On Saturday, March 30, the Asian American Cultural Center is hosting a cultural show to celebrate Pan-Asian American Heritage Month. Started last year, the showcase has become an annual event set to take place each spring. This year, the show’s theme is “Nostalgia and the Path Forward.”

“There is such a wide variety of acts beautifully representing this year’s theme for Pan Asian American Heritage Month, and I can’t wait to see our planning come to fruition,” said Thomas Kannam ’26, who organized the event in coordination with the AACC’s Assistant Director Sheraz Iqbal. 

Kannam said that they reserved the auditorium in the fall and worked on promotional content, scheduling and logistics over the past few months.

After advertising the show through entries in the AACC’s newsletter, posts on social media, physical fliers and personal outreach, Kannam finalized a lineup of thirteen performers from various affinity groups on campus. The showcase includes solo acts along with group performances from students affiliated with the AACC.

Showcase participant and an AACC First-Year Coordinator Marissa Halagao ’27 said shows like the one planned for Saturday exemplify the strength of the Asian community at Yale. 

Halagao, along with other members of Yale’s Filipinx student association, Kasama, will dance the Tinikling, a traditional Filipino dance that mimics the movements of the small “tikling” rail bird present across the Pacific. The dance form is known for its incorporation of bamboo poles. 

The group will dance to choreography by Resty Fufunan ’24, Ava Estacio-Touhey ’25 and Mark Chung ’25. Their performance will include traditional Filipino Tinikling and modernized components, which Halagao said represent the diaspora’s reclamation and adaptation of the dance style.

According to Halagao, Tinikling is thought to have originated during the period of Spanish colonization, when Filipinos forced to work on plantain farms were beaten with bamboo poles. Halagao said the dance evolved into a symbol of resilience and cultural reclamation over generations, ultimately becoming the national dance of the Philippines.

“Dancing Tinikling as a Filipino American has been so empowering for me,” she said, expressing her anticipation for the upcoming show. 

Along with providing Tinikling choreography, Chung is performing with UNITY —- Yale’s only student group dedicated to traditional Korean drumming. On Saturday, the group will play a style of drumming called “samul nori” that includes percussion instruments commonly used in Korean folk music. “Samul” means “four things,” while “nori,” means to play, and the genre’s name refers to four musicians and their respective instruments. 

Chung said UNITY, which was originally founded in 1991, was revitalized this spring after becoming inactive during the COVID-19 pandemic. The group has been rehearsing for the show since its revival. According to Chung, efforts by KASY — Korean American Students at Yale — and opportunities like the PAAHM Cultural Show have helped facilitate UNITY’s return.

“This has definitely been a learning process,” said Chung. “Many of us have played music before but are new to traditional music.”

The group’s efforts will culminate this Saturday along with the other performers including Stella Choi ’26 Sunehra Subah ’24, Annabelle Huang ’26, Valentina Pham ’24, Linh Buu ’26, Kelly Tran ’27, Linda Do ’27, Jana Nguyenová MED ’25, Eunice Kiang ’24 and Patricia Joseph ’26.

Kannam said the most rewarding aspect of planning the showcase is celebrating Asian creativity on campus. Noting the diversity of this year’s acts, he underscored the honored cultural traditions and innovative techniques that both make up the showcase’s performances. 

“I think art and performance has a unique ability to bring people together,” they said. “It’s one of the most effective paths forward.”

The Whitney Humanities Center’s Auditorium is located at 53 Wall St.

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The film, which is Song’s directorial film debut, follows two childhood friends, Nora and Hae-sung, as they reunite with each other and confront all that has changed — and remained the same — over the last 24 years. Song’s speech touched upon intentional creative decisions within the film, her experiences in the theater and film industry and her reflections on her bilingual, bicultural identity.

This year’s PAAHM celebrations centered on “Nostalgia and the Path Forward,” a theme that resonated with “Past Lives,” said Song.

“At the heart of the movie’s audience are immigrants,” she said. “And it can be in India, or it could be in France, or it could be in the United States. But wherever it is, the audience that this is for, at the heart of it, are people who have [had their] feet in two different spaces.”

Song’s address was preceded by a performance from “UNITY,” Yale’s traditional Korean drum and dance troupe — as well as introductions from Joliana Yee, director of the Asian American Cultural Center and an associate dean of Yale College, and Zahra Yarali ’24. Song’s speech was followed by a short Q&A session, moderated by Diza Hendrawan ’25 and Jenny Lee ’25.

According to Yee, the theme of “Nostalgia and the Path Forward” is an important reminder to carry lessons from the past with us as we are moving forward to the future.

“This year’s theme, ‘Nostalgia and the Path Forward,’ is a reminder in an ever-changing, fast-paced and oftentimes turbulent society, of the necessity to slow down, pause and remember our roots, where we come from,” Yee said. “I have personally found that whenever I feel fear and doubt about the future, drawing from the strengths of my ancestors and communities, who shaped me into being, [has] been my most powerful tool.”  

For fans of rom-com and film buffs alike, “Past Lives” has received critical acclaim for its modest, yet emotionally devastating, portrayal of romance. In some ways, the film’s honest and realistic nature is unsurprising, given that “Past Lives” is partially inspired by Song’s own experiences.

The idea for this movie first came to her as she was sitting at a bar, in between her white husband Arthur and a childhood friend from Korea, translating between two men who had loved her across time, space and languages.

This moment would later serve as the inspiration for the opening scene of the film, in which two strangers observe Nora, Hae-sung and Arthur sitting at the bar and speculate about their relationships. They ask themselves whether Nora and Hae-sung are siblings. Is Nora introducing Arthur, her friend, to Hae-sung, her boyfriend? Viewers are left wondering how these three characters’ relationships are intertwined.

As much as this opening scene serves to tease out curiosity and tension between the characters, for Song, this moment is an empowering one. Her bilingual tongue, an insecurity of hers, seemed to be a “superpower,” bringing together the worlds of two strangers.

“I remember also knowing that the only reason why these two people ended up in this bar on the same night and our ‘in-yeon’ is because of me,” Song said. “Because of their connection to me. And I think that being in that room, being bilingual felt like a superpower. It felt like I was now able to collapse time and space and become whole and become bigger than an ordinary person.”

Since its release, “Past Lives” has enjoyed considerable success and popularity. Most recently, the film was nominated for Best Original Screenplay and Best Picture at this year’s Academy Awards and received five nominations at the 81st Golden Globe Awards. 

Not everyone was sold on this movie at first, according to Song. Particularly during the pre-production stages, it was difficult for people to understand the marketability and feasibility of a bilingual film. Song had written the script before the success of 2018 film “Parasite,” which spurred critical discourse on how foreign-language movies were treated in award circuits, said Song.

It seemed as if this was a story nobody wanted to hear. Even the script-writing programs seemed to reject bilingualism, Song said. 

“I opened ‘Final Draft,’ and I realized that they don’t support any other alphabet except for the English alphabet,” Song said. “It’s a way of implicitly telling you that Hollywood is not interested in a movie that is bilingual.”

While “Past Lives” was Song’s first script-writing venture in the film industry, Song has been a playwright for more than decade. If there’s anything that Song has learned from her experience in the theater industry, it’s rejection. As a playwright, she said, you realize that “no one wants to do your plays anyway.” Just as she had done with theater-writing, Song pushed on and continued to write.

Even as she met and spoke with audiences in various different countries, Song noted that this story is particularly relatable for viewers who are used to having their feet in two different worlds: “sometimes bilingual, sometimes bicultural and sometimes not even fully that.”

At the same time, however, there is a universality to the heartache and yearning of “Past Lives,” said Song. She recalled a conversation she had with an audience member in Galway, Ireland, who tearfully spoke to her about his childhood sweetheart, all the while pronouncing “in-yeon,” the Korean word for fate, in a heavy Irish accent.

“There’s a way that you can watch ‘Past Lives’ where it is quite a universal feeling,” Song said. “Just by having been 16 once and no longer 16 and feeling displaced from the person that you were when you were 16 and having become a different person, because now you’re a little bit older … I think that’s the reason why the audience existed in such a big way.”  

For Lee, one of the co-moderators for the Q&A portion of the talk, “Past Lives” is more than a story of romance. 

The film presents a chance for its characters, as well as viewers, to properly say goodbye.

“To me, it was a story about a childhood sweetheart and a now-lover but also about letting go of a life that could’ve been,” Lee said in an interview with the News. “It’s about visiting Korea and seeing high school-aged girls in uniforms and wondering what I could’ve looked like in a Korean high school uniform. It wasn’t just a film about letting go of an imagined romance with someone but also about mourning versions of a life forfeited to, as Celine Song shared in her keynote, the Pacific Ocean and time.” 

Song’s play “Endlings” premiered at the American Repertory Theater in 2019 and tells the tale of three older Korean haenyeos — female sea divers — and a Korean-Canadian writer residing in New York. 

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Before Swae Lee takes the stage, twin sisters Coco & Breezy will open the April 27 festival with a joint DJ set, followed by indie pop band Dayglow.

The Spring Fling committee announced the lineup in a video shown on Wednesday night during Woads, the weekly Yale-only dance party at Toad’s Place. Although weather conditions pushed last year’s Spring Fling indoors to College Street Music Hall at the last minute, this year’s event is set to return to its traditional location on Old Campus. 

“It’s such a dynamic lineup bringing in a ton of high energy and nostalgia,” Spring Fling Hospitality Chair Olivia Telemaque ’26 told the News. “The headliner, Swae Lee, is such a force. He brings in so much hype, with easily recognizable songs in his huge discography.” 

The process of curating the lineup of musical acts for the annual festival begins over the summer, when Spring Fling leadership meets to decide their joint vision: genres to explore, goals to accomplish and elements to improve from the following year. The search for artists then begins as soon as members of the committee step foot on campus. 

This year’s committee — led by Telemaque alongside Talent Chair Luis Halvorssen ’25, Production Chair Nour Tantush ’26 and Marketing Chair Karela Palazio ’25 — crafted a student-facing survey intended to gauge interest in different musical genres and festival styles. 

Many college music festivals in the United States take place at similar times in the late spring, Halvorssen said, which can make it challenging to secure the artists before other colleges book them. 

“One surprise about this experience is how dynamic the music industry is,” Halvorssen told the News “One week we’ll be discussing a potential artist and by the next week, they’ll be booked by a different event. It makes for a thrilling process and results in so much celebration when an artist is finally booked.” 

This year’s three acts represent a wide variety of musical genres, performance styles and backgrounds. 

Identical twins and DJ duo Coco & Breezy, specializing in Afro-Latina-infused dance and house music, will open up this year’s festival. 

“They are a hugely talented duo, representing Afro-Latina influences as they challenge the bounds of electronic and dance music,” Telemaque told the News. “They infuse so many genres into their craft. As a Black woman myself, it’s so inspiring to see up-and-coming artists reclaiming genres, and breathing so much life, love, and healing into their music. They’re producers, musicians, style icons, and just such a vibe.” 

Tantush matched Telemaque’s excitement, citing that the pair “encompass[es] a lot of what we were looking for.” She noted that electronic dance music was one of the most requested genres in the survey sent out to students this year, which makes inviting this artist to campus especially exciting. 

Besides DJing, Coco & Breezy are also known for their “cool-girl aesthetic” and “eponymous sunglass brand.” Palazio noted that she’s been incorporating the artist’s album covers into her color inspiration for the “entire festival identity.” 

Following Coco & Breezy, the “fun and vibrant” Dayglow, as Halvorssen described the indie pop band, will take the Spring Fling stage.

Led by lead singer Sloan Struble, audience members can expect to hopefully hear some of the group’s top hits like “Hot Rod” and “Can I Call You Tonight?” 

Telemaque said that she has had the songs on repeat for weeks. 

“Their music to me represents the epitome of band music and is very reminiscent of the spring,” Tantush added. “I spent a lot of time over this New Haven winter listening to Dayglow, and I think they have such a youthful and summery sound.” 

That sound aesthetic has influenced the design of the festival’s merchandise, Palazio said, which will be available for purchase prior to the festival. 

Finally, headliner Swae Lee will close out the night. Swae Lee, who acts as one half of the hip-hop duo Rae Sremmund with his brother Slim Jxmmi, has a long history of iconic performances at major festivals including Coachella, Governors Ball and Rolling Loud. 

“He’s everywhere,” Telemaque said. 

All four Spring Fling chairs described a continuous thread of “nostalgia” in this year’s artist lineup; Swae Lee’s headlining performance is perhaps the most emblematic of that theme. 

“We’ve been listening to his music for years and growing up with the challenges that he’s [experienced] too,” Telemaque told the News. 

In 2016, when the viral “Mannequin Challenge” hit its peak, Rae Sremmurd’s hit song “Black Beatles” became the unofficial anthem of the video trend. 

As part of the committee’s efforts to incorporate an air of nostalgia in all parts of the festival, Wednesday’s announcement video — produced by videographer Reese Weiden ’27 — brought the audience back in time. Just as the internet trend in 2016 had people across the country posing as frozen mannequins, the Spring Fling committee did the same, announcing to cheers from the crowd at Toad’s that Swae Lee would headline the festival.

Besides partnering with Slim Jxmmy, Swae Lee has collaborated with a variety of other artists in a plethora of different musical genres throughout his career, which allows him to appeal to a variety of students, Halvorssen said. In addition to working with world-famous rappers Travis Scott and Drake on 2018’s “Sicko Mode,” Swae Lee collaborated with Post Malone on hit song “Sunflower” from the film “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse,” also in 2018. He also co-wrote Beyonce’s hit single “Formation.” — just three of Swae Lee’s big-ticket collaborations.

“Swae’s collaboration with so many different artists is what makes him an excellent choice for

headlining Spring Fling,” Halvorssen told the News.  “If you put his complete collection on shuffle you’ll hear Rap/Hip-Hop, Pop, R&B, EDM, Reggaeton, and even Country. With Swae having such a wide reach, he’ll be a great fit for all music fans.” 

While the committee does not control the specific set lists of the artists they book to perform at the festival, per Tantush, they do extensive research on each artist’s past performances and how their sets will complement one another. 

For Swae Lee, audiences may expect to hear some of his biggest songs, including “Sunflower,” “No Type,” “Unforgettable” and even some songs from his previous work under Rae Sremmurd, like “Come Get Her” and “Black Beatles.”  

In addition to the booked professional artists, Yale students will also have the opportunity to be a part of this year’s festival lineup. The committee will hold both a “Battle of the Bands” and “The Dock” competition to select student bands and DJs to begin the day’s musical festivities. 

“I think the thing I am the most excited and proud of as Production Chair is facilitating a festival which will showcase both the artists we have chosen and also the student talent on campus,” Tantush told the News. “What makes Spring Fling so unique is our ability to combine mainstream acts with Yale’s very own talented musicians.”  

Last year, the committee hosted “Battle of the Bands” at the Yale Farm. The three winners  — DJ Leon Thotsky, PJ Frantz ’23 and Tired of Tuesdays — opened for Ravyn Lenae, Dombresky and Pusha T at College Street Music Hall. 

The Dock, however, is a new creation this year, which Halvorssen spearheaded to reflect the growing presence of student DJs on campus. 

Both student-artist events will take place after spring break.

The post Swae Lee to headline Spring Fling 2024 appeared first on Yale Daily News.

Dhamaal is one of two major cultural shows that Yale’s South Asian Society, or SAS, hosts each year, accompanied by Roshni in the fall. While Roshni traditionally only features Yale-affiliated groups, Dhamaal includes student groups from other universities. 

This year, the intercollegiate spring showcase will feature six Yale teams and seven outside teams from Duke University; the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Rutgers University; the University of Maryland, Baltimore County; Harvard University; the University of Connecticut and Carnegie Mellon University. The event will take place this Saturday, March 2, from 4 to 6 p.m.

“The day of Dhamaal in itself is also so much fun,” said Maanasi Nair ’25, who is co-captain of both classical dance team Kalaa and Bollywood fusion group Rangeela. “It can be insanely busy and everyone tends to be in a frenzy, but it brings us all so much closer together. I love the energy and excitement of the hours leading to the show.”

Tarun Kota ’26, another member of Rangeela, shared similar sentiments about Dhamaal — particularly noting how rewarding it is to see his team’s rehearsals come together for the final performance.

Rangeela has weekly practices every Saturday morning, and throughout the week, subgroups of the team have additional practices together. During tech week, which is the week before the show, the team practices every day for two hours. 

Nair said that Kalaa schedules their practices with flexibility for dancers who can choose how many hours to commit each week. The team starts with choreography, welcoming any dancer with an interest in exploring that element of the process. 

Kalaa ensures their choreography reflects the various types of classical dance before they move on to begin rehearsing. Depending on how many pieces a dancer is in, that rehearsal time could range from two to five hours per week.

According to Amadie Gajanaike ’26, communications chair for SAS, preparations for Dhamaal include booking venues, gathering sponsors, editing promotional videos and coordinating with groups from other schools. The organization began planning the showcase in December, with meetings and discussions held during the Asian American Cultural Center’s after-hours meetings. 

“We send out Dhamaal information to around 50 South Asian performing arts groups at universities across the US and they submit an audition,” said Gajanaike of SAS’s efforts to select guest teams. “By January, we choose 7-8 of those groups and contact presidents.”

Kota said that the showcase fosters community between students from different institutions, noting that members of SAS host students from other universities during the weekend of the event. Last year, Rangeela had a post-Dhamaal mixer with Dartmouth Raas.

Gajanaike said she worked with Zahra Virani ’26 and Sheel Trivedi ’26 of SAS’s Cultural Committee to assign housing, plan photo-booth decorations and decide what causes donations should be sent to. 

Kavya Gupta ’27, who dances for Yale Jashan Bhangra, a group dedicated to the Punjabi dance form bhangra, expressed her gratitude for her team and excitement to see other groups perform this weekend. 

“It feels like we have come closer as a team, learning to communicate and apply all our hard work from the past few months,” she said. “We are all so excited to see the other Yale groups and teams from other schools perform.”

Kota and Nair shared Gupta’s excitement about being able to perform for her community. Kota said sharing his cultural heritage with friends is his favorite part of Dhamaal, and Nair said that her team feels like a family.

“Our shared love for art and performance is so special,” said Nair. “It’s something I cherish immensely and will forever continue to value.”

Registration for Dhamaal is available on Yale Connect.

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Held on Feb. 24 at MINIPNG’s store on Audubon Street, the fashion show was the first from Eiress Hammond, known by the nickname MINI, and brought together a selection of her fans and members of New Haven’s local art community.

Among the attendees was Zoe Jensen, who is the founder, publisher and co-editor of Connetic*nt Magazine — a quarterly zine featuring local Connecticut artists. Jensen, who initially met MINI during an interview for the magazine, contributed to the show’s lookbooks.

“I am a huge fan of Mini. I think she is such a visionary,” Jenson remarked. “She is kind of like the Vivienne Westwood of New Haven … She leans into this punk fashion in a way that’s extremely feminine and coquette. It’s focused on sustainability and community-building in a similar way.”

The showcase spotlighted MINI’s hand-made knitwear, a craft she had spent the past three years teaching herself. MINI shared that each piece requires between a day to a week of effort to complete. The intricate pieces are comprised of a variety of different yarns — including mohair, alpaca, sheep and other Italian-sourced wools. She uses a technique of weaving scrap yarn into her projects as she works, creating a collage-like effect of different gauge, color and texture.

Models of all sizes donned the garments, demonstrating the fabrics’ elasticity and versatility. Because of the knitting techniques employed, the one-size-fits-all knit pieces accommodate a range of body types. 

Pieces had purposefully undone hems and loose threads dangling off them to further emphasize their properties as imperfect hand-crafted goods. Many models wore the colorful knits with angel wings and glittery make-up, underscoring the show’s fairy-like theme, as pop music scored the event from speakers at the front of the showroom.

“I would love to do more [runway shows],” MINI said. “I may do something in the summer, and maybe something in the fall, like a three-time-per-year thing,”

MINIPNG, founded in 2019, traces its roots back to MINI’s side-project while studying pre-law, where she began making and selling clothes on Depop. Gradually, her designs gained traction, allowing her to open her own brick-and-mortar storefront in 2022.

She is now involved in Connecticut’s art scene, showing her work and holding events in her New Haven store. She further spoke about her ambitions to open another location in New York within the next few years.

Attendee’s applauded as MINI rushed out after the models’ final lap. Following the showcase, the storeroom opened up for retail, where attendees were able to purchase pieces from the show. The venue featured local jewelry maker Skye and her brand Cielv, a shirley temple booth, and afterwards, a music set by Qween Kong.

Skye initially attended a trade school in New York with aspirations of becoming a jeweler. However, her interest in crafting non-traditional jewelry led her to establish her own handcrafted silver and solder jewelry business.

“I met MINI through another event I was vending at Plush,” Skye said. “She happened to be there that day and she saw me. She said ‘I would love you,’ and she had another event later that month, and said ‘would you like to vend?’ We’ve been tight ever since then. She’s a doll. I love what she does, and all of the work she did today was super amazing.”

MINI was a pre-law student at Wittenberg University in Ohio before turning to fashion.

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For many students, formals are a memorable part of the Yale experience — but it is unusual for every class to have one. This year’s formals have had their fair share of firsts, including subsidized ticket prices.

An integral part of the planning is the creative decision-making process. 

“I think the most difficult aspect of formal planning is finding a theme that not only everyone will love, but also fits the venue,” said Karen Yang ’26, the Sophomore Class Council’s vice president of creativity and concepts. 

According to Jalen Bradley ’27, the First-Year Class Council’s board discussed themes before voting for their favorite. Once they had decided on the theme, they began searching for student DJs and a string quartet. 

This year, “Celestial Garden” won the FCC board’s vote. According to Bradley, the committee tried not to reuse themes or choose ones that were similar to other classes’ or residential colleges’ formal themes. The current theme combines the ideas of “Enchanted Garden” and “Celestial Bodies.”

“We all want to make the First Year Formal memorable,” said Carrie Lange ’27, who is responsible for organizing the decorations for the event.

While Lange said she would like to keep the specifics of the decor a surprise, she encouraged attendees to interpret the formal however they wished. Noting that guests should wear whatever they like, she said that the theme “Celestial Garden” is intentionally open-ended.

On Friday, Jan. 26, the Sophomore Class Council hosted its first formal since 2022, changing the trend of sophomores not having a formal.

According to Sophomore Class President and YCC Health and Accessibility Director Mimi Papathanasopoulos ’26, SoCo wanted to host a formal because the class does not have many opportunities to convene in its entirety. She also said that planning a formal is a significant undertaking.

SoCo planned the formals over months, negotiating with contractors, searching for performers and sorting out safety issues. Ultimately, the committee planned an event that included drinks and desserts, live music and photo booths.

The Sophomore Formal theme, “Rhapsody in Blue,” was chosen through a Google Form sent to the class in early November. The survey collected theme ideas, music suggestions and refreshment preferences. 

Joana De La Torre ’26, vice president of operations for SoCo, said that deciding on a theme meant balancing creativity and feasibility. Deliberating on unique themes that would be realistic to plan, Vice President of Marketing and Communications Avery Dewitt ’26, said the council debated four or five different themes before settling on “Rhapsody in Blue,” a piece by George Gershwin. This year marks the piece’s centennial anniversary.

“Our goal is to ensure our capacity is as large as it can be,” said Olivia Lombardo ’25 of events hosted by YCC.

The Omni Hotel is the only venue in New Haven with a capacity of 1,000, and SoCo aimed to guarantee that all interested sophomores were able to attend. SoCo also chose the hotel because the First Year Formal is always held in Schwarzman Center. Thus, they felt a new location would be a refreshing change. The junior class formal will also be held in the Omni Hotel with a “Bridgerton Ball” theme.

In an effort to appreciate student groups on campus, SoCo chose The Yale Undergraduate Jazz Collective and the band Public Discourse to perform at the event. DJ Chris Rush also had a set at the Sophomore Formal.

The junior formal will also showcase performances by members of groups such as the Berkeley College Orchestra, Davenport Pops and the Yale Ballroom Dance Team.

Ticket prices for this year’s FCC formal have been reduced from the regular price of $15 to $5. 

“The subsidization is from the Dean’s Office, which was 22k dollars that went to the formal,” said Andrew Boanoh ’27, current FCC President.  “People have reached out personally to say that 5 dollars was financially troublesome as well, and we provided aid to anyone with that need.”

Echoing that sentiment, Papathanasopoulos said that the community’s response to the subsidization of ticket prices was overwhelmingly positive, noting that tickets for the formal sold out.

Lombardo, the YCC events director and former beat reporter for the News, said that the council’s events board is very collaborative in budget planning. She said that advocating for subsidized pricing has been a years-long process, giving particular mention to each class’s president and council for working together to make the change happen.

“It was so exciting to be able to showcase our amazing student groups,” said Papathanasopoulos. “We loved seeing our class rocking it on the dance floor.”

The First Year Formal will be held on Feb. 23.

The post Class formals to highlight student performers appeared first on Yale Daily News.

The Black Student Alliance at Yale will present “The HY-light,” a Black Harvard-Yale student showcase at the O.C. Marsh Lecture Hall — featuring a line-up of groups, including acapella group Shades of Yale and East African dance group DESTA. 

Sketch comedy group “The Fifth Humour” will join improv group “The Purple Crayon” in their annual collaboration with Harvard improv group “On Thin Ice” on the eve of the game. On that same night, Yale and Harvard Glee Clubs and the Radcliffe Choral Society will perform at Woolsey Hall. 

HYLight: Harvard-Yale Black Arts Showcase 

“The HY-light” showcase has been a decade-long tradition, according to William Romain ’26, who said that Afro-American Cultural Center Dean Timeica E. Bethel ’11 had participated in this showcase when she was an undergraduate. This collaboration began when Yale Gospel Choir and the Kuumba Singers of Harvard, a Black music choir group, performed together to “create solidarity” and “uplift Black voices across the diaspora,” said Romain.

Romain said that he was eager to see the “fun, respectful showdown” between Yale and Harvard groups. The showcase’s line-up consists of Yale organizations such as Steppin’ Out, Sabrosura, Shades of Yale, Rhythmic Blue, DZANA, Desta and Yale Gospel Choir, and Harvard groups such as Nigerian dance group Omo Naija, Eritrean and Ethiopian dance troupe Dankira and choir group Kuumba. 

“I am personally excited about watching the active community engagement between both Harvard and Yale dance teams and singing groups,” said Romain. “A lot of Yale groups have a Harvard equivalent, so it will be a fun respectful showdown, which will hopefully bring a lot of people together.” 

“The HYLight”’ showcase is a part of BSAY’s larger Harvard-Yale weekend festivities. 

On Friday night, BSAY will host “The Pre-Gate” at the Afro-American Cultural Center, where students can eat food, listen to music, play games and purchase merchandise. The next morning, before the game, the Afro-American Cultural Center, along with Black sororities and fraternities such as the Zeta Chapter of Alpha Phi Fraternity and the Xi Omicron Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority will be hosting “The Tailgate” event at Lot D of the Yale Bowl.   

If there’s anything the Yale and Harvard students can expect, Romain said, it’s a “lot of cheering, a lot of fun and a plethora of Black culture.” Through these collaborations, he hopes that this showcase will offer cultural connection to students. 

“I hope that this stage offers students the chance to connect with one another, especially in a cultural sense as we will be hosting groups that pretty much cover the full African diaspora,” Romain said. 

A Comedic Feast hosted by Purple Crayon, Fifth Humor and On Thin Ice

Yale comedy groups The Purple Crayon and The Fifth Humor and Harvard group On Thin Ice have teamed up for their annual collaboration to deliver laughs to the Harvard-Yale audiences. Tickets for this performance have already sold out, and the event will take place at Dunham Laboratory Auditorium.

For The Purple Crayon member Amara Neal ’26, this year’s comedy event is different from the joint performance at Harvard in the previous year. She will now stand in front of a mostly-familiar audience, as a sophomore who has had a year’s worth of experience under her belt.  

“I think the Harvard audience [at last year’s Harvard-Yale game] was the first time I’ve ever had to perform for an audience that I really had to earn their laughs, which was a little nerve-racking,” said Neal. “Now performing at Yale, one, I’ll feel more comfortable because I’m a sophomore and I’ve done this before. And two, I’m performing with my friends and peers who I have a rapport with.” 

While The Purple Crayon and On Thin Ice have collaborated in years past, this year will mark the first time The Fifth Humor will join their show. As a sketch comedy group, The Fifth Humor performs written skits and scripts — unlike the more on-the-fly jokes of The Purple Crayon and On Thin Ice. 

According to co-president of On Thin Ice Raina Hofstede, Harvard’s sketch comedy group — called “Sketch!” — does not have a consistent presence on Harvard campus, as it reappears “every couple of years,” she said. Hofstede said that she is excited to learn from collaboration with The Fifth Humor. 

“I want to see more of [sketch comedy] at Harvard,” said Hofstede. “I’m excited to see what Fifth Humor brings. If I can talk to them and learn from them after the show that weekend, it would be really great. I’d love to learn more.” 

As the Harvard-Yale game attracts a larger audience of parents, alumni and visitors from outside of Yale, one challenge that emerges for The Fifth Humor is writing jokes that will resonate and engage this new audience, says The Fifth Humor president Betty Kubovy-Weiss ’25. 

While the group takes this shift in audience demographics into consideration, Kubovy-Weiss said that the group “works very hard” to preserve their voice and identity as a college sketch comedy group. As group members often incorporate “socially relevant themes” into their jokes, Kubovy-Weiss said that she hopes the performance will use comedy to create humor even when “the world is awful.” 

“Because this show is coming as a part of a weekend that is so celebratory and joyful, I think that makes it all the more important to focus on the ways in which we can add to the joy of this weekend,” said Kubovy-Weiss. “It can feel frivolous sometimes, to be like ‘Our world is so awful. Why are we all getting so excited about a stupid fucking football game?’ But I think at the end of the day, the world is gonna be awful either way, but we might as well find these moments in which we can have laughter together.”  

Harvard, Yale Glee Club and the Radcliffe Choral Society:        

The Harvard and Yale Glee Clubs and Radcliffe Choral Society — Harvard’s treble chorus — will have their Harvard-Yale Choral Concert at Woolsey Hall at 7:30 p.m. on Friday. 

This concert will premiere several new compositions, including works by Shruthi Rajasekar that will feature dancers from Yale Rangeela and Kalaa, Ismael Huerta, the winner of Yale’s annual Emerging Composers Competition and John Raskopf ’27, the winner of the annual Fenno Heath Award — an award given to Yale student composers.

According to Yale Glee Club musical director Jeffrey Douma, the concert has been a “cherished annual tradition” for more than a century. 

“It’s one of our favorite concerts of the year — the friendly rivalry is always overshadowed by our mutual respect and love of making music together,” wrote Douma in an email to the News. “The concert ends with the choirs singing our alma maters together.”  

According to Yale Glee Club president Awuor Onguru ’24, the concert will also be a “great pep rally” for the game, where the choral groups will sing football medleys and engage in “pranks, joint performances and general merrymaking.”

The Yale-Harvard festivities and performances will begin on Thursday and last all the way until Saturday evening after the iconic sports showdown.

Dating back to 1875, the Harvard-Yale football rivalry is 148 years old.

The post Yale-Harvard arts and performance groups collaborate for The Game appeared first on Yale Daily News.

This all changed when Chung took Michael Roemer’s class, Film as Art, during his senior year. The class opened Chung’s eyes to the very real possibility of pursuing film, Chung said. 

Twenty-two years later, Chung returned to campus to speak to a tightly packed group of Yale students at the Leitner House, in an event sponsored by Pierson College and the Yale Film Archive. He spoke about the production process of his first feature film, his upbringing in Arkansas and how his highly-acclaimed film, “Minari,” came to life. Later in the evening, Chung attended a screening of “Minari,” which was presented on 35mm film print — the only film print of it made. 

“It’s great to see a filmmaker, especially one that was so shaped by Yale, come back and talk about his time here,” said Joji Baratelli ’24, who facilitated the conversation. “In many ways it puts things into perspective: a career in film is a long and difficult journey, but also I think exciting for a student body looking out into the future and in the possible ways of being. He offers that very hope, I think, of a life in art as a possibility — and for students, I think that’s a really exciting thing to see.”

Time would fly by during Chung’s all-nighter editing sessions for Roemer’s class, more quickly than it did in his stop-watch timed work at the genetics lab, according to Chung. 

That was when, Chung said, he first considered a career as a filmmaker. 

“I’m sure you guys have felt this, where you just entered this flow and you just realize, time exists somewhere else and you’re just in this space of creative work,” Chung said. “I just thought to myself that year, what if I could live life like this? What if I could just enter into a life in which I do this?”  

Roemer’s influence, and his films, brought Chung back to Yale decades later. Chung reached out to the University for Roemer’s contact when the Yale Film Archive presented screenings of two of Roemer’s films last fall. 

When film archivist Brian Meacham sent Roemer’s information to Chung, Meacham told Chung of the film archive’s plan to make a 35mm print of “Minari.”

Meacham asked Chung if he would be interested in attending the screening, to which Chung enthusiastically agreed, said Meacham. Though it took an entire year, the event was organized smoothly, as Chung and a densely packed audience watched “Minari” on film on Friday night.  

“In the digital age, I still feel it’s important to create, when possible, a tangible, physical copy of a film like this, which will remain in Yale’s collection and be a resource for students, faculty, and the community for many years to come,” Meacham wrote in an email to the News. 

Chung started dreaming of leaving the east coast when his own older sister left Lincoln, Arkansas to attend Yale. From then on, Yale became his “escape,” Chung said. 

Upon his arrival, however, Chung felt as if he were a “fish out of water”. 

“I couldn’t place this into words until later in life,” Chung said. “That I felt maybe more of a culture shock here than I did in Arkansas, as a child of Korean immigrants [growing up] in a very rural place that was obviously very different from my parents’ culture. It was just the level of education, the lingo, the way that people from the coast would talk. All these different things that I just wasn’t used to.” 

Chung eventually revisited his Arkansas upbringing in what he intended to be his final script. With the birth of his daughter, Chung said he was considering stepping away from filmmaking and accepted a teaching position at University of Utah’s Asia campus in Korea. 

Before Chung left for Korea, he sat down to write one last script. In his writing process, Chung said he was greatly inspired by writer Willa Cather, who wrote stories about life on the Great Plains, and whom Chung could see parts of himself in. 

“There was a quote that she gave that always stood out to me,” Chung said. “She said that her life really began when she stopped admiring, and she started remembering. She stopped admiring all of these people who she thought she needed to emulate, and instead, she turned to her own experiences and she started to remember.”  

Chung spent the entire afternoon that day “just writing down memories,” he said. Among them, he remembered the dust rising from the carpet of his mobile home. As he organized and shifted around these memories on his document, Chung began to see “a story take shape.” 

While Chung remembered his memories from the perspective of the child, in recalling stories from this time, he was able to better understand his family, he said. In particular, he resonated with his father’s struggles, as Chung was now a father himself. 

“I felt like I had grown enough, I’d become a parent, and now I could see the perspective of everyone else in a better way,” Chung said. “In that film, when you watch it, it’s definitely based on a lot of life experiences, but there’s a bit of me in every single person in that film.”  

Calling “Minari” the “most personal film [he] ever made,” Chung recalled being “scared” to see his parents’ reactions to the film. Chung and his wife Valerie Chu ’01 organized a screening with Chu’s aunt and uncle because he knew “they wouldn’t flip out in front of other people,” Chung joked. 

To Chung’s surprise, his parents responded very positively and were “moved.” Afterward, Chung recalled how his parents told him that they could not fall asleep later that night, as “they were picturing the movie.” 

Chung and Chu met in their first year at Yale, at the first-year formal. After their marriage, Chung followed Chu to Rwanda, where she helped train counselors in Kigali. There, Chu asked Chung to “figure out something that [he] could do to help people.” 

He offered to teach classes on filmmaking, what he considered at the time — 2006 — to be a “low priority need.” To his surprise, many individuals signed up for his class and with a $30,000 budget, Chung and his students would create a film over a course of 11 days. Emerging as the final product of this class was Chung’s directorial debut, “Munyurangabo,” which told the tale of friendship in the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide. 

“In retrospect, for me, when I look back on it, it was such a pure filmmaking process,” Chung said. “It was all about the creative energy of all of us, coming together and doing something together. We had no idea that this would get recognized the way that it did as well.” 

“Munyurangabo” was an official selection at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival and the winner of the grand prize at the 2007 American Film Institute Festival. It was the first narrative feature film in the Kinyarwanda language, and Chung said that he directed the entire film with somebody whispering and translating in his ear. 

When Baratelli asked about what is lost and gained in translation, Chung likened language to a form of exploration, even while translation may overlook the nuances of language at times. 

Through this project, Chung was able to appreciate the beauty of language, he said, a value that would eventually carry on to future works. “Minari,” for instance, was mostly written in Korean. 

 “When you make a movie, you just get to explore something in such a deep and profound way,” Chung said. “You go and live with people, you go into their homes, you learn their stories, you tell him you know that there’s something so beautiful in walking across those bridges. The art … itself becomes a way to explore things and to see the world and understand it a little bit more. And I tried to treat that with a lot of respect. I don’t feel like I’m entitled to that, but there’s some humility that has to go into that. And I think that’s the part with language.” 

When asked about future projects and the films he hoped to make, Chung said that he wanted to make “timeless” pieces that will “hold up in years to come.” As he glanced over at his daughter, who was fidgeting with the bookcase in the Leitner Room, Chung also said that he made ‘Minari’ in hopes that she will see the film when she was older. 

Chung acknowledged the significance of his work for the audience of Koreans and diasporic Korean-Americans. While Chung accepted the “communal aspect” of his films, he said that he tried not to feel “burdened” by it.  

“From there, I do feel some responsibility [as a Korean-American director],” said Chung. “I understand my work has a communal aspect to it, in terms of how it’s received … but I try not to either oppose it or run to it too much,” he said. “I still try to operate with some freedom. You can’t be doing work that is meant to simply hold up a cause or anything like that. There’s got to be some honesty in it.”

Chung’s next directorial project, “Twisters,” is a sequel to Jant de Bon’s 1966 disaster film “Twister,” and is slated to be released in July 2024. 

The post ‘Minari’ Director Lee Isaac Chung ’01 talks growing up, filmmaking appeared first on Yale Daily News.

The last slide listed a Venmo handle — which, as of Monday night, appears to no longer exist — and also tags another Instagram account called @abolishtheusa. That account features a handful of posts from this month showing support for Fauda, a self-described “anarchist movement in Palestine” that the account says associates itself with Hamas, which the United States recognizes as a terrorist group. According to the account, a Fauda member in an interview described the organization as one of “15 anti-Zionist resistance groups in Palestine” — specifically including Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Kitab al-Aqsa — that are “all together” and “follow the same goal.” 

In an email sent to Ballet Folklórico members yesterday at 4:14 p.m., the co-presidents wrote that they made the decision to include the QR code hours before the first show “without consulting the board or membership,” which they called a “substantial oversight.” They apologized to members who were “unwillingly and unknowingly aligned” with the statements.

“We realize this post brought considerable damage to the Jewish community,” Ballet Folklórico’s four co-presidents wrote in the email. “We should have been more prudent with our choice of platform and should have looked beyond the resources provided on the second slide and noted the damaging material on the third. We would also like to emphasize that we condemn antisemitism as well as any form of violence committed against any community. Our rash decision did not appropriately reflect the values we wish to represent. Although we stand behind efforts to aid and bring attention to this crisis, linking this post was a grave error.”

In the Monday email, the presidents cautioned members to make their personal social media accounts private and untag Yale Folklórico in any posts, as part of “preventive measures” aimed at supporting members’ safety.

The “Floreciendo” fall showcase took place in the Morse/Stiles Crescent Theatre and aimed to celebrate Mexican culture through the art of dance, according to the event’s YaleConnect page. One show took place on Friday, Nov. 10 and the other two on Saturday, Nov. 11, with 210 people registered to attend across all three shows. 

The dance group is a Yale student organization that strives to preserve traditional Mexican dances, according to its listing on the Yale College Arts website. 

The News reached out to five Ballet Folklorico members and 16 registered attendees on Monday night. One individual declined to comment and 18 did not immediately respond. 

The co-presidents held an emergency meeting on Monday night with all Ballet Folklórico members. The News, seeking to attend the meeting, reached out to the co-presidents; the presidents stressed that the meeting was not open to the public and meant for Ballet Folklórico members only.

This comes as the ongoing Israel-Hamas war has led to increasing tensions and student fears of personal safety on college campuses. 

On Oct. 7, Hamas launched a surprise attack against Israel, killing at least 1,200 people in Israel and taking more than 230 hostages, according to Israel’s Foreign Ministry as reported by the Washington Post. Israel responded with a formal declaration of war, airstrikes and a ground invasion of Gaza, killing more than 11,180 people in Gaza from Oct. 7 to Nov. 10 and displacing more than two-thirds of the population, the Post reported according to figures from the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza and from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. United Nations officials have called Israel’s attacks “horrific crimes” and “collective punishment” in violation of international law. 

Gavin Guerrette ’25, an attendee at the Saturday 6 p.m. show and co-editor-in-chief of the Yale Daily News Magazine, said that an individual came out before the show to promote “direct relief to Palestinian families” and describe the post linked in the QR code. 

Guerrette said that he thought a “key part” of this presentation was a call to audiences to be informed about the Israel-Hamas war, “independently of their request for funding.” 

Guerette believed these actions to be “an earnest attempt” to support Palestinian families and civilians. 

“All I’d be willing to say here is that it was an attempt to provide information to people and an attempt to provide a means of supporting people who they view to be in a humanitarian crisis,” said Guerrette. “If incidentally, they linked to something which is, quote unquote, ‘loosely affiliated’ with Hamas, I don’t think it’s by any direct malicious effort.”

In their Monday email, the Ballet Folklórico co-presidents said they had removed the portion of the YouTube livestream that included the QR code and are in conversation with La Casa Cultural administration to navigate through the situation. They also said that they will seek input from the board and membership before making public statements in the future. 

Morse College is located at 304 York St.

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The event, held on Sunday, Nov. 12, from 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., featured a program of classical pieces that explored themes of nostalgia, history and fate.

Under the baton of music director Nicole Lam ’25, the orchestra — which consists of Yale undergraduate and graduate students, faculty and professional affiliates — worked together to make the night musically cohesive and harmonious. The concert started with Jean Sibelius’ “Impromptu for Strings,” before progressing to the “Weiner Serenade,” inspired by Hungarian folk music. 

“As this orchestra plays more and more together, the more cohesive they sound, the more fun they’re having,the more they’re blending into each other,” Lam said. “And I really felt that these pieces are extremely challenging both as an ensemble and also just technically, and I think people put in the work [to] create a product that everybody feels really proud of.” 

Kincaid MacDonald ’23, a player in the BCO, commented on the piece’s complexity. He said that he thought the Verdi was technically the “hardest,” noting that it required “the most skill” to play. He said that the Weiner, on the other hand, was the most musically difficult because “it has this different style” that is less common.

Another highlight of the evening was Giuseppe Verdi’s “La Forza Del Destino,” a composition that combined drama with more intricate orchestral arrangements to evoke a story about fate and the future. The title translates to “the force of destiny.” 

The concert’s programming was inspired by Nicole Lam’s own experience of music as a medium that transcends time — something that evokes past memories, present experiences and future aspirations, she said.

Joshua Chen ’27, a clarinetist in the BCO, reflected on the orchestra’s preparation. “We had about a month to prepare for this concert, but it really came together in the last couple of weeks,” he told the News.

Julieanna King ’27, another BCO player, praised the selection of pieces, noting that the execution of the show required many “moving,” independent parts to harmonize.  

While this was the last concert for the BCO this semester, the orchestra has two shows planned for next semester.

In addition to planning a collaboration with the Yale Ballet Company for February and a double bronze concerto for next April, the BCO also has a smaller chamber concert planned for the end of the semester, involving a subset of the whole orchestra.

The audience remarked positively on the selection of works at the concert. Mehran Sadeghi, father of BCO member Cyrus Sadeghi ’27, appreciated the more abstract themes of the night. 

Tthe pieces that were put together catered to different moods and were quite lovely,” said audience member Elena Krapivina.

Founded in 1976, the Berkeley College Orchestra is Yale’s oldest student-run orchestra.

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