Chakkalakal on Stowe House

Letter to the editor: A letter from Gregg Abella '92

I was hoping with a change in administration that some of Bowdoin's PC rhetoric would be tempered with at least a modicum of reality. No such luck.
As an alum with immediate family members of Mexican descent, I was annoyed by the news regarding a “tequila" party held on campus. I was not upset by the alleged events, but by the politically-correct environment that has spun out of control at Bowdoin.
Coddling each student’s particular sensitivities leaves him/her woefully unprepared for the outside world (and the reality of others' first amendment rights). It also (erroneously) gives the impression that one can expect to modify others' behavior by whining about it, and then retreating to a "safe space" free of "micro-aggressions."
Bowdoin students need to be taught tough life lessons. In the real world, people may do or say things that one dislikes. Simply being put off, though, doesn't necessarily provide a legal basis for one to demand certain behavior from others. No PC bubble exists in the real world—in the US, or even Mexico.
Gregg Abella '92
P.S. If sombreros and tequila offend you, don’t attend a soccer match at Estadio Azteca. Your head will explode.

Letter to the editor: On the master plan

To President Rose, Dean Scanlon, the Bowdoin Board of Trustees and the Campus Planning Committee, The Campus Master Plan is an opportunity to dream big about the Bowdoin that we bequeath to future generations. As Campus Planning Committee member Grace Butler ’16 summarized, this is an opportunity in which we consider “our values as a community and how [they] translate into the built environment.” Knowing that continued reliance on fossil fuels will cause enormous economic disruption, social destabilization and ecological catastrophes, we should place sustainability at the heart of all building decisions. We urge you, the leaders of campus development, to make deeper investments in sustainable infrastructure. The College has committed to carbon neutrality by 2020. This commitment is beyond debate, but reaching that goal is very challenging. The surest way to avoid failure is by requiring that every addition to the campus adds no carbon. Such “net-zero” buildings are increasingly common and represent a minimum standard for Bowdoin to adopt in ground-up construction. Bowdoin exists to educate its extraordinary students and serve the Common Good. Bowdoin is much more than a collection of buildings, but net-zero buildings can be superb educational tools. Simply by existing and being overtly carbon-free, these buildings will raise awareness and instruct. If Bowdoin chooses a less sustainable path forward, we’re also educating our students, but with lessons inconsistent with the Offer of the College. We applaud the new Roux Center for the Environment as a site of interdisciplinary collaboration and, in President Rose’s words, “new and enhanced engagement with… stewardship of the environment.” The Roux Center itself is part of that engagement and must reflect the highest standards of energy efficiency and low carbon. LEED Standards do not meet this need. Instead, the Roux Center should be built as the first net-zero facility at Bowdoin and one of the first in New England. We live in a crucial time for both the College and society as a whole. We look to you for leadership.
David Vail, Adams-Catlin Professor of Economics, EmeritusNathaniel Wheelwright, Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Natural Sciences /Chair of the Department of BiologyTricia Welsch, Professor of Cinema StudiesMadeleine Msall, Professor of PhysicsBruce Kohorn, Linnean Professor of Biology and Biochemistry /Director of Biochemistry ProgramMary Hunter, A. LeRoy Greason Professor of MusicHadley Horch, Associate Professor of Biology and Neuroscience and Director of Neuroscience ProgramLaura HenryJohn F. and Dorothy H. Magee Associate Professor of Government/Acting Chair of Russian DepartmentNadia Celis, Associate Professor of Romance Languages and LiteraturesMark Battle, Associate Professor of Physics

Letter to the editor

April 7, 2016

At a moment when colleges and universities across the country, including Bowdoin, are actively stripping away their historical and economic ties to slavery, I want to call our community’s attention to another, perhaps less-talked about but no less significant, tie to our past. Last month, the Network to Freedom, a branch of the National Park Service devoted to preserving and disseminating information about the Underground Railroad, the symbolic name given to the vast route slaves developed to secure their freedom, designated The Stowe House an official stop on the Underground Railroad. The Stowe House, named after Harriet Beecher Stowe who resided at 63 Federal Street from 1850-52, was where she wrote “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” A less known fact about the house is that Stowe harbored fugitive slave John Andrew Jackson in the “waste room” of the house so that he could continue his journey for freedom that began when he fled his home on a plantation in South Carolina.

While the House was designated a national landmark in 1962, to commemorate the novel that supposedly helped to start the Civil War, it took another half century for the nation—and the College—to recognize the house as a site for freedom. With the official recognition from the National Park Service we now have cause to celebrate our history. I urge you to visit the House that will soon be open to all members of the College—and the nation.

Tess Chakkalakal
Associate Professor, Africana Studies and English

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