L4- The Michigan Daily - Wednesday, December 10, 1997 'Dance' concert delivers diversity By Lucija Franetovic For the Daily The School of Music's Department of Dance will present the Dance and Related Arts concert this week- end at the Betty Pease Dance Studio Theater. There are exceptions to the presentation:® There won't be ordinary dance, PR nor will it be performed only by dance students. Dance The Dance and Related Arts is a class offered in the fall term. It4 gathers students from all disci- Betty Pea plines within the arts into a collab- orative effort to design an expressive work that brings together various ideas and talents. Taught by Bill DeYoung and Stephen Rush, this course is not lacking in artistic guidance and inspira- tion. The five pieces are original student works, prod- ucts of classwork and outside practice. Though the pieces are not necessarily about the Beat Generation, Rush and DeYoung used the poetry of such Beat poets as William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac to serve as a shared inspiration and spark the creative energy of the students. Poems were listened to and passed out at the first class meeting and inde- pendent research was assigned and encouraged. "We pair people up by random for a 30-minute exer- EVIEW and Related Arts Concert Thurs-Sat. at 8 p.m. ase Studio theater - $5 cise and it's like spontaneous com- bustion," explained Rush. "The Beat Generation was a period of great artistic freedom in music, jazz and poetry; it was a powerful firmament of breaking some pat- terns and making something new," said DeYoung. "We do whatever cal movement and spoken text, a violin, a trumpet, a scream and banners from the ceiling are some of the things you will encounter. The dancers will take the form of water, the natural elements, of people in daily routine and adolescents experiencing embarrassing moments in high school, of human spiders and go-go dancers. "Go Go Boys Love to Dance" is an analytical pieco about strippers. It starts out with the male performers (almost) stripping on the runways. Later, words from a Gina Bonati poem are heard: "dancing 5 a.m. into a massacred dawn, raw and ravenous nerves, ravaged wanting," while the dancers touch each others' faces and Jason Roebke improvises on his base. "The class was a chance to see more perspectives in art. Sometimes ideas and artistic vision stick to a tradi- tional mode. With other aitists I found that it was chal- lenging and inspirational," explained Major. The Dance and Related Arts is an effort of workin9 together and sharing creative ideas and discipline, "You get to hatch some ideas you wouldn't otherwise get a chance to do," DeYoung said. we can to break situations where people create bound- aries. We want to get people away from the idea of my piece and my way," he added. The participants include musicians, composers, actors, dancers and visual artists and the performers don't nec- essarily stick to their craft. There are music majors danc- ing and composers choreographing. "It is a venue for them to find a path out of what they do," said Rush. Video images on a backdrop screen, poetry, theatri- Price makes ActiMates Barney not worth loving i By Stephanie Jo Klein Daily TV/New Media Editor If you want to give your little sister nightmares for Christmas, they now come in a convenient purple and yellow box. With a price tag of $109.95, your sister's trauma now answers to the name of Barney. Int( e E 0 For Barney's lat- est incarnation,L Microsoft's evil empire has extended into formerly sacred territory - PBS, the home of the overly happy sing-song kids' show. It's not enough that Barney already stunts the imaginations of American chil- dren with his goofy laugh and clumsy dancing on TV and videotapes. With ActiMates, Barney can now frighten chil- dren whether they're watching TV, play- ing computer games or merely having high tea with the doll in their living room. The eery sci-fi adaptation for the Barney ActiMates is that Barney is no longer just the goofy dinosaur on televi- sion or the plush toy to play with; the new doll talks and can be hooked into the TV, VCR or per- V i W sonal computer via a funky, frisbee- ActiMates shaped transmitter. active Barney Like Teddy * Ruxpin in the '80s, Microsoft the battery-operated Barney doll spews numerous warm-fizzy catch-phrases like "I like getting hugs," "I love being here with you" and "Exercise is good for you." And when watching the videotape, Barney responds to signals from the transmitter so that he intermittently sings parts of songs and says "Isn't she a great dancer?" Although Barney and his cheeseball sidekicks are mildly annoying for the babysitters who've got "Barney and the Sandbox" on repeat, it's undeniably fun for children who like to sing along. But unlike the intelligence of "Sesame Street," the Barney show, especially with the addition of the talking doll, encourages impressionable children to let others do the thinking for them. When your favorite toy tells you you're enjoying yourself, don't you believe? And don't you want to repeat the same actions over and over to insure maxi- mum fun? Not exactly imaginative. If your little sis isn't already a total idiot, talking Barney only instigates an imminent media coma. Should a child look away or begin to play with some- thing else, Barney courteously reminds the kid: "Look, there's the TV!" How nice. The frightening thing about the smil- ing T-Rex is that he appears so innocu- ous that kids don't have a clue that their minds are being co-opted for the sake of the almighty merchandising buck. After all, they're just glad to have a playmate - all their buddies are busy playing with "Tickle Me" Elmo, "Sleep 'n Snore" Ernie, "Fart On Me" Barbie or "Peel My Banana" Curious George. If young children want to play with ActiMates Barney while they watch TV, they may not be able to if parents aren't around, what with all the plugs, cords and the transmitter necessary to start him up. Surely this is the idea behind making Barney function on his own, but even then he's hard to operate. Little ones grab and poke at anything, talking or not. If they continue to squeeze Barney's toe too many times, he will stop singing random songs and go into a musical seizure, twitching out "Mary had a twinkle twir kle A-B-C-D-E-F bah bah black sheep eensy beensy spider ..." Another scary find with the standalone Barney - Barney has a foot fetish. Before you realize the purpose ofsqueez- ing his hand (he plays "Peekaboo" games) or foot (he sings songs), he yelps out "Oh! Oh! You're tickling my feet! Oh! I like it when you squeeze my toes!" I guess Bill Gates is a bit more desperate than he looks. Children unskilled wit: mechanical dolls may be frightene when Barney flails his arms in Peekaboo, when they keep covering his eyes. The only redeeming factor of ActiMates Barney is the PC version. Perhaps the game is a success because it hardly features Barney. The doll sits near the computer and the transmitter, aiding the child (and the parent or older sibling who will have to play to super- vise) and giving positive reinforcemen and directions. The characters in the counting and spelling games are cute, with songs' from a sassy lighthouse named Lucy Letter and snazzy owl named Hootin' Annie. It's a surprisingly worthwhile purchase from Microsoft. The obscene price tag for the high- tech Barney-fest is just too high. To save the money and the mind of your little tyke, skip ActiMates Interactive Barney To spur your little sister's mind and nc her nightmares, buy her a cushy brown teddy bear that she'll still love 10 years from now, even if the nose is chipped. I I - 7 " 1YtuSie C oneert T Shirts 100'm of Mtickers Complete Hemp Clothing;r A ccessories Wool loves, Itt tand sweaters Tobacco Products .