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By Audrey Lutz

Ms. Switzer and her History of Nonviolence class made an outstanding art installation depicting a visual timeline of nonviolent movements in American history. The project is the culmination of many years of preparation, research, and development. 

After involving Ms. Story, an upper school art teacher, they decided to make a timeline following events through history. We were standing in front of the artwork when we spoke and she said,  “If I were to go back 20 years when I first started teaching about non-violence I would not have known half of what is up here.”

Each student made individual tiles that show non-violent activists and researched them to gain a better understanding of who they are and how they affected history. I was able to speak with Leah Cox about her involvement with this project. “I was a student in the class, so I helped with brainstorming and making the background,” she said. “If you look at the board, on the far right, there is a collage of non-violent organizations and above it there are doves. I made both of those.” 

Ms. Switzer said that the installation is a way “of visualizing all of the interconnected complexity of non-violence in American history.” Everything is connected one way or another, and this installment shows all of the historical branches. 

As we started the interview Ms. Switzer implied that “Non-violence isn’t just about creating peace and justice, it’s creating conditions where violence is less likely.” This art is meant to show that peace is possible and that people are willing to risk their lives to stand up and say, they want a better society. 

There are 14 different non-violent movements that are represented on the board, but the art piece starts with the Indigenous people in the United States. “What my students discovered is that from a very early point, Indigenous people in the United States had non-violent peacemaking kinds of cultural technologies, and a lot of the non-violence that evolved came from seeing the way the Indigenous people resolve conflict,” said Ms. Switzer. 

The Indigenous people are the true roots of America and the first people to teach non-violence. “Many people think that the Indigenous people were just bows and arrows, but they had such a complex life,” said Ms. Switzer. 

Next, we move on to the Quakers and Anabaptists. “The historic peace churches (the Quakers and Anabaptists) came to the United States to escape persecution.” The Quakers and Anabaptists lit the fire for the anti-slavery movement. “They believed that there is a god and somehow that god is present in all people, so then anytime you’re unjust or violent to another person, you’re being unjust and violent to god. So that sort of theological premise motivated them to confront slavery first.”

Everything is connected in history and this board is illustrating that. “So we have this early women’s movement that starts, and those same women became the leaders of the suffrage movement.” Ms. Switzer then shows me how the branches connect everything together. 

As we keep moving down the boards we are introduced to the pre-civil rights which of course leads us to the all mighty civil-rights movement. They tried to include as much as they could, but the board can only hold so much. The board includes the majority of the 50s, 60s, and 70s. 

Finally, we come to the final board with the Black Lives Matter movement “as the most recent manifestation,” with its focus on anti-racism. “We have anti-racism, kind of having these moments of surging and then receding and then surging over time, but always there.” 

People have always been fighting against racism in history. “A takeaway that one of my students realized is that since the 1600s, there have been people, white people standing against racism, all the way to the current time. And since 1730-1740 every year someone has been born in America who has fought against racism.”

At the end of the final board, there are many pieces of art. “We have this collage of doves and it sort of represents the future for hope and peace,” Ms. Switzer said. There is a collage of different activists, and then finally  a mirror “because we wanted people to get to the end of the installation and say, well what can I do to make a more peaceful future?” 

Under the mirror, it says “The Future of Nonviolence is You.”

This project was a semester-long idea, yet the idea mainly came to fruition right around thanksgiving. As Ms. Switzer usually has a much bigger class she doesn’t do big projects like this one. This year she only had 9 students in her History of Nonviolence class, so Ms. Switzer asked them if they wanted to do something more creative than they normally couldn’t do with a greater number of students. “We talked to Ms. Story and we started brainstorming options. My students wanted to work together so we developed this idea, which was much more complicated than we were expecting and I didn’t know if we were going to finish.”

They started making it right after fall break and only had until exams to finish. “Towards the end of the last 2 weeks of class, this project was all we did. The students came before school, after school, and during lunch. They spent so much time on this and it’s incredible.” Leah Cox, a student who worked on this project, said that “There were times when we would have to come during our free periods, and we would work together and collaborate throughout the whole process.”

As the artwork started to finish they brought in Ms. Story again to take a look. “Once Ms. Story saw the project coming together she said that we needed to get this in front of other audiences.” Then came talk of where this outstanding project could go. They are considering the  Hartfield Jackson airport, which has a section where they display student work; the Center for Civil and Human Rights; and even the history center of Atlanta. “Right now the chief of the marketing department – Janie Beck- is working on finding out if this could be a traveling exhibition.”

Ms. Switzer is so proud of this piece and it has only made her think of what she could do in the future. “I’ve been trying for years to know how to organize this incredibly complex history and the more I taught the more I realized that it’s not just the history of non-violence but the histories of non-violence, and I’ve always struggled to make sense of it all visually. And the fact that they were able to create a way of visualizing it is amazing, not only to me but to them and future students.”

This project was huge, not only for Lovett but for the future of Ms. Switzer’s class. This artwork alone holds so many important people, dates, and moments in history that are not talked about in the history books. 

The students had to work so incredibly hard to get this project completed and it brought them closer together. “I think that this bonded my class,” she said. “We would see one another so much during the day that our close proximity to each other almost forced us to get closer.”

This artwork will be displayed in the art gallery hall until the end of February. After that, no one is truly sure where it will end up but, hopefully, wherever it goes it will inspire people. “We’re trying to create a better world,” Leah said.

By Beza Kifle

Game days are the best. We have all played Kahoot, Jeopardy, or board games for review, and they’re a nice change of pace from the traditional work that we have to do.

In Sra. Mitchell’s Honors Spanish III Class, students just learned about the subjunctive tense, a tense that Sra. Mitchell says is not present in English. “The subjunctive tense is a tense that we use a lot,” she explained to me. “As a native, I used the subjunctive tense more than any other tense.” 

The subjunctive tense is a tense that has to do with things that you wish or hope will happen.  “It’s part of my culture,” Sra. Mitchell says. “This is how we live every day – waiting and hoping for something good.”

Students learned about sentences in the subjunctive that have noun clauses and subjunctive clauses. Sra. Mitchell showed her student a formula, which helps them correctly write the sentences. The keyword in the sentence is the word in the middle, “que”, which lets you know that the verb in the subjunctive clause should be conjugated in the subjunctive tense. There are other triggers, too. There are also 9 rules for the tense. “It’s very difficult to learn because there are 9 rules. It has more rules than any other tense,” Sra. Mitchell told me.

Knowing that this tense would be difficult for students to understand, Sra. Mitchell decided to have her students create games in order to help them learn and understand the subjunctive tense better. “For me, this year was the first year that I tried games, and it was extremely important because through playing you can learn,” Sra. Mitchell said. 

According to her, students tend to have trouble with this tense, probably because we don’t have one like it in English. “We need to start teaching students at Spanish 2 because they need to use it a lot at AP. They’ll really know how to speak Spanish if they learn the subjunctive,” Sra. Mitchell told me.

The games aren’t only helpful for students to learn the subjunctive in the future, but also for lesson four, which is when students will learn how to use the subjunctive with adjective clauses. “Games can help us to recycle the information that we learned previously in lesson 3,” Sra. Mitchell explained.

Students split up into groups and began designing the perfect game to help them learn and understand the subjunctive. There was Jepordary, Candy Crush, and other board games. Sra Mitchell was proud of her students’ effort saying, “I saw all of my students put in a lot of time and effort to see how they can put the 9 rules into one game.”

By Keya Nijhawan

On the last day of the shortest month of the year, Lovett was blessed with a visit from René Descartes. This was puzzling, given that Descartes, who, according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, was a “creative mathematician of the first order, an important scientific thinker, and an original metaphysician,” lived from 1596–1650.  

Turns out the visitor who famously said “I think, therefore I am” was not actually Rene Descartes, no matter how much he may have thought he was. Instead, it was Mr. Butler (Aka. Mathman). Makes sense, since there have been other times that he has turned math class into history class. I was one of many who were blessed to have with “Mr. Descartes” as a math teacher on February 28th in place of our favorite math teacher. 

Mathman told us about how we could all thank Descartes for bringing geometry and algebra together, and for confirming that we do exist and are not just in a bad dream. We also learned that during this time one had to follow the rules or die and that it was dangerous to promote ideas that went against the teachings of the church. 

As interesting as all this was, for me, the gist of the lesson was that lovely Mr. Descartes, may, with his complicated math ideas, be the reason for my bad grade all these centuries later. 

By Gisella Brok

For each heritage or history month, one of the ways that Lovett teaches their students is through cuisine. So, to investigate the importance of cuisine, I talked to one teacher from each of the languages taught here at Lovett. 

Interestingly enough, each language class incorporates food into the lessons.

For Latin, you might think that because the language is no longer spoken, cuisine wouldn’t be so important to learn about, but actually there is an ancient Roman cookbook that still exists today. Before the pandemic at her previous school, Ms. Mellican would have a unit centered around Roman food, and she would “like a chance to do that here.”

In Señora Mitchell’s Spanish class, she will be showing the Disney movie Encanto and bringing in homemade arepas. This Colombian delicacy is one she would eat almost every day, and now she is passing the recipe to her son (like a generational tradition) and introducing it to her students. 

In Ms. Hu’s 10th grade Chinese class, they have a unit about food where they learn about the four major categories of food, pick their favorite category, and either go to a restaurant and order the dish in Chinese or make their own dish. Then, they report back what they learned.

In Dr. Norwood’s French class, she is trying to plan something with the cafe, and possibly making crepes with her class. In the past, her students would prepare food from a region that they are learning about. She’s “really sad they can’t do this as much” because of the pandemic, but last year they were able to do this outside!

After learning about food within classes, I asked the big question: Why is cuisine so important?

For the Romans, both cuisine and dining were extremely important because the people really loved to eat. Among the “elite” Romans, they felt that throwing dinner parties was a way to entertain their guests and that they had to “one up” each other when doing it. According to Ms. Mellican, every house had a dining room and if they were too full, they would go to the vomitorium (yes, that is exactly how it sounds) and then immediately go right back to their feast. In the markets, there were many bakery stands, places to sample food, and even murals of the food that they were selling. Even though this is an ancient society, Ms. Mellican points out that aspects of it are still seen today like how the Italians focus on having family meals. Learning about food and cuisine also “brings life to the people” and makes students realize that these ancient people were people just like us. 

Within the many Spanish speaking countries, “everything is surrounded by food,” Sra. Mitchell says. It connects members of the family. Sra. Mitchell showed me a “perfect example” of this, which is an art piece of La Tamalada, and it depicts a family gathered together to make tamales and bonding through making food together. Within the culture, there are celebrations and gatherings with families centered around food, and because they “love to eat well,” families can come together and “enjoy being together” with some tasty foods. “Food is a reflection of culture and tradition,” Sra. Mitchell explains, and she makes sure to carry this tradition by passing down her own recipes to her son. 

There is a famous Chinese saying: “Mín yi shí wéi tian.” This directly translates to “people regard food as heaven.” From this, it’s obvious that cuisine holds a significant spot within the culture and everyday life. Food is the “most important thing in China,” Ms. Hu explains, and it’s involved in everything from funerals to parties to business meetings. With many dishes, there is symbolism or meaning behind it. For example, noodles are symbols of longevity, and fish is a symbol of abundance. Because of this, it’s very common to eat fish on Lunar New Year.

For the French, it’s a tradition to take time to enjoy a meal and to always use quality ingredients. There’s a lot of time that goes into both preparing and enjoying the meal, and “they put a big importance on not rushing a meal,” Dr. Norwood says. It’s also important to them where specifically the ingredients come from. For example, the Normandy region makes good dairy products, so many dairy ingredients might come from there. Food also “brings people together” and is a great way to investigate a culture (plus, it’s a chance to taste something new). 

After figuring out the importance of cuisine, I thought it would be intriguing to explore some of the recipes, and the one I chose to make were the Colombian arepas that Ms. Mitchell brought up. I had never made them before, so trying to make something new was a fun and interesting experience. It didn’t take much time, so if you’re interested, try it out! They were tasty, and I’d like to make them again soon. 

Of course, this isn’t the only food that can be made. “Every dish is unique,” Ms. Hu says, so there won’t just be one dish that goes for everyone who speaks the language. Despite this, the teachers and I were able to brainstorm popular dishes.

While the dishes may not be so popular today, there were quite a few Roman dishes such as a beef stew called Copadia, and the website that Ms. Mellican recommended, https://pass-the-garum.blogspot.com/, has many of the other dishes that were common during that period of time. 

Ms. Mitchell and I brainstormed some foods that are similar between each country. There are rice dishes like arroz con leche, variations of arepas, and types of empanadas. 

There are 8 categories of Chinese cuisine, and four of the main ones are Cantonese, Sichuan (which incorporates the use of three peppers), Huaiyang (which has sweet and salty dishes seen at the national banquet), and Shandong (which is mostly seafood since that region is close to the sea). One dish that you can try out is ma yi shang shu, which is a Sichuan dish, and the name actually means “ants climbing a tree.” Some other ones are gan chao niu he, a beef stir fry dish, or lazi ji, a Sichuan chicken dish. 

One of the main foods that Dr. Norwood and I spoke about was crepes. One dish that has a history is a Canadian meat pie, because when the French settled there, they were just trying to survive the cold, so they came up with the meat pie.

I can’t wait to cook more recipes that I’ve heard about from the other teachers, and I encourage you to expand your cooking repertoire. We’re not trying to survive the cold here in Atlanta, but it might just be chilly enough to try out the meat pie.

By Alexis Dalton

February 2 marked the start of a Lunar New Year! According to Wikipedia, Lunar New Year is the beginning of a calendar year whose months are Moon cycles, and it is based on the lunar calendar or lunisolar calendar. Though it is acknowledged around the world, the Lunar New Year is primarily celebrated in countries within East and Southeast Asia. 

The Lunar New Year signifies putting the past behind us and looking forward to a fresh start. “We want to send away all the bad things,” Xiaohua Yang, professor and director of the China Business Studies Initiative at the University of San Francisco, told USA TODAY. 

In the astrological system based on the lunar calendar (known as the Chinese zodiac), each year corresponds with one of twelve animals. In order, the animals are the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig. Some people believe that their horoscope, personality, and love compatibility are closely related to their Chinese zodiac sign, which is decided based on their birth year.

For example, according to the Chinese horoscope, someone born in 2004 (year of the monkey) is likely to be mischievous, curious, witty, and intelligent. Check the end of this article to see what your Chinese zodiac says about you.

As you might have seen on the wall in front of a Chinese classroom, on the whiteboard at the café, or even on Snapchat filters, this lunar year is the year of the tiger. 

A tiger can be seen as an uplifting animal that gives people hope. It is usually associated with bravery, courage, and strength, which is something we all need starting yet another year with COVID-19 still around.

Lovett sophomore and Chinese student Natalie Harris told me about some of her Lunar New years traditions from when she lived in Singapore. “A lot of people eat fish as well as dumplings and noodles,” she told me. “I love to make pineapple tarts.” Gifting pineapple tarts to friends and loved ones is a gesture aimed to bring prosperity for the coming year.

Natalie also told me about how the origin of Lunar New Year has many legends and stories, including the tale of a monster named Nian. Every 365 days, Nian would come out of hiding to hunt people and livestock and eat their crops. According to Britannica, because Nian feared the color red, loud noises, and fire, red paper decorations were pasted to doors, lanterns were burned all night, and firecrackers were lit to frighten the beast away. Because of this legend, families still to this day decorate with red, burn lanterns, and light firecrackers.

With the Lunar New Year passed, it’s time to embrace 2022. I wish you a happy New Year and good health. 

Horoscope guide:

Rat (…1996, 2008, 2020…): quick-witted, resourceful, versatile, kind.

Ox (…1997, 2009, 2021…): diligent, dependable, strong, determined.

Tiger (…1998, 2010, 2022…): quick-witted, resourceful, versatile, kind.

Rabbit (…1999, 2011, 2023 …): quiet, elegant, kind, responsible.

Dragon (…2000, 2012, 2024 …): confident, intelligent, enthusiastic.

Snake (…2001, 2013, 2025 …): enigmatic, intelligent, wise.

Horse (… 2002, 2014, 2026 …): animated, active, energetic.

Goat (…2003, 2015, 2027 …): calm, gentle, sympathetic.

Monkey (…2004, 2016, 2028 …): sharp, smart, curious.

Rooster (…2005, 2017, 2029 …): observant, hardworking, courageous.

Dog (…2006, 2018, 2030 …): lovely, honest, prudent.

Pig (…2007, 2019, 2031 …): compassionate, generous, diligent.