Though only in its third year, Macalester’s African American Studies Conference is already making waves.

This year’s conference, titled “The Psychology of Being Black in 21st Century America” was held here last weekend. The event took place from Feb. 15 to 17 and was sponsored by the Macalester College African American Studies Program. {more}

A group of students has worked for two years to organize a conference about the civil war in the Sudan, a conflict in which more than two million people have died.

Modeled after Macalester’s annual International Round Table, the conference on Sudan is a two-day affair featuring internationally known experts on that part of the world. The conference will kick off next Friday, March 1 with keynote speaker Francis M. Deng, a well-known scholar of the conflict. {more}

The St. Paul Police Department has begun a criminal investigation into a break-in at Olin-Rice’s chemistry stockroom on Wednesday, Feb. 13.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation is also participating in the inquiry. The FBI is serving as a resource and liaison because “of the potential of the chemicals where the break-in occurred” Sgt. Tracie McHarg of the St. Paul Police Department said. {more}

Macalester’s devotion to internationalism will be on display Feb. 26 through March 1 during the school’s annual International Week.

The theme for this year’s event is, “The Arts, Identity and Internationalism.” “These themes are often looked over in international studies,” said Natalie Mettler ’03, who helped to organize the event. The International Week Committee, the International Center and Sunday News are sponsoring the event. {more}

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Imagine walking past 45 flags at graduation, flags that represent all your fellow classmates’ countries except yours. Imagine being called Jordanian and Israeli, when you can't live in Jordan or vote in Israel. Imagine having to explain your country's politics all the time, just so that people understand your identity. Imagine being a student at Macalester for four years. Imagine Kofi Annan. Imagine internationalism. Imagine flag policy. Imagine no flag at your graduation. {more}

“So, Are You Comfortable With Your Twinkiness?”

By THERESA SONG

I hit him on the arm, half jokingly and half taken aback from the question. He was Asian too, but his experience was different from mine. He grew up in an Asian country. He was still fluent in his native language. He lived most of his life somewhat comfortable with his Asian identity.

But me? My experience was different. I grew up in a wealthy, white neighborhood in the South, where the Confederate flag was still visible at my mostly white private school. I had white friends, white teachers, white coaches, white supervisors and white neighbors. Everyone in my community was white and hell, you know what? I thought I was white too, or at least wished I was when I remembered I wasn’t. {more}

You could call it the new epidemic. Eating disorders have become increasingly pervasive in our society and today affect three times as many people as are affected by AIDS. Although AIDS will claim, at the moment, 100 percent of its victims, eating disorders claim five to 20 percent of their victims.

Anorexia Nervosa alone has the highest fatality rate among psychological illnesses in women. In the United States today between five and 10 million women and more than one million men are living with diagnosed eating disorders, but most eating disorder victims are never diagnosed. {more}

I’m writing in response to a comment made at the African American Studies Conference this weekend. For those of you who were not there, I’ll briefly detail the scene: Panelist Mark Soderstrom was presenting his paper named “Family Trees and Timber Rights: Albert E. Jenks and the Rise of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota.” The paper discussed anthropology’s role in the construction of racism in America. He used as his case study an anthropology professor at the University of Minnesota who was obscenely racist. {more}

Spiderman is my favorite superhero. Everyone knows that he got his spider-powers from a radioactive spider. Most people do not know that he first decided to use his new powers to go into show business. While auditioning, he let an escaping thief go by, saying that the thief was not his problem. That same thief later killed the uncle who had raised him from infancy. Horrified by his failure to act when he had the chance, Peter Parker realized that with great power comes great responsibility, and he became a superhero. {more}

Tim Lewandowski ’03 - Nordic skiing
Afton Hanson ’04 - Women’s basketball

The Macalester Athletes of the Week for Feb. 11-17 are Tim Lewandowski ’03 (Hopkins, Minn.) from the men's nordic ski team and Afton Hanson ’04 (Karlstad, Minn./Tri-County) from the women's basketball team. Lewandowski earned all-conference status at the MIAC Championships at Giant's Ridge in Biwabik by placing sixth in the10-kilometer Classical race with a time of 33:02. He also took ninth in the 15K Freestyle. Hanson closed out a great sophomore season by averaging 18 points, 9 rebounds and 4.5 assists in a pair of league games last week. She had 14 points and 10 rebounds in a big win over St. Mary's and followed that up with a 22-point, 8-rebound performance in a loss to Hamline. Hanson finished the season just four points short of taking the MIAC scoring title. {more}

A three-pointer from Ryan Gerry ’02 with 1.4 seconds remaining sealed a comeback from a 17-point deficit to give Macalester an 83-82 win over defending MIAC champions St. John’s in Tuesday’s quarterfinal game. {more}

In a neutral site in Iowa, men’s tennis fell to Cornell in a tear-jerking 4-3 loss on Saturday.

The Scots (0-3) nearly pulled off the huge upset, tying the match at 3-3 after singles victories by number two singles player Jake Depue ’04, number three player David “The Scorchin’ Georgian” Yesilevskiy ’03 and number five player Senam Ghebo ’04. {more}

I suppose St. Paul is a nice town and all, but spending four straight years there with little to do besides drink handles of Taaka and listen to people filibuster about how smart they supposedly are can get on one’s nerves. Mine, specifically. As a result, I decided to skip town in favor of Budapest, where I am currently living and studying (for lack of a better word). While most people choose to study abroad at slighlty more scenic locales, like Paris or Newark, I’ve found that this place has got quite a bit going for it. {more}

Last weekend the Walker Art Center opened its doors to reveal its most recent acquisition, a new exhibit titled “Vital Forms: American Art and Design in the Atomic Age, 1940-1960.” This dynamic, multimedia collection occupies three galleries and features such artistic manifestations as paintings, sculpture, photographs, furniture, toys, clothing and examples of fashion and architectural designs. The collection, organized by the Brooklyn Museum of Art, includes almost 250 works, all of which are linked by a shared “vital forms” aesthetic. In other words, the works all draw inspiration from nature and biomorphic shapes, representing a widespread artistic convention of the World War II and post-war period. {more}

Showing at the Bryant-Lake Bowl is “Weird Romance,” a musical by David Spencer, Alan Menken, and Alan Brennert (authors of “Little Shop of Horrors”). “Weird Romance” is billed as “two one-act musicals of speculative fiction,” each running about 50 minutes with a short intermission. {more}

Lots of indie-rock artists have attempted incorporating soul influences into their records, but few have ever done it better than NYC’s Chris Lee. His self-titled solo debut, released in 2000, seemed to channel equal parts Al Green and Television. The end result was a scintillating and previously unthinkable combination. Now Lee, 26, has returned with the equally enigmatic pop hybrid Chris Lee Plays & Sings Torch’d Songs Chari-Vari Hymns and Oriki Blue Marches (Smells Like Records).

Expanding upon the three-piece rock of Chris Lee, Plays & Sings draws from an even wider range of influences. Lee credits different working conditions for the increased sonic breadth of his new album, “The first record we just sort of banged out in three days, because that’s all we could do. This album we were able to let it sit and cook for a little bit. We would lay down the basic tracks, and then come up with different ideas for arrangements. If the song called for a horn player or an organist, we were able to bring that in, it helped having that kind of flexibility.” {more}