Off the Cuff – The Oberlin Review

Off the Cuff: Melissa Harris and Christian Bolles, Editors-in-Chief

May 11, 2018

College seniors Melissa Harris and Christian Bolles are the outgoing Editors-in-Chief of The Oberlin Review. Harris has been involved with the Review since her first semester at Oberlin, when she started out her journalism career as a staff writer. Since then she has worked as a Review Production Editor and News Editor and has interned for publications such as The Chronicle Telegram and Homeland Security Today. Bolles got involved his sophomore year at Oberlin and served as an Arts & Culture Editor before his tenure as EIC. Bolles is most known for his movie reviews. They were interviewed by the incoming Editors-in-Chief, College junior Sydney Allen and College sophomore Nathan Carpenter. This interview has be...

OTC: Mike Keith, Oberlin College Transportation Department

May 4, 2018

Mike Keith has worked at Oberlin College for the past seven years. He started out as part of the custodial staff in Dascomb Hall, and has since moved to transportation services for the College. During his time at Dascomb Hall, Keith was known for being a warm and enthusiastic member of the community and for going out of his way to welcome students. He has been dubbed by many students and signs off his emails as “Dascomb Mike”. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Where are...

OTC: Ilja Luciak, Professor and Author

April 27, 2018

Professor Ilja Luciak is chair of the Political Science department at Virginia Tech University. He is the author of After the Revolution: Gender and Democracy in El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala and The Sandinista Legacy: Lessons from a Political Economy in Transition. His work been published in several academic journals throughout Europe, North America, and Central America, and he has served as an invited election observer in El Salvador and Nicaragua. His research currently focuses on gender an...

OTC: Tyrone Wicks, S & S Officer

April 20, 2018

Tyrone Wicks is an officer with the Oberlin College Office of Safety and Security. He has been in his position for just over a year. The Review sat down with Wicks to discuss the highlights and challenges of his job and what it’s like to be a Safety and Security officer on campus. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. How and why did you start working for Safety and Security at Oberlin? Well, I was born and raised here. This is my hometown, so I’m back in my hometown after I’ve live...

Off the Cuff with Asef Bayat, Sociology, Middle Eastern Studies Professor

Simon Idelson, Staff Writer

April 13, 2018

Filed under NEWS, Off the Cuff

Asef Bayat, originally from Iran, is Professor of Sociology, Middle Eastern Studies and is the Catherine and Bruce Baistain Professor of Global and Transnational Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Bayat completed his B.A. in Politics from the University of Tehran in 1977, and Ph.D. in Sociology and Politics from the University of Kent, from 1978 to 1984. Bayat’s work focuses on social movements and social change, religion and public life, and the urban space and politics. Bayat came to Oberlin to deliver the talk on “Rebel Cities: A View from the Middle East” on April 5. Bayat was the keynote speaker in Oberlin’s spring 2018 Global Issues Symposium, a series of lectures, film screenings,...

Off The Cuff: John Elder and Steve Hammond

April 6, 2018

John Elder and Steve Hammond are co-founders of the group Citizens for Safe and Sustainable Energy, an environmental group that has been working to fight the NEXUS pipeline and advocate for Oberlin’s Community Bill of Rights. Hammond is also the Pastor for Oberlin’s Peace Community Church. The group has been fighting the NEXUS pipeline since 2013, pursuing lawsuits, engaging community members, and advocating with City Council. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. How did y...

OTC: Kirsten Pai Buick, Art History Professor

March 9, 2018

Kirsten Pai Buick has been a professor of Art History at the University of New Mexico since 2001. She focuses on African-American art, western art, and representations of the human body. She has been researching Mary Edmonia Lewis, a sculptor who attended Oberlin College from 1859 to 1863, since 1991 and gave a talk last Thursday about the final years of Lewis’ life. At her talk, Buick discussed some of Oberlin’s historical figures such as Marianne Dascomb, John Mercer Langston, and the Keep fam...

Heidi Brown, OC ’93, Investigator

Gabby Greene, Staff Writer

March 2, 2018

Filed under Off the Cuff, Recent Stories

Heidi Brown, OC ’93, is a former journalist for Forbes Magazine in Russia. She covered the Russian business environment after the collapse of the Soviet Union and has written extensively on Russia’s oligarchs and governmental corruption. She now works for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority as an investigator. Brown delivered a talk on Russian politics, titled “Beyond the Oligarchs” in King Building Monday. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. What drew you to Russia’s business scene? I did not have any interest in business or being a business journalist when I was at Oberlin or when I decided to commit to journalism as a profession. After I graduated, I went to New York, and ...

OFF THE CUFF: Sara Hlupekile Longwe, Feminist Activist

February 23, 2018

Sara Hlupekile Longwe is an internationally renowned feminist activist from Zambia. She visited Oberlin Feb. 16 to give a talk titled, “Organizing to Tackle Women’s Issues in Lusaka Zambia,” which detailed her experience with gender disparities in Zambia as well as her experiences creating and organizing women’s collective action groups there. She is known as one of the foremost figures in Zambian activism, often referred to as the founder of the women’s movement in Zambia. She is the autho...

Off the Cuff: Clarence “Ryan” Warfield, Oberlin Police Chief

February 16, 2018

Chief Clarence “Ryan” Warfield is the recently appointed city of Oberlin Chief of Police. A native of northeast Ohio, Warfield, a former sergeant from the city of Elyria, brings an impressive skill set to the position including specialties in interrogation, voice analysis, body language study, youth violence training, and death scene investigative skills. He also served as a police academy instructor in the martial art of Krav Maga and worked with the Lorain County Drug Task Force. Although ...

Jake Bernstein and Luke Fortney, Editors-in-Chief of The Grape

February 9, 2018

College seniors Luke Fortney and Jake Berstein are Editors-in-Chief of The Grape, Oberlin’s biweekly alternative newspaper that has printing since 1999. Fortney has worked at The Grape for three semesters as a copy editor and contributing writer before starting as an EIC in fall 2017. Berstein joined the publication the spring of his sophomore year, working as a contributing writer and features editor before becoming an EIC last fall. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. How ...

OTC: Rebecca Mosely, Title IX Coordinator

December 8, 2017

Rebecca Mosely serves as the Title IX coordinator and director of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion at Oberlin College. She develops and administers policy on discrimination and harassment and handles issues concerning equity policy and concerns. Before taking on this role a year and a half ago, Mosely served in the Office of Residential Education for 11 years. She earned her bachelor’s degree in French education and a master’s degree in student affairs and higher education from The Ohio State Un...