Dear campus community members,
With Halloween approaching, we encourage you to be thoughtful of how to celebrate while simultaneously treating all of our campus members with care and respect. Although fall is a festive time, it is also a time where cultural appropriation and offense can occur when people participate in practices or customs that are not their own. Choosing costumes that dilute cultures at minimum –or are dehumanizing, stereotypical, and/or racist at their worst– come at a cost in making marginalized persons feel like they do not belong to our community. Similarly, hosting or attending parties with themes that are tied to tropes of marginalized communities are hurtful and offensive, such as “tiki,” “ghetto,” or “fiesta” events. Dia de los Muertos events that are not hosted by or sponsored by Latinx populations are also subject to perpetuating cultural appropriation as this cultural holiday has nothing to do with Halloween.
The Office for Institutional Equity and Diversity is hosting a student-led lecture and discussion on Cultural Appropriation today Friday, Oct. 21, from 5:00 - 6:00 p.m. in the Murray Boardroom. Do consider attending to build awareness about and act against cultural appropriation and how it affects us in our everyday lives, not just during Halloween season.
We hope that you prioritize community care as you celebrate Halloween. Please intervene when you see or sense something that can negatively impact another campus member. We ask that you act promptly in reporting any incidence of bias, discrimination, harassment, and/or assault in a timely manner to Security Services and/or file a report at: https://www.pugetsound.edu/file-discrimination-harassment-report.
Vivie Nguyen
Director for Intercultural Engagement
Lorna Hernandez Jarvis, Ph.D. (She, Her, Hers)
Vice President for Institutional Equity and Diversity