Journals reflect campus creativity

Issues faced by two campus publications, the Plum Creek Review and Desi

A look at Oberlin's campus publications reveals a number of journals. Comparing the Plum Creek Review and Desi , there is the established and the developing, both with ambitious visions of their future.

It should come as no surprise that Oberlin has its own literary magazine. The name, however, may not be familiar: The Plum Creek Review . The PCR publishes poetry and prose, fiction and non-fiction, and although it has existed since about 1964, it enjoys less name recognition than one might expect. That is the result of a number of factors going against the magazine. First among them is how frequently it is published - in the distant past it came out twice a year, but has since been released only one a year. To make matters worse, last year it was not seen at all, and the issue meant to come out during the 1995 Commencement was instead released at the beginning of this year. The staff has tried to overcome these barriers, and among other things hosted a string of open-mic nights to better advertise the magazine's existence.

Desi is an entirely different animal. The South Asian Students Association (SASA) began planning its existence last year. The idea came partly from the need for South Asian students to voice their opinions to the entire school, but mostly to create a dialogue within the community. According to Narges Kakalia, editor of the magazine and college senior, "the publication was the one way to have everyone speak their mind." There is no "particular vision. No one way we want it to go," she added, but instead it is supposed to be an open forum for conversation. It was first considered last year, and through a great deal of persistence it has finally come to fruition. Like the PCR , Desi suffers from some name recognition problems. However, this comes from entirely different factors.; Desi has been published only once, and that was this semester. What's more, there were also only 300 copies published, versus the 500 copies David Leland, editor of Plum Creek , considers the rock bottom number they could release and still be viable.

Both organizations have staffing problems. The Plum Creek Review perennially has 20 people show up at the first interest meeting, tapering to four to seven core members who stick with it to the end of the year. For Desi , the challenge was to find people who were willing to risk not getting academic credit for their work. Through the journalism class offered here it is possible to get up to two hours of credit by working for one of the caampus publications. Ultimately, Neil Mehra, Numair Chandhry, Nadia Junaid, Suraiya Ishaque, Sonya Fatah and Kakalia were the ones who would go through the submissions and put together the magazine, along with the help of Shilpa Mankikar and Permeil Dass, who worked on Desi for no academic credit.

It is the question of money where the two magazines begin to diverge. As a firmly established publication, the Plum Creek Review has long been financially secure. Money is still something to be considered at every step, but the issue there is finding a publisher who will produce at a lower cost than last year, or one who could do something akin to silk-screening on the cover for a reasonable price. For Desi , money was a much more urgent problem. Because in the past Southeast Asian Students Association (SASA) has not done much in the way of capital-intensive projects, its budget from Student Finance Committee (SFC) has been sparse for its five year existence. This year the organization received money from the Asian American Alliance and the Multicultural Resource center, who each gave $150. SASA's own fund was bolstered by contributions from the offices of President Nancy Dye and Dean of Student Life and Services Charlene Cole. That came as part of the President's and Dean's mission of supporting groups that have been inactive in the past, in order to make them more active.

The magazines are also different when it comes to submissions. The number of submissions to Plum Creek has remained static over the last few years. This has frustrated Leland, who notes that not only is Oberlin a liberal arts college with English as the most popular major, but creative writing is also the third most popular intended major for the class of 1999. The number of submissions did increase somewhat this year, but Leland observed that that was probably a result of the disappearance of Cuyahoga, which dissolved last year. Cuyahoga was another literary magazine which came out in tabloid format four times a year and published photographs and interviews, as well as short fiction and poetry.

Kakalia was pleasantly surprised to find that more articles were submitted for Desi than could be published. She was not anticipating as much of a response, because South Asian students had not contributed much to campus publications in the past. The magazine's success also owed a great deal to the many who supported it during its creation, among them Jan Cooper, who got the Computing Center consultants, an intern at the MRC to offer the use of a computer which did not end up being used, and the eight people working on Desi credit for their work.

Both magazines have their aspirations. The Plum Creek Review is in the process of putting their past issues on the Web, and already has last year's on-line. The PCR is also trying to be "more structured with how we're going to deal with staff turnovers," says Leland, who had to deal with the taking over the magazine after the last editor had been in that position for two years.

The new process involves the editor working more closely with the next year's editor, to make future transitions smoother. Desi is also planning staff changes, because the work was tremendous for only eight people; there is also a desire for a greater part of the South Asian community to be more involved. SASA also intends the magazine to be produced twice a semester next year.

At bottom, the Plum Creek Review and Desi have a great deal in common. SASA must take its magazine through the growing pains any successful publication experiences.