Harpur College of Arts & Sciences : March 29 HOTLINE

Harpur on Broadway!

Harpur College Alumni and Friends Enjoyed "The Producers" Theater Benefit

Harpur College alumni and friends enjoyed a lively reception at Brassiere de Boeuf before seeing one of the first New York City performances of the new Broadway musical, "The Producers" on Friday, March 23, 2001. The event was the first of its kind, thanks to the help of Harpur alumnus Keith Hurd `88 a successful marketing and promotions consultant for Broadway productions. The fun-filled event helped raise money for Harpur College Performing Arts.

"It’s so great to see our alumni connecting at an event like this. The theater party was a wonderful way for everyone to have fun and support a great cause," said Harpur College Dean Peter Mileur.

As they left for the theater, party attendees were delighted to see the author and producer of "The Producers," Mel Brooks and his wife Ann Bancroft dining at the same restaurant. The musical, starring Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick, is based on the Oscar award-winning movie of the same name.

A good time was had by all. Hopes are high that alumni theater parties might become an annual event.

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Harpur College Hosts Renowned Film Professor, Hamid Naficy

Harpur College welcomed Hamid Naficy, Professor of Film and Media Studies from Rice University on March 9, 2001. His workshop, "Cinema of Diaspora and Exile: Representing House, Home, Homeland" focused on films about people exiled from their own homeland for political or religious reasons. Naficy was sponsored by the departments of Philosophy and MENA Studies, the Braudel Center, the Women Studies program, and the Interdisciplinary Perspective on Social Protest Workshop.

Naficy’s newest area of specialization is "accented film," which he explores in his forthcoming book, An Accented Cinema: Diasporic and Exilic Filmmaking (Princeton University Press). According to him, "Accented films are made by displaced Third World émigrés living in the West who despite fundamental differences, share the fact of their deterritorialization. It is this fact that imbues their films with certain common features, among them multilingualism. Many of the films are in two or more languages."

The workshop featured films about houses. "In accented cinema, the house is a significant and signifying place", he explained, "It is a threatened physical place that experiences possession, dispossession, and repossession." He showed clips of three films: "House" by Amos Gitai, a documentary about the reconstruction of a Jerusalem house, "Nostalgia" by Andrei Tarkovsky, about a Russian exile in Italy, yearning for his original home, and "The Adjustor" by Atom Egoyan, about an Armenian family living in Toronto. Each film features a house inhabited by people who were in varying stages of exile and displacement. Naficy concluded, "Exile discourse is popular because mobility is a way of life in this country."

Born in Iran, Hamid Naficy came to the United States in 1964 to attend the University of Southern California. "I was actually taking pre-dentistry courses," he reminisced. "I took a communications course and liked it so much I changed my major." He received a Ph.D. in Film and Television Studies from UCLA. "I was always interested in literature and the arts," he said, "As [children] in our house, we'd produce children’s magazines with cartoons, stories, translations, and political jokes."

Naficy has published extensively on exile and diaspora theory and media on Iranian, Third World, and documentary cinemas. He is currently completing a long-awaited book about Iranian cinema.

"The day after Naficy spoke at Binghamton, the New York Times published an article about Iranian cinema in which Naficy was cited. It's great that Harpur College can bring speakers here with international reputations that can introduce students to areas of specialization that are somewhat outside of mainstream cinema," summarized Dr. Melissa Zinkin, Assistant Professor of Philosophy.

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HARPUR STUDENT SPOTLIGHT
Marnie Stolzenberg '01

Marnie Stolzenberg wrapped up her Harpur College education on Saturday, March 24^th with a recital in Casadesus Recital Hall featuring many of her favorite songs in Italian, Spanish, Hebrew, Ladino (a Spanish dialect), and English. A native of Wantagh, New York, she plans to graduate with a B.A. in Music this May. "I’ve always sung in choruses and have been taking voice since the 6^th grade." Marnie knew right away she wanted to major in music. "I’ve always been singing. It’s my main interest."

She’s been a member of the Harpur Chorale since her Freshman year and sang at least one solo annually. She served as secretary for three years and is currently president. Music department chair Bruce Borton has appointed her treasurer for Binghamton University’s music organizations, the six performing ensembles on campus. She has been a soloist for Temple Concord in Binghamton since 1998. Marnie has studied voice with Professor Mary Burgess and has been a vocalist for the North Hills chapter of Hadassah, a women’s Zionist organization since 1997.

Outside music, Marnie is interested in Jewish culture and religious organizations. She has served as president, secretary, and Kesher committee head for Hillel — The Jewish Student Union. She’s been a member of Kesher, a national organization for Reform Jewish college students since her freshman year. During the summer of 2000 Marnie completed an "Ulpan," six weeks of intensive language study at Hebrew University of Jerusalem on Mt. Scopus.

Marnie’s hard work has paid off, gaining her membership into the Golden Key and Phi Eta Sigma National Honor Societies. In 1999, Who’s Who in American Colleges and Universities listed Marnie among its elite. She plans to work towards a Master’s in Sacred Music and be invested as a Cantor at the School of Sacred Music of Hebrew Union College — Jewish Institute of Religion. She explained, "The school is a seminary, so I’ll be clergy."

Harpur College’s small classes granted Marnie more attention from her professors. "Being a music major, all of my classes have been 30 students or under, which enabled me to develop better relationships with most of my professors." She will fondly remember her voice teacher, Professor Mary Burgess and Professor Lance Sussman, Rabbi at Temple Concord, from whom she’s taken many classes at Harpur.

Marnie will leave Binghamton with many happy memories. "My social life is really good," she exclaimed. She recalls touring the metropolitan Washington D.C. area with the Harpur Chorale during her freshman year. "I’ve really had a good time here," she said, "I’ve learned a lot. College was the best four years of my life. I feel like I’ve grown intellectually and as a person in general."

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Harpur College Alumnus,
Arnold Levine '61,
Receives First Albany
Medical Center Prize

Harpur College alumnus, Arnold J. Levine, Ph.D., president of The Rockefeller University, is the first recipient of the Albany Medical Center Prize in Medicine and Biomedical Research. Levine is recognized for his discovery of the p53 tumor suppressor protein, one of the body's most important defenses against many forms of cancer.

The Albany Medical Center Prize in Medicine and Biomedical Research, which carries a $500,000 award, is the largest annual prize in science or medicine offered in the United States. The prize honors a physician or scientist whose work has led to significant advances in health care and scientific research.

Levine, who is the Robert and Harriet Heilbrunn Professor of Cancer Biology at The Rockefeller University, first isolated the p53 protein in 1979. P53 was originally thought to be an oncogene, or tumor accelerator, but Levine and his colleagues later showed that it is, in fact, a tumor suppressor--it prevents cancer. Other scientists went on to show that a mutation in p53 is the single most common genetic change in human cancers, including those of the breast, lung, colon, prostate, bladder and cervix.

Levine came to Rockefeller from Princeton University, where he was the Harry C. Wiess Professor of Life Sciences. Between 1984 and 1996, he presided over a major expansion of Princeton’s life sciences programs as chairman of the Department of Molecular Biology. Levine helped shape U.S. science priorities as chairman of an influential 1996 review panel on federal AIDS research funding. He also chairs the National Cancer Advisory Board, which advises the National Academy of Sciences and its Institute of Medicine on cancer policy.

Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., Levine received a B.A. in Biology from Harpur College in 1961 and a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1966. Levine is the author of the book Viruses (Scientific American Library, 1992).

Levine graciously hosted the kick-off event for The Campaign for Binghamton University in November 1999 on the campus of The Rockefeller University. It was a showcase event attended by numerous alumni.

Harpur College Sponsors Romano Lecture

The Mario'69 and Antoinette Romano Lecture Series was endowed in 1984 to sponsor lectures given by noted speakers in history, economics, art history, and medicine. At the invitation of the Art History Department this year’s guest speaker will be Professor Phyllis Pray Bober presenting The Culinary Arts of Ancient Rome. The lecture will be held on April 5th at 5:00 p.m. in the Presidents Reception Room in the Anderson Center. Campus and community members are invited to attend.

Phyllis Pray Bober, distinguished scholar of ancient and Renaissance art and Professor Emerita of Bryn Mawr College, is the author of "Renaissance Artists and Antique Sculpture: A Handbook of Sources" (Oxford University Press, 1986) and "A Life of Learning" (American Council of Learned Societies, 1995). At Bryn Mawr, where she taught art history and classical archaeology, she also served as Dean of the Graduate School of Art and Sciences for seven years before her retirement in 1991. Since the early 1990's, Professor Bober has increasingly turned her attention to the study of the history of food and the culinary arts. Her book, "Art, Culture and Cuisine: Ancient and Medieval Gastronomy," which examines cooking through the dual lens of archaeology and art history, was published by the University of Chicago Press in 1999. In this ground-breaking work, she shows cuisine and dining to have been at the heart of the cultural, religious and social activities that have shaped Western sensibilities. Her forthcoming book, "Art, Culture, and Cuisine," will be published in June 2001.

Professor Bober has also taught at Wellesley, Cornell, New York University (NYU), and MIT. Since 1997 alone, she has been Appleton Eminent Scholar in the Arts at Florida State University in Tallahassee; Professor-in-Residence at the American Academy in Rome; and Kennedy Professor of the Renaissance at Smith College. In May of this year, Bowdoin College awarded her the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Humane Letters.

Harpur College is proud to have this kind of support from alumni. Events such as this allow us to showcase interesting and renowned speakers on a variety of topics of interest to the campus and the community at large.

Share A Memory On-Line

Be sure to visit the Harpur College Memory Book - and leave your mark. Share a favorite memory of your Harpur experience, whether as a student or as a faculty or staff member. Or, maybe you just want to wish Harpur a happy Anniversary. Memories will be listed and updated on a regular basis. Put those thinking caps on and tell us about your favorite Harpur moment.

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Shop Harpur Online!

Announcing a new way for you to buy Harpur merchandise. Shop the campus bookstore from the comfort of your PC or Mac. Want to pick up a copy of the new Harpur history book The Cornerstone? Visit...
Binghamton University Harpur College Shopping Online

Check out the Harpur mugs, the cool notecards and bumper stickers.