Wajahat Ali is a 24 year old who grew up in middle class America. He is of Pakistani descent and Muslim. He’s a graduate of UC Berkeley, a law student, and has dabbled in stand up comedy. He is also considered an up and coming literary talent.
Ali has gained notoreity for a two-act play he wrote called “The Domestic Crusaders”. The play is about a Muslim American family coming together for a birthday party. The play focuses on life after 9/11 for a Muslim family living in America. It speaks to the conflicts, religious and political, that affect many families today.
Ali enrolled at UC Berkeley in 2001. One of his teachers was Pulitzer Prize winner, Ishmael Reed. Although Ali was taking Reed’s short story class, Reed was quick to notice the budding author’s talent and encouraged him to write a play. Ali took on the challenge and spent many hours researching how plays are structured and presented. Reed was his mentor throughout the process. “The Domestic Crusaders” is the result of all that hard work.
“The Domestic Crusaders” has received critical acclaim. And, audiences have enjoyed it immensely. We should expect more achievements from this young talent in the future.
If you would like to learn more about the play and the playwright, visit the home page for the The Domestic Crusaders
Walter Smith teaches physics at Haverford College in Pennsylvania. He has a unique approach. He’s made up songs about Einstein, oscillation, and other science topics and he sings them in the classroom.
He greets his students with song right on the first day. Most of the students aren’t sure what to think. They don’t expect their science teachers to serenade them. And, science isn’t the first thing you’d think of when you think of music.
Smith has quite a repertoire. Some songs are the result of a collaboration with his wife, other songs come from satirists and other teachers. His own compositions include such hits as “Divine Einstein”, “Love Song of the Electric Field”, and “The Photon and the Wave”.
Smith is liked and respected by his students. Although his methods are unconventional, they bring results. If you’ve gotten a song stuck in your head, then you know that music would be an excellent complement to any curriculum. It may be difficult to remember facts, but the words to a song well memorized usually come quite easily. Since alot of learning is repetition, why not set it to song to make it easier?
Smith isn’t the only science teacher using this method. James Livingston at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has also composed songs and poems related to science. Livingston uses the songs to complement curriculum, but he does not sing them.
Smith has a website dedicated to his musical compositions as well as songs contributed by others. The website includes a song database and information on how to use the songs with course material. You can visit his website at this address: Physics Songs
[Photograph credit: Joerg Loehnig, www.sxc.hu]
