Humanites Center allies mock administration

Another demonstration against the potential closure of the Humanities Center (HC) took place last Thursday outside Brody Learning Commons.

This demonstration, called “Cards Against the Humanities Center,” was a play on the party game “Cards Against Humanity,” in which players complete fill-in-the-blank statements, typically by inserting words or phrases printed on cards that are considered offensive or inappropriate.

The event drew approximately 25 people, the majority of whom were graduate students from a variety of departments.

Up until this event, the demonstrations have mostly taken the form of sit-ins or demonstrations. Cognitive science graduate student Matthias Lalisse, an organizer, explained why he and other protesters took a different approach on Thursday.

“We really wanted to do something fun that would rally the community of Hopkins — people who might not have heard of the situation with the Humanities Center — and bring them into the conversation and make sure they are aware of what is going on,” Lalisse said. “And obviously, ‘Cards Against the Humanities Center’ was too good of a pun to pass up.”

The completed statements on the cards generally expressed opposition to the closure and the administration.

For instance, “You receive a flood of emails from concerned students. You:__” was completed with “lock them up,” “send a meaningless template response” and “smoke Alexander’s grass,” the latter a reference to the recently formed Alexander Grass Humanities Institute.

Other completed statements included “You say closure, we say no deans no presidents,” and “Public Safety Advisory — Students Thinking For Themselves Incident.”

The winner of the game received a breakfast sandwich purchased from the Daily Grind to highlight what they see as the absurdity of a possible closure.

Graduate student and participant Jacob Kripp interpreted the event as a means of satire.

“It seems for me to be a pretty creative way of articulating what’s happening but also ‘satiring’ the absurdity of it,” Kripp said. “I think that’s kind of the theme here. It’s exposing, through absurdity, how absurd what is happening to the Humanities Center is.”

At the same time the game was being played, the University Board of Trustees had a meeting in the Hodson Trust Seminar Room in Brody, at which University President Ronald J. Daniels was present.

After finishing the game, protesters decided to initiate a confrontation.

However, by the time the protesters arrived, the Board had left the room.

Lalisse felt that their absence was irresponsible on the Board’s part.

“The Board of Trustees has a mandate to evaluate the University’s top administrators, and to look after the long-term health and reputation of the University,” he said. “My first thought, on seeing the room empty, was disappointment that the Board of Trustees had chosen to flee a group of students who wanted to talk to them about an issue that precisely threatens the University’s reputation and, for many of us, threatens our academic lives and careers.”

He pointed out that the administration has consistently shown reluctance to come forward and talk with opponents.

“Every attempt at communication has been met with a form letter and constantly deferred meetings,” he wrote. “It was unfortunate that we had to play cat and mouse with them all day in order to have a conversation — though at least we know now who is the cat.”

While protesters believed that the Board had fled after being notified by Campus Security, Lieutenant Stephen Moffett stated the Board ended their meeting before the protestors decided to confront them.

Though participants were disappointed, visiting graduate student Hannah Wallenfels felt that the event had fulfilled its purpose.

“Of course it was a little unfortunate,” she said. “But it was a good opportunity to keep the focus on what is going on here today and to signal to people that even though it’s the [second to] last week of classes, we are not forgetting what is happening here.”