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The title of Ariel Levy’s book, Female Chauvinist Pigs, seems at first a paradox. In the post-feminist world that we live in, women continue to serve as advocates for their independence and freedoms—right? As Levy astutely points out on her website, ariellevy.net, “just because we are post- doesn't automatically mean we are feminists.” It turns out that “chauvinist” isn’t a gendered term at all; men and women alike have the capacity to act in anti-feminist ways.

Max Kenner, founder and executive director of the Bard Prison Initiative (BPI), spoke in the Red Pit on Thursday evening. His talk, titled “Values of a Liberal Education: Reflections on Ten Years of the Bard Prison Initiative,” addressed not only BPI but also treatment toward incarcerated people on a national level.

Last year, the Career Center launched an initiative for sophomores aimed at assisting them with career exploration and decision making by offering the opportunity to “shadow” (observe) a Hamilton alumnus/a or parent in the workplace for a day or part of a day. HamiltonExplore gives students the chance to see what a professional in a selected field does on a typical workday. By observing the nature of the work first-hand and asking questions of the sponsor, students can acquire insight into a career field and determine the suitability of that career.

On Friday Dec. 2 at 11:30 p.m., student filmmakers gathered for the commencement of the annual 24-Hour Film Festival. In the past, the event has taken place in the spring, but this year, Film Production Guild President Taylor Coe ’13 wanted to see the Festival through before going abroad to Edinburgh for the spring 2012 semester.

Economist Christina Romer gave a talk titled “What Do We Know About Fiscal Policy? Separating Evidence From Ideology” on Nov. 7 as a guest of the Levitt Center.  Romer was chair of the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) in the Obama administration, from Jan. 2009 until Sept. 2010. Currently, she is the Class of 1957 Garff B. Wilson Professor of Economics at the University of California Berkeley.

Every year during the second full week of November, the National Collegiate Emergency Services Foundation recognizes on-campus EMTs for National Collegiate EMS Week. From Nov. 7 through Nov. 13, the College honors Hamilton College Emergency Medical Services (HCEMS) for their unparalleled dedication to the campus community.

Every year, Hamilton’s chapter of Phi Beta Kappa—the oldest academic honor society in the United States—holds a lecture in honor of Richard Couper ’44. The lecture series, which began in 2005, focuses on the library collections and the institutions themselves, as Couper was a major benefactor of Burke Library. This year’s speaker, Kevin Smith ’81, spoke on “The Impact of Copyright on Art and Scholarship in the Digital Age.”

Professor of History at Oxford University Alan Knight gave a presentation titled “The Mexican Revolution: Success or Failure?” on Sept. 29. A scholar on the topic and of Latin American history as a whole, Knight is the author of the award winning two-volume collection, The Mexican Revolution.  

Among the Bicentennial Kickoff celebration weekend activities were more than 30 Bicentennial colleges and tours. Besides several dedicated to the life and times of Alexander Hamilton, these lectures and historical tours covered topics ranging from the Archaeology of Hamilton College to Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility.  Student writers attended the Colleges throughout the weekend to provide a glimpse of the range of topics covered.  Following are synopses of a few that took place on Thursday and Friday, Sept. 22 and 23.

At a liberal arts college, students are encouraged to pursue a diverse variety of subjects, rather than study a single discipline they believe will foster future success. The lack of specialization is often met with the argument, “But what can you do with that?” A panel of Hamilton College alumni assembled on Friday, Sept. 16, to answer this question, showing just what a student can make out of his or her liberal arts education—specifically, a concentration in philosophy. The panel was co-sponsored by the Career Center and the Philosophy Department.