city government

Tulane University asking city for control over four Uptown blocks

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Tulane University is asking the city for control over four city blocks adjacent to its Uptown campus. The proposal requests “long-term leases for site control and access” to the four Uptown blocks and one block near the downtown medical school. The request took University Area neighbors, already rankled by parking and traffic congestion in the area, by surprise. Tulane spokesman Michael Strecker told Uptown Messenger that the university just wants to fix and maintain the Uptown streets. “None of these areas would be closed to the public,” Strecker said in an email.

Book Fest: Local authors Fatima Shaik and Michael Tisserand talk New Orleans Creole history 

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Local writers Fatima Shaik and Michael Tisserand sat down Friday (March 11) to talk about “Hidden History: Black and Creole Influence and Culture in New Orleans” at the New Orleans Book Festival at Tulane University. 

Shaik’s book chronicles the history of Black New Orleans through a group of free men-of-color, the Société d’Economie et d’Assistance Mutuelle. “Hidden” is part of the title because this society and its activities were unknown even though the men of the Economic and Mutual Aid Association community were significant figures in the city from the Haitian Revolution in the 1790s to the creation of jazz in the early 20th century. The name “Economy Hall” refers to the Tremé building where the association met and held events. Tisserand is the author of “Krazy: George Herriman, A Life in Black and White,” the acclaimed biography of New Orleans-born illustrator, journalist and cartoonist George Herriman, the creator of “Krazy Kat,”  a newspaper comic strip that ran from 1913 to 1944. The book investigates his life navigating — or hiding from —  the color line in the early 20th century. 

Shaik relates that she and Tisserand discovered many affinities due to their deep research and dedication to unknown New Orleans stories.

books and literature

Book Fest: Local writers and photographers take it to the streets

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The streets of New Orleans were among the wide range of topics covered at the inaugural New Orleans Book Festival at Tulane University. The sessions were not on the potholes or the perennial roadwork, though that was discussed, too. (“The problem with the streets is that we are sitting on top of an ever-changing river,” writer Jason Berry said.) They were on the spectacle of street life in New Orleans. Two Friday (March 11) sessions — a panel called “Visual New Orleans: A City of Neighborhoods” and a talk by Berry on his film and book “City of a Million Dreams” — covered recent works chronicling public rituals in the city’s Black communities that have become emblematic of New Orleans: the second-line parade and the jazz funeral. Judy Cooper’s “Dancing in the Streets” and Jason Berry’s “City of a Million Dreams” delve deeply into these traditions — deep enough to avoid cliches and appropriation.

events

Book Festival at Tulane, opening Thursday, includes sessions on jazz, Southern humor, climate change, football, race and more

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The long-awaited inaugural New Orleans Book Festival at Tulane University opens Thursday (March 10) and runs through Saturday on Tulane’s Uptown campus. The festival was planned for 2020 and again for 2021 but was canceled twice amid Covid-19 surges. 

The event features more than 60 panel sessions from a lineup of 130 renowned and rising authors, including an award-winning group of children’s authors, some of New Orleans’ top chefs and an all-star musical lineup. The book festival is free and open to the public. Seating is available on a first-come, first-served basis. The author lineup includes national bestselling authors participating such as John Grisham, Malcolm Gladwell, Michael Lewis, Imani Perry, Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Bakari Sellers, Don Lemon, Jon Meacham, Charles Blow,  Sarah M. Broom and David Brooks. 

Local authors include Jason Berry, John Barry, Barri Bronston, Richard Campanella, Donna Brazile, Macon Fry, Sister Helen Prejean, Michael Tisserand, James Gill and Tom Piazza.

colleges

Tulane University to host ‘X’s and O’s,’ a play about football and traumatic brain injury

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From Tulane University

Six years ago, Tulane University assistant professor Jenny Mercein and playwright KJ Sanchez co-created a play called X’s and O’s that examines the lasting physical and neurological impacts from playing football. Mercein and Sanchez are now bringing their docudrama to Tulane’s campus. On Thursday (Feb. 17) at 7 p.m., Tulane will host a reading and panel discussion of X’s and O’s inside the Jill H. and Avram A. Glazer Family Club at Yulman Stadium, 2900 Ben Weiner Drive. The event, a collaboration between the Tulane Center for Sport and the School of Liberal Arts’ Department of Theater and Dance, is free and open to the public.

colleges

Tulane University’s burgeoning residential village receives major donation

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The university’s new residential village currently taking shape along McAlister Way on the Uptown campus received a boost recently from an alumnus whose name is synonymous with Tulane men’s basketball. Real estate magnate Avron B. Fogelman, a 1962 Tulane graduate, and his wife, Wendy Fogelman, a 1963 Newcomb College graduate, are providing the lead gift to build the pre-eminent student hall in the university’s residential project. The gift will propel the construction of Fogelman Hall. The freshman residence will replace Irby Hall, a popular residence hall on the former Bruff Quad next to McAlister Auditorium. Fogelman Hall will be one of five new residential buildings in The Village, the name for Tulane President Michael Fitts’ vision for reimagining the university’s residential spaces.

colleges

Tulane University to study water quality in Louisiana following Hurricane Ida

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From Tulane University

The National Science Foundation has awarded a Tulane University researcher a RAPID grant to study how pollutants from flooding caused by Hurricane Ida may have affected groundwater and water systems in south Louisiana. Louisiana and other coastal states face hazards like superstorms and hurricanes that can expose groundwater and water systems to chemical or microbial contaminants that may have serious implications for human health. Samendra Sherchan, associate professor of environmental health sciences at Tulane University’s School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, will lead a team collecting water samples at more than 150 sites in Houma, LaPlace, Slidell and other areas at different time intervals during the next six months to gain a better understanding of the impacts of extreme flooding on water quality and the mobilization of contaminants in coastal groundwater systems. Ida made landfall as a Category 4 storm near Port Fourchon on Aug. 29, bringing coastal storm surges, heavy rainfall and catastrophic flooding to many rural areas in southern Louisiana. “Such large-scale flooding has the potential to transport chemical agents and microbial pathogens and contaminate groundwater,” Sherchan said.

Tulane researcher suggests marijuana can cause infertility in men

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By Lance Sumler, Tulane University

As more states legalize marijuana, a new study by a Tulane University researcher has a warning for would-be dads. Smoking weed regularly may harm a man’s fertility. Researchers from Tulane and the University of Washington found a connection between low semen volume and damaged sperm among men who smoked marijuana. But the side effects weren’t all bad. The study also found that men who smoked marijuana were more likely to have sperm that swam faster.

colleges

Tulane tightens its COVID guidelines ahead of the fall term

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By Daniel Schwalm and Domonique Tolliver, Uptown Messenger
This fall, Tulane University will require all students to receive the coronavirus vaccine, wear masks while indoors on campus and get tested regularly for COVID-19. Before the Delta variant surge, the university had been planning to relax its COVID guidelines as most of its students, faculty and staff were vaccinated. Vaccinated individuals would have been allowed go unmasked on campus. The school also had been planning to scale down its regular testing regimen, only requiring regular tests for those who were unvaccinated. However, on July 30, the city reinstated the indoor citywide mask mandate, for both vaccinated and unvaccinated people, and colleges in the city are following suit.

colleges

Tulane researcher studying hate crimes against Asian Americans

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From Tulane University

The COVID-19 pandemic has sparked a dramatic increase in hate crimes and other hateful incidents against Asian Americans, and a Tulane University researcher wants to gain a better understanding of these experiences. Irang Kim, an assistant professor in the Tulane School of Social Work, is teaming up with Xiaochuan Wang, an assistant professor of social work at the University of Central Florida, to gauge the extent of hate and hate crimes targeted at individuals of Asian descent and who self-identify as Asian American. They also want to study how these experiences affected their well-being in terms of resilience and coping strategies. As part of the study, Kim and Wang are conducting the “Asian American COVID-19 Experience Survey,” which is open to Asian Americans and Asian immigrants 18 years of age and older. The survey, available in English, Korean and Chinese Mandarin, takes around 15 minutes to complete and will be open through July 31.