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Isabella Jin


Features Writer

Isabella Jin is a writer for the features section of the Daily. She is a first-year at SMFA and can be reached at Isabella.Jin@tufts.edu

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Features

How Tufts professors balance teaching with creative pursuits

As midterms approach, many Tufts students are scrambling to memorize terms for a biology test or agonizing over lengthy papers. What many students may not consider is that Tufts professors are also approaching one of the busiest periods of the semester. With over 9,700 faculty publications from 2022–24, one may wonder how these professors can work around the clock to not only grade assignments, ensure course quality and hold office hours, but also reserve time for their role within their chosen field. In other words: How do professors balance creative and research work alongside their teaching duties?

Landscape in the style of Yan Wengui and Fan Kuan
Columns

Evanescence and the Beautiful Foolishness of Things: Spring snow

According to the traditional Chinese calendar, on Feb. 4, we officially transitioned into spring. The first season in the 24-term solar calendar, Lichun (立春), marks the start of the new year and the beginning of harvest. It is also known as risshun in Japanese, ipchun in Korean and lập xuân in Vietnamese. Lichun doesn’t mark the immediate defrosting of snow, yet it is felt as and symbolizes the first marks of blooming life. In fact, the present snow is often seen as a contributor to the joys of the season because, as snow gradually melts, it nourishes the ground underneath to bring a strong, lucrative harvest. Beyond its practical role, snow also holds powerful symbolism and aesthetic meaning in East Asian thought. 

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Features

FTR: Tisch Library Exhibitions

Sitting next to the lush greens of President’s Lawn is Tisch Library, a building we all know and love that serves as a center of academic learning and scholastic research at Tufts. Students utilize the library for a wide range of purposes, which include creating in the Digital Design Studio, meeting group members in Tower Cafe and finishing a last-minute homework assignment in one of the reading rooms. 

SMFA
Features

Fifth-year students at Tufts balance freedom and limitations

There’s much splendor surrounding graduation: the glitz and glamor of the senior gala, the intimate community bonding at the baccalaureate and, of course, the proud walk across the stage to receive one’s hard-earned diploma. Fifth-year students at Tufts have the opportunity to attend most of these events alongside their classmates. Unlike their peers, however, they also carry the knowledge that they will return to campus next year, while most of their friends enter a new stage of life.

Hokusai’s ‘The Great Wave’ is pictured.
Columns

Evanescence and the Beautiful Foolishness of Things: Hokusai’s ‘The Great Wave’

For centuries, the East and West have existed as what seem to be distinct entities — so different in culture and ideology that the art they produced reflected those stark differences. While Western art focused extensively on perspective and individual expressionism, East Asian art maintained its historical lineage of searching for “essence” in life and depicting the philosophical ideas of Buddhism and Daoism. However, as suited to the adventurous spirit of the great explorers, cultural exchange between the two was an inevitable historical product that brought excitement and revolution. 

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Arts

The people’s artist: Qi Baishi

Situated among the Boston MFA’s proud Asian collection is a dimly lit exhibition hall whose inconspicuous presence belies the crowds of visitors frequenting its displays. To protect the fragility of the Xuan paper and silk scrolls, as well as to ensure the ink doesn’t fade, each work is spotlighted under a single warm light. However, these soft beige and brown illuminations do not dull the vibrancy of Qi’s colors nor detract from the eccentricity of his brushstrokes.

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