Naming genocide, the Brown/Trinity MFA program, and sickness
Volume 51 Issue 8 — December 5, 2025
Hey, Indie here. Welcome to The Clog, the weekly newsletter from your favorite alt-weekly, the College Hill Independent.
We’re finally back after a break, but just like that… it’s The End. I’m devastated. I know you’re devastated. We’re all devastated. How will we survive these next two months without a single fresh hot-off-the-press copy of the Indy to look forward to? Me personally, until Volume 52 begins in all its glory, I’ll be rereading this issue repeatedly—to cope, yes, but also because it is, as ever, the richest of texts. There’s just so much to uncover! Including the below. Segue.
In World, Coby Mulliken B’27 challenges our reliance on the concept of ‘genocide’ to understand catastrophic violence.
“This is naming at its most powerful: God’s words have force, a transcendental force that remakes rather than describes. And it is this force to which we moderns have aspired in our genocide conventions and international tribunals and haughty opinion pieces.”
For Metro, Sebastian Botero B’27, Ben Flaumenhaft B’27, and Cindy Li R’26.5 examine the future of institutional art-making through the closure of the Brown/Trinity Rep MFA Acting Program.
“While the marriage of Brown University and Trinity Rep seemed to be a perfect union, Austyn Williamson MFA’25 compared being in B/T to being ‘a child of divorced parents.’ A fundamental misalignment on what it means to be an art-making institution strained the ideal of a world-class theater combined with a world-class educational institution. Today, B/T is nearly disassembled, with only the class of 2026 remaining.”
In Feats, Cameron Calonzo B’28 and Ellie Wu B’28 each write on sickness and health. Calonzo meditates on figurations of bodily illness and the experience of pain, and Wu questions the pathologization of menopause and the natural changes of the female body.
But wait—there’s more! Read the rest of the issue at www.theindy.org. If you want to view the digital layout, click here! And if you enjoy The Clog, consider subscribing, sharing, or supporting our paid stipend program.
Til next year! xoxo Indie