College News, 1930-01-15, Vol. 16, No. 11

              -X"
The College News
VOL. XVI, NO. 11
BRYN MAWR (AND WAYNE), PA., WEDNESDAY, JAN. 15,1930
PRICE,   10 CENTS
Miss Finch Quotes the
Alabaster Princess
On * Friday evening, January the
tenth, under the auspices of the Parents'
Association of the Thome School, Miss
Lucine Finch presented Her Mammy's
Stories in Goodhart Hall. Miss Finch
commenced" by announcing that she would,
tell these stories exactly as they wese told
to her b/ her old Negro mammy. Miss
Finch's Negro mammy had been bought
in the New Orleans slave market and
died in New Orleans a few years ago
after giving loyal service to three genera-
tions of the Finch family. She was of
royal blood and always called herself an
Alabaster Princess. At the end "of a
long life, said Miss. Finch, she was as
much a princess as in the beginning, for
slavery had not touched her inner aris-
tocracy. Her father was a high-class
Moor whose daughter, later Miss Finch's
mammy, was stolen and sold by the
Moors when he became converted to
Christianity.
Miss Finch assured her audience that
she told these stories in a true spirit of
reverence�reverence for the stones them-
selves and for the old woman's religion*.
The first number in Miss Finch's pro-
gram was the story of Moses in the Bul-
rushes. This was followed by two old
songs chosen from a collection of Negro
-lyrics which Miss Finch has compiled.
"Not," said Miss Finch, modestly, "that
I pretend to be a singer, but because I
think it is beauty to preserve them."
The songs were: Xobody Krioirs de
Trouble I Sec and Who Build de Ark?
Miss Finch then told a few amusing
anecdotes about -an old slave, a whim-
sical character named. Uncle Carter, who
was famous among the grown people be-
cause he never did any work at all and
among  the   children   on   account   of   his
Continued on   Page   Four
Whitehead Lectures
On History of Ideas
Slow     Progress    of    Humanity
Illustrated by Growth of
Freedom.
<*.
Mrs. Manning Discusses
Curriculum Committee
Changes in Faculty for
Next Semester Announced
On Tuesday morning, January four-
teenth, Mrs. Manning announced in
Chapel the changes planned in the faculty
and the work, during the second semes-
ter of this year.
In the department of Archeology, Dr.
Edith Hall Dohan will take over several
of Miss Swindler's courses. Miss Swind-
ler, who has not had a vacation in twenty
years, has been granted leave of absence
to take a trip to Egypt. Mrs. Dohan
will give her course, iji .Greek' Sculpture,
and will take over her graduate work,
giving a seminary in Cretan Civilization.
Miss Swindler's course in Latin comedy
will be taken over by Mr. Broughton,
and her course on Ancient Rome will be
taken over by Dr. Louise Adams Hol-
land.
Dr. Dohan graduated from Smith in
1899, and got hgr Ph. D., in Archeology
and Greek, at Bryn Mawr, in 1908^ From
1903-05 Mrs. Dohan held a Fellowship
in the American School of Classical Stud-
ies, at Athens, and from 1909-11 she was
instructor in Archeolbgy at Mt. Holyoke
College. In the year 1912-13, she was
Assistant Curator at the University
Museum, in Philadelphia. Dr. Dohan
substituted for Dr. Carpenter at Bryn
Mawr in 1923-24, and again in 1926. The
Latin course in Roman -Life, given by
Dr. Broughton in the first semester, will
be given by Dr. Holland in the second,
and Dr. Holland's course in Advanced
Latin Prose will be given by Dr. Taylor.
Miss Eleanor Grace Clark, of the Eng-
lish Department, has been offered an im-
portant position at Hunter College in
New York, which she will take after the
end of this semester.    Thus,  she has to
U. S. ABOLISHED SLAVERY
The Second Event in the Bryn Mawr
Series was "Pygmalion," by George
Bernard Shaw. The play was pre-
sented by the Theatre Guild in Good-
hart Auditorium, Tuesday afternoon,
December 17. A play of Shavian
thrusts and jibes, tested by years of
theatrical use, "Pygmalion" is of itself
solidly entertaining. The characteri-
zation by the Theatre Guild players, al-
though it seemed not "always to hark
back to a just interpretation of Mr.'
Shaw, was adequate; it was more than
adequate in Mr. Doolittle as rendered
by Dudley Digges, and in the not over-
ranting moments of the eccentric Hig-
gins, ..Pygmalion himself, as rendered
by Elliot Cabot. Mr. Shaw, as usual,
has a text for his sermon: phonetics;
in his preface, he affirms, with one can-
not tell how much malice aforethought,
that the play "is so intensely and de-
liberately didactic, and its subject es-
teemed so dry that I delight in throw-
ing it at the heads of wiseacres who
repeat parrot-like that art should never
be didactic."
Higgins, a teacher extraordinary ^gf
phonetics, becomes professionally en-
chanted by the tones of the Cockney
wench, Eliza, and resolves to take her
into his flat and "make a duchess out
of this draggle-tailed gutter snipe."
Moreover, Higgins succeeds, and pro-
duces an exquisitely empty-headed
"lady"�Eliza herself has wits in plenty
�of long drawn-out syllables; Eliza's
manufactured airs are absorbed as the
latest mode by the social aspirant Clara
Hill, and enslave her brother Freddy.
This Pygmalion however is a boor in
extravagant whimsies and unman-
ly conduct; his interest in Eliza is
merely scientific and practical: she is
the product of a "job," and incidentally
she is a good girl for picking up his
slippers; that the girl may have "feel-
ings" is not his concern, and he is
rather tired .of the whole affair by the
time he has .finished her off-. Eliza,
cut by his indifference even to her
phonetic-*�hieve#iients, throws the slip-
pers^at'him, rouses him to self-right-
eous indignation and runs away. Hig-
gins finds her at the house of his
mother, and he, using abominable lan-
guage, ^comes as close as ever he can
to apology; Eliza gives him a final
rebuff and ends the play with a threat
to rival Higgins in his profession. The
action is thus left up in the air, but in
the wicked postscript those interested
may discover a statement telling of
Eliza's subsequent marriage to Freddy
Hill.
Shaw's plays are' not spectacles; the
scenery is negligible and success de-
pends upon the "getting across" of the
lines and the implications. The open-
ing scene under the portico of St. Paul's
Chdrch in a London fog purposes to
jostle the characters against each other
and to display- the Notetaker's profi-
cient detection of twangs. But either
the point of the remarks was oblit-
erated in the swish of the rain, or the
confusion depicted became too realistic,
for the total effect was as indistinct as the
background. The four succeeding acts
moved smoothly with clearly spoken
lines, disturbed only in the uproars
staged   by   Eliza and   Higgins.     How-
Pygmalion Given
Theater Guild
By
%
give up
Mawr, but she will continue her seminary
by coming down here over week-ends,
and giving if on Friday or Saturday.
The Major Drama course v A\ be taken
over by Miss Glen, who is also an-Eng-
lish specialist, and who has taught drama
at Vassar. Miss Finch �vill take over
the course in Victorian Poets during
the second semester. - The resulting
changes in the- Required English courses
-are  that   Miss  Grierson   will  take   Miss
In Tuesday chapel Acting-President
Manning gave an explanation of the in-
vestigation being carried on by the Cur-
riculum Committee at present. Mrs.
Manning last year wrote a letter to Presi-
dent Park pointing out some defects of
the present system, and the Committee
has also welcomed suggestions from the
undergraduates.    The difficulty with the
9
curriculum in all schools and colleges of
today lies in the number of subjects to
be taught; the older. type of education
was more limited in its scope, and its
problems were infinitely simpler; a good
deal can be said for a curriculum limited
to certain subjects. But when you teach
only a half dozen subjects you neces-
sarily narrow the outlook of the whole
school community; no logical reason
exists for such a limitation, since many
subjects, such as Economics and So-
ciology, are .closely-related to every-day
life, and without some range of knowl-
edge a student is not educated when she
receives her Bachelor of -Arts degree.
Mrs. Manning considers that in the
present arrangement of- courses not
enough time is allowed to make of the
individual course what the members of
the faculty want it to be. Students in-
evitably rush from one lecture to another,
and the students in general do not have
leisure to work out plans for themselves.
Requirements and schedule sometimes
seem- to be unnecessarily complicated.
The present demand for more time for
individual work is in one sense new. A
few years ago the students were always
telling the faculty that they lectured too
much, but the undergraduates then wished
discussions in which all would take part.
It has since then been shown that in some
subjects reading and time for study are
more  necessary than discussion.
The Committee is considering new ar-
rangements of courses which will make
a more flexible lecture schedule. It has
been shown that a course may meet two
or three times a week, and the students
do as much work as for a five-hour
course. The real question is how many
subjects the student should work on at
once. The Committees-believes that the
student ought to spend one-third or one-
fourth of her time on each of her funda-
mental courses. This would mean taking
less courses, and many students object
to such a plan. Their objection rests
on the perfectly sound idea that they do
not wish to miss one opportunity for
becoming acquainted with many differ-
ent kinds of subjects. The Committee
would be glad if it could work out a sys-
tem by which the student could inform
herself along general lines while devot-
ing half her time or more to a special
line. But it is essential to give all major
courses and retired courses the time
they deserve. The work of the college
cannot accomplish what it should, unless
the basic sources�major and required
subjects, have the place they deserve in
the students' work-time and leisure.
The Curriculum Committee may possi-
bly not be ready with a definite plan this
year. They are glad of suggestions from
the undergraduates even when they can-
not incorporate all suggestions into their
plans.
Interesting   Interpretation   Lays
No Stress on Shaw's
Moral.
DOOLITTLE   IS   SHAVIAN
her undergraduate work at Bryn   ever, considering that Shaw's assertion
may be half-way trusted, and that he
is after all preaching phonetics, this
feature of the play is barely marked in
Higgins' articulation, and Eliza, al-
though her shrill "gutter-snipe" tones
were good, was not in her diction the
"lady" one would expect. In their ac-
tions also Higgins and Eliza were
rather broad caricatures of "personali-
ties than^ personifications of Shaw's
ideas. It was in the interludes devoted
Glen's   Freshman   Elective   Course,   and   to Middle Class Morality as expounded
CaMUKd  on   I'��r  Four
Continued  on  Parr Three
Calendar
Wednesday, January 15:. Profes-
sor Whitehead will give the
second of his series of lectures
on "The History of Id^~ in
the Goodhart Auditorium, at
eight-fifteen in the evening.
Friday, January 17: The last day
of first semester lectures.
Monday, January 20, to Friday,
January 31: Mid-year examina-
tions.
Monday, February 3: Vacation.
Tuesday, February 4: The work
of the second. ^J'qister will
begin at nine in'the mori.!
On Wednesday night, January 8, Pro-
fessor Alfred North Whitehead, of Har-
vard University, gave the first lecture
on the Mary Flexner Foundationship in
Goodhart Hall. Professor Whitehead
took- as his title The History of Ideas.\
This title as such, he said, might be
taken as symbolic of the history of the
human race. But the human race must
write its own history, and it is this fact
which Professor Whitehead proposed to
consider by illustrations and examples.
The facts in detail depend on scholarly
criticism; for the scholar selects from
his observations and gives his own inter-
pretations of events, thus arriving at pure
history. The notion of history must be
devoid of personal and petty prejudices.
The historian is dependent on his own
judgment as. to what is important to
human life.           �
Miss Martin Speaks
On N. S. F. A. Conference
Take first the political history of man-
kind. Hegel observed it in the Prussian
�State, Macaulay later in England. One
cannot consider the wisdom or folly of
it except� by some standard of judgment
constituting the driving force of ideas.
The notion oi mere knowledge is one
to dismiss. Graduations appear in all gen-
eralities. Specific forms appear arising
from the specific circumstances of the
race and of the civilization. There is an
emotional accompaniment to these gen-
eralities due to a feeling of. one's own
importance, and to the specific forms in
which they are. manifested: in a national
anthem for instance.
Gibbon's History tells a two-fold talc.
It tells of the decline and fall of the
Roman Empire over a period of a thou-
sand years; he describes administration,
wealth, religion, and philosophy; he por-
trays greatness and smallncss, soldier and
statesman, happiness and hom>r. But
throughout the whole it is Gibbon who
speaks.
Transition in All Ages.
Comparing steam and democracy, and
barbarism and Christianity, steam and
barbarism are defenseless agencies, de-
mocracy and .Christianity are articulated
beliefs. A well-marked transition can be
traced to steam and democracy. A period
of change is oiie of hope or despair, of
discovering new worlds or of being
haunted on the shore. It is easy to exag-
gerate in contrasting the ages, for one's
point of view depends entirely on surviv-
ing records and whosever's feelings they
represent. In every transitional age there
is an oncoming complexity of habit be-
tween which lies force of habit. All de-
pends on the standpoint of criticism; a
history of ideas depends on a knowledge
of   history.                      w
Man is not. young, and in all ages
there Is*always transition. In the forest
age some who tried to climb and live in
trees became known as apes; then some
of the race descended* to the ground and
became men. It is the order of history.
The Huns had some ideas preferable to
the degenerate Romans. Steam engines
represent brute force.
Intellectual impulse is subject to gen-
eral ideas and specific notions. Each age
distinguished by high effort finds some
profound cosmological outlook, which is
Only partly expressed. Intellectual strife
is mainly concerned with generalities. In
each period the form is transcendent, and
only1- by an effort are we aware of it
Take the political history of the Medi-
terranean�Pericles and Cleon, Caesar
and Cicero all differed; yet all agreed
fundamentally that a large slave popula-
tion was necessary for an active state
\ substratum was needed because the
civil community is not self-sufficient. The
fact was derived from an earlier desire
of the Egyptians for bricks, so they cap-
tured the Hebrews who supplied the
mechanism   for building.
The problems are still alive today and"
yet we differ on the only point to which
trtem-slavery wnj*j
In Chapel on Thursday Margaret Mar-
tin, '30, gave her impressions of the fifth
annual congress of the National Student
Federation of America which met at Stan-
ford University from the first until the
fourth of January. The first conven-
tion of this federation was hejd at
Princeton five years ago.. "Its aim
was a permanent and inclusive organi-
zation of colleges and universities in
America. This movement was a part
of a general development of student or-
ganization in countries throughout the
world, begun in Strasbourg in 1919, and
resulting in'the International Confed-
eration of Students." This year the
conference aspired to a completer un-
derstanding of problems of students in
Ainetita and abroad which would lead
to a sort of general citizenship of the
world.
"The congress began on January the
first with an informal tea in the after-
noon and a reception at the President's
house in the evening. Such social ac-
tivities�lunchcofls, more teas, and an-
other dance�continued throughout the
conference. In me business meetings
many pertinent � problems were dis-.
cussed,   among   them   the   question   of
self-government for, men's colleges and
self-government for women's colleges.
These discussions were very illumi-
nating. Apparently some colleges have
quite surprising difficulties, especially
the big universities where .there are
problems of cheating that are simply
phenomenal. In comparison our col-
lege seems quite serene. . . . The
Honor System was another subject fo'r
discussion, and there was put the ques-
tion: 'Is the Honor System of enough
importance that the N. S. F. A. should
sponsor its promotion and extension?'
Under the heading Buying and Selling
the problem of 'hot' and 'cold' checks
arose, and for a moment almost every-
one was at a loss until it was ex-
plained that these were bad checks
often passed by students at those col-
leges that had co-operative stores run
by students. In the future it was sug-
gested that there be regional confer-
ences held before the large congress.
"As for general impressions one saw
the distinct difference between the
Eastern and the Western colleges, and
between the large and the small col-
leges. The larger ones were so much
more difficult to handle. ' The real
value of the conference is in its inter-
national work, which is definitely, con-
structive. This year the Bulgarian
students   are   being   helped.
"At the close of the conference sev-
eral resolutions were passed: first, that
there be elected an executive secretary
to act as a definite managing head of
the Federation; secondly, that delegates
returning from the congress should es-
tablish local committees to make
people N. S. F. A.-conscious, and
thirdly, that a tax�finally determined
to be two cents per capita�should be
levied on students in all colleges par-
ticipating in the Federation."
presupposed; to us freedom is presup-
posed. This growth of the rights of man
is exemplified in the history of ideas. Its-
conclusion will be the trial of a later
stage of civilization.
Idea of Freedom in Greece.
Historical civilization^ is remarkable for
two reasons: first, there is a culmination
of slavery in classical history�to be civ-
ilized was to be a slave owner. Some
among them, Cicero and Pliny, were
kind; some were efficient and therefore
brutal. And second, KC sec in the class-
ics an introduction 51 the modern criti-
cal system. Plato was an aristocrat by
birth and by c�nviftioiis. but we-cannot
read the Dialogues without noticing a
question in his mind concerning the rights
of human nature.' Here we see the first
appearance.of new ideas having limited
application. On the whole the social
system was against the new idea, for
general ideas are always dangerou,s to
the existing order. But it was nerving;
men'like Marcus Aurelius to rise to the
height   to  which  he   ascended    For   six
CoattaartTom  Pace  Three