Curiosity drove roommates Anna Ackerman '12 and Annie Sneed '12 to Zuccotti Park in New York City on October 10. They had heard about Occupy Wall Street, but wanted to experience and understand the leaderless and nonviolent movement against corporate greed firsthand.
"I feel like our generation is pretty apathetic and that I should be involved in something that is questioning the same things I have questions about myself," Sneed said.
Occupy Wall Street, inspired by an article about the Arab Spring in the anti-consumerist Canadian magazine Adbusters, began in New York City on September 17, and has since spread to over 900 cities across the globe.
The protest has been described as a rejection of the social and economic inequality rampant in American society, withthe protestors claiming to represent the 99 percent of non-über-rich Americans.
"I felt like it created this environment that is really rare for young people to be in," Ackerman said of the protests. "It is outside of the classroom, but you are in this setting where it is expected of you to engage in conversations that are really provocative about issues that we do not talk about with just anyone on a day-to-day basis,"
When they arrived back at campus, however, Sneed and Ackerman found that many students did not even know what Occupy Wall Street was.
In an email to the Orient, Professor of Gender and Women's Studies Kristen Ghodsee wrote that she has been encouraging her students to become involved with the movement.
Regretful of her own decision to not go see the Berlin Wall fall in 1989, Ghodsee wrote that she wants her students to witness history.
"No one knows what will happen, but something is happening, and it seems to me that Bowdoin students should look up from their books and Solo cups and pay some attention. The world they are going to inherit might be in the process of being made," Ghodsee wrote.
Wesleyan University junior Maxwell Hellmann has been involved with the movement since this summer, and began attending the protests in New York City in September.
On October 1, Hellmann and four other Wesleyan students were arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge along with 700 other protesters and were then held by police for 12 hours for disorderly conduct.
Since then, Hellmann has helped students organize visits to Zuccotti Park; he estimates that up to 120 Wesleyan students have attended since his arrest.
"Up until now, it seemed like the systems are too big to fight," Hellmann said. "But now that we see this huge solidarity movement all across the globe, it is inspiring enough that the [youth] are actually getting out there in large numbers."
Occupy College, in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, is an offshoot movement for students against high tuition bills and a lack of jobs.
Most recently, it organized a "National Student Solidarity Protest" on October 13 with an estimated participation of 140 campuses in 25 states. No Bowdoin students participated.
Hellmann, along with other students, has started Occupy Wesleyan and has encouraged students to get involved with Occupy New Haven and Occupy Hartford. Both Portland and Boston have Occupy movements.
Sneed and Ackerman both said that they believe Bowdoin students should get involved with the Occupy movement.
"I would say go with an open mind," said Sneed. "It may not be for you; "That is fine, but I think that just having an open mind means going there willing to discuss something with people, no matter who it is. I think that's an important [part of] being an educated and involved citizen."