- the “primal scream” Monday at midnight (to release all tension and frustration built on over the semester, Wes students will emerge from their dorms/libraries/rooms/etc. at the stroke of midnight, screaming at the top of their lungs outside for a full minute – it’s really interesting to be around so many people who are ready for finals!)

- music concerts

- dance performances

- comedy troupe shows

- and much, much more!

It’s that time of the year!!!

CHEERS!

H. Rizk ‘08
Senior Interviewer

• The Writing Workshop: This is the epicenter writing resources at Wesleyan. Stop by the office and meet with a writing tutor or peruse sample essays and writing resources. Workshop tutors also hold satellite drop-in sessions throughout campus. Check out the schedule here.
• Writing Course Tutors: Attached to a specific course, these tutors are excellent resources for course and dicipline-specific writing help. Every course tutor is well versed in the specific subject of the course and/or the department. Course tutors are often associated with FYI courses.
• Writing Mentors: Unlike workshop and course tutors, writing mentors work repeatedly with the same students to help them improve their writing skills. Students and their mentors are encouraged to meet as often as possible to work on any writing assignment. This is an excellent way for less experienced writers to work one-on-one with someone who knows the student’s writing intimately and can facilitate growth.

Additionally, the English department offers “The English Essay,” a course on developing your non-fiction essay writing skills. This course is especially helpful for non-native speakers.

For more information, check out the Writing Program’s website.

And for those of you who dream of being published in The Atlantic Monthly or other media outlets, head over to WesMaps and check out the amazing creative writing courses (numbered between 130 and 170) we’re offering this year.

Justin Holzwarth ‘08
Senior Interviewer

A small sampling of some of the best speakers to come to campus in the past four years:

Music and Art:

Dar Williams ‘89 – a folk singer-songwriter

Patti Smith – singer-songwriter, poet, musician, who was one of the women most influential in the birth of punk rock.

Sol LeWitt - minimalist and conceptual artist specializing in wall drawings with exhibitions in museums such as the Museum of Modern Art.

Amiri Baraka - author and poet, former Poet Laureate of New Jersey.

Books and Literature:

Art Spiegelman - comics artist, editor, and Pulitzer-Prize winner for his best selling graphic memoir, Maus.

Daniel Handler/Lemony Snicket ‘92 – author, screenwriter, and musician. Best known for his children’s series A Series of Unfortunate Events. He has played accordion with The Magnetic Fields.

Eric Schlosser - author best known for Fast Food Nation and Reefer Madness.

Journalism and Politics:

Ralph Nader - consumer advocate and presidential candidate.

Seymour Hersh – Pulitzer-Prize winning investigative journalist and author.

Amy Goodman – progressive broadcast journalist and host of the radio program “Democracy Now!”

Madeline Albright - former United States Secretary of State.

Film and Television:

Joss Whedon ‘87 – Academy-Award nominated writer and director famous for his show Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Alexander Payne – Academy- Award winning director and screenwriter best known for Election.

Michael Bay ‘86 – director and producer best known for The Rock, Transformers, Armageddon, and Pearl Harbor.

Paul Weitz ‘88 – director and screenwriter best known for American Pie, American Dreamz, and In Good Company.

Jonathan Demme – Academy- Award winning director, producer, and writer best known for Silence of the Lambs, Stop Making Sense, and Philadelphia.

Martin Scorsese – Academy-Award winning director, producer, and writer best known for Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Goodfellas, Gangs of New York, The Aviator, and The Departed.

and… finally… gracing our campus this coming Thursday …

Robin Williams – Academy-Award winning actor and comedian best known for Mork and Mindy, The Birdcage, Patch Adams, Jack, Aladdin, Mrs. Doubtfire, Good Will Hunting, and Dead Poet’s Society.

Enjoy!

Emily Einhorn ‘08 and Jeff Wong ‘08
Senior Interviewers

The Colloquium Vibe
The colloquia are lively seminars, and the students are as actively engaged as the faculty. With two professors in the room, there is no sense that any question has a right or final answer, but through discussion students and faculty explore ideas and texts together. Because of this format, COL students have a high tolerance for ambiguity, allowing questions to be raised and discussed, but ultimately linger unresolved. The class grows together through these colloquia, and the ability to draw on previous discussions and readings makes the discussions progressively richer through the program. Classes also see the development of a strong class dynamic that makes the group understand each others’ speaking, learning, and thinking styles and habits, and react more effectively to them. In most colloquia, students are in charge of initiating the conversation, with one or two students given responsibility for leading any day’s discussion and providing relevant background (we occasionally assign each other extra reading, but generally just send out some provocative questions to get everyone ready for the discussion).

Because all classes taken in the COL for major credit are ungraded (we use written evaluations instead), there are a lot of opportunities to take risks—why play it safe when you could come up with something brilliant by going out on a limb, or learn a lot from a spectacular failure? This idea is carried through in COL colloquium papers, where there are rarely specific assignments. Instead, students choose individually how they want to formulate the questions, selecting their texts, framework, and the style of the paper. With two professors commenting on your work, it is common to elicit different reactions to the papers, which gives students a fuller understanding of the strengths and weaknesses in their work, and a good sense of how to improve.

The Application Process
Students apply to the College of Letters at the end of their first year. While acceptance to the major is based on a brief application essay and interview, the process is far from competitive. COL students are a self-selecting bunch, and those students who are passionate about their studies will generally do well in the program. The one strict requirement is that students be advanced enough in a European language to study abroad in their sophomore year.

Sophomore Spring Abroad
COL sophomores study abroad in the Spring semester, and after having had a class together, having all these friends spread across Europe can be really helpful when you’re traveling. COL students study mostly in Wesleyan’s programs in Madrid (Spain), Paris (France), Regensburg (Germany), and Bologna (Italy), though other options are available for those interested in studying in Africa, Eastern Europe, Latin America, or an ancient language. During my semester abroad in Madrid, I was with three other COL students on the Vassar/Wesleyan program, but also visited the COL majors in Paris, and accidentally ran into one while we were both on vacation in Florence, waiting in line at the Uffizi. The abroad experience gives COL students confidence and fluency in the language they study, and also provides a good background for continued study in the junior and senior years—when we talked about the connections between Medieval scholasticism and Gothic architecture, I had actually seen the buildings!

The Social Aspect
Because of its unique structure, the COL has a strong social aspect. The majors in each graduating class form a tight bond, with a series of five classes together, a shared study abroad experience with many students from the major, and the intense Spring semester of junior year spent studying for Comprehensive Exams together. In addition to these elements, there are also a series of faculty/student dinners each semester, as well as lectures and social hours that bring students and faculty together for food and intellectual engagement outside of class. In addition to the official departmental functions, it is not uncommon for the majors to have parties of their own, welcoming the new sophomores, welcoming the juniors back from abroad, celebrating the end of junior comps, or just to talk about Sartre some more. My class has also organized COL tea, and recently, has had several film viewings outside of class (after all, if you have to read Beowulf, why not see the Angelina Jolie movie version, too?).

What do you read?
The COL is often thought of as the “dead white men” major, but this is only partially true. COL doesn’t use a fixed canon, but rather the texts are selected anew each semester, so we read works that professors and students continue to find relevant and interesting. We follow Western ideas, but don’t necessarily confine ourselves to geographical limitations. In the Ancient Colloquium, the movement of ideas from the fertile crescent through Northern Africa and eventually up to Europe, as well as out of Greece and Rome and into Asia Minor are particular focuses. This concept of the movement of ideas continues strongly in the 19th and 20th centuries, as we look at colonial and postcolonial reinterpretations of the Western canon, and at how the ancient ideas of the Western world can be adapted and used in new ways. Because COL is not just a series of fixed courses but allows a great deal of flexibility, a lot of students take a particularly modern bent on their studies, using the Classical education they can get in the COL to inform their ideas about gender, race, postcolonial theory and literature, etc.

As for the actual books we read, here are a few sample reading lists from my colloquia:

20th Century Colloquium, “Precedence and the Void,” Fall 2005
Dostoevsky, Yeats, Freud, Engels, Eliot, Kafka, Woolf, Hemingway, Benjamin, Orwell, Borowski, Arendt, Sartre, Beauvoir, Camus, Rubenstein, Fanon, Friedan, Garcia Marquez, and Foucault.

Ancient Colloquium, “Geographies of Identity,” Fall 2006
The Bible (Old and New Testaments), Hesiod, Sophocles, ancient historians Herodotus and Livy, Plato, Aristotle, Virgil, Ovid, and St. Augustine.

If you have questions about the College of Letters, please don’t hesitate to email me at pshill [at] wesleyan [dot] edu—I’d love to tell you more about it!

Peter Hill ‘08
Senior Interviewer

Wrote for your school newspaper? Always wanted to do some investigative journalism? Just interested in covering some concerts or sports games?

Well, here at Wesleyan, the Argus has it all. The Wesleyan Argus is published twice a week during the academic school year, except for exam periods. Sections ranged from your standard News, Sports, Arts, and Features, to our own comic section and joke section. Wespeaks are Wesleyan’s unique version of a letter to the editor. These pieces can be written by anyone in the Wesleyan community and range from the serious ( for example: campus politics, world politics) to the absurd ( for example: a call to action for more dancing on campus).

Unlike some larger schools, freshmen are welcomed and encouraged to write for the Argus as soon as they come to campus. And, with some dedication and commitment, you can become an editor or columnist early on in your Wesleyan career. People who write and work for the Argus have very varied experiences with high school journalism, some people were editors of their school paper while others, like myself, had never written an article before Wesleyan. But, after writing for four semesters, I was co-editor of the Arts section my Junior Year. Once an editor, you serve on the Argus editorial board, which writes an opinion piece each paper about something related to campus politics, world politics, or issues affecting the Wesleyan community.

Also, one way to be clued into what’s happening at Wesleyan before coming to campus is to read the Argus online. New editions are posted on Tuesdays and Fridays, sometimes late in the afternoon. So stay posted, be aware, and know what is going on before you even step foot on campus! It’s a great way to get in on the conversations as soon as you get here and see all that Wesleyan students are involved in and passionate about.

Happy reading!
Emily Einhorn ‘08
Senior Interviewer

Some of these are First Year Initiative (FYI) courses. The FYI is a special breed of Wes-course and is one that we take great pride in. To put it simply, these courses are Wesleyan’s answer to the freshman seminar. We cap the courses at 20 first year students (and only first year students), so you’ll be able to have an intimate class right off the bat. Furthermore, departments assign their cream-of-the-crop faculty to teach these courses, which tend to be outside the standard curriculum. Wesleyan is a core curriculum-free zone, so there isn’t any sort of freshmen writing seminar. Therefore, one of the main goals of FYI courses is to make sure that every student has a proper introduction to writing at the college level. Many FYI courses have their own writing tutors who are there to read students’ work (before it’s handed in) and help them through writing their first college essay. Most students sign-up for at least one FYI, but they are not required. I actually took four, because I found the topics so intriguing.

My favorite was “Culture and Cuisine,” taught by Professor of Government John Finn. It was a sociological look at food, and Professor Finn has been to culinary school, so of course he cooked for us! “Culture and Cuisine” was very reading and writing intensive, but the topic was so interesting that it never felt tedious. And that’s just the nature of FYIs! So head over to WesMaps Search and click the box next to “First Year Initiatives.” A lot of them sound really neat! I wish seniors could take them.

Justin Holzwarth ‘08
Senior Interviewer