On Cultural Appropriation

Here at Exeter, we are fortunate enough to live in a community of people who are, for the most part, understanding of each other. I’ve seen this time and time again from members in our community in how we all strive to better understand how differences in equality continue to affect members of our community. During this year in particular there has been a concentrated effort on campus to provoke discussions surrounding contentious issues such as consent before Dunbar’s Back in Black Dance and Cultural Appropriation before Halloween. That is why I was particularly disappointed this year when on the Friday before Halloween I saw multiple people wearing costumes that trivialized and appropriated other cultures.

As a Japanese student, seeing multiple people wear variations on the kimono, a traditional Japanese robe, was particularly upsetting. Perhaps those people thought they were honoring my culture in wearing the kimono as a costume. I certainly understand that sentiment. I am proud to call myself Japanese, to embrace the traditions and heritage that I have inherited from my family. I am proud of the crafts and rituals that have evolved and been honed through my culture to become what they are today. Traditional kimonos are made of the finest silks, hand embroidered and take hours to create and the processes behind them have evolved as part of Japanese culture. They are a labor of love and a great amount of thought and skill goes into manufacturing them. Not only do they take a great deal of time to make, there is a great amount of ritual surrounding dressing in a kimono. To compare those kimonos to the gaudy, satin robes with “Asian” details that consists of most “Japanese” costumes or to compare them to the cardigans that are often referred to as kimonos in the United States devalues this ancient and valued tradition. Taking an aspect of another culture then bastardizing it to fit your tastes yet continuing to use it to represent said culture is not appreciative. Taking an aspect of another culture and adopting it as your own is also not appreciative. In using a kimono as a vehicle to become “Japanese” for a day, they did not show their appreciation, but instead reduced my culture, heritage and ethnicity into a cheap facsimile and trivialized them into a choice as simple as putting on or taking off an outfit.

To appropriate is not to appreciate, and a culture is not a costume. It is perfectly acceptable for someone to appreciate an aspect of another’s culture. However, to take an aspect of someone else’s culture and to call it your own, to reduce another culture into a simple item or triviality and to not recognize the nuances that make every culture unique is plainly disrespectful. In a community that takes pride in having youth from every quarter, we should be able to learn about and appreciate each other’s cultures in respectful ways. While a Halloween costume may seem like a silly thing, the sentiment behind the appropriation seen on that day reflects in many aspects of our lives. We are fortunate enough to live in a diverse community of people most of whom would gladly share their cultures. We all deserve the common courtesy of being treated with respect, and that individual respect should carry forth into how other cultures are treated and discussed on campus. We must learn to respect one another, and to carry that through into every aspect of our lives, both on Halloween and on every other day.