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Regents’ Lecturer Sees Unity of Purpose Among Planners and Artists

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Urban planning can seem bureaucratic and risk-averse — seemingly closed off to experimentation and imagination. “But I believe that planners have a lot of creativity,” said UC Regents’ lecturer Mallory Rukhsana Nezam during a Feb. 21 presentation in the Grand Salon of Kerckhoff Hall. “I always find that planners are the most excited about their arts and culture work,” Nezam said. She has worked with many planners who are driven toward social causes and social change. “And artists are also drawn to that. So, there’s an overlap of values there.” In her consulting practice, Justice + Joy, Nezam seeks to de-silo the way cities are run and build models for interdisciplinary collaboration. “What planners are actually doing is work that pertains to a built environment, and I think that’s really ripe for this intersection with arts and culture,” she said during a presentation that included a lively Q&A session with Professor Chris Tilly of UCLA Luskin Urban Planning and audience members. Nezam’s presentation was organized around reimagining planning in three ways — structural, process and spatial. Citing examples from across the country, she outlined ways in which city planners are incorporating artists into government, including a growing number of artists-in-residence. “These residencies are embedding artists deeply as co-creators and problem-solvers,” she said. “We’re not talking about artists just painting murals, we’re actually talking about artists being at the table when we’re discussing policy.” She expressed optimism about approaches that reward innovation. “We have to imagine something different — imagine a world we haven’t created yet. And that’s where this creative, radical imagination of arts and culture can come in.”

Download an audio recording or view photos on Flickr.

Mallory Nezam Regents' Lecture

 

Doubling Down at UCLA Luskin undergrads are bringing a public service ethos to second majors, including from the arts and sciences

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By Mary Braswell

Think deeply. Analyze facts. Find solutions.

These skills form the core of the UCLA Luskin undergraduate program, preparing students for leadership roles in any field.

But some public affairs students choose to pursue a second option among UCLA’s more than 125 undergraduate majors, perhaps to bring a civic service ethos to a specific career path or simply to pursue two passions.

Economics, education, sociology and political science are commonly paired with the B.A. in Public Affairs, said Erika Villanueva, director of undergraduate student services. Lately, however, more students from the sciences and arts are finding a home at the Luskin School.

Zerxes Bhadha, who is also majoring in astrophysics, and Lilah Haye, who is also majoring in dance, shared how their discovery of the public affairs program shifted their approach to a UCLA education.

IN THE BEGINNING

UCLA Luskin launched undergraduate classwork in the fall of 2018, just as Bhadha and Haye were beginning their freshman year.

Bhadha had planned to study biochemistry but was having second thoughts. “My gut was telling me there’s no real rush to pick a major right now, it’ll work itself out. I’ll figure it out as we go along,” Bhadha recalled.

That plan was upended after a conversation with a teaching assistant at a UCLA summer program for incoming students. The TA, who happened to be an urban planning doctoral student, suggested that Bhadha check out the new undergrad program at Luskin.

“I was totally hooked,” said Bhadha, who uses they/them pronouns. “I realized, this is where I want to be, this is what I want to do. And the next day, I signed up for the pre-major.”

But Bhadha still felt the pull of the sciences.

“One of my earliest memories is my dad taking out this small telescope that we had and showing me the craters on the moon. And you know, since then I’ve been looking at stars, and we’d go out and look for meteor showers, and I’d read everything I could about space and physics,” they said. “It’s definitely something that I really enjoy and so that’s how I settled on this second major.”

For Haye, majoring in dance at UCLA immerses her in the art that she loves.

“I’ve been a competitive dancer my whole life. I started dancing at 5 and I haven’t stopped since,” she said. Contemporary dance is her forte, but as part of the World Arts and Cultures program, she has also studied the dance traditions of places like India, Brazil and West Africa.

The public affairs major is preparing Haye for another dream: a career in law or politics.

“Before school even started I had heard about the brand-new public affairs major, and I knew from the beginning that I wanted to double major,” she said. Learning about the senior capstone project, which immerses students in a year-long research project with a community partner, sealed the deal.

“At the end of the day, the capstone gives you real-world experience in comparison to just taking more upper-division classes,” Haye said. “That’s what really drew me to public affairs.”

BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

Bhadha has found that the physical sciences and social sciences look at the world from different vantage points.

“My science training tells me that every problem has a solution … whereas in many of my public affairs courses, we’re looking at individuals and at systems and at things for which there isn’t necessarily one correct answer, there are just guidelines and principles that we follow to make the world better,” they said.

There is little overlap between the two majors, though the advanced math needed for astrophysics has made the public affairs degree’s statistics, coding and quantitative analysis requirements easier to manage.

While the two fields open doors to a multitude of professions, “it really comes down to how I want to spend my time and where I want my career to be, and that is in public service,” said Bhadha, who’s looking forward to working with the Maryland public defender’s office for their capstone project.

Haye’s chosen majors, as well as her minor in African American studies, allow for quite a bit of crossover. Many people don’t realize that the dance major requires intensive research and writing, she said, such as the 20-page paper she produced on the racialization of dancing bodies, from blackface minstrelsy to modern dance.

Haye was able to satisfy public affairs elective requirements with World Arts and Cultures courses such as “Art as Social Action.” Her capstone internship is with the office of California Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, who has lobbied for fair wages for dancers. And Haye seeks out every opportunity to introduce the arts into her public affairs assignments.

“One of the main things we learn in the dance major is how to use dance as activism, and the public affairs department is all about activism. They’re so intertwined.”

AN INTERDISCIPLINARY LENS

Coupling fine arts or hard sciences with public affairs “makes absolute sense,” said Villanueva, who advises public affairs majors on their educational journeys at and beyond UCLA.

At UCLA, the arts embrace equity and community engagement, she said, and the sciences are viewed through an interdisciplinary lens that captures the importance of social responsibility.

But the decision to double major should not be taken lightly, Villanueva stressed.

“It does take careful planning, and it really comes down to a student’s energy level,” she said. “It becomes a more holistic conversation about what they will gain from double majoring or minoring, other than saying I have an extra line on my diploma.”

Bhadha’s course load is challenging but also provides structure and incentive. “I’ve always taken the view that I would be taking all of these classes anyway,” they said.

In addition to dance and public affairs, Haye was drawn to UCLA’s African American studies curriculum to learn more about her father’s heritage.

“I love public affairs, I love dance, and African American studies is my actual racial identity,” she said. “My three forms of study really define me.”

Urban Planning Alumna Leads National Endowment for the Arts

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Urban Planning alumna Maria Rosario Jackson PhD ’96 has been confirmed as chair of the National Endowment for the Arts, becoming the first African American and Mexican American woman to lead the federal agency. “The arts are critical to our well-being, to robust economies and to healthy communities where all people can thrive,” said Jackson, a professor at Arizona State University who has served on the National Council on the Arts since 2013. For more than 25 years, Jackson’s work has focused on understanding and elevating arts, culture and design as critical elements of strong communities. She has served as an advisor on philanthropic programs and investments at national, regional and local foundations, including the Los Angeles County Cultural Equity and Inclusion Initiative and the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. She serves on the board of directors of the Performing Arts Center of Los Angeles County, among other organizations, and her work appears in a wide range of professional and academic publications. She also taught a UCLA course on arts, culture and community revitalization. Jackson grew up in South Los Angeles and credits her parents with instilling a love of the arts in her family. “Our art, culture and creativity are some of our country’s most valuable resources,” she said. “They are evidence of our humanity, our ability to learn from our examined experience, and our ability to imagine and innovate.” President Joe Biden nominated Jackson to the NEA post in October, during National Arts and Humanities Month; her appointment was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on Dec. 18.

Read full release and bio

 

Chancellor’s Arts Initiative Awards Grant to Umemoto

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Urban Planning Professor Karen Umemoto has been named a recipient of the 2021 Chancellor’s Arts Initiative, a program to advance arts-related research that is timely, relevant and original and that increases public awareness of the arts at UCLA. Umemoto, director of UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center, is one of 12 faculty members to receive a grant under the $150,000 program sponsored by the Chancellor’s Council on the Arts and the Office for Research and Creative Activities. Priority was given to projects that contribute to UCLA’s larger commitments to sustainability, anti-racism, equity, diversity and inclusion. Amid a rise in anti-Asian violence in America, the Asian American Studies Center in collaboration with the Asia Pacific Center will spearhead a multimedia and multiperforming arts event commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Los Angeles Chinese Massacre of 1871, which involved the lynching of 19 Chinese immigrants. In addition to spoken narrative based on an original script, the project will feature body movement artists and a soundscape that draws from culturally diverse acoustic instruments and computer-generated sounds. This community engagement piece will include a pre-performance workshop and a post-event reception with speakers, performers and invited guests sharing historical accounts of racist violence against Asians in Los Angeles and linking the experiences of the past to the present. The Chancellor’s Council on the Arts also announced the launch of GO ARTS UCLA, an online platform that brings together the full array of UCLA arts and humanities events and research in one central location, underscoring the role of the arts at the university and within Los Angeles’ cultural ecosystem.

 

Jack Rothman’s ‘Delayed Harvest’: Poetry That Grasps People Emeritus professor of social welfare publishes a collection of poems to link readers to his nine decades

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By Stan Paul

Jack Rothman, professor emeritus of social welfare at UCLA Luskin, has written numerous books — more than 25 — during his long academic career, most of them on community organizing and multiculturalism.

Among those titles is a book on the film industry and a recent chronicle of his search for his ancestral home, a Jewish village, or shtetl, in Ukraine — a place that didn’t appear on any map at the time.

His most recent literary effort is a book of poetry published during the worldwide pandemic titled, “The Voice of Consciousness: Poems Composed After Ninety.” (Tebot Bach)

“My poems dig into the past, embrace the present, look to the future,” Rothman wrote in the book’s introduction. The book is organized into three sections: Musings, Family and Humor. Some of the poems deal with his long-term interests in social issues, such as peace, social justice, and inequality. Rothman describes his straightforward verse style as accessible, “like low-hanging fruit you can easily reach and digest.”

“Too much poetry nowadays,” he says, “is abstract and hard to fathom.”

The collection is the product of a poetry workshop that Rothman, now 94, started attending in his early 90s. A few poems in the collection were written before then, like “The 1%,” which was previously published in The Huffington Post. The rest, about 95%, he says, were written in the last few years.

Rothman, who garnered numerous awards and honors for his academic research, describes himself as “a proponent of social activism and a supporter of progressive causes.” He has written political opinion pieces over the years that appeared in publications including The Nation, Social Policy, The Humanist and the Los Angeles Times. But, he explained, “With time, I found that poetry became a tighter, more cogent way to express my thinking and feelings about what is important to me.”

The section Musings includes titles such as “Precious Consciousness,” “A Struggle for Language” and “Renewal,” where “Hundreds of students/Chant/Carrying posters/Demanding climate change action/Speaking hope amidst the waste.”

In Humor, Rothman takes a poke at the political with “Voting,” “America Ain’t Got No Social Classes” and even the former occupant of the White House in “The Donald.”

Rothman says as teacher he always liked telling stories and discusses the origins of his poetry in his latest book.

My poetry springs from the comic
I was born with a funny bone
Or was it many funny bones
I’ve merged humor and poetry

In fact, in his 70s, Rothman took up stand-up comedy, which resulted in gigs at local venues including The Comedy Store, The Improv and Pasadena’s Ice House.

His work wanders from mundane and daily observances to memories of his childhood in Depression-era America to hope for his grandson in the next generation. For example, Rothman, who grew up in New York, the son of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, paints a portrait of an August day in 1935, remembering his father.

Pop, an immigrant,
Owns a candy store

Somewhat shabby and worn
On a Street corner in Queens…

Always a hard worker
The Great Wall Street Crash
Battered Pop’s life
In a double disaster
He lost his wife the same year
And I a toddler of two
Lost my mother…

In “Ode to My Miata,” Rothman uses the image of his prized silver sports car, which “remained streamlined and sporty/Ever youthful,” as he “sprouted signs of aging.” The well-cared-for car is passed on to his grandson, “who now navigates the Miata/with the care and love/That I had bestowed upon it.”

Leaning on my cane
I see a glint on the horizon
An auto and a young man
Flowing along the Southern California Sunset

And lastly, a simple object gives voice to consciousness for Rothman. In “The Yellow Pencil,” he concludes:

“My Yellow pencil may be worn out
The eraser a stump
Just give us a little more time
And we’ll compose
A lasting anniversary rhyme
For my wife”

The book is dedicated to his wife, Judy, “Companion and Helpmate Extraordinary.”

As for the future, Rothman says, along with his other interests, he’ll keep writing poetry.

Yaroslavsky on Vision for a Cultural Hub in Downtown L.A.

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A Los Angeles Times commentary arguing for stepped-up investment in a downtown L.A. arts scene as a way to rebound from the economic devastation of COVID-19 sought insights from Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin. Envisioning a “democratic gathering place for arts and ideas” centered around the monumental Grand Avenue complex now under construction, the author called for building out the area with new and renovated concert venues, car-free stretches and outdoor cultural events accessible to all. Yaroslavsky, known as a supporter of the arts in his decades as a city councilman and county supervisor, endorsed this vision of Grand Avenue for the future but cautioned that it is too soon to expect governments to invest heavily.

Read the commentary