David LowJenny He ’02 is the co-author, along with Ron Magliozzi, of a new book Tim Burton, published by the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York City to accompany a major career retrospective that is currently on view at the museum. The publication considers Burton's career as an artist and filmmaker, the evolution of his creative practices and the influence of popular culture and Pop Surrealism on his work. The book traces the path of his visual imagination from his earliest childhood drawings through his mature works, which includes his films Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas,…
Joss Whedon ’87 will be honored by the Producers Guild of America with its Vanguard Award, which recognizes achievements in new media and technology. He will receive the award at the 21st Annual PGA Awards ceremony on Jan. 24 at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles. Previous Vanguard Award recipients include George Lucas, James Cameron, John Lasseter, MySpace CEO and co-founder Chris DeWolfe and president and co-founder Tom Anderson, and YouTube founders Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Will Wright. Whedon is a producer, writer, director, and creator for the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly and Dollhouse. He…
Bill HolderThe freshly minted Wesleyan Lawyers Association (“WLA”) hosted a successful kickoff event Nov. 7 during Homecoming /Family Weekend at the Woodhead Lounge in the Exley Science Center. Approximately 100 attorney alumni, undergraduates, and friends attended a talk given by Ted Shaw ’76, currently the Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia University Law School and of counsel at the international firm of Fulbright and Jaworski. Shaw, who was director-counsel and president of the NAACP’s Legal Defense and Educational Fund from 2004 through 2008 and served as a Wesleyan Trustee for 15 years, addressed how his experience at Wesleyan affected his legal career as one of…
Cynthia RockwellCaroline Little ’81, the North American CEO for the U.K.-based Guardian News and Media, was the subject of the most recent, “So What Do You Do” Q-and-A for Mediabistro.com. Previously CEO at The Washington Post.com, where she led the web sites for the Post, as well as for Newsweek, Slate, and The Root, Little had begun her career as a lawyer. She says that she made the jump in 1997 to digital media because, “when something's new, there's a lot of opportunities” and her background had given her an overview of the business. Asked about the Guardian’s goals in the…
Brooklyn, N.Y. resident Bridget Palardy ’05 has received the inaugural JT3 Artist Award of Distinction for emerging filmmakers for her short film Middletown B-Boys, a compelling dance-filled documentary that was shot in Middletown, Conn. Palardy and four other innovative young filmmakers from Brooklyn were honored at the first-ever JT3 Artist Awards at the Brooklyn Academy of Music on Oct. 22 in a celebration with director Adam Brooks (Definitely, Maybe) and hosted by Tony-award nominated actor Brandon Victor Dixon. A nonprofit foundation created in memory of the dynamic young writer/director/producer Jesse Thompkins III, who died in a tragic traffic accident last year,…
In his third poetry collection, Tourist (NYQ Books, 2009), Sanford Fraser ’54 reveals a mastery of the lyric form and plainspoken language. The collection is divided into three sections: Strangers, Roles and Connections. In the first section, the narrator and/or characters in the poems are strangers isolated from and emotionally detached from others; in the second, they play various roles in the world beyond themselves; and finally in the last section, they experience emotional attachments with others. Frasier shares the following observations about his new book: “The busloads of tourists who ride and walk through the streets of my neighborhood…
Olivia DrakeMore than 5,000 parents, alumni and friends came to campus Nov. 6-8 to celebrate Homecoming/Family Weekend. This year's theme was "Come Home!" Event photos are posted on the HCFW website. "Every year, I hear from alumni, parents and students that Homecoming/Family Weekend gets better and better," says Gemma Fontanella Ebstein, associate vice president for external relations. "We had a terrific turnout this year and the energy was palpable across campus – in the WESeminars, athletic contests, department anniversary celebrations and other special gatherings throughout the weekend. This has become one of the highlights of the year for the Wesleyan community.” The…
Kate Wetherhead ’98 currently stars in the off-Broadway musical Ordinary Days with a score by Adam Gwon and directed by Mark Bruni. The show deals the lives and troubles of four young people living in New York City. In a positive review in The New York Times, Charles Isherwood says the show “captures with stinging clarity that uneasy moment in youth when doubts begin to cloud hopes for a future of unlimited possibility.” Wetherhead plays an unhappy graduate student who has lost her thesis notebook, which is found by an aspiring artist (Jared Gertner), and the two eventually meet at…
In The Calculus of Friendship (Princeton University Press), Cornell University professor Steven Strogatz chronicles the moving story of the friendship he developed with his former high school math teacher, Don Joffray ’50, over 30 years through the exchange of letters between them. For a long time, their friendship revolved almost entirely on a shared love of calculus. Joffray goes from the prime of his career to retirement, competes in whitewater kayaking at the international level, and loses a son. Strogatz matures from high school math whiz to Ivy League professor, has a failed marriage, and experiences the sudden death of…
In the Nov. 16 issue of The New Yorker, staff writer Ariel Levy ’96 looks at two new books: When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present (Little Brown) by Gail Collins, and You’ve Come a Long Way, Maybe: Sarah, Michelle, Hillary and the Shaping of the New American Woman (Palgrave) by Leslie Sanchez. In her essay, titled “Lift and Separate,” Levy discusses not just the content of the two books but also considers how feminism is still so divisive. She discusses some of the triumphs and defeats of the feminist movement and some…
Grant Brenner ’92, Daniel Bush and Joshua Moses are co-editors of Creating Spiritual and Psychological Resilience: Integrating Care in Disaster Relief Work (Routledge), which explores the interface between spiritual and psychological care in the context of disaster recovery work, drawing upon recent disasters including the experiences of Sept. 11, 2001. The book contains three sections structured around the cycle of disaster response and focusing on the relevant phase of disaster recovery work. In each section, selected spiritual and mental health topics are examined with contributions from spiritual care and mental health care providers. This is a useful reference volume for theory…
Daniel Pollitt ’43, University of North Carolina Kenan Professor Emeritus and longtime civil-liberties and civil-rights advocate, was awarded the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, one of the state’s highest honors, last summer. Nominated for the award by state Sen. Floyd McKissick Jr., whose father, Floyd McKissick Sr., worked with Pollitt on a number of civil-rights issues, Pollitt was presented with the award by Sen. Ellie Kinnaird, with whom he was wed last April. Bestowed for a lifetime of “integrity, learning and zeal,” the award recognizes his activism and commitment to the causes of social justice. In the 1950s, he…