu/videos/king-halloween-and-miss-firecracker-queen-daughters-tale-family-and-football"><em>The King of Halloween and Miss Firecracker Queen: A Daughter’s Tale of Family and Football</em> </a>(Morgan James Publishing) Lori Leachman, professor of the practice of economics</p> <p><a href="https://anthrodendum.org/2018/06/11/review-of-the-pursuit-of-happiness-black-women-diasporic-dreams-and-the-politics-of-emotional-transnationalism-bianca-c-williams-duke-university-press-2018/"><em>The Pursuit of Happiness: Black Women, Diasporic Dreams, and the Politics of Emotional Transnationalism</em></a> (Duke University Press) Bianca C. Williams ’02, A.M. ’05, Ph.D. ’09</p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-13T00:00:00-04:00">Wednesday, June 13, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/writers/lucas-hubbard" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Lucas Hubbard</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/DELBIANCO-PORTRAIT_0.gif" width="250" height="300" alt="" /></figure></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue<section class="field field-name-field-sub-header field-type-text-long field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Sub-header:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Laurent Dubois helps you understand soccer, Rae DelBianco &#039;14 shares her literary inspirations, and more.</div></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Cover Story </h3> <h3 class="field-label"> Homepage </h3> Wed, 13 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498232 at https://alumni.duke.edu https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/recently-published-books-alumni#comments Q&A with Professor David Morgan, on enchantment https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/qa-professor-david-morgan-enchantment <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p><strong><em>Enchantment, as you see it, is more than wish-fulfillment or escapism. It changes our relationship to the world, and it involves the little things we do to make the world go our way—tokens, devices, objects, words, images. But in an age of scientific rationality, aren’t we beyond enchantment?</em> </strong></p> <p>I write that modernity is not the era of the scientific eradication of religion, magic, or any other form of enhancement. Telegraphy became a primary metaphor for spiritualism; photography captured the soul and documented spiritual effluvia; the phonograph recorded the sounds of the dead. Electricity was miraculous, and magnetism was a soul-curative. Enchantment is a fundamental part of our humanity. We’re wired not just for rational thinking. We feel our way through life with our emotions, our sensations, as much as we do with our reason and our logic.</p> <p><em><strong>Even at NASA, right?</strong> </em></p> <p>At NASA, the most scientific minds animate objects by applying human names to them. They invest in a satellite, which travels to the far end of the solar system, as it if were kind of a child. They name it. They name its components. They talk about it so tenderly. They humanize this piece of technology because in some ways it is an extension of us; we think of it as our offspring going out to space.</p> <p><em><strong>Do we see enchantment in everyday life?</strong></em></p> <p>Enchantment is at work when we look at an advertisement, or the clothing worn by a passerby, or the car someone is driving, and imagine ourselves similarly arrayed. We may be so persuaded by the image’s appeal, so moved by the promise of its power to transform us from one thing into another, that we actually purchase the item. Consumerism seems premised on enchantment, so that a commodity magically will confer on its owner a new status or place in the world.</p> <p><strong><em>You write that enchantment often involves imagery of one kind or another. But we usually think of images as just things to look at and not as being “at work.”</em> </strong></p> <p>Images are not just messages; they are agents. They do things. And they do things to us: They scare us, they inspire us, they threaten us, they comfort us.</p> <p><em><strong>How can images scare us?</strong> </em></p> <p>What makes things terrifying is what exposes our impotence and threatens our sense of ease and control over the universe. The eighteenth-century concept of the sublime often meant showing people facing a vast ocean or a towering mountain. The human presence is dwarfed. That’s what J.M.W. Turner does in his paintings. He blurs the horizon. He takes away the principle of stability. It’s disorienting. Some other force is stronger than you; it overwhelms you.</p> <p><em><strong>Maybe more typically, images can be comforting, can help orient or anchor us.</strong> </em></p> <p>I remember interviewing a guy at a church in Chicago where, it was said, a picture of Mary began weeping. I was the typical secular scholar saying, “Oh, this is pretty incredible. What do you think about this?” And he goes, “It’s not incredible at all. Our Lady does this. This is how she manifests her will to us. She shows us she is with us. Pictures of Mary have been weeping for centuries.” So he helped me understand that it only looked supernatural and weird to an outsider. In his world, that’s what the image of Mary does.</p> <p><em><strong>What role does chance play in the forming of images and the work of enchantment?</strong> </em></p> <p>When a random occurrence matches a need, the result may appear mysterious but not particularly random. We see in the world around us what matters most to us. Enchantment curbs randomness by making it the agent of divine or superhuman action; it helps make the universe a friendlier, more sympathetic place for us. Religion, magic, and art all manage chance. By doing so, they help make the world go our way.</p> <p><em><strong>In the book you refer to The Wizard of Oz. What does that illustrate about enchantment?</strong></em></p> <p>It’s a story about estrangement and return. Dorothy had been alienated from her world by the menace of losing her dog. And she found her world once again only by following the yellow brick road. That’s what enchantments are successful at doing. Losing yourself, and then re-emerging to find your place in the world is what’s so powerful.</p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-13T00:00:00-04:00">Wednesday, June 13, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/author/robert-j-bliwise" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Robert J. Bliwise</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/MORGAIN-PORTRAIT_0_0.gif" width="250" height="300" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-photo-credit field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Photo Credit:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/photographers/les-todd" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Les Todd</a></li></ul></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue<section class="field field-name-field-sub-header field-type-text-long field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Sub-header:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Morgan, professor and chair of religious studies, is the author of Images at Work: The Material Culture of Enchantment (Oxford University Press)</div></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Cover Story </h3> <h3 class="field-label"> Homepage </h3> Wed, 13 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498230 at https://alumni.duke.edu https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/qa-professor-david-morgan-enchantment#comments What it takes to be a winner https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/what-it-takes-be-winner <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>In my sophomore spring, I spontaneously signed up for an “Archives Alive” course titled “History of the Book.” I worked with an eighteenth-century manuscript in the Rubenstein Library and pieced together the stories of those who had owned it through the years. The comprehensive nature of this kind of “detective work” got me hooked on archival research, and I began my own independent research of similar manuscripts. When it came time for me to propose a senior thesis, the Rubenstein allowed me to combine my passion for classics with my newfound love of the archives: My thesis traces the development of papyrology in the U.S., and the Rubenstein houses the records of the American Society of Papyrologists, along with the papers of esteemed historian Michael Rostovtzeff, who worked extensively with papyri. I credit my experiences with archival research for not only training me as a researcher but also for giving me a visceral reminder of the human element of history. —<strong>Gabi Stewart, Rhodes Scholar</strong></p> <p><img alt="" class="media-image" src="https://dukemagazine.duke.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/AMY-portrait.gif?itok=WBVTgEfb" style="height:300px; width:250px" />Collecting oral histories through my senior thesis has been the perfect culmination of my four years at Duke. As an ROTC cadet and council member of the Duke Program in American Grand Strategy, I’ve studied the military’s role in foreign affairs. But after learning that the single greatest indicator of a state’s peacefulness is how its women are treated, I wanted to know why women’s empowerment wasn’t the most important consideration in our conflict-resolution efforts. I was also curious about the positive impact women are having in regions of conflict. I identified three countries in three different states of conflict: Afghanistan was my in-conflict case; Israel, my conflict-ridden civil society case; and Rwanda, my post-conflict case. My goal was to capture women’s stories in their most honest form and to celebrate some of their accomplishments that have gone largely unrecognized. I heard stories of women in Afghanistan, for example, defending their schools against terrorist groups. Those oral histories opened my eyes to my own capacity to influence positive change as a leader. —<strong>Amy Kramer, Schwarzman Scholar</strong></p> <p>The Baldwin Scholars Program taught me to abandon the idea of being a “good girl” and comfortably own the idea of being a confident, bold woman. Everything I had done before Duke had been to fulfill my role as perfect daughter to immigrant parents who, hoping to offer me the world, had sacrificed their own goals. I couldn’t afford to take risks if it meant not following the course charted out for me. But Baldwin mentors and peers taught me about indifference to healthy sexual relationships and left me determined to create a Sexual Health Resource Center on campus. Following Baldwin conversations around independence, I worked with a team in Ethiopia, through DukeEngage, to understand what secondary schools needed from their sexual-health curriculum materials. My goal was to provide a new, culturally appropriate curriculum, even as I struggled with wanting to include themes that—in a country where homosexuality is illegal—weren’t culturally accepted. —<strong>Riyanka Ganguly, Schwarzman Scholar (below, left)</strong></p> <p><img alt="" class="media-image" src="https://dukemagazine.duke.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/RIYANKAARON.gif?itok=XIeoxjue" style="height:300px; width:250px" /></p> <p>The director of the Program in American Grand Strategy, Peter Feaver, stresses that college is important for the relationships we forge and the initiative we take. As a sophomore, I found myself organizing the AGS staff ride to Grenada—a deep dive into the 1983 U.S. intervention on the island. I played the role of Captain (today General) John Abizaid, who was among the first paratroopers deployed in the assault. I not only had to outline the key details relevant to my character’s experience; I also had to defend his decisions on the ground, whether right or wrong. Abizaid’s push to lead his company on an immediate offensive northward seemed foolhardy at the time. But that decision ended up saving many American lives by destroying the Cuban anti-aircraft guns. In the classroom, it’s easy to condemn mistakes or celebrate heroism. During the staff ride, I learned a different form of analysis—examining the root causes of decision-making and inhabiting the perspective of a leader who has to make difficult judgment calls with imprecise information. —<strong>Aron Rimanyi, Schwarzman Scholar (above, right)</strong></p> <p><img alt="" class="media-image" src="https://dukemagazine.duke.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/ANTONIO-portrait.gif?itok=_AjkQZtF" style="height:300px; width:250px" />What most inspired me at Duke wasn’t the Gothic stone but rather the workers who, every graveyard shift, cooked and cleaned. In my four years there, I made so many lasting friendships: McDonald’s staff who invited me to family quinceañeras; bus drivers who taught me “You don’t know where you’re going, until you know where you’ve been”; housekeepers who talked with me, over 5 a.m. coffee, about organizing strategies for unions. While I am indebted beyond measure to the countless faculty who have mentored me, I emphasize the staff, because they, overwhelmingly Latinx and African American, reminded me where I came from. This community taught me to fine-tune my advocacy, to be a better leader. In them, I saw my father, returning from work with his waiter’s vest every night, with a commitment to provide for his family. Every time I ordered a McCafe, I saw my parents’ generation, laying the foundation for their children behind kitchen fumes and industrial-strength sprays. It was with their struggle in mind that being president of La Unidad Latina, Lambda Upsilon Lambda Fraternity Inc., was so rewarding. Our small cadre organized LARP (Latino/a Access to Higher Education Recruitment Program), a four-day, annual school trip for sixth-to-eighth-graders to visit and experience our university. We do this work because we hold steadfast to the belief that when they see us here, they can see themselves here, too. —<strong>Antonio Lopez ’16, Marshall Scholar</strong></p> <p><img alt="" class="media-image" src="https://dukemagazine.duke.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/JACKSON-portrait.gif?itok=Dsv-aIVl" style="height:300px; width:250px" />In the spring of my sophomore year, I had the good fortune to meet Professor Douglas Campbell, who encouraged me to pursue a graduate certificate in Duke Divinity School’s Prison Studies Program. I then took a course in which, alongside inmates at Butner Federal Prison, we examined the modern applications of Gandhi’s teachings. My final paper explored the manifestation of Gandhi’s notion of ahimsa—the principle of dynamic, indomitable nonviolence toward all living things—as it plays out in restorative justice. The most interesting exchange I had all semester occurred after our first class. I struck up a conversation with an older inmate who had committed a slew of armed robberies as a young man; his past forty-one years had been spent in prison. Long ago, he said, he had outgrown his penchant for crime, and he had much to offer society. It was a revelation to see the shortcomings of our criminal justice system through the eyes of men captured in its grip. <span style="font-size:13.008px">—<strong>Jackson Skeen, Mitchell Scholar</strong></span></p> <p><img alt="" class="media-image" src="https://dukemagazine.duke.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/JOHN-portrait.gif?itok=aFO2ggqs" style="height:300px; width:250px" />One day, I happened to watch a video on schistosomiasis, the deadliest of what the World Health Organization classifies as “neglected tropical diseases” (NTDs). I wanted to learn more. I scraped together money from a few grants to fund a summer working on a public-health control program for schistosomiasis in Tanzania. I recall speaking with one old man in particular. He had grown up in the area and once hoped to send his two little girls to college. He could not afford to pay their primary-school fees; his disability from chronic schistosomiasis infection had robbed him of his wage-earning capacity. In him, I saw glimmers of my own grandparents, who had once lived in a rural farming village in China. I came to realize that while NTDs don’t kill people, they kill hopes and dreams. I’ve also done mathematical modeling around NTDs. That’s revealed to me that simply treating individuals with NTDs is insufficient: People become re-infected. Preventive vaccines need to be developed, and my hope is to make that my life’s work. —<strong>John Lu, Marshall Scholar</strong></p> <p><img alt="" class="media-image" src="https://dukemagazine.duke.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/MEGHANA-portrait.gif?itok=bHFIbabv" style="height:300px; width:250px" />Through Program II, Duke’s design-your-own curriculum, I’ve been able to tackle a core question: What does brain function or dysfunction tell us about ourselves? I sliced through both human and animal brain tissue to find the anatomical structures that allow us to move, think, and feel. Program II also led me to Oxford, where I lived above a bagel and ice-cream café in the heart of the city. I spent the days conducting empirical neuroethics research and meeting academic stars, while spending the evenings running in Oxford’s cow- and duck-friendly meadows. Just this past year, I ran my own qualitative study in Kathmandu, interviewing more than fifty doctors and medical students to investigate their thoughts on mental health. As I write my thesis, I draw from epidemiology, anthropology, neuroscience, ethics, global health, and more to flesh out an understanding of phenomena like stigma and social suffering. I find myself returning to the conflicts between free will and determinism, global and local cultures, theory and practice. I’ve gained so much knowledge while working in diverse academic and physical spaces; yet I’m left with these aching, fundamental ponderings on self, subjectivity, and humanity. —<strong>Meghana Vagwala, Marshall Scholar</strong></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-13T00:00:00-04:00">Wednesday, June 13, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-main-images/WINNERS-MAIN_0.gif" width="1900" height="900" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/GABI-portrait_0_0.gif" width="250" height="300" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-photo-credit field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Photo Credit:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/photographers/chris-hildreth" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Chris Hildreth</a></li></ul></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> Yes <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue<section class="field field-name-field-sub-header field-type-text-long field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Sub-header:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Eight was a big number for Duke this past academic year. It&#039;s the unusually hefty count of student recipients of postgraduate international fellowships. Here those students reflect on undergraduate experiences, from working to contain a tropical disease to researching the history of the book, that were particularly meaningful for them—and that helped propel them to standout status.</div></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Cover Story </h3> <h3 class="field-label"> Homepage </h3> Wed, 13 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498229 at https://alumni.duke.edu https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/what-it-takes-be-winner#comments A hero in his country, a star on the tennis team https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/hero-his-country-star-tennis-team <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"> <p>April is crunch time for college tennis teams, and for the top player on Duke’s men’s team, redshirt junior Nicolás Álvarez, to step away for a week during the cruelest month, it had to be for something important.</p><p>He had to win a match for his country.</p><p>When healthy, Álvarez isn’t just one of the top players in college tennis; he’s one of the best tennis players from his native Peru, full stop. When his homeland competes in the international Davis Cup, he kind of has to play. “There’s not a vast array of players they can choose,” Álvarez says matter-of-factly, after his April victory in Metepec, Mexico, pushed his career Davis Cup record to an unblemished 5-0.</p><p>For coach Ramsey Smith, Álvarez is the first player he’s coached at Duke who has competed in the Davis Cup while in college. “It’s tricky because he’s a part of this team, and he’s on scholarship, and he’s our best player,” says Smith. “But then he also has this unique opportunity to represent his country, which is bigger than Duke.”</p><p>The Davis Cup is unlike anything in tennis. It’s wildly partisan, played either in front of raucous supporters or hostile opposing fans. And unlike NCAA team tennis, only one match happens at a time. Which means, for players, all eyes are on you. “The entire country’s watching,” Álvarez says. “Well, maybe not the entire country…but a bunch of people are.”</p><p>In the fall of 2016, Álvarez faced off against his Venezuelan opponent in the deciding match. Playing in front of his friends and family in his hometown of Lima—ten miles from his house, at “a club I’m familiar with, I’d drive through there on the weekends,” he says—could have overwhelmed the youngest player on Peru’s team. Not to mention being forced to return on a second day after darkness suspended the match with Álvarez just three games from victory.</p><p>But he came through, notching the win to secure Peru’s promotion to a higher level of the competition. Which means his coach’s assessment doesn’t seem like hyperbole. “He’s a national hero there,” Smith says.</p><p>Álvarez’s origin story starts at age four, with him picking up a racket at the club where his parents were members. Belonging to a club, he explains, is the only way to learn the sport in Peru; no public courts dot the country like they do in the U.S. Álvarez eschewed soccer and karate to focus just on tennis around age ten; his education at an American school in Peru supplied him the English skills to thrive academically here.</p><p>His mother had played at Clemson, and she knew the opportunity college tennis presented. As the average age on the pro tour has steadily crept up, Smith explains, more international players have used college tennis as an incubator to prepare for the increased physicality of the professional ranks. Beyond that, in the U.S. the sport has unrivaled resources. “I always talk about how there’s so many college facilities that are absolutely amazing, like the one we have here [at Duke],” Álvarez says. Peru’s only similar club, he says, is the home for its tennis federation.</p><p>Applying to schools as an athlete from afar isn’t the easiest, especially for a Peruvian tennis player: Coaches “wouldn’t imagine that you’d be looking to come from Peru and play,” he says. He was reaching out to colleges—not vice versa—and sending them tapes of himself, including to the sole school whose academic ranking and tennis ranking were, at the time, both in the top-ten nationally. “You get a good feeling or a bad feeling pretty soon,” Smith says, of recruiting visits. And when Álvarez visited Duke’s campus, Smith had a “great” one: He offered a scholarship to Álvarez without ever seeing him play a match in-person.</p><p>It was a good decision on Smith’s part. After Álvarez committed, his results soon improved, and his junior ranking jumped from outside the top-100 to the top twenty. “Then I started receiving e-mails from coaches,” he says, laughing.</p><p>From carving a path to Duke as an unknown recruit, to adapting a style built on the clay courts of Peru for the hard courts of college tennis, to bouncing back from a wrist injury that cost him all of last spring, Álvarez has continued to develop. He’s won matches for college and country; he’ll wrap up his Duke career in 2019 and then take aim at the pro ranks.</p><p>That jump, from college to pros, isn’t an easy one to make. But if recent history is a predictor, odds are Álvarez has a better shot than it seems.</p><p>“I get a lot of videos, and sometimes it’s hard to tell [a player’s quality],” says Smith, of when he first watched tape of Álvarez. “But you could just tell his technique was rock solid. He was very good from the ground, no real holes.”</p><p>“Having said all that, he ended up being way, way better than I could’ve ever imagined.”</p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-13T00:00:00-04:00">Wednesday, June 13, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/writers/lucas-hubbard" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Lucas Hubbard</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/ALVAREZ-PORTRAIT_0_0.gif" width="250" height="300" /></figure></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue<section class="field field-name-field-sub-header field-type-text-long field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Sub-header:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Nicolás Álvarez has competed in the Davis Cup for Peru while in college. </div></div></section> Wed, 13 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498231 at https://alumni.duke.edu Alumni profiles: Jack Davis' 14 and Robert Higgins Ph.D. '61 https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/alumni-profiles-jack-davis-14-and-robert-higgins-phd-61 <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"> <p>Sure, <strong>Jack Davis ’14</strong> has seen and enjoyed <em>Scream</em> and <em>Final Destination</em>, those signature modern-day horror-film classics. Yet it wasn’t so much a love for the genre that led him to cofound <a href="http://crypttv.com/">Crypt TV</a>. “My interest is in how tech and media intersect,” he says.</p><p>Davis points out that his sister, six years younger, doesn’t go to movie theaters at all, choosing instead the screen on her personal devices. Indeed, overall, he notes, the theater audience is dwindling. People even deal with the Internet differently than they did a half-decade ago.</p><p>When Davis was at Duke, those changes were just beginning to percolate. He noticed. “No one was doing scary content, no one was filling that space,” he says.</p><p>The Los Angeles native had met director writer/producer Eli Roth—he’s responsible for <em>The Hostel</em> films—so they came together to launch the horror-media company in 2015 to reach the social and mobile generation. The company has received additional investment and support from high-powered figures Jason Blum, who runs horror studio Blumhouse (<em>Get Out</em> and <em>The Purge</em>), and Kenneth Lerer, who has invested in BuzzFeed and Mic.com.</p><p>Things look promising. According to <em>Deadline</em>, Crypt TV has drawn an average of more than 100 million views per month across its Facebook show pages, which have more than 7.5 million total fans. Its YouTube channel has more than 575,000 subscribers.</p><p>The shift in the way the films are consumed has changed the process of making them, says Davis. Storytelling still matters, he says, but crafting those stories comes with the technological benefit of data. Crypt TV creators can tell how old their viewers are, whether the story has been successfully engaging, and specifically, in what parts of the story viewership peaked.</p><p>Data tell Davis that 92 percent of his audience is watching Crypt TV on smartphones. “So a powerful visual is so important. It’s not just that people could be watching something else. They could be texting, they could be on Instagram.”</p><p>That’s why the company has become particularly adept at creating monsters; Davis’ oft-stated goal is that Crypt TV become the “Marvel of monsters.” To that end, he’s already had a hit with Giggles, a scary female clown character with the worst teeth you’ll ever see and more than 370,000 Facebook followers. Besides appearing in Facebook live videos, she’s had live fan gatherings and merchandise selling in some of Spencer’s stores.</p><p>Giggles’ burgeoning ubiquity is a step toward Davis’ hope that he can bring his monsters beyond the short videos and features Crypt is now producing to different formats, including virtual reality, podcasts, and long-story forms. “We want to make the next class of iconic monsters,” he says.<em> —Adrienne Johnson Martin</em></p><p> </p><p><img alt="" class="media-image" height="300" width="250" typeof="foaf:Image" src="http://dukemagazine.duke.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/HIGGINS-PORTRAIT.gif?itok=mbfEo64j" />Even for <strong>Robert Higgins Ph.D. ’61</strong>, it’s a little tricky to describe kinorhynchs—and their appeal—to a broad audience. For decades he studied these meiofauna, marine, microscopic “mud dragons” that live not among but between grains of sediment, that are smaller than a period on this page yet are nevertheless essential to marine food chains. Higgins helped discover a new species of them and a new phylum (one of four new phyla described in all biology in the twentieth century). He developed and supported an international network of researchers interested in this topic; he even received an honorary doctorate at the University of Copenhagen from Queen Margrethe II of Denmark.</p><p>But growing up, Higgins didn’t have “a great deal of interest in biology, certainly not microscopic things,” he says. So how did he end up here?</p><p>Maybe the best explanation invokes the William Blake poem “Auguries of Innocence.” The poem starts, Higgins explains, with this line: “To see a world in a grain of sand.” And once Higgins figured out how to catch these creatures in bulk, he unlocked a whole new realm. “I think I got people interested in them, because I had broken the barrier of how to work on them,” he says.</p><p>Higgins got his start with microscopic science at University of Colorado Boulder, where he took “whatever job I could get to supplement my G.I. Bill,” landing on a thirty- five-cents-an-hour gig in the moss-and-lichen herbarium. He worked with Professor Robert Pennak to study tardigrades (read: microscopic “water bears”) and soon made plans to head to Duke for similar doctoral work, selecting it from the five schools that had accepted him. “Duke seemed to be the best at the time,” Higgins says, “and it certainly turned out to the best.”</p><p>The turning point came the summer before he traveled east. He was on a fellowship at the University of Washington, trying to collect kinorhynch samples for Pennak. Minimal literature existed on this process; Higgins decided to painstakingly skim the surface of a bucket of muddy water and attempt to collect these unknown creatures one by one.</p><p>Higgins had never seen a kinorhynch before; it took him an hour to catch just four. But when he fumbled a piece of paper into the water and rinsed it off, Higgins realized he had snagged hundreds of them at once. In doing so, he invented a precursor to the still-used “bubble and blot” method for finding mud dragons, and he soon had an unfiltered view of that world Blake was talking about.</p><p>So when Higgins arrived at Duke, his area of study had changed. “I said, ‘Well, I’m still very interested in tardigrades, but I’ve actually gotten more interested in kinorhynchs,’ ” Higgins says, of his initial conversation with C.G. Bookhout, a legendary Duke Marine Lab professor. “And basically he said, ‘I’ve never seen one of them; I don’t know anything about them, either. So...what do you need?’ ”</p><p>“I designed a dredge, and he had it built,” Higgins says, “and from then on I did my thing.” <em>—Lucas Hubbard<br /></em></p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-13T00:00:00-04:00">Wednesday, June 13, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/JACKDAVIS-PORTRAIT_0_0.gif" width="250" height="300" /></figure></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue Wed, 13 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498228 at https://alumni.duke.edu Retro: The evolving living arrangements for freshmen https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/retro-evolving-living-arrangements-freshmen <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"> <p><span class="dc">T</span>his summer, anxious freshmen prepare to see their new living quarters and meet the person they will be living with for the next nine months. Duke students arriving as freshmen today live on East Campus, which has been specifically designated as a first-year campus since the fall of 1995. But the freshman experience has varied widely since Duke became a university in 1924.</p><p>Back then, men and women lived on East Campus (then the only campus). The opening of West Campus in 1930 allowed the university to create a coordinate college system; men were housed on West and graduated from Trinity College, and women were housed on East and graduated from the Woman’s College.</p><p>Starting in 1930 and well into the 1960s, it was the YMCA (Young Men’s Christian Association) or the YWCA (Young Women’s Christian Association) who would meet the arriving freshmen and help them find their dormitories. The freshman handbook in 1930 advised students to write ahead to reserve a room, but if you hadn’t you were advised to “go to Mr. Whitford’s office in the basement of the administrative building and you will be able to get a room key and assignment there.” All students were asked to bring sheets, towels, and blankets. Rugs, curtains, and lamps were optional, but “will make the room more attractive.” Freshmen were also asked to bring a typewriter—if they had one. All male freshmen were required to wear “dinks” (beanie hats) and women to wear bows, each with their class years. Although freshmen were not housed together as a cohort, they were nevertheless instantly distinguishable.</p><p>Dormitory life for freshmen continued in much the same way up into the 1960s, by which time dinks and bows were a relic of the past. As Duke desegregated and diversified in the 1960s, the realities of interracial life on a formerly segregated campus set in. The housing application forms, for a brief time, included questions about willingness to room with a person of another race or nationality.</p><p>With the changing student body, new residential models, including all-freshman dormitories, were being tested. In 1969, the Committee for the Study of Student Residential Life, co-chaired by professors Thomas A. Langford and Howard A. Strobel, issued a report addressing various aspects of Duke residential life, with considerable attention given to freshman-only men’s dorms. The report noted that the dorms had an “enjoyable esprit de corps” as students navigated their first year at college. Among the downsides, though, was social strife: “The freshmen are isolated from the rest of the university. They usually have great difficulty in meeting and getting dates with girls. Their initial contacts are ordinarily made in somewhat artificial meetings in the girls’ dorms. There the freshmen have to compete with upperclassmen, a competition that they usually lose.”</p><p>In conclusion, they wrote, “[i]t is true that all the freshmen are going through the same trials and share their experiences; it is conversely true that the all-freshmen house is one of their more serious trials.”</p><p>Although the report did not spell the death knell for all-freshman dormitories, experimentation continued with other residential models. The merging of the Woman’s College into Trinity College offered new opportunities for coeducational living arrangements. Based on the 1969 report, “federations” were developed; they would have a cross-sectional (multiple class years) population and provide an intellectual and social framework for students. Different houses, both selective and independent, were brought together under the program. This new model was implemented in 1971 in several dormitories. However, new students could still elect to live in a variety of other housing models. The federation model was phased out in the 1980s.</p><p>Other scenarios were also investigated, including “clusters” of dormitories and residential colleges. Multiple studies and reports were produced.</p><p>Finally, in 1994, a new report, “Plan for the Enhancement of Residential and Co-curricular Life,” recommended a new model for freshman life, with all freshmen rooming on East Campus. Noting that what was missing from the Duke residential experience was an overall sense of community, the report’s authors stated, “The plan to house all first-year students on East Campus emanates from the assumption that entering students, when housed together in a relatively tranquil environment, in close proximity to faculty and an array of academic support services, and with opportunities to participate in small seminars, writing courses, and other academic and co-curricular venture experiences, will flourish and grow.”</p><p>Indeed, since 1995, freshmen have found a community on East Campus. No longer are they greeted by the YMCA or YWCA, but rather by professional staff, a move-in crew of older students, and a robust orientation program. Members of the new first-year class will not, for the first time in recent memory, be allowed to pre-select their roommate, a change made to better introduce students from different backgrounds to one another. And so the story of freshman life will continue, but the anticipation and excitement of beginning the Duke journey will never change.</p><p><em>Gillispie is the university archivist.</em></p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-13T00:00:00-04:00">Wednesday, June 13, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/author/valerie-gillispie" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Valerie Gillispie</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/RETRO-portrait_0_0.gif" width="250" height="300" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-photo-credit field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Photo Credit:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/photographers/duke-university-archives" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Duke University Archives</a></li></ul></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue Wed, 13 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498227 at https://alumni.duke.edu From the president: Summing up the first year https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/president-summing-first-year <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p><strong><em>What’s your best piece of advice to newly arrived Duke first-years?</em></strong></p> <p>Embrace the creative confusion of your time at Duke, the freedom to explore new ideas and try out the full range of possibilities before you. And more important, get some sleep!</p> <p><strong><em>What’s your best piece of advice to freshly graduated seniors?</em> </strong></p> <p>Stop now and then—especially when you are at your busiest—to pause, reflect, and relax. These pauses will help clear the path ahead.</p> <p><strong><em>What’s your favorite place to hang out on campus?</em> </strong></p> <p>Duke Gardens or the Al Buehler Trail with my dogs, Cricket and Scout.</p> <p><strong><em>What’s your favorite space to stroll in the Duke Gardens?</em> </strong></p> <p>I enjoy the Blomquist Garden of Native Plants, which demonstrates North Carolina’s rich biodiversity, although the dogs aren’t allowed in that section.</p> <p><strong><em>With the move south, what’s the favorite season for your dogs?</em> </strong></p> <p>Cricket and Scout have absolutely loved their first spring on campus, which they’ve spent chasing the squirrels. Scout has taken to closely observing—I might say obsessing over—the ducks at the Gardens. She’d like to get closer, but that’s why we have leashes.</p> <p><strong><em>What course would you love to take at Duke?</em> </strong></p> <p>I’d love to take one of the first-year seminars: maybe “Game Theory and Democracy” or “From Quarks to Cosmos.” And while it may not count as a traditional course, the Spring Breakthrough experience over spring break offers some enticing opportunities, from learning to build a bike to building a March Madness bracket for U.S. presidents.</p> <p><strong><em>What food choice most appeals to you among the Brodhead Center’s offerings?</em> </strong></p> <p>Falafel. It’s become a mainstay.</p> <p><strong><em>In burning off falafel calories, what’s your favorite piece of workout equipment at Wilson Rec?</em> </strong></p> <p>You’ll find me in the morning on one of the two elliptical machines, just at the bottom of the stairs, that permit running at full-stride.</p> <p><strong><em>What was your favorite Nasher exhibit this past year?</em> </strong></p> <p>I enjoyed <a href="https://nasher.duke.edu/exhibitions/solidary-solitary/"><em>Solidary and Solitary: the Joyner/Giuffrida Collection</em></a>, and I loved the exhibition of Bill Bamberger photographs of basketball backboards around our region, which was co-curated by undergraduates through a Curatorial Practicum taught at the Nasher Museum by assistant curator Molly Boarati.</p> <p>The Nasher has also loaned our office a wonderful collection of prints by Risaburo Kimura, the Japanese printmaker. We’re displaying his brightly rendered geometric depictions of world cities in the second floor of the Allen Building.</p> <p><strong><em>What research project out of Duke this past year most intrigued you?</em> </strong></p> <p>Not a specific project so much as a program: Bass Connections. I visited the showcase recently and was so deeply impressed by what I saw—students and faculty are teaming up to explore dozens of real-world issues, from population health in Durham to digital archaeology to professional ethics.</p> <p><strong><em>Which is your favorite presidential portrait in the subdued setting of the Allen Building board room?</em> </strong></p> <p>William Preston Few, my fellow four-eyes.</p> <p><em><strong>How would you describe the noise level at a Cameron game?</strong> </em></p> <p>Delightfully deafening.</p> <p><em><strong>What was the most eye-opening city you visited on the alumni circuit?</strong> </em></p> <p>As a native of Southern California, I enjoyed returning to Los Angeles for the first time as Duke president. L.A. has changed a lot since I was a kid, but it still has that Hollywood magic.</p> <p><strong><em>If you could have a conversation with one (no-longer-present) figure out of Duke’s past, who would you choose?</em> </strong></p> <p>I wish I had an opportunity to get to know Samuel DuBois Cook, who casts a deservedly long shadow at Duke. Dr. Cook was here for such a tremendous period of transition for the university–he helped Duke begin to realize its potential as a welcoming, diverse academic community.</p> <p><em><strong>Though they aren’t good conversation partners, how would you and Annette feel about a lemur or two taking residence in Hart House?</strong> </em></p> <p>They sure are cute, but we’ve already got two pretty wild animals in the house– plus Scout and Cricket.</p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-12T00:00:00-04:00">Tuesday, June 12, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/author/robert-j-bliwise" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Robert J. Bliwise</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/PRESPRICE-PORTRAIT_0_0.gif" width="250" height="300" alt="" /></figure></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue<section class="field field-name-field-sub-header field-type-text-long field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Sub-header:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">As Duke was celebrating its newest graduates, President Vincent E. Price was marking the end of his freshman year. Here he responds to questions from the magazine’s editor, with first-year reflections on campus hangouts, canine habits, presidential portraits, leaping lemurs, and more.</div></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Cover Story </h3> <h3 class="field-label"> Homepage </h3> Tue, 12 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498235 at https://alumni.duke.edu https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/president-summing-first-year#comments DR/TL (Didn't Read/Too Long) https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/drtl-didnt-readtoo-long <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p><strong>ANIMALS</strong></p> <p>IT’S A WORLD OF TRADEOFFS, PART I: Toenail fungus seems to have <a href="https://today.duke.edu/2018/02/toenail-fungus-gives-sex-infect-human-hosts">given up sexual reproduction in order to more effectively reproduce on your feet</a>.</p> <p>IT’S A WORLD OF TRADEOFFS, PART II: Snapping shrimp queens without rivals <a href="https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/03/animals-shrimp-oceans-queens-evolution/">have smaller pincers and lay more eggs</a>; those in colonies with multiple queens have larger pincers and lay fewer eggs.</p> <p>What <a href="https://today.duke.edu/2018/03/how-infighting-turns-toxic-chimpanzees">probably caused the four-year period of killing and land grabs</a> among the CHIMPANZEES studied by Jane Goodall was—wait for it—top males fighting for status. You may file this under STOP THE PRESSES.</p> <p><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs00359-018-1254-4">HOGFISH can “see” with their skin</a>. With information their skin perceives, they decide what color to be. Wouldn’t you?</p> <p><strong>PEOPLE</strong></p> <p>OBESITY does not seem to be declining in American children or adolescents; in fact, <a href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2018/02/22/peds.2017-3459">obesity in children ages 2-5 seems to have increased in recent years. </a></p> <p>Students who receive monthly SUPPLEMENTAL NUTRITION ASSISTANCE PROGRAM (SNAP) benefits find their <a href="https://sanford.duke.edu/articles/timing-snap-benefit-affects-children%E2%80%99s-test-grades">test scores vary with the timing of the benefits' arrival</a>, implying that benefit levels are commonly not sufficient.</p> <p><strong>DUKE</strong></p> <p>Duke has begun work on a <a href="https://pratt.duke.edu/about/news/new-engineering-building">new 150,000-SQUARE-FOOT, THREE-STORY, $115-MILLION ENGINEERING BUILDING</a> to house research, entrepreneurship, and education initiatives at the Pratt School of Engineering.</p> <p>Duke Health is funding <a href="http://www.heraldsun.com/news/local/counties/durham-county/article200064344.html">a $100-million expansion to DUKE REGIONAL HOSPITAL </a>even though Duke does not own the hospital. The investment will increase the number of psychiatric beds and expand its emergency room facilities, among other things.</p> <p>Duke has <a href="http://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2018/04/duke-power-plant-delayed-biogas">indefinitely postponed plans </a>to build a combined heat and power plant, which would have burned natural gas; Duke will instead focus on increasing the use of biogas and other ECOLOGICALLY FRIENDLY FUELS.</p> <p>To encourage diners to return the distressing amount of silverware liberated from dining places on campus, Duke instituted a <a href="http://www.dukechronicle.com/article/2018/04/what-the-fork-fork-amnesty-day-to-give-students-chance-to-return-stolen-forks">FORK AMNESTY DAY</a>.</p> <p>Duke accepted a record-low 6.4 percent of its regular-decision applicants for the CLASS OF 2022.</p> <p><strong>SCHOLARSHIP</strong></p> <p>Carl Bolch Jr. and his wife, Susan Bass Bolch, will <a href="https://law.duke.edu/news/10-million-gift-establishes-carl-and-susan-bolch-judicial-institute/">endow the new CARL AND SUSAN BOLCH JUDICIAL INSTITUTE at Duke Law School</a>. It will be dedicated to bettering the human condition through studying and promoting the rule of law. The university and other donors will match the gift, bringing the total in support of the Bolch Judicial Institute to $20 million.</p> <p>SUHANI JALOTA ’16, from Mumbai, India, has been <a href="https://knight-hennessy.stanford.edu/program/scholars/suhani-jalota">named to the inaugural cohort of Knight-Hennessy Scholars</a> at Stanford University. The scholarship will fund her Ph.D. in health policy at the Stanford School of Medicine.</p> <p>Professors SALLIE PERMAR and GEORGIA TOMARAS from the Duke School of Medicine were a<a href="https://medschool.duke.edu/about-us/news-and-communications/med-school-blog/permar-and-tomaras-elected-american-academy-microbiology-fellows">mong 96 new fellows elected to the American Academy of Microbiology</a>.</p> <p>Samantha Bouchal and Shomik Verma, juniors, and Pranav Warman, a sophomore, were among 211 students from 455 institutions <a href="https://today.duke.edu/2018/04/two-duke-juniors-one-sophomore-named-goldwater-scholars">named 2018 BARRY M. GOLDWATER SCHOLARS for 2018-19</a>. The federally endowed program encourages students to pursue careers in mathematics, the natural sciences, and engineering.</p> <p>Twelve Duke students were awarded FULBRIGHT placements in 2017-18.</p> <p>ADRIAN BEJAN, J.A. Jones Professor of mechanical engineering and father of the constructal theory of thermodynamics, received the <a href="https://www.fi.edu/laureates/adrian-bejan">2018 Benjamin Franklin Medal</a>, one of the nation’s highest scientific prizes.</p> <p>With a grant of $15 million from the A. James &amp; Alice B. Clark Foundation, the Pratt School will launch the <a href="https://pratt.duke.edu/about/news/clark-scholars">A. JAMES CLARK SCHOLARS PROGRAM</a> to encourage entrepreneurial thinking among engineers. It will give recipients dedicated servicelearning opportunities, leadership training, and mentorships.</p> <p><strong>MISCELLANY</strong></p> <p>The world <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2018/02/14/leaked-u-n-climate-report-sees-very-high-risk-the-planet-will-warm-beyond-key-limit/?utm_source=rss_energy-environment&amp;utm_term=.2fef2fd095c0">has only 12 to 16 years’ worth of GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS left</a>, from the start of 2016, if it wants a better-than even chance of holding warming below 1.5 degrees.</p> <p>On the other hand, <a href="https://nicholas.duke.edu/about/news/cutting-carbon-emissions-sooner-could-save-153-million-lives">if we accelerate cuts to carbon emissions, we could save 153 MILLION LIVES </a>over the next century in the 154 largest urban areas.</p> <p>Remember how ELECTRONIC HEALTH RECORDS were going to save all kinds of money? Nuh-uh. <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/hbsworkingknowledge/2018/03/07/electronic-health-records-were-supposed-to-cut-medical-costs-they-havent/#225447f15060">Savings haven't materialized</a>.</p> <p>Silver-coated copper NANOWIRES can be covered with silicone rubber and printed onto clothing, making stretchable, wearable, and inexpensive “felt” wires that <a href="https://researchblog.duke.edu/2018/04/02/stretchable-twistable-wires-for-wearable-electronics/?utm_source=bronto&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_term=Stretchable,+twistable+wires+for+wearable+electronics&amp;utm_content=Duke+Daily+News+Summary:+April+4,+2018&amp;utm_campaign=Duke+Daily+News+Summary:+April+4,+2018">may be usable for fitness and other monitoring and tracking</a>.</p> <p>PLASTIC METAMATERIALS <a href="https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-04/du-tem041018.php">can redirect and reflect sound waves</a> with almost perfect efficiency.</p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-12T00:00:00-04:00">Tuesday, June 12, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/writers/scott-huler" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Scott Huler</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/DRTL-PORTRAIT_0.gif" width="250" height="300" alt="" /></figure></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue<section class="field field-name-field-sub-header field-type-text-long field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Sub-header:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Brief mentions of things going on among Duke researchers, scholars, and other enterprises</div></div></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Cover Story </h3> <h3 class="field-label"> Homepage </h3> Tue, 12 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498238 at https://alumni.duke.edu https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/drtl-didnt-readtoo-long#comments From the editor: When Tom Wolfe came to K-ville https://alumni.duke.edu/magazine/articles/editor-when-tom-wolfe-came-k-ville <div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden view-mode-rss"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"> <p><span class="dc">W</span>hen I’ve taught magazine journalism, my departure point has been Tom Wolfe’s <a href="http://nymag.com/news/media/47353/">essay</a> on “The New Journalism.” It’s an argument for applying familiar literary devices—scene-setting, point of view, symbolically meaningful attributes—to the work of nonfiction. Wolfe, who died in May, was a protégé of the late Clay Felker ’51, the founding editor of <em>New York</em> magazine (and the longtime advisory-board chair of this magazine); New York, in many ways, provided Wolfe an early laboratory for his writerly experiments.</p><p>Wolfe was relentlessly curious about the times he inhabited. But he was also timeless: His literary forebears were figures like Dickens and Balzac—figures who similarly appealed to Felker. And, decked out as he was in those thoroughly emblematic, somewhat outlandish, white suits, Wolfe was always out of context, the perpetual outsider looking in.</p><p><em>The Economist</em>, among many other publications, found it easy to classify Wolfe’s <em>I Am Charlotte Simmons</em>, from 2004, as the work of an author with Duke insider knowledge. It was a novel that “poked fun at the macho culture of an elite university that was closely modelled on the would-be Princeton of the South, Duke.” For his part, though, Wolfe always insisted that his inspiration came from the excesses of higher education—excesses that he saw as an indictment of elite privilege—and not Duke specifically.</p><p>Still, Wolfe was deeply tied to Duke, largely through his daughter, Alexandra ’02. (He gave the <a href="https://today.duke.edu/2002/05/commence0502.html">commencement address</a> for her graduating class.) In the winter of 1998, <em>Duke Magazine</em> brought Wolfe, this clear-eyed and sharp-edged cultural observer, into the raw and rarified setting of Cameron, for a men’s basketball game. Several weeks later, <a href="http://dukemagazine.duke.edu/article/duke-university-alumni-magazine-130">I interviewed him for a conversation</a> that would appear in the next issue. That was back in New York, in his Upper East Side apartment, a space that could have been a testament to Balzacian good taste and high society.</p><p>Wolfe’s personal story intersected with athletics, he told me. He played baseball in high school and college, and then for a couple of years after college. He had fantasized that some pro scout would recognize his talent. “It turned out I was in no danger of being discovered. If I had been offered a professional sports contract, I’m sure I would have gladly done that. Who cares about writing? Nobody cheers you for writing.”</p><p>This was a basketball encounter, though, including K-ville, a collection of student tenters who endured, if temporarily, sometimes extreme conditions and unwavering rules for game-going privileges. K-ville, as Wolfe saw it, was “a sort of Academic Outward Bound.” In an autobiographical aside, he described attending summer camp for three years and liking it a lot—“except for the camp’s insistence on camping out.”</p><p>For the game itself, the magazine positioned Wolfe courtside; this scholar of sub-communities had a clear avenue into a sub-community with its own exotic rituals. He characterized the student spectacle in Cameron as “high-class choreography,” adding: “There are also elements of ballet about it, and of ancient religious choreography in particular. Rhythmic dance started when people who believe in magic were facing a drought. They would all get together and start swaying to imitate the motion of wind against wheat. The ancient folk thought that when the wheat danced, the rain would come.”</p><p>Wolfe’s most intriguing analogy was aligned with animal life. “You know the biological term colonial animal?” he wondered in our conversation. “It’s an animal made up of independent organisms all attached to one another…. And that’s what the crowd is like—it’s like one great colonial animal that has immediate responses to whatever is going on.”</p><p>From there, Wolfe went on a trajectory from Cameron to the broader human comedy. He said he was perpetually pondering “why people like stories so much,” but also why people are drawn to the ongoing story of athletic competition: “How are people able to transfer their own yearnings, ambitions, hostilities, primal emotions of various sorts to a group of athletes who represent them in competition?”</p><p>In representing the Duke masses, these athletes were garbed in uniforms that he found, well, a little funny, and the white-suited Wolfe was happy to show off his sartorial sensibility: “The thing that I don’t like about the basketball uniforms is the baggy pants. I don’t get it; they’re not elegant, they’re goofy…. Maybe one day they’ll wear Lycra, and the players will all look like Spiderman.”</p> </div></div></div> <h3 class="field-label"> Published </h3> <span class="date-display-single" property="dc:date" datatype="xsd:dateTime" content="2018-06-12T00:00:00-04:00">Tuesday, June 12, 2018</span><section class="field field-name-field-main-image field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Main image:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/default_images/dukmag-horizontal-placeholder.jpg" width="238" height="140" alt="" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-author field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Writer:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/author/robert-j-bliwise" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Robert J. Bliwise</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-issue field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Issue:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/issues/summer-2018" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Summer 2018</a></li></ul></section><section class="field field-name-field-portrait field-type-image field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Portrait:&nbsp;</h2><div class="field-items"><figure class="clearfix field-item even"><img typeof="foaf:Image" class="image-style-none" src="https://alumni.duke.edu/sites/default/files/dm-portraits/GARGOYLE-portrait_0_0.gif" width="250" height="300" /></figure></div></section><section class="field field-name-field-photo-credit field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above view-mode-rss"><h2 class="field-label">Photo Credit:&nbsp;</h2><ul class="field-items"><li class="field-item even"><a href="/magazine/photographers/tom-wolfe-yousuf-karsh-gelatin-silver-print-1990-national-portrait-gallery" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Tom Wolfe by Yousuf Karsh, gelatin silver print, 1990. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Esterllita Karsh in memory of Yousuf Karsh. copyright Estate of Yousuf Karsh</a></li></ul></section> <h3 class="field-label"> Featured article </h3> No <h3 class="field-label"> Background color </h3> blue Tue, 12 Jun 2018 08:00:00 +0000 Joseph Sorensen, JOSEPH E. 18498239 at https://alumni.duke.edu