On Feb. 20, SFUAD students gathered in King Lounge for 41 Seconds, a suicide awareness event that facilitates a dialogue about mental health and suicide.

A new class is getting a lot of buzz on campus this semester. Taught by artist in residence Kate Reid, Songs of Our Lives focuses on folk music, social justice and the history behind activist songwriting.

After a semester long hiatus, the Feminist Collective had its first meeting of the year Feb. 28. With a nearly packed room, the Collective kicked off a great start to the new semester, outlining a number of its goals.

SFUAD students discuss the American Dialect Society’s decision to make “they”—as a singular gender-neutral pronoun—its Word of the Year for 2015.

The theme of the Nov. 6 show was Tokyo Street Fashion—a genre known for its bright neon colors and unique accessories—and featured some of SFUAD’s best fashion talents.

While most students early Halloween morning were sleeping in or scrounging together a last minute costume, those in  Corine Frankland and Shanna Marsh-Martinez’s  “Singing Over the Bones” class were about to embark on a much different activity. While munching down on breakfast burritos provided by Frankland, the group of 20 piled into two white vans and drove three hours to the Wild Wolf Spirit Sanctuary in Ramah, NM. The experience to follow was an incredible journey for students, guests and faculty members alike. Shortly after arriving, there was a tour of the facility during which students got to see all of the different types of wild canines the sanctuary was home to. There seemed to be every species imaginable. From foxes to wolf-dogs to even Australian Dingoes, students stood in awe of each animal inside its enclosure. With each stop on the tour, the guide described the story of how each animal had arrived at the facility, even getting into the enclosure with a red fox named Romeo. While the students enjoyed seeing the animals, many felt conflicted about the sanctuary. While the enclosures were well maintained and adapted for each wolf’s natural environment, they were still behind bars. “One of the wolves at the sanctuary had only been there about six months, and he was so anxious at the sight of our tour group that he couldn’t stop running in circles,” says Creative Writing major Marisa Dee. “The sad part is he’s going to have to get used to this environment, with humans looking at him, because he’s got nowhere else to go.” This is exactly what Frankland wanted her students to experience. “Singing Over the Bones” is a special topics class that delves into how myth and anatomy coincide. The course description emphasizes “…understanding ourselves in relation to the Wild Woman archetype and how this ancient archetype influences our connection with our bodies, our dreams, our Earth, and our art form.” The textbook for the course is Women Who Run with the Wolves by Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes and interprets how myths of “La Loba” and “Bluebeard” can be used to “access the wisdom inherent in the feminine psyche.” “I wanted the students to see what happens when we’re captured even by the best meaning people,” Frankland says of the trip. While the Wild Wolf Spirit Sanctuary is a place that takes excellent care of their rescued animals, Frankland believes the animals are still “instinctively injured.” The sanctuary “is doing amazing things, but these animals are still captured.”  Frankland wanted the class to understand what that was like and how the captured wolf can relate to their own social captivity. As the class is composed of entirely female identified individuals, Frankland wanted to focus on how the metaphor of a captured wolf parallels to her students own feelings of being captured as women by societal norms and gender roles. “Wolves have been a reoccurring theme in the class. La Loba, another name for She Who Knows, or the wild woman archetype, connects us with the freedom and power of wolves… Wolves carry weight for women. Wolves help us remember the wild nature,” says Jen Hanson, another Creative Writing major in the class who attended the trip. After the tour, the group was excited for its “Ambassador Meeting” with Zeorro, a Gray (Timber) Wolf Dog. Rory Zoerb, Zeorro’s handler, strode out in front of the sanctuary, both hands gripping onto Zeorro’s leash as he led the group down to a clearing. While Zeorro pulled him along easily, Zoerb was still able to keep him under control as he explained the wolf’s story. After buying Zeorro as a companion for his white German Shepherd, Vuka, Zoerb spent 18 months with the two dogs in the wilderness, training Zeorro to be more hospitable to humans. After a while, it became clear that while Zeorro had bonded with , he was...

With Halloween quickly approaching, the Jewel Box Cabaret is furiously working on “Hell on Heels,” its newest, holiday-themed show. After a summer off the stage, the cast and crew of JBC are excited to pull their wigs and stilettos back on and give Santa Fe one hell of a season opener.

With both Santa Fe Comic Con and Halloween quickly approaching, students are scrambling to get their costumes together and for cosplayers (those who dress up as fictional characters outside of Halloween for fan conventions), the holiday is an even bigger deal.

Excitement buzzed in the room as “zinesters” explored the many publications available and chatted with each other about their own works.

Gender neutral hall residents have been in conflict this semester when it comes to the signage of their restrooms. Last year, the hall’s multi-stall restrooms were very clearly labeled as gender neutral, which allow any student, regardless of gender, to use them. While this year the hall was supposed to be gender neutral, the multi-stall restrooms were labeled with “Men” and “Women” signs. However, residents have collectively decided to use the restrooms as if they were gender neutral. Despite this, there have been recent allegations of conflict with facility workers over this decision. Resident Brian Iglesias claims he was told to leave the restroom by one of the janitors on the basis that he was a man in what had been labeled as a women’s bathroom. “I explained to her that the hall was gender neutral, so the signs didn’t mean anything and pointed to the ‘Human’ sign I’d made out of sticky notes to put over the ‘Women’ sign. She looked me dead in the eyes and tore it down,” he said. Later, Iglesias replaced his signs but they didn’t last the night. The next morning, Iglesias says he found the janitors cleaning and the signs were gone. “I just kept replacing them after that. I had plenty of sticky notes,” he said. Creative Writing major Dee Rose described a comparable experience. “I was in the bathroom washing my face… This guy from the cleaning staff walks in and tells me I can’t be in there. I thought he meant because he had to clean, so I pointed out that I wasn’t the only one in there. Both my hands and face are covered in soap during this whole conversation. He tells me again that I have to leave, but this time he says it’s because I’m a woman in the men’s restroom. I try to tell him that it’s gender neutral, but he said ‘No, the sign says men’s, so it’s men’s.’ I tried again to clarify that even though the sign says it’s men’s, it’s not….Everybody is allowed regardless of gender. He still makes me leave. I got the soap off my hands, but not my face. So I found myself sitting in my room, face full of soap, and my glasses still in the bathroom,” she said. After learning from Housing Director Connor Nelson that the hall wasn’t fully gender neutral, Iglesias made the decision to stop making his temporary signs until the hall was officially labeled as gender neutral in the school’s system. Nelson has released a survey for residents of the hall to officially make a decision on the restrooms. Until every resident has taken the survey, a decision about the bathrooms will not be officially made. Other residents took up the gauntlet and continued to cover the permanent signs with temporary, paper ones. One student, who wishes to remain anonymous, decided to remove the permanent “Men” and “Women” signs completely, hoping that would solve the issue. However, there are obvious problems with this approach. “They really shouldn’t have done that,” Nelson said, explaining that if the hall were to be used as anything other than a gender neutral hall in the future, they would need to order new signs. “We didn’t say anything about it, though,” he said, explaining that he understands the desperation behind the removal. Housing decided to not take action against the student for removing the sign and hopes that once the survey is complete, they can put up new, gender neutral signs for the hall. “We’re just waiting on a few people to turn in their survey before we make a decision,” Nelson added. While residents hoped removing the signs would solve the issue, this wasn’t the case. Allegedly, at least one janitor began writing “Men” on one of the restrooms in permanent marker. “She just came through with a sharpie… and wrote on the door. I was watching her,...

The full moon was just breaking through the clouds Sept. 28 when the Indigenous Cultures Club gathered on the Quad. Organizers say they were there to do what Native Americans have traditionally done for centuries; to gather and tell stories. Seated in a circle, one by one attendees shared tales from their lives and ancestors’ lives well into the night. Some told stories more than 150 years old while others shared tales from just a few years, months or weeks back. It didn’t matter what the nature of the story was. The point of the gathering was to connect with others. The Indigenous Cultures Club was created last year when it became apparent that there were a lot of Native American students on campus but very few were talking to each other. “We kind of kept to our own cliques,” Treasurer Raven Two Feathers explains. There wasn’t a space for Indigenous students to talk about culture on campus, she says, so, “We saw a hole and decided to fill it.” Not long after, the ICC was formed and has been holding gatherings such as the Full Moon Gathering and last year’s Cultural Gathering ever since. Vice President Hallee Fresco and Two Feathers feel very passionate about The Full Moon Gathering. “The full moon is a time to cleanse,” says Fresco and added that traditionally gatherings such as these takes place in accordance with the lunar cycle. For many attendees, the event was a good way to get things off their chest. For one particular storyteller, the night was more than just a cleansing. Anna C Evanitz told a very old Croatian tale about her great great grandfather and how he died of literal laughter. After getting between two men in the middle of a fight, he received an axe to his chest. Luckily for him, the town’s doctor was in the same pub at the time and he survived. They stitched him up and a week later he was back in the pub with his friends. Unfortunately, the group of men began laughing so hard about the whole ordeal that Evanitz’s ancestor spilt his stitches and bled to death. “My father told me the story when I was a little kid,” Evanitz says. “It reminds me that my family is tough but also has a positive outlook on things.” She wants to adapt the story for film. “I tried to make it before but it came out too depressing. It’s supposed to be a funny story!” Evanitz says that she has told the story before in ICC and it always gets a good reaction. She enjoys sharing the tale even though it doesn’t come from Native American culture, which ICC fully supports. “Stories are important to pass on experiences from any culture,” says Two Feathers. She believes that whether one is native or not, it’s important to share your past. “Telling stories orally helps you hear someone’s individual voice in a different way than writing or film,” Two Feathers says, which is why she thinks gatherings such as these are so important. They give storytellers a greater means of sharing not only their experiences, but a little bit of themselves as well. It’s more intimate to sit in a circle with a group of people than to send a manuscript to a stranger to read. The ICC hopes to continue holding storytelling events every month on the quad during the full moon. They are also planning to show Native American themed films during the new moon and are taking suggestions for films now. Regular club meetings are on Sundays in the Film School at a time to be announced. Those interested can learn more by joining the SFUAD Indigenous Cultures Club Facebook...