A Day at the Zoo

Deis fashion relief after European adventure

Returning from a semester in Spain, I admit, I feel a little displaced, especially when it comes to fashion. After all, where are the t-shirts with the scandalously deep V’s or the tight jeans with a bedazzled skull on the pocket? And then there’s women’s fashion. For anyone who has not had the pleasure of […]

A meditation on love and friendship

My cousin got married last weekend, so I made the trek from Boston to Chicago to be present on his special day. The wedding was beautiful and, of course, I cried. I didn’t think I would, but as the music started and my cousin walked down the aisle to await his beloved, like a Pavlovian […]

Remaking Woodstock not such a buzz kill

Once upon a time there was a music festival called Woodstock. 500,000 people came, grooved, and partied in the mud. Many were sick, tired, hungry, and, dare I say it, annoyed at what might have fairly been deemed a disaster. For some the experience was life changing. Elliot Tiber was one of them. “Taking Woodstock,” […]

Let’s get personal (essays, that is)

“Truth is stranger than fiction,” the old saying goes. If you read a lot of tabloids or watch TMZ then you’d probably agree. Even in the literary realm, a striking account of real events can make even the tallest of tales seem rather unextraordinary. What’s more remarkable is if the striking account is told first-hand, […]

A great band arises from the ashes of Strokes-mania

I like deep meaningful music about the alienation of the modern world as much as the next Radiohead fan, but sometimes postmodern angst can’t exactly be described as fun. But that’s certainly not true of French band Phoenix’s fourth and latest album, “Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix.” There’s a certain French arrogance in cribbing Mozart for an […]

Aestheticism

Put me out of my insanity. As a victim to my vanity, the convoluting constricts of my mind are plain to see. These suffocating sinews emerge from a noxious venue; ever-present ever-poison in my quaint reality. Let me imitate this poison with almost-unfaulted poise, and I will show you how I counterfeit the images I […]

Life in a broken home

Beit Hanina, Ashkaria village, July 13th 2009, 9.30 am. A woman, wearing a navy blue djelaba, and a purple headscarf, extends her hands to the sky crying “Hasbiallah aleikum, al rahman, al rahim.” Photographers, Palestinian and Western European, tell her to lean this or that way, to speak louder, to look at the sky… She […]

Ask the Queer Resource Center!

Do you have questions about gender, sexuality, diversity, or acceptance? Would you like anonymous advice from friendly peer counselors? Check out the Queer Resource Center, the educational branch of Triskelion, the Brandeis LGBTQIA (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer/questioning, intersex, asexual/ally) group. We provide free, confidential peer counseling to people of all identities in Shapiro Campus […]

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