By Somaye Dehban (’07)

- There are some people in Iran that eat with their hands!

- Excuse me?! We use a spoon and fork when we eat. We don’t use a knife but we don’t eat with our hands either!

It was among the first of many times that I felt insulted in my class by the way the teacher had referred to my country and culture, somewhere in 2006. It was an anthropology class, where you are supposed to learn about “people” and their “culture”, and I did not want my classmates to think that I was from a culture where eating with your hands is the norm; I didn’t want them to think that I didn’t know how to eat like them, the civilized ones! Nobody in my family eats with their hands; it was actually quite looked-down upon and we were forbidden to use our hands, as it was not correct table manner. We were even clearly instructed on how to hold a spoon and fork: not holding the handle of the fork or spoon with a clenched fist –as it gives the impression that you are ‘hungry’ and therefore poor– but to use our fingers to hold the handle and rest the end of the handle on the part of the hand between our thumb and index finger –cause it would indicate that you are always well-fed and therefore rich– and even sometimes holding up your pinky a little bit was a sign of good table manners. We hardly ever used a knife at the table since the type of food we ate never needed to be cut at the table. But that is no reason to think we eat with our hands, right?

So why did she say that in Iran some people eat with their hands? I can’t recall how the conversation ended or even the exact context this example was presented in, but I do remember that it was about eating habits and rituals. Nonetheless, this was not the ritual I grew up with and this was not my habit. But how can I distinguish myself from this example? The example that puts me in the category of ‘those who eat with their hands’. Would my classmates start watching me when I am eating in the Dining Hall?
And why would that matter? Why was being categorized as “someone who eats with her hands” such a big deal, affecting my trust towards my teacher and making me worry about my classmates watching me eat? Does it have to do with the hierarchy of cultures, which culture ranks higher or is the better culture? The culture of the ones being “observed” versus the culture of the ones “observing”?

And of course this was not what I thought at the moment my teacher said that there are some people in Iran who eat with their hands, but this was how I felt when my teacher gave that example. I felt that the culture of the “observer” is the higher and better culture, and at that moment I knew that I was not part of the “observer” group; I was part of the “observed” in this context. I read the text books that were written from a “we” perspective, but who is “we”? We, the West. And where was I from? The ‘other’ side. And when they present an example of “the other”, it wouldn’t be about them. It would be about me, the observed.

I still don’t use knives that often, and I prefer a spoon over a fork. But now I can agree with my teacher that there are some people in Iran who eat with their hands, and it is indeed a ritual and habit. Actually, I do recall my grandmother, most of the time, eating with her hands and saying: “the food tastes different [better] when you eat with your hands”, but now I am not offended or ashamed of admitting it. The context is different now, and my understanding of the culture is too. I am still from the other side, but I am not solely the observed one. I observe ‘me’ and I observe ‘you’. Not that this necessarily gives any (dis)advantageous position to either of us.

By Somaye Dehban (’07)

- Did you take it off since you came here?

- No, I also did not wear it there…but in the streets you have to, it’s the law!

- But in the picture you sent us with your application you are wearing a headscarf!

- Yes, not all the photo studios accept taking unveiled pictures…

I’m not sure if it was her accent, her chair, or her clothes that instantly made me attracted to her. I don’t know if her approach was comfortable that made me feel at ease or the easiness of her approach that made me feel comfortable. In any case, it was not what I expected: the college teacher in baggy trousers and a loose blouse was not what I had seen in “college movies”. No suit, no tight skirt, no make-up, no antique bookshelf stacked with thick books, nothing resembled the image I had in mind for my first appointment with my tutor.
It was January 2005, just couple of days after our arrival to the Netherlands, maybe 10, since it was after introduction week that I had my first appointment with Rosemary. It was a habit that we went everywhere together, Bamshad and I entered the first room on the right side of the right corridor of College Hall on the first floor (or, by our counting, the second floor). A greeting was extended to both of us and we were introduced to Floris, who happened to be my Philosophy teacher.

Did she notice that I was letting my eyes wander around her room rather than listening to her? When you’re not a native speaker of a language you cannot rely on your “passive” listening; a mistake I made a couple of times at the beginning of my college days. On top of that she had an accent and all I could hear was a melody instead of words. All the English I had ever heard were the accents of non-American movie stars like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jackie Chan, Jean-Claude van Damme, and the ones whose English was not very comprehendible like Sylvester Stallone. I had heard Chris de Burgh, but his accent sounded anything but British. She asked whether we had a room together. I got that part, shook my head and closed my mouth that I did not realize had been open. I’m not sure whether she had a longer chat with Bamshad or with me.

I saw my file on her desk, with my picture stapled to the top left corner. It was one of those passport photos that you look good on – or at least somewhat – and then use for all places that need one: my newly minted national ID card, my other ID card, my driver’s license, and I guess a couple of other things. When I sent my application for UCU, I used the same photo (I liked it after all). I’m not sure if I even gave it a second thought that this photo might give a wrong impression of me to those who were going to process my application. But should that even matter?

Some questions were hardly ever asked when I was growing up, or were never asked directly. When my cousin took off her chador, all the family members knew about it, but nobody asked her anything about it.  Not that they approved of the act – quite the contrary – but they did not want to confront her or themselves with the change.

But here I was asked and confronted directly: did I take of my veil when I came here? No and Yes. No, because I did not wear it back there, and yes, because I had to wear it back there. I wish this was the whole story I could tell and have it be over with, but there are so many more layers to being unveiled.

By Somaye Dehban (’07)

- Is that you, Somaye?

- Yes! Of course!!

- You look…look different?

- Well, yeah! It’s Moulin Rouge night!

When you are an alien to a group or community and try to be part of them and blend in, you never know when you have crossed the line for trying too hard! There is always this background noise asking you: “What the heck are you doing?!” and you want to be able to answer the question every single time it’s asked in great detail and with satisfactory answers. The noise is louder when you are crossing the values that you grew up with, the values that you actually believed in and perhaps still believe in. Yet, you also do not want to be an outsider, not anymore – and probably at that time you do not know exactly why you do not want that. And you try. You try hard. The harder you try, the louder the background noise gets.

And there is a moment that you do not know whether it’s that noise that’s telling you that you have crossed the line or if you have actually crossed the line of trying too hard and now the “others” are telling you that you have crossed the line, the others that you are trying to be one of; the others that you are trying to blend in with. That moment is a fucked up, confusing moment! A moment like the Moulin Rouge night moment!

It’s somewhere in 2006 when I’ve been a chief at the bar for a few months; I have a second-patrol-shift at the entrance for Moulin Rouge night. I had been going through my clothes to find something appropriate for the night; but what is appropriate for Moulin Rouge night? The color code was Black and Red and the only thing I had seen from Moulin Rouge was that “Lady Marmalade” video by Pink and Missy Eliott and some other singers whose names I did not know at the time. The uncomfortable feeling I had for a while after watching that clip was thinking that I had committed a sin just by watching those women. Lingerie, full-color lipstick, fishnet-stockings and skin – showing off skin!

That’s all you have to play with to dress up properly for a Moulin Rouge night at the bar, when you want to be one of them. The first I do not have, the second I do not dare to put on, the third was available but never used, and the last one makes the background noise scream in my ear!

The noise goes back to a point it made before, a couple of months earlier, when I signed up to be a bartender: “If you hadn’t signed up, you wouldn’t have to go now!” and it made sense. “But for how long do you want to back off?” I asked the noise and there was only silence.

I step out of the door of the apartment on the Kroumhoutweg in the hope of being invisible till I get to the bar and hopefully the rest of the evening. Helaas, you are spotted in that “costume” immediately – the Red!

You want to play it “cool” and pretend that you “own” the way you look and that it’s not a hopeless attempt just to look like them. The first one just looks at you twice, but the next one asks:

- Is that you, Somaye?

- Yes! Of course!!

- You look…look different?

- Well, yeah! It’s Moulin Rouge night!

by Annelien van der Mark (‘06)

We begin life with sentiments for a futuristic utopia and, should we age till old, we end it romancing nostalgia. But the latter is a privilege, and one not it my grandfather’s fate. Affected by Alzheimer’s disease, my grandfather lives between a moment already past and an impossible future. The illusion left burns on his face.

I can’t comprehend how my grandfather inhabits and encounters his unknowable history and unnamable material reality. My photographs of him resemble, but fail to restore him. Here, between that which is seen and that which is said, the shock of mortality dissipates under the mercy of finitude.

On a motorboat to Samalona Island to collect sand. Taken in July 1948.

With his daughter and granddaughter in December 2011 in Goes, the Netherlands, at a care facility for people with dementia.

Maria Șalaru (‘11) is doing a MSc in Visual Anthropology at the University of Oxford. You can find more of her photography at: http://mariasalaru.carbonmade.com

The first holder of the Mondriaan Chair, Prof. Dr. Orlanda Lie, reminisces about her student days and contrasts them with her recent Visiting Professorship at UCLA.

In the Fall Quarter of 2011, I had the honor of being the first holder of the Utrecht-Mondriaan Chair in Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Utrecht University initiated this Visiting Professorship to foster the collaboration and exchanges between the two universities. My core activity as Chair holder was to teach two courses and give a public lecture. In consultation with my host department (History), I offered a course on the Cultural History of Magic and Science, and one on Women’s Medicine in the Middle Ages. The topic of my public lecture was Sarah’s Menopause: A Clerical View on Women’s Physiology.

What was it like to be teaching at UCLA?

A few preliminary remarks may be helpful in this context. I was born and raised in Suriname; my parents are Hakka Chinese immigrants from Guangdong Province. When I finished high school, I was accepted at UC Berkeley, where I registered as a student in the College of Letters and Science, from 1967 to 1976. In this period I pursued a BA (double major German and Spanish), MA (German) and PhD (German and Medieval Studies). While working on my dissertation (a comparative study of French, German and Dutch medieval Arthurian romances), I found my way to Utrecht, was offered a job in the Dutch department and have lived in the Netherlands ever since. I joined the UCU faculty in 2004.

Returning to teach at an institution where I was a student more than forty years ago turned out to be a very special experience. Although UCLA is not my alma mater, it is part of the University of California system and, as such, it shares with Berkeley a similar teaching concept to my own student days: a Liberal Arts educational philosophy. As a faculty member of the History department, I was working with colleagues and students who shared my affinity with the broad-based educational system that has also been characteristic of our own UCU Liberal Arts & Sciences context. All these aspects, in combination with the unsurpassed Californian spirit of friendliness and hospitality, made my stay at UCLA both personally and professionally enriching. Not only could I take a look behind the scenes and experience firsthand what it was like to teach at another institution and compare notes, I could also take the time to reflect, to look back and benefit from the insights that I had acquired over the course of my professional career.

In revisiting my own academic journey, I realized how decisive and formative my years as a student were. When I started as a first-year student at Berkeley in 1967, Lyndon Johnson was nearing the end of his presidency and Richard Nixon was already gearing up to succeed him. America was deeply divided by the war in Vietnam. The Berkeley campus was the center of the anti-Vietnam War demonstrations and the hotbed of the student revolution. Telegraph Avenue formed the backdrop for people with flowers in their hair (hippies) and monks in flowing orange robes, who were dancing and chanting Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna, Krishna, Hare, Hare. On my way to class, I would pass the campus police, standing tall behind masks and shining shields, and I stayed as far away as possible from the battle grounds: police charging into rock-throwing demonstrators, pillars of smoke and the pungent smell of tear gas. There were peaceful sit-ins and noon rallies on the steps of Sproul Hall, with passionate speakers such as Mario Savio, Marshall McLuhan and Jerry Rubin. Unforgettable performances by Joan Baez (‘We shall overcome’), Judy Collins, Simon and Garfunkel, and Bob Dylan. In my second year, Martin Luther King was killed, and two months later, Robert Kennedy. In my third year, American troops invaded Cambodia and four students were killed by the Ohio National Guard during an anti-Vietnam War demonstration at Kent State University. The Watergate Affair that forced Richard Nixon to resign as president unfolded when I was a graduate student. Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, the two Washington Post reporters who investigated and uncovered the dirty political tricks behind this scandal, were our heroes.

Another milestone was my first literature course (Introduction to German Literature). The professor wore bell-bottom pants, had a ruddy complexion, long hair, and granny glasses. He always began his class by reading the headlines in the daily news about the war in Vietnam and the student demonstrations. One day, one of my fellow students raised his hand and said: “Professor, what is the sense of taking your class, reading poems by Goethe and novels by Thomas Mann and Hermann Hesse, while at this very same moment, hundreds of people are being killed in Vietnam?” The ensuing discussion taught me a few lessons that have stayed with me until this very day. According to the professor, being a liberal arts student at Berkeley, one of the top universities in the world, was not only a privilege, but also a moral responsibility. As students, we owed it to ourselves, and to the world, to develop not only our intellectual abilities, but also our moral values. The pursuit of knowledge could never be an end in itself. Academics have a moral obligation to use their knowledge and insights in service of a better world. It did not matter what major or which disciplines we would study, our education at Berkeley would give us the academic tools to become critical thinkers and socially engaged citizens. As a specialist of literary studies, his task was to teach us how to read, analyze and interpret poems and novels, and how to communicate one’s findings to others. The mastery of all these reading and writing skills would be part of our academic toolkit for responsible and critical citizenship. With these academic skills we could analyze new developments and make meaningful contributions to the current political debates, like the Vietnam War.

The US political climate of 2011 is marked by the economic crisis. During my stay at UCLA, the student demonstrations that made the news were part of the Occupy movement. Statewide, students rallied against the increase of tuition and corruption in banking. At UC Berkeley, student demonstrators clashed with the campus police in Sproul Plaza. At UCLA, students and workers blocked traffic at the intersection of Wilshire and Westwood Boulevard to voice their concern about the growing cost of higher education and budget cuts in public services. Most media attention went to the Occupy protest at UC Davis. The video of a campus police officer who deliberately pepper-sprayed sitting protesters went viral. I also discovered that the use of pepper spray was not limited to riot police. On Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving (generally, the last Friday in November) and the opening of the Christmas shopping season, pepper spray was in the news again. On this particular Friday, retail stores lure customers by offering substantial discounts on their products. Some stores already opened their doors after midnight. Bargain hunters slept in tents in front of the stores or in the parking lots. The morning news on Black Friday opened with the story of a woman who had used pepper spray on fellow shoppers to make sure she would get to the merchandise (electronics) before them.

When I discussed the Occupy movement with my students, their primary focus was on the rising cost of tuition for their college education. California students at UCLA pay about $31.000 per year; non-California students have to reckon with $50.000 per year. The majority of the students have to borrow money and/or combine study with work. The only way to pay back these loans as quickly as possible is to earn a lot of money after graduation. This means that students who want to qualify for prestigious graduate schools or jobs, must distinguish themselves by getting outstanding grades. Especially descendants of immigrant parents study under a lot of pressure. They feel a great sense of duty and want to live up to their parents’ expectations. Getting straight A’s is the least they can do to show their gratitude.

The extraordinary emphasis on grades was a recurring theme during office hours. For some students, getting anything lower than an A is not only a sign of personal failure, but also shameful for the family. The drive to work hard and the ambition to be successful were salient characteristics of the majority of students I encountered. My drive as a teacher was to find a format for my classes that would challenge them intellectually, provide an opportunity to explore unknown territories, and discover new things about themselves. In other words: How can I share with them the joy of learning, get them out of their comfort zone and, in the process, make them forget the pressure of grades?

I found the answer after a visit to the beautifully renovated Charles E. Young Research Library. The UCLA Library System, with more than 8 million volumes, is one of the top research libraries of America. The collection is spread over several libraries, archives and research centers on and off campus. The Special Collections Department of the Young Research Library has an interesting range of rare books and manuscripts. Standing face to face with a piece of parchment, smelling its oldness, and knowing that centuries ago someone like me was reading this very same passage, is a feeling that I find deeply satisfying. While browsing through the contents of two boxes at the Special Collections Department, labeled ‘loose leaves’, I was thrilled to find that one of the manuscript fragments had preserved an episode from La Mort le Roi Artu (The Death of King Arthur), the subject of my PhD dissertation. If only I could share these treasures with my students! And that was the moment when the idea occurred to me to use these original medieval sources as a time machine that would catapult the students back to the Middle Ages: operation Ad Fontes (back to the sources). I discussed my ideas with the Library staff and everyone got very excited about the project. To protect the manuscripts, we agreed on making high quality digital scans available to the students and organizing a small exhibition of the original sources at the end of the project.

Organizing the project was both enervating and challenging.  To complement the other (individual) assignments of the course (open book exam 30%, final essay 30%), I decided to use the format of a group assignment, with a group grade (30%). The remaining 10% was for ‘participation’, and was based on individual log books that students kept during this project.  I randomly divided the class in 10 groups of 5 students. Each group was assigned a medieval source that was connected in one way or the other to the themes of the course: world view, magic and witchcraft, magic and (medical) science. During an intense five-week period, students got their first taste of historical research and experienced firsthand the frustrations and pleasures of working with sources that are more than 700 years old¹. At the final event, each group proudly presented their findings in the elegant setting of the Library Conference Room, surrounded by the original manuscripts. It was an unforgettable and rewarding experience for all of us.

Prof. Dr. Orlanda Lie holds a PhD in German and Medieval Studies from the University of Berkeley and is a professor of Medieval Culture at Utrecht University and Head of the Humanities Department at University College Utrecht.

¹ Since the majority of the students were not trained in deciphering medieval script and did not read Latin or French, they were guided by the information from the catalogue description by M. Ferrari & R.H. Rouse (Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts at the University of California, Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1991, pp. 92-144). The ten fragments that were selected for this assignment are the following: Aristotle (De somno), Aristotle (De physica), Aristotle (De anima), Aristotle (De metaphysica), Macrobius (Saturnalia), Burchard of Worms (Decretum), Isaac Israeli, (Liber urinarum; Latin translation: Constantine the African), Thomas Aquinas (Summa theologiae), anonymous (Treatise on the Liberal Arts), anonymous (La Mort le Roi Artu). With special
thanks to Octavio Olvera, Visual Arts Collection Specialist (Department of Special Collections).

Nina Brands tells of her passion for dressing up as a Napoleonic soldier amidst men who would rather she didn’t.

Voluntarily spending several weekends a year sleeping on sheepskins and hay in a canvas tent, cooking your meals on a campfire in between fighting battles on a muddy field might not sound like your ideal way to pass the time. However, historical re-enactments are becoming increasingly popular and more people, including myself, do choose to spend their free time recreating life as it may have been in the past. A large part of this is focused on life in the military, ranging from a Roman legion to a U.S. platoon in Vietnam. While some people are quick to dismiss this as simply a bunch of grown-ups playing soldiers, there is much more to it.

Historical re-enactment can perhaps best be described as an attempt to recreate a certain historical period as accurately as possible. While re-enacting, it is strictly forbidden to use any objects or materials that would not have been available in the period you are trying to recreate. You will not find a medieval trader dealing in coffee and tea or a Napoleonic soldier brandishing an AK-47.  This is why re-enacting entails more than just the weekends spent on the battlefield. Most re-enactors spend a lot of time researching the time period they aim to recreate. As many items and pieces of clothing needed for an accurate portrayal of, for instance, a 17th century Dutch pikeman are far from readily available, most of the clothing and uniforms worn by re-enactors are homemade.

This is not as easy as it sounds. For instance, try finding buttons that belonged on the uniform of a specific Confederate regiment from the American Civil War era. These kinds of items are therefore often homemade as well. Not only do re-enactors gain a lot of theoretical knowledge, they often gain practical knowledge in the form of practicing a certain skill. Many of these abilities, like spinning, smithing, or even cooking historical dishes, are partially preserved through historical re-enactment.

This is just one of the reasons historical re-enactment can be seen as more than grown-ups dressing up. As a re-enactor, you get to visit historical sites that might not normally be open to the public, you meet many people who share your interest in history, and you get to share your passion with an audience you might not otherwise reach. You get a glimpse of what life must have been like for a French soldier serving under Napoleon when you’re trudging through a muddy field wearing your heavy woollen uniform, uncomfortable spiked shoes and carrying a musket that weighs 5 kilos. Then again, you’re lucky you even have shoes, you had a proper breakfast and a reasonable night’s sleep inside a tent; luxuries the average soldier could only have dreamed of.

Of course, this is only valid for those actively participating in the re-enactments, not those viewing it. However, visitors to re-enactment events do gain insight into a certain period as well. By simply asking questions, seeing how food is prepared on a campfire or viewing the tents used to sleep in, they get an understanding of how different life was in the past. It is a truly hands-on experience, as visitors are often allowed to sample some food, touch the uniforms to feel how heavy the fabric is or get an explanation of the steps involved in readying a musket for firing. Re-enactors transfer their knowledge and insight through these interactions with the public, making history very accessible. This is what makes re-enactment a valuable contribution to the more traditional ways of teaching and studying history.

However, try as they might, re-enactors will never actually be able to fully recreate all the circumstances and hardships that came with living in the past. Like historians, re-enactors face boundaries that cannot simply be put aside. For instance, a lack of historical sources may mean a recreated regiment can never be quite sure their uniforms are exactly the same as those worn by soldiers serving the regiment in the past. Moreover, certain aspects cannot be recreated for the sake of hygiene and safety. Most re-enactment units try to compensate for these unavoidable modern influences (think: the use of modern toilets instead of digging a ditch and food brought from home rather than scavenged in some nearby village) by striving for a representation that is as accurate as possible in every other way. This is of course very commendable, though certain problems do arise; some of which I have personally encountered.

You would think that any re-enactment unit would be more than happy with a young, new recruit. Taking myself as an example, I appear to fit the description of the average soldier: I’m in my early twenties (I was 19 when I joined my group) and I’m of average build and height. There is, however, one small problem: I’m also a woman. This would not necessarily be a problem if I was willing to spend my weekends re-enacting a camp follower, doing dishes, cooking and selling small trinkets. While many women are content in this role, I am far more interested in the military side of things. I want to wear the uniform, carry arms and engage in the (simulated) battles.

This is a problem because most re-enactment units do not allow women in their ranks. Unless you’re talking about a select few groups recreating units that explicitly allowed women in the ranks, for instance Second World War-era Soviet snipers, you will have a hard time convincing a group to allow you to serve in a male role. This might seem obvious, seeing as these groups put a lot of effort into being as historically accurate as possible. Before World War II, women were generally not allowed to join the armed forces serving in the field. Women were sometimes allowed to perform auxiliary functions but were rarely allowed on the actual battlefield. So it does not seem too strange that re-enactment units would not allow this either.

And indeed, on the surface, these groups seem to have a very valid point. Why sacrifice such an integral part of your authenticity and historical accuracy for the sake of gender equality?  The problem is that authenticity and historical accuracy are sacrificed to allow men in the ranks all the time. If a re-enactment group truly cared for authenticity in the form of bodily appearance, they should, for instance, not allow overweight men in the ranks. Most common soldiers would have struggled to find enough food to make it through the day, let alone finding enough to become overweight. This privilege was usually reserved for officers.  Any grown men portraying a common soldier could thus be said to not be allowed to weigh over 70 kilos. The same goes for age restrictions; most foot soldiers would not live or serve as foot soldiers past the age of thirty, either because people in general, let alone soldiers, simply died younger or because those older surviving soldiers would get promoted to a higher rank. Having men over the age of thirty portray a common soldier should then also not be allowed.

If you would tell a potential male recruit he’d have to go on a diet because he doesn’t adhere to the historical standards concerning the average soldier’s body, he would probably think you’d gone insane. Yet this is the exact same argument potential female recruits get when asked why they can’t portray a male role. Moreover, if groups would only allow members to serve as soldiers until they are thirty years old, most groups would struggle to even exist. It appears that even though age, weight and build are not important standards to adhere to when it comes to historical accuracy, gender is.

And this cannot simply be excused by saying women did not serve in the ranks in a certain era, because, most likely, neither did 50-year old overweight men. Many re-enactors might still believe they’re protecting their authenticity by not allowing women in the ranks, yet it seems something else is at play, namely that historical re-enactment is a male-dominated hobby. The ratio of men to women is probably around ten to one. Most women in re-enactment are wives, daughters, friends or colleagues of a male re-enactor and it is very rare for a woman without any existing connection to a re-enactor to join a group. This is not just because it is simply less likely for women to somehow come in contact with re-enactment, but also because their participation seems to be discouraged. Women are rarely seen on websites run by re-enactment groups, unless it’s in a special female unit or category.

Perhaps the underlying principle is very simple: “girls” play house, while “boys” play soldiers and fight. Whenever a woman wants to join the ranks, the traditional gender roles are mixed up and the supposed masculinity of the hobby is undermined. No re-enactor would probably admit that this is the reason for not allowing women in male roles, though it seems likely that this is the real reason. Most re-enactors probably do not consciously exclude women, yet they do subconsciously seem to view women as a threat to their hobby.

Putting the gender trouble aside, I would heartily recommend everyone to come and have a look at a re-enactment event if you ever get a chance. And be sure to check if you can actually tell if there are women present in the ranks when you see units moving on the battlefield; my bet is you won’t even be able to tell us apart from our male counterparts.

Nina Brands (‘10) has an MA in Cultural History, works as a museum employee and volunteers at the local archives in Oss. In her free time she is a member of a historical re-enactment society aiming to recreate a French Napoleonic infantry regiment as accurately as possible.

Eelke Kraak goes overboard on honey wine and finds himself in the middle of a true spy thriller, facing off against his nemesis’ henchmen and -women.

On the 2nd of April 2011, Prime Minister of Ethiopia Meles Zenawi made a remarkable announcement at a press conference that was convened not in the capital Addis Ababa, but in the unremarkable town of Guba 700 kilometres away. “Not far from this place”, he told the gathering, “Ethiopia just started construction on the largest dam of the Nile river, or of any African river for that matter.” The dam, which was later re-branded the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, would stand 145 metres tall, submerge an area twice that of the country’s largest lake, and the hydropower station below the dam would quadruple Ethiopia’s energy production.

The location of the dam on the Nile river makes the plan a divisive venture. This arm of the Nile flows from Ethiopia through Sudan to Egypt, who both rely on the water supply for their irrigated agriculture. Egypt in particular, has always feared that Ethiopia would interfere with the source of its water. Its former president, Anwar Sadat, once even stated that his country was prepared to go to war over water. Finding out more about this project in order to make sense of the geopolitics, seems more the task of a spy than of a humble PhD student.

Only three days before Zenawi’s announcement, I had arrived in Addis Ababa for a conference on hydropower in Africa, sponsored by Sinohydro, a Chinese state-owned company that prides itself as being the largest dam-builder in world. The conference and the ensuing five weeks of fieldwork were to provide me with useful data for the empirical chapters of my PhD. My work on the politics of transboundary rivers and dams brought me to Central Asia previously, and now I found myself in Ethiopia studying the Nile amid the pomp and circumstance of a new dam.

Learning about dams.

I actually found out about the new dam a day before Zenawi’s speech. As research goes, I was at a place not unlike our college bar, with the Ethiopian minister of water and the CEO of the country’s power utility (and perhaps a hundred other conference attendees) to celebrate the successful completion of the conference. We had some injera with tibs and kitfo¹, while I was placed in a far corner among the interns, assistants and other minions.

Under the influence of more than a glass of honey wine I dared to introduce myself to these two dignitaries. Although they accepted my business card seemingly disinterested, during our brief conversation they slipped the big news of the next day, probably also under the influence of more than a glass of honey wine. More importantly, they introduced me to high-profile policy-makers in the ministry from whom I learned a great deal about the logic of this dam and its implications.

The reader will be excused for thinking that the timing of my trip and the gathering of this information was based on coincidence and luck, but the methodology section of my thesis speaks of research skills instead. As it often goes, listening to the town’s gossip is more fruitful than formal interviews and long policy documents.

The new dam is part of a long and turbulent history of water management in the Nile, of which Moses managing the seven meagre years in biblical times is perhaps the earliest example. The river has a notoriously high seasonal and inter-annual variability which makes agriculture quite the challenge. Reservoirs that are created by dams provide storage that is theoretically the answer to variability. Yet it comes at a cost too. In the Nile basin alone, millions of people have been displaced and even more had their livelihoods altered or destroyed by the impact of dams. Because of the unequal distribution of costs and benefits, no project is without controversy.

Although Ethiopia has had aspirations to build a large dam on the Nile for decades, the start of construction of the new dam came at a geopolitically opportune moment. The dam was announced only a couple of weeks after President Mubarak of Egypt was ousted during the popular uprising in his country. Sudan organised its referendum on the secession of its southern part only two months earlier. With both downstream states that traditionally oppose Ethiopian water developments occupied with their own business, nothing would stand in the way of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam.

The paradox of Ethiopia is that, although 86 per cent of the world’s longest river originates in its territory, there are still massive shortages of water, food and electricity, leading to famines and arrested development. This cynical contradiction has been milked out well by the country’s politicians and the development industry and in the last decade Ethiopia has been re-branded as the ‘water tower of Africa’ to attract investment rather than humanitarian aid.

A propaganda banner, proudly strung across Addis Ababa’s central Meskel Square, pictures Meles Zenawi not only with children and schoolbooks, but also among fertile agricultural fields. The text lauds the upcoming Ethiopian Renaissance and is lined with photos of large hydropower dams. Discursive depictions like this suggest that the new dam is much more than just a response to the country’s energy needs. Political theorists Timothy Mitchell describes this phenomenon well in his book Rule of Experts when he observed that “large dams offered a way to build not just irrigation and power systems, but nation-states themselves”.

A hegemonic discourse that directly equates the dam with development is also utilised to raise the required funds for the dam, which are estimated at a prohibitive $5 billion. The government has issued bonds that are marketed towards its own population to finance this dam, a novel strategy for any African state. The bonds come in uniquely small nominations, starting with the equivalent of $20, but the interest rate of 4 per cent after a period of 5 to 10 years is much smaller than the risk of the project or the devaluation of the currency would justify. “This does not matter”, said Feleke, my driver in Addis Ababa, “because now the population finally has the chance to do something for the country.”

How circumstantial the comments of a taxi driver may be, they hint at a broader strategy of the government that does not just raise finance for the dam, but also enrols the population in the controversial project. What makes this dam different from previous large-scale top-down interventions is that the dam is not just an elite pet project anymore, but quite literally owned by the population. Unfortunately, this does not make the project less contentious or more transparent.

The turbulent waters of field research.

A couple of weeks earlier, while still in the UK, I had met with the Ethiopian ambassador in London for an interview. I was hoping to gauge the mood, find out about the general sentiment towards nosy researchers, and ask some general questions on government policy. Instead, fearing that I was yet another anti-dam protester, he gave me his regular tirade against what he calls neo-colonial NGOs who prefer the lives of butterflies over the developments of human beings. I applied for my visa during this embassy visit, which was perhaps not the smartest move.

Indeed, in Ethiopia there were remarkably many people that were ‘expecting’ me. After just a couple of days, for instance, I was approached in my hotel by a young lady whom I suspected to have a rather questionable profession. But instead of complimenting me on my blond hair or making shameful and even unspeakable proposals, she inquired after my research results and asked when I would visit the dam site. How amazing, I thought, no girls in Europe are interested in my research!

Talking this through with my contacts in Addis Ababa, I was warned to be careful. Ethiopia has one of the largest internal security organisations in the world that was originally set up and trained by the Stasi, back in the days that Ethiopia was a staunch East German ally. Prime Minister Zenawi is not the biggest fan of opposition movements, as his crackdown after the stolen 2005 elections suggests, and he would not take critique on his pet project lightly. Indeed, the girl’s intentions were probably beyond a general interest in the geography of dams, but without the sound effects and background music spy movies usually have it is hard to interpret the trickiness of the situation.

At the same time, I found out more and more about the murky geopolitics of the dam. As was expected, relationships between Ethiopia on the one hand, and Sudan and Egypt on the other, were deteriorating. Sudan and Egypt have distributed virtually all Nile water amongst themselves by virtue of two dubious legal agreements dating from 1929 and 1959. A dam of this size is bound to have a significant impact on the hydrology of the river. It will take years of decreased flow to fill the 63 km3 reservoir and the dam has the potential to make the water needs of Egyptian farmers second to energy demands in Ethiopia.

Reality does not need to look so grim. With a storage facility in the cool mountain valleys of Ethiopia, Egypt could decrease the volume of its inefficient reservoir behind the High Aswan Dam – a place where currently 10 per cent of the Nile waters evaporate. A decent framework of cooperation could optimise electricity provision for Ethiopia as well as water supply to Egypt and Sudan: a win-win solution (albeit a very expensive one if we include the costs of the dam).

But rather than talking about some of the opportunities the dam offers, the Egyptian and Ethiopian vox populi echo the threat uttered by former President Anwar Sadat decades ago. Rumours over an impending water war circulate internet forums and the popular press in both Egypt and Ethiopia. The Ethiopian news site ethioforums.com published an article in April 2011 under the forbidding title “Will this be the next Middle East water war?”. In a widely copied but ungrounded argument it notices that Egypt had already instructed its military to prepare for any eventuality regarding the water dispute over the new dam.

In contrast, Egyptian diplomats have tread more cautiously and met with Meles Zenawi a couple of times since the fall of Mubarak in order to discuss the dam. There seems to be a clear distinction between popular geopolitics and formal geopolitics, which should dissuade a water war.

Discharging the tension.

I was to present my first findings in a presentation to the ambassador of the Netherlands at the end of my stay in Addis Ababa; a range of other diplomats were invited, including some from Egypt and Sudan. The event got cancelled last minute. The ambassador informed me that he was called to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to explain why the Netherlands would support opposition to the dam and development of the Ethiopia. In diplomatic terms he was urged to cancel my presentation, because it would give the wrong sign of Dutch intentions. Although I had not even formulated my conclusions yet, it was feared by the authorities that my talk would not fit in the formal Ethiopian discourse.

Back in Oxford, I reflected on my trip with mixed feelings. Interestingly, perhaps the difference between a field researcher and a spy is not that big after all. Both are generating unique knowledge with specific goals in mind (military intelligence or an obscure publication that a handful of people will read). Already, I was dreaming away of a career running through the night in black tie, attending glitzy parties with glamorous people, and reporting back on my findings by microchip.

But my academic supervisor managed to put my feet back on the ground. She is much more advanced in her academic-spy career, being banned from Russia for an indeterminable number of years for activities undermining the state. “Eelke, the main risk you run with these experiences”, she advised me, “is that they make you find your findings much more interesting than they really are. Why don’t you write up your results in a nice 100,000 word format first, and then we’ll talk again.” A year and a bit later, I doubt that my work can stir more than a tiny academic debate on the nature of some obscure geographic theory, let alone make a high priority microchip, but the experience gives some good stories for late-night reunions in our college bar.

Eelke Kraak (‘08) left for the UK to do an MPhil (‘10) and a PhD (‘12 – hopefully) at the School of Geography and the Environment of the University of Oxford, for which he spent considerable time in Central Asia, Russia and Africa. In October 2012 he will start as a senior associate at the Boston Consulting Group in Amsterdam.

¹Injera is the traditional base of any Ethiopian meal. It is a pancake or flat bread made out of flour. Tibs are sauteed meats and vegetables and kitfo is raw minced meat.

While riding his electric bicycle from the Norwegian North Cape to the South African Cape of Good Hope, Gijs Stevers explores the possibilities of renewable energy.

Fact: Every day the earth receives five-thousand times the energy it needs from the sun.

This might be a random fact, yet it is the random fact which inspired me to cycle 22,000 km on an electric bicycle. I started on April 12th from the North Cape, Norway and will cycle down to the Cape of Good Hope, South Africa. During this journey I want to explore our renewable energy future.

The first people I visited were Hans and Aurelien, who work at Havoygavlen – the northernmost wind-park in the world. That day they went up to the wind-park by snowscooter and climbed one of the 80 meter high towers to clean the slip-ring of one of the turbines, which ensure that Norway is the country where already 100% of the produced electricity comes from renewable sources.

Hans and Aurelien are just two of many who regard renewable energy to be exciting, necessary and profitable. It is people like them who I want to meet during my journey. I want to listen to their stories and share the things I learn with others. Because producing renewable energy requires science, but above all, it needs bright motivated people.

Our renewable energy future needs bright people

Fact: The yearly subsidies on fossil fuels are almost four times the subsidies received by the renewable energy industry.

History shows that energy revolutions take time. Even though oil had clear benefits over coal it still took the transportation industry decades to shift from one to the other. Currently we are in a similar situation where electricity generation from renewable resources is about to take off.  Yet, the vested interest of the fossil fuel industry is hindering this, both directly and indirectly. With both amazement and shock, I see how current young talent is still so attracted to a fossil fuel industry which extracts our resources at such a fast pace that there will be nothing left for our grandchildren.

I would understand this choice if there was no alternative, but there is one and it’s fantastic. Wind turbines are becoming more powerful, solar cells more efficient and the sales of electric cars are skyrocketing – it must be great to work in such an industry.

Actually, the costs per kWh of solar and wind power have halved several times over the past 10 years. It has come down to such a level that they are very competitive to conventional methods of electricity production. Now that science gave us the solution to a prosperous and clean world it is still people who need to implement this future. A shift in investment from fossil fuel energy to renewable energy will only come when more people start believing in a future without fossil fuels.

As the current youth will be creating and living in our renewable energy future I will give workshops around this theme at secondary schools along the route. With help of LEGO bricks the students will try to change the energy towers of 2030, the bricks represent units of energy. The workshop gives a good insight into the possibilities and challenges which we will face while changing our energy systems.

Renewable energy and e-mobility

Fact: Recently an electric car reached a top speed of 250km/h – on ice!

The high energy density of gasoline and diesel did give us the possibility to drive more than 500km without having to refuel. Soon this will also be possible with electric cars, yet, do we really need this 500km range? As an example, the UK Department for Transport estimates that 93% of all journeys in the UK are below 40km. For most people – including speed junkies on frozen lakes in Finland – the electric car is already a viable option. At the same time, though, together they could become an essential part of a future based on renewable energy production by acting as a gigantic battery.

The nice thing about fossil fuel is that it was both an energy source and carrier. The challenge of most forms of renewable energy is that the energy needs to be stored one way or the other – as it is not always sunny or windy. The electric vehicles which are (still very) slowly replacing the fossil fuel powered vehicles could be the solution and store surplus energy for some time. As an example, when there is not much wind I could use the energy from the battery package of my electric bike to iron my shirts, when there is more wind a smart system makes sure to charge the battery so it is fully charged at the moment I need to continue my journey.

My motivation

I have studied Environmental and Natural Resource Economics in Copenhagen and worked at the sustainability department of Maersk. Even though I heard a lot about renewable energy and e-mobility I never installed a solar panel, smelled any bio-diesel or drove an electric car. Cape to Cape 2012 will give me a good practical insight in an industry which will be developing extremely fast with many opportunities. Aside from the fact that I like to see my parents grow old in a world with clean energy I am doing this project for myself. I believe it will prepare me well for starting a business in this sector and – as an added bonus – I will be outside breathing fresh air for a year.

Gijs Stevers (‘08), while working for the shipping company Maersk, obtained his MSc in Environmental and Natural Resource Economics from the University of Copenhagen. He is currently biking somewhere between the North Cape and Cape Town, to explore the future of renewable energy.

You can follow Gijs’ progress on his website www.capetocape2012.com and www.facebook.com/capetocape2012

There’s a lot more to networking than we realise, Hannah van der Deijl explains. Apparently Tolkien knew this as well.

The Myth of Urgent Networking

The word “social network” seems to conjure up two types of associations in the current discourse. At job fairs and job market seminars, ‘networking’ is mostly presented as a conscious activity. You ‘build’ your network, in order to later be able to ‘use’ your network for various purposes, such as finding information, jobs or other opportunities. In an extreme example, a friend told me about a seminar in which the speaker encouraged her audience to create a folder with information about their contacts, including such information as birthdays and the names of their kids.

The second association that comes with “social networks” has to do with social media¹, which are built on friend-to-friend connections and recommendations. Ultimately, there does not seem to be a big distinction between the popular view on ‘job market’ networks and these online networks. Again, job market gurus and web writers have been quick to jump in and extend advice in this area: it is important that you are in control of your web presence and use the new social media to create an attractive profile of yourself.

Taken together, we might call this story The Myth of Urgent Networking. In this story, social networks feature as a tool that exist for us to use and further ourselves in the world. After all, these (online) networks have sprung up and why not explore what they can mean for us? I am not trying to argue against the importance or existence of networks. Instead, I’d like to ask these questions: should we care about network effects? And how can they be useful? In answering these questions, we will mostly bring some nuance to the existing views on networking by adding some lesser-known details about networks.

Problems with the urgent networking view

The first problem with the general representation of networks is a misguided and overly simplistic focus on the utilitarian side of networks and the question: “what can my network do for me?” This is sad because it takes a lot of the fun out of meeting people as it re-categorizes various activities that were previously simply called “socializing”, “drinking”, or “procrastinating”.

This view, which encourages taking an unemotional stock of our environment furthermore discounts the importance of individual agency and inflates the importance of getting things done through magical connections, with little understanding of the underlying structure of these connections and too much talk of carrying the names of peoples’ kids around in a special folder?

A second problem on of incomplete information on network structures. Forming new connections is not always helpful (for instance, you might not like the person you just met). In short, a little extra knowledge on the structure of networks can help you navigate networks and put them into a less urgent perspective.

Adding reciprocity to the network view

There are a few principles that illustrate how the ‘utilitarian’ view of networks can never hold true over the long run.

Clue 1: networks exist irrespective of “networking”

Whether you are an early Facebook adopter or a conscious internet objector; a social butterfly or someone who prefers to hang with their inner circle – if you talk to people every once in a while, you’re in a network. In this sense, the verb “networking” doesn’t make that much sense, other than as a proxy or cover-up for ‘partying’ in a work context (see also the above).

What is more, networking is not something that does not require active doing most of the time; it can simply imply the observation of existing ties and social patterns between individuals. Any time people meet each other you could also apply the network perspective as an alternative way of observing the situation. In that sense, networks are also not restricted to the work environment and there is no urgent need to build anything.

Clue 2: spiraling causality

Furthermore, there is a logical inconsistency to the idea that networks can magically further our career or success. One way to look at this is the simple observation that ties between people are generally reciprocal². Another way to look it is to connect network effects to individual productivity. Perry-Smith and Shalley³ (2003) speak of “spiraling creativity”: if you are good at something, people will hear about it. It will help you form connections, which will help you do a better job with what you are doing, which people will then hear about, and so on.

In other words, networking is never going to be useful as an isolated activity; it is not the cause of success or a substitute for hard work; and it can never be one-directional over the long run. We may summarize in the epic words of John F. Kennedy.: “ask not what your country can do for you–ask what you can do for your country”⁴ (taking “country” loosely as “group of people you care about”).

How network knowledge can help

The other problem described above is the incompleteness of the generally vague use of the term words “social network”. There seems to be a notion out there that ‘networks and connections matter’, without specifying how these networks work. There are a few pieces of information that help specify why the network paradigm, at the end of the day, is a very useful way to look at the world.

Building blocks: ties and triads

A tie, or a connection between two people, forms the basic building block of networks. A useful distinction at this level is the difference between strong and weak ties. Your direct friends and family are known as your strong ties; people you talk to on an infrequent or spontaneous basis form the weak ties. A key realization in this field is that if you need help, in most cases your strong ties will be the people to look to, especially for emotional support and sharing. On the other hand, your strong ties are likely to have access to a lot of the same information as you, while weak ties are likely to move in different circles and may open doors to a whole set of new information, ideas and people to talk.

It’s been said that three’s a crowd, and networks support this statement. Moving from a tie with two actors to a triad or a combination of three actors, we jump to 18 ways for three people to interact (seeing each tie as either positive, negative, or non-existent). “A friend of the devil is a friend of mine” as The Grateful Dead once detailed.

Studying networks as sets of ‘triad’ connections has another important implication: networks have a strong tendency towards “closure”; i.e. for these triads to close up. In real life, the dominant effect is not the one described by the Grateful Dead, but rather that of “the friend of my friend is my friend”. As such, networks tend to become ‘small worlds’⁵ of the same interconnected people.

The Shire: bubbles or tribes of similar people

When we take the argumentation one step further, we can look at what happens at the ‘community’ level when you combine the building blocks. Studies on large network structures consistently show that the level of ‘clustering’ in social networks is much higher than one would expect if the formation happened according to a random pattern⁶. In other words, people flock together in tight-knight groups.

When we combine this observation with a second observation from social identity theory – people prefer to connect to ‘similar others’ – and you can see that you are likely to be ‘embedded’ in a group of like-minded people. We might call these clusters ‘bubbles’ or tribes⁷. A great example would be J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Shire from “The Lord of the Rings”: a social bubble that features known perimeters, shared norms and values and possibly inside jokes (another great example of a Shire-like environment would be a certain little campus we all know).

The Shire vs. wizards

Now, if we are talking about The Shire, where are the wizards? A long-standing debate in the literature of networks concerns the importance of ‘closure⁸’ vs. ‘brokerage⁹’. In other words, the advantage of being a Hobbit who hangs out around his village versus the advantage of being the middleman and connecting two such villages – let’s call the latter person Gandalf.

Roughly summarized, we could say that bubbles are good for safety and support, getting things done, stability and producing known things, while brokering between two ‘villages’ helps generate new ideas, and additionally places you in a great position to negotiate and potentially select or translate information in selective ways (this may well be where networks got their bad rep).

Influencing – Peregrin vs. Gandalf

Christakes and Fowler¹⁰ studied obesity in networks and discovered clusters of healthy and of unhealthy people, and found these pattern of clustering become stronger over time. While the paper focused on eating behavior, it is a powerful illustration of the ripple effect: your behavior influences those around you, who in turn influence those around them.

Going back to our Hobbit analogy: a hobbit change may be as powerful as the change brought about by a wizard (although Gandalf would want us to note a wizard is still far superior in transmitting information between distant locations).

Concluding remarks – the network perspective as an alternative metaphor

At our common Shire, also known as the Campus, I learnt that the paradigms a person chooses in life affect the outcome of both one’s research and observations and one’s research outcomes. This effect cannot be helped, but one can be made aware of this inevitable choice.

As a paradigm, I can only recommend the social network view, which takes people, their beliefs, habits, and behavior as interconnected rather than isolated. It shows the reality of the social structure shaping the options of the individual, but equally the power of the individual to shape their social reality.

If there’s a message in this odd compilation of network facts, it’s that we shouldn’t look at networking as an isolated activity, but rather take the insights offered by network theory as an invitation to venture out of our own circles every once in a while. Finally, don’t buy into the obligation to network, do think about what you have to share, stay critical and by all means, shake your head like Gandalf from time to time.

Hannah van der Deijl (‘04) is a PhD researcher and FWO fellow at the University of Leuven. Her research uses network analysis to gain a better understanding of the organization of science within universities, specifically looking at internal and external network structures of research groups.

¹ For example, a search of the words “social network” in the NY times article section yields 9 articles on Facebook, 3 articles on Twitter and a further 8 articles on other social media on the first page of the search.

² See for example the “The Gift: An Interdisciplinary Perspective“, (2005), edited by: Komter, A. 18–26. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, from prof. Komter’s course “The Gift” at UCU. When they are not, this is because of a difference in hierarchy or power. This undermines the story in which you need to network to receive help: help is always a two-way stream over the long run.

³ Perry-Smith, J.E. and C.E. Shalley, (2003), “The social side of creativity: a static and dynamic social network perspective” The Academy of Management Review, Vol. 28, No. 1, pp. 89-106

⁴ Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents of the United States, John F. Kennedy, Friday, January 20, 1961

⁵ Milgram, S., (1967), “The Small-World Problem”, Psychology Today (May), 62-67.

⁶ Newman, M.E.J. (2001), “Scientific collaboration networks – I Network construction and fundamental results, Physical Review E, Volume 64, 016131

⁷ Seth, GodinTribes: We Need You to Lead Us, London, Piatkus, 2008

⁸ Coleman, J.S., “Social Theory, Social Research, and a Theory of Action”, The American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 91, No. 6 (May, 1986), pp. 1309-1335, Published by: The University of Chicago Press

⁹ Burt, R.S., (1992), “Structural Holes: The Social Structure of Competition”, Harvard University Press, Cambridge

¹⁰ Christakes, N.A. and J.H. Fowler, (2007), “The spread of obesity in a large social network over 32 years”, New England journal of Medicine, Vol. 357, No. 4.