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Wednesday, October 28, 2015

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

The Personal Statement Issue

» INSIDE

let’s get personal

Nutrition, food 
security and fair 
trade featured in 

short lectures 

By ANNA HARITOS

Daily Staff Reporter

The University’s Sustainable 

Food Systems Initiative hosted 
10 bite-sized talks Tuesday 

night on topics related to food 
and agriculture.

The second annual “Fast 

Food for Thought” talk brought 
together nine faculty members 
from several University depart-
ments, with the 10th “talk” for-
matted as a Q&A session. Each 
of the speakers was given five 
minutes to address a broad 
range of global and local food 
topics, including sustainability, 
potential connections between 
food and politics and the grow-

ing problem of herbicide resis-
tance. The USFSI encourages 
University students and faculty 
members to learn about and 
promote food systems that are 
beneficial to both the environ-
ment and economy.

More than 100 attendees 

filled the lecture hall in the 
Dana Building. Thomas Prin-
cen, 
associate 
professor 
of 

natural resource and environ-
mental policy, started off the 
event by asking, “Why food, 

why now?” In his talk, he brief-
ly explained his six hypotheses 
for why American interest in 
food has skyrocketed in the 
past few years.

Among them: the “brains and 

hands” hypothesis. What dis-
tinguishes humans from other 
animals, Princen said, is the 
ability to combine experiences 
both tactile and intellectual. 
He said because food engages 
humans both with their brains 

Two former 
Congressmen 

address increased 
legislative gridlock

By SAMANTHA WINTNER

Daily Staff Reporter

Frustration 
with 
the 

sometimes sluggish legislative 
process isn’t unique to voters 
— a point that two former 
legislators hammered home in a 
lecture Tuesday night.

Former Congressmen Tom 

Davis (R–Va.) and Martin Frost 
(D–Texas) spoke at the Gerald 
R. Ford Presidential Library 
about legislative gridlock and 
how bipartisanship can remedy 
it, an issue they address in a new 
book they co-authored with 
journalist Richard Cohen.

Davis 
and 
Frost 
have 

a 
combined 
40 
years 
of 

congressional experience, and 
both served two terms as the 
chair of their respective party’s 

House campaign committees.

“(Because we’ve both had 

these roles), we tend to see 
things structurally the same 
way,” Frost said.

According 
to 
a 
2008 

interview with The New York 
Times, Davis decided not to run 
for re-election because he was 
dissatisfied with the partisan 
nature of Congress. At the 
time, he said party divides were 
increasingly making the process 
of lawmaking dysfunctional, 
especially as a new wave of social 
conservatives were becoming 
a dominant contingency in the 
GOP.

“I’m a partisan Republican 

and 
Martin 
is 
a 
partisan 

Democrat,” Davis said. “But we 
were dealmakers, we know how 
to work with the other side, we 
felt when the election was over, 
it was time for everyone to act 
like grown ups again and try to 
get things done.”

In their book, Davis and 

Frost elaborate on the growing 
political 
polarization 
they 

Assembly also 

hears resolution to 
add mental health 
resources to syllabi

By JACKIE CHARNIGA

Daily Staff Reporter

The 
Central 
Student 

Government Assembly deviated 
from its usual meeting spot 
in the Michigan Union on 

Tuesday night, convening in 
Pierpont Commons on North 
Campus 
to 
discuss 
course 

evaluations 
and 
increasing 

awareness of on-campus mental 
health services by including 
information on syllabi.

Course evaluations

A chunk of Tuesday’s meeting 

was dedicated to discussing 
the Faculty Senate’s decision 
Monday to vote against the 
immediate release of student 

course evaluation data. The CSG 
Assembly has previously pushed 
to make these course evaluations 
available to the public, and 
introduced a resolution last year 
to do so.

Public Policy junior Jacob 

Pearlman, CSG general counsel, 
noted that the course evaluation 
results, 
which 
provide 
a 

mechanism for the University 
to gauge professor proficiency, 
were originally made available 

Louise Glück 

featured in Helen 

Zell Visiting 
Writers Series

By CAMY METWALLY

Daily Staff Reporter

In 
a 
gallery 
inside 
the 

University’s Museum of Art, 
Louise Glück stood between 
two white sculptures, and read 
poetry that conjured images 
of the night sky, rain and the 
changing seasons.

Tuesday night, the Pulitzer 

Prize-winner 
and 
former 

United States Poet Laureate 
read a collection of her poetry 
for the Zell Visiting Writers 
Series, presented by the Helen 
Zell 
Writers’ 
Program. 
A 

reception and book signing 
followed the event.

Between 
poems, 
Glück 

shared some of the struggles 
she has faced in her professional 
career. She said during one low 
point in her writing, she sat at 
home reading plant catalogues 

to pass the time. Even so, she 
said this period was ultimately 
productive because later on it 
inspired a number of poems 
in her Pulitzer-winning book, 
“The Wild Iris.”

“It’s ... poems spoken by 

flowers, 
poems 
spoken 
by 

humans who are in conflict 
with each other, and poems 
spoken by some third celestial 
principle,” Glück said.

Glück 
advised 
poets 
to 

do what they want, even if 
it’s reading plant catalogues 
because, ultimately, this is how 
they will write poems of their 
own.

“You have to do what you 

want to do,” Glück said. “If you 
don’t do what you want to do, 
you will ever write poems that 
are yours alone to write.”

Glück read a number of 

poems from “The Wild Iris,” 
including “The Red Poppy.”

During the Q&A portion, 

an 
attendee 
sought 
advice 

for aspiring writers. Glück 
encouraged those interested in 
poetry and writing to read what 
they love and build a life they 

Guest lecture 

focuses on political 
influence of scholar 

Al-Qaradawi

By ALEXA ST. JOHN

Daily Staff Reporter

Jakob 
Skovgaard-Petersen, 

a professor in the University of 
Copenhagen’s 
Department 
of 

Cross-Cultural 
and 
Regional 

Studies, lectured in the School of 
Social Work on Tuesday about the 
life and significance of Egyptian 
Islamic activist and author Yusuf 
al-Qaradawi.

Hosted by the Center for Mid-

dle Eastern and North African 
Studies, Skovgaard-Petersen eval-
uated al-Qaradawi’s public and 
political role in Egypt, particular-
ly after the Egyptian revolution 
in 2011. Al-Qaradawi is a widely 
known figure in the Islamic 
world, with a television program, 
books and a website that reach 
millions of people.

According 
to 
Skovgaard-

Petersen, 
the 
“apex” 
of 
al-

ZOEY HOLMSTROM/Daily

Art & Design Prof. Joe Trumpy speaks about sustainable farming in his speech titled “Homesteading as Creative Practice” at the Fast Food for Thought 
discussion in the Dana Building on Tuesday. 

EMILIE FARRUGIA/Daily

LSA senior David Schafer discusses the proposal to include language mental health resources in course syllabi at the 
Central Student Government meeting in the East Room of Pierpont Commons on Tuesday.

GOVERNMENT

LITERATURE
CAMPUS LIFE

See FOOD, Page 3A
See CONGRESS, Page 2A

See SCHOLAR, Page 3A
See CSG, Page 3A
See POET, Page 3A

Ex-House 
leaders dish 
on political
polarization

Faculty discuss foodways, 
agriculture in 10 mini talks

Former poet 
laureate hosts 
reading in A2

CSG remains committed to 
course evaluation release

Visiting prof. 
 
 

talks Islam, 
activism in 
Middle East

INDEX
Vol. CXXV, No. 20
©2015 The Michigan Daily
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