8A = THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
NEWS
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 13,2002
WEONESMAY 13.0
amateur comedy
NIGHT
7:00-8:00 pm
Hawks Nest
kansas union, level 1
KARAOKE CONTEST
& OKIE NOODLING
8:30 pm-karaoke
9:30 pm-movie
Woodruff Auditorium
win tickets to beck &
flaming lips
kansas union, level s
THURSDAY FRIDAY
11 AM & 11 PM
FEATURE FILM
Minority Report
7:00 & 9:30 pm
Woodruff Auditorium
kansas union, level 5
SATURDAY
11A PM
BECK/
FLAMING LIPS
Sold Out Concert
7:00 pm
Lied Center
MONDAY
11.8 PM
INTERNATIONAL
FILM SERIES:
"Pather Panchali"
8:00 pm
Woodruff Auditorium
kansas union, level 4
kansas union
gallery
WORKS BY
Rachel Schmidt
November 11-November 26
4:00am-4:00pm
kansas union, Level 4
TUESDAY 19TH
SUA COMMITTEE MEETINGS
5:00, 6:00, 7:00, 8:00 pm
CHECK THE SUA OFFICE
FOR THE LOCATION OF
your committee!
CALL TICKETS for movies are $2.00 at
THE HAWK SHOP, LEVEL 4 kansas union or
FREE WITH AN SUA MOVIE CARD.
QUESTIONS about these or other
SUA events?
CALL THE SUA OFFICE at 864-SHOW
11/13-11/19 weekly events
KANSAS UNION
[Open Study]
Hawles Nest Level 1
50% Coffee after 1st cup at WheatWavers
11/17
HAWKS NES
11/18
HAWKS NES
11/19
HAWKS NES
11/13
HAWKS NES
11/14
HAWKS NES
11/15
HAWKS NES
11/16
[Monday Night Football]
6pm-Close Hawks Nest Level 1 Big Screen
1/2 price Priceeizers at WheatWavers
[Billards Night]
754 a game
7pm Applied English Center
[Touchdown Tuesdays]
KU Bookstores Level 2 (both Unions)
5% off for every KU Touchdown
[2-for-1 Bowling]
3:30-6pm Jaybowl Level 1
$1.99 Pretzel & Fountain Drink at WheatWavers
SUA College Bowl Trivia Night
[Amateur Comedy Night]
7pm Hawk Nest Level 1
$2.99 Chicken Tender and Drink at WheatWaven
[Spend a Little Time with "Friends"]
7:00pm Hawks Nest* Level 1
$1.99 Pizza and Fountain Drink
[Froo Billiards]
7-10pm Hawks Nest Level 1
$2.99 Chicken Tender and Drink at WheatWavers
[College Football]
Hawks Neat Level 1 Big Screen
$1.99 Hot Dog & Fountain Drink
about live performances was being able to adapt to the audience.
Second City
CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1A
Grazulz said it was important not to let the shows become a rote experience. He said the key was to keep reinventing the show for oneself.
"You want to be in their reference base," she said.
One might assume the word embarrassment is not in a comedic actors vocabulary, and for Kloss, that is true.
"I don't get nervous anymore," she said. "I just want the audience to have a good time.
One thing that appealed to students about The Second City was their reputation of hilarious improvisation skills.
Freshman Adam Reese said he had seen The Second City twice before in his hometown of Manhattan. While waiting in line to see show number three, he said it was the funniest show he'd ever been to.
Reese said he also liked the fact that many alumni from the show Saturday Night Live began their careers on The Second City. Chris Farley, Bill Murray and John Belushi are just a few of The Second City's alumni.
"I like the spontaneity, how anything could happen," he said of sketch comedy.
The groups skits touched on issues such as abortion and drug addiction. They also set some skits to song.
Grazulis said things that should never be put in song form are sung about.
"Like politics and weird relationships," he said.
He said music was a big part of the group's performance because it added another dimension to the performance.
The group performed an improvisational skit they called "freeze tag" which drew upon their wit. As the word "freeze" was yelled, one pair continued the skit using the prior couple's last line.
Kevin McCabe, St. Louis.
Mo., junior, said he enjoyed the unpredictability of sketch comedy.
"The people are pretty creative." he said.
"The Second City is probably our biggest act of the year," she said. "It's like a wrap up."
Student Union Activities sponsored the event. It was one of four comedic events SUA sponsored this semester, Aaron Mesmer, vice president of membership said.
— Edited by Christine Grubbs
Andrea Shores, special events coordinator for SUA, said she thought students enjoyed comedic events because it gave them the opportunity to relax.
Meeting CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1A
Mark Dupree, Kansas City.
Kan, junior, said that being a minority was something he had to learn to accept.
inition of diversity and then trying to determine to what degree it existed on campus, in Lawrence and throughout the country.
Some students argued that not much diversity existed on campus and that they would feel more comfortable with more racial minorities in the student population.
Andrew Dies, Hehigh senior, had a different perspective. He said that Hehigh was a small town of about 200 people, and that Lawrence and KU had been a startling example of diversity to him.
"As a minority, you're forced to accept certain things," he said. "On campus, there's 2.5 percent African-Americans. You're thrown into it. You have no choice."
"That's one of the reasons I came here," he said. "For the diversity."
The group agreed with Melanie Weiser, Dallas, Texas, junior, who said that while definitions of diversity varied, it could be defined as anything that makes a person unique.
The group also agreed major media outlets played an important role in how cultures were perceived.
Dupree said children, the most impressionable of all.
were molded by mass media images that depicted false stereotypes and perpetuated ignorance.
Santos Núñez, director of the center, told the group that hate crimes were occurring at the moment the students were discussing diversity. Núñez said hate can begin with a single derogatory slur.
"Hate comes in so many forms and it starts with just one word," she said.
Edited by Adam Pracht
Corporate America tries to win over teenagers
The Associated Press
CHICAGO — Use a little slang and you've got their attention. That seems to be the growing thought in corporate America and the media, eager to hook the younger crowd.
Some sportscasters have started describing impressive plays as "sick." Before that, Budweiser ads helped place the greeting "Whassup" in the American lexicon.
But those are the rare cases that don't draw groans and eye-rolling from the young crowd. More often, young people say adults shouldn't even think about using lingo from the streets, hip-hop clubs and school hallways.
"Uh-uhhh, they need to quit," says Aurielle McIntosh, a seventh-grader from the Chicago suburb of Oak Park. "They just look silly."
That goes for just about anybody over 30. Aurielle says she and others can't help but piggle, for example, when their social studies teacher shouts, "Roll out!" — the title of a hit song by rapper Ludacris.
Still, corporate America seems set on using slang.
One current TV ad announces the release of DVDs of "Star Wars: Episode II" with the question "Who's da man?" and answers. "Yoda's da man," while showing scenes of the movie's pint-size Jedi elder fighting bad guys.
Another new spot for a new Microsoft Xbox game called "Blinx the Time Sweeper" features old guys wearing urban clothes and calling each other "homeys."
Some news organizations are getting into the act.
In an e-mail leaked this fall to other media outlets, a CNN Headline News producer gave his staff a slang dictionary and a suggestion, "Please use this guide to help all you homeys and homes add a new flava to your tickers and dekkos," the message said, referring to graphics on the TV screen.
"I would sort of chuckle at it, although it would catch my eye," says 14-year-old Guy Weltcheck of South Orange, N.J. "But what are they going to say? Something like 'Yo, yo, yo — what up, Saddam?'
Another problem: The slang adults use is often out of date.
CNN's slang dictionary, for example, has an old definition for "ill," which once meant strange or obnoxious. Now it means just the opposite — as in, "That DJ rocks. She plays the illest music."
In yet another ad, America Online uses slang for its new broadband service — "phat sounds to fat pipes." Phat, in that case, means rich, luscious, big.
Elsewhere, others prefer "slammin" and "tight" to describe something they like. And at parties, some like to get "crunked up."
But Kenny Ong, a graphic design student at the Art Institute of California-Orange County, says you are much more likely to hear students there say "that's butter" or "that's gravity" instead of what.
It's no surprise that most adults don't know that, says Paul McFedries, creator of an online catalog of terms called Word-spy.com.
"Slang is meant to be separate," he says. In other words, if adults are using it, it's not cool anymore.
That's what Microsoft failed to understand in the Blinx spot, says Buzz Marketing Group, a New Jersey-based firm where teen advisers panned the ad.
"I think the smartest advertisers are realizing that it's more about understanding youth culture than using their language," says Tina Wells, Buzz Marketing's 22-year-old chief executive.
partner of Blue Flame Marketing + Advertising, agrees. "It's really about being respectful," says Spencer, whose company is led by music executive Sean "P. Diddy" Combs. "Any culture wants to be respected - it doesn't want to be seen as a mockery."
Sometimes slang in ads can be funny, says Steve Messam, a junior and football player at Central Michigan University. He thought the Budweiser "Whassup" campaign, which began with younger black guys loudly greeting one another, worked well.
"I'm sure a lot of black people laughed because they know somebody — some family member or friend — who says that," says Messam, who is black. "And it translated well to white culture, too," he adds, noting later commercials that poked fun at nerdy white guys.
But race also can make using slang tricky.
Emily Hall, a white teacher ata predominantly black junior high in Columbus, Ohio, uses it to get students' attention. "Don't play with me!" she sternly warns those who act up. But generally, she waits to use slang until she knows students better.
"If they don't know you," she says, "they think, 'Who does she think she is?'