The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Friday, January 19, 2018 — 3

SARAH KUNKEL/Daily

“The Comforter,” an art instillation by Patricia Piccinini, is featured in the University of Michigan Museum of Art.

THE COMFORTE R

Feb 2, 2018

White Card.”

The economics of theater, 

as described by Carl, is often 
centered around the reality that 
the primary consumers of theater 
are white. 

“It has been an interesting 

learning curve for me as an artist 
of trying to figure out how do we 
present this play in a way that 
makes people want to stay in the 
room and have the conversation, 

but also feels real and true,” Carl 
said.

Rankine described the artistic 

negotiation that occurs between 
profitability 
and 
authenticity 

within the theater business. She 
said the amount of thought she 
and her collaborators have given 
this negotiation has been one of 
the most of surprising aspects of 
her creative process.

“So, suddenly, you have this 

thing you are trying to make, and 
you are trying for the thing to be a 
reflection of the life you are living 
and the life you are seeing, but you 
also have to be careful because 

the life possibility of the thing you 
are making is dependent on the 
generosity of the subject of the 
play,” Rankine said. “There is a lot 
of anxiety around that.”

Rackham 
graduate 
student 

Daniella Toosie-Watson, a first-
year fellow in the Helen Zell 
Writers’ Program, said she was 
inspired by Rankine’s willingness 
to engage in dialogue and was 
able to empathize with Rankine 
through her own experiences as a 
writer within the classroom.

Education. Spencer will rent 
the space for $1,650 and 
MSU will provide security 
and ticketing. Spencer will 
provide insurance for the 
event but will not contribute 
to securing the event and will 
not hold any other event on 
MSU’s campus.

March 5 is the first day of 

MSU’s spring break, a time in 

which many students return 
home and are off campus. In 
negotiations regarding the 
pending request from Spencer 
to speak on the University of 
Michigan’s campus, Spencer’s 
team also requested dates 
during the University’s spring 
break. After announcing they 
would begin negotiations in 
November, 
the 
University 

said it would suggest dates to 
Spencer’s team by the end of 
January. 

However, 
that 
doesn’t 

necessarily 
mean 
the 

event would be lacking in 
attendance. In a December 
email shared with the Detroit 
Free Press, Bristow said one 
of the reasons they needed 
a quick response from the 
University was so they would 
have time to make travel 
arrangements for “numerous 
involved parties.”

University 
spokeswoman 

Kim Broekhuizen said that 
there are no updates on 
whether the decision in the 
MSU case will affect U-M’s 
negotiations with Spencer.

informing attendees of these 
recent events and reaffirming 
the purpose of the gathering: To 
honor Ansari’s life and mourn her 
loss. Public Policy senior Ibrahim 
Ijaz, a member of the executive 
board of Michigan Pakistanis, 
gave a speech voicing his sadness 
and highlighting the severity of 
the issue and need for action. He 
thanked the crowd for showing up 
to the vigil the despite the cold.

“It’s important to take time 

and space out of your day to think 
about what’s going on in the 
world,” Ijaz said.

Following 
Ijaz’s 
speech, 

attendees 
participated 
in 
a 

moment of silence to pray or 
reflect. 
LSA 
senior 
Martina 

Cholagh said she appreciated the 
moment for t“We all just prayed, 
or did whatever we thought 
necessary to honor this girl’s life,” 
Cholagh said. “We come from 
different backgrounds, different 
beliefs, but we were able to come 

together to honor this girl’s life 
and basically pray for her. I think 
that was really important.”

Cholagh noted one of the hopes 

of the vigil was to help people view 
the crime with more empathy 
and emotion, rather than simply 
reading about it in the news.

“I think vigils really help in 

bringing a face to the situation, 
acknowledging that this is a 
human being just like any other 
instead of having this senseless 
murder be another number in the 
media,” Cholagh said.

Ijaz’s 
final 
remarks 

emphasized the importance of 
every individual coming together 
to take action in preventing and 
seeking retribution for abuses like 
Ansari’s.

“We cannot just expect justice 

if we’re not harboring it or honing 
it in ourselves first,” Ijaz said. 
“We need to make sure that as 
members of any society that 
we’re in, whether we’re Pakistani 
Americans, whether we come 
from another country, whether 
we’re born in this one, we need to 
act with justice in everything that 
we do, every single day.”

Following 
months 
of 

competition, Amazon released 
a short list of 20 cities Thursday 
as potential locations for its 
second headquarters, “Amazon 
HQ2.” Despite encouragement 
from Mark Schlissel, president 
of the University of Michigan, 
Detroit did not make the list. 

“We’re a research machine 

with 
an 
enormous 
array 

of 
faculty 
doing 
work 
of 

relevance to the types of 
businesses that Amazon is 
in,” Schlissel stated in an 
interview with The Detroit 
News in September. “And, 
we’re a source of educated 
talent 
for 
whom 
Amazon 

here in Michigan might be an 
employer of choice.”

Amazon seeks to invest 

$5 billion into its second 
headquarters 
and 
expects 

the headquarters “to be a 
full 
equal 
to 
our 
Seattle 

headquarters,” CEO Jeff Bezos 
said in a statement. 

Amazon sought locations 

fitting 
specific 
criteria 

including being within two 
miles of a major highway, 
access 
to 
mass 
transit, 

proximity to a top university 
and being within 45 minutes 
of an international airport. 
While 
the 
headquarters 

do not need to be located 
in an urban area, it had to 
meet 
the 
aforementioned 

criteria. An offer of potential 
business incentives such as 
tax exemptions or relocation 
grants 
was 
an 
additional 

consideration Amazon took 
into account.

A location in Michigan, 

specifically near Detroit, fit 
many of these qualifications. 
Amazon HQ2 in Detroit would 
create about 50,000 high-
paying jobs and contribute 
billions of dollars into the 
local economy, according to 
Amazon. The Detroit Mayor’s 
office stated the city would 
be evaluating the potential of 
the office. Gov. Rick Snyder of 
Michigan was a proponent of 
Amazon HQ2 in Detroit.

“Not only is Michigan a top-

10 state for doing business and 
attracting 25 to 34 year-olds, 
our workforce is growing at a 
higher rate than the national 
average and we lead the region 
in 
inbound 
migration 
for 

those with bachelor’s degrees 
or higher,” Snyder said in a 
statement.

Following 
the 

announcement of Amazon’s 
decision 
not 
to 
consider 

Detroit, 
Snyder 
released 

a 
statement 
expressing 

disappointment as well as 
encouragement and excitement 
for Detroit’s future.

“It’s 
disappointing 
we 

will 
not 
be 
welcoming 
a 

new 
Amazon 
headquarters 

to 
Detroit, 
but 
appreciate 

their 
continued 
investment 

and expansion in Michigan, 
including right in the heart of 
our Comeback City,” Snyder 
said. 
“Michigan’s 
spirit 
is 

unstoppable, and so is our 
comeback. This won’t set us 
back- we’re accelerating to the 
next opportunity. We know it’s 
out there.”

Other 
cities 
still 
in 

consideration include Bezos’s 
hometown 
Miami, 
Atlanta 

and Washington, D.C. and its 
metropolitan area. Amazon 
received proposals from 238 
communities and will now 
work with the remaining 20 
locations to decide on the best 
location for the company. A 
final decision is expected in 
2018.

of 38,499 were charged across the 
state, with 401 citations originating 
from Washtenaw County alone.

Enforcement on campus is 

relatively consistent. According 
to Diane Brown, University of 
Michigan Division of Public Safety 
and Security spokeswoman, DPSS 
arrested 172 people for MIPs in 
2017 and 168 people in 2016.

On 
campus, 
Student 
Legal 

Services 
provides 
University 

students with free resources and 
legal assistance as part of their 
tuition. A comprehensive review of 
the change in the law is published 
on their website. Attorney Douglas 
Lewis, director of Student Legal 
Services, said they serve many 
students with MIP charges.

“Under the old law, it was our 

responsibility to make sure that 
(the students) left us without 
having a conviction on their 
records. 
That 
usually 
meant 

paying a fine, working through 
the court’s first offender program 
and the student taking a class 
called ‘basics,’ offered by Health 
Services,” Lewis said.

Though the original MIP law 

included possible jail time for 
multiple 
offenses, 
Lewis 
said 

through the Washtenaw County 
courts, none of his clients ever 
faced jail time.

“Even on second and third 

(offenses), I never saw a person 
sent to jail for a MIP,” he said.

That may be unique to Ann 

Arbor, though. Lewis said the MIP 
law was being unevenly enforced 
across counties, and some courts 
were giving harsher penalties than 

others.

“The old law read that a court 

may give (a violator) a first-
offender program. A lot of courts 
that are in the northern counties 
weren’t giving anybody any first 
offender program. You came in 
with a MIP, you walked out with a 
conviction,” Lewis said.

He 
said 
he 
believes 
one 

motivation behind the new law 
was to instill more consistency 
across all county courts.

“The treatment of the law 

from one county to the next was 
not necessarily uniform, and I 
think the new statute changes 
that. It makes the language much 
more mandatory for the courts to 
follow,” Lewis said.

Brown echoed Lewis’s point 

that MIP charges in Washtenaw 
County 
often 
got 
expunged 

from students’ records, so the 
outcome was effectively like a civil 
infraction — though this was not 
the case in all counties.

“In the county, Washtenaw 

County, the court system had 
in place some protocols to deal 
with 
first-time 
offenders 
for 

alcohol violations that allowed the 
offender to take a number of steps 
and then that particular violation 
often was expunged from their 
record. So the outcomes for first-
time offenders of MIP, in this 
county, likely aren’t going to get a 
lot different in what happens with 
them,” Brown said.

She recognized such a protocol 

for 
getting 
a 
misdemeanor 

expunged was not make available 
in all counties. 

“That kind of active role that the 

court system played in Washtenaw 
County wasn’t duplicative all 
across the state,” Brown said.

In Ann Arbor, the anonymous 

student received his first MIP from 
holding an open container outside 
of a party, and a second MIP for 
drinking in his dorm room. He 
received his second MIP while on 
probation from the first. 

For his first MIP, he had to 

pay $405 and received 50 days 
probation. For his second MIP, 
he admitted wrongdoing under 
the Michigan’s Holmes Youthful 
Trainee Act, which is a way for 
young adults to keep convictions 
off their record.

He 
said 
he 
thinks 
the 

punishments he is facing under 
the old law are unfair given his 
offense, saying the punishment he 
received felt on par with someone 
who got arrested for driving under 
the influence.

“After this whole process is 

done, I will have paid close to two 
grand, and my chances of getting 
a government job are completely 
done. The people I am doing my 
community service with are there 
for stuff like felony assault, DUI 
and home invasion, while I am just 
a college student looking to have 
a good time on the weekends,” he 
said.

Ultimately, no one is sure if the 

change in MIP law will result in 
more or fewer arrests, or affect 
student drinking behaviors.

“I don’t think (the new law) will 

lead to more drinking… College 
students are going to drink no 
matter what,” he said.

Lewis pointed out the effect of 

the law will still depend on how 
police choose to enforce it.

“It’s going to take time to see 

what police do with this. The court 
has come up with a new system 
of dealing with them. Folks can 
simply walk in, pay their ticket and 
leave,” Lewis said.

DeGraff studies variations of 
Creole, a group of languages 
that developed during the rise 
of colonialism. Haitian Creole, 
DeGraff says, is one of the 
most stigmatized languages 
in linguistics. The dialect 
has been called primitive, 
undeveloped 
and 
childish 

by linguistic scholars. This 
perception is common among 
people in Haiti.

Growing 
up, 
DeGraff 

attended a private school 
where 
speaking 
Haitian 

Creole was forbidden.

“I spent the formative years 

of my life being told by parents 
who love me, who want the 
best for me, that Haitian 
Creole is broken French,” he 
said. “If you want to succeed, 
you have to be human. You 
have to speak French.”

Despite the stigma, only 

5 percent of Haitians speak 
French fluently and most of 
the nation use Haitian Creole, 
French remains the primary 
language of instruction in 
schools. 
DeGraff 
believes 

this worsens Haiti’s standing 
when it comes to education. 
The country has a 61 percent 

literacy rate for males and 57 
percent for females, which 
is 
currently 
the 
lowest 

literacy rate in the Western 
Hemisphere. 
Being 
taught 

in French rather than the 
much more prevalent Haitian 
Creole 
creates 
another 

obstacle 
Haitian 
students 

must overcome.

“We didn’t go to school 

to learn math. We didn’t go 
to school to learn physics,” 
DeGraff said. “Kids go to learn 
French. It’s a tough situation. 
How do you convince parents 
that kids can learn French as 
a second language, as well 
as math and physics and 
geography?”

After his lecture, DeGraff 

received a commemorative 
plaque for his scholarship and 
work in social justice from 
the Department of Romance 
Languages and Literatures.

LSA sophomore Dominique 

Witten 
said 
anti-Creole 

prejudice reminded her of 
Ebonics, an American dialect 
spoken 
by 
some 
African 

Americans.

“My mom has actively said, 

‘You need to use standard 
American 
language,’ 
with 

the idea that Ebonics itself 
is a lower grade of English,” 
Witten 
said. 
“I’m 
even 

struggling myself –– would 

I want a school where I’m 
taught everything in ebonics? 
I’m not sure of the answer.”

LSA 
junior 
Mitchel 

Dipzinski said he also found 
similarities between attitudes 
toward Haitian Creole and 
Ebonics.

“Ever 
since 
I 
took 
a 

language 
and 
diversity 

course, it has kind of opened 
my eyes to the education 
system in ways that I didn’t 
think about it before, with 
things like Ebonics and how 
that can affect the people 
learning,” he said. “This just 
solidified more of what I 
want to be an activist for, and 
there’s ground being made.”

DeGraff 
and 
the 
MIT-

Haiti Initiative have hosted 
numerous 
workshops 

promoting the use of Haitian 
Creole in government and 
academics. DeGraff hopes to 
expand Haitians’ access to 
Creole-speaking education.

“Children being taught in a 

different language and being 
told that what you speak at 
home is not a valued language 
is a serious issue,” DeGraff 
said. “It’s a challenge to 
human rights when you have 
schools or administrations 
that use another language for 
discourse.”

SPEECH
From Page 1

MIP
From Page 1

LINGUISTICS
From Page 1

Detroit cut from Amazon HQ2 
short list, cites poor transit

REMY FARKAS
Daily Staff Reporter

VIGIL
From Page 1

POET
From Page 1

Read more at MichiganDaily.com