My Culture Is Not a Costume

Why a campaign?

Using identities and cultures as costumes has unfortunately become normalized in our society. We see Indigenous people reduced to mascots, headdresses sold as costumes, Blackface and brownface still prevalent, and the harmful trope of a man in a dress to mock trans people, particularly trans women.

This campaign aims to spark dialogue on campus, emphasizing that Halloween should be safe and fun for everyone. This spooky season — and throughout the year — we invite and encourage students and community members to challenge and change harmful beliefs and practices related to Halloween costumes, including cultural appropriation.

What is cultural appropriation?

Cultural appropriation is the act of taking significant elements (symbols, dress, words, practices, etc.) from a culture that is not your own and removing all original context or meaning. During Halloween, cultural appropriation often manifests in the form of wearing costumes that rely on specific cultural symbols or stereotypes, where people dress up as an ethnicity, race or culture that is not their own, often without understanding or respecting the culture they are portraying.

Five questions to consider:

1. Whose is it?
   To what ethnic/racial/cultural group does the practice or artifact belong?
2. Does this oppress?
   How is the group that the practice or artifact belongs to marginalized?
3. Do you benefit?
   Do you benefit from doing this? How?
4. Harm to others?
   Why might it make someone uncomfortable?
5. Is this your tradition?
   What makes it possible for you to engage with this practice, tradition or material?
   (How did you come to acquire the artifact or elements of the practice?)

I'm confused, isn't it just a costume?

It may be viewed as "just a costume," but it comes at the expense of people's safety and security. Oppression is not just maintained by overt, public, aggressive and physically violent forms of attack. It is also reinforced by the denial of rights, harmful stereotypes, and the dehumanization of people through jokes and stereotypes.

Here is a list of some costumes to avoid (unless they connect with your own experience or identity)

• An Egyptian person
• A Mexican person
• Day of the Dead themes (skull makeup, floral headpieces, skeleton themes)
• A geisha
• A Romani (sometimes referred to using the slur, g*psy)
• An indigenous person or person of color (though it is okay to dress as a particular individual e.g. Obama or Snoop Dog — as long as you do not try to embody their racial identity by doing Blackface, brownface, wearing cultural garments or wigs representing Black hair like dreadlocks)
• A ninja
• A prison inmate
• A mentally ill person in a psychiatric facility
• A transgender person (there's a difference between dressing as a trans person as a joke/mockery and dressing in drag. Many folks use Halloween as a safe opportunity to play with their own gender and drag has a long history of being connected to Halloween)
• A hula dancer
• A homeless person
• Fat suits
• Costumes that make fun of sexual and gendered violence (e.g. "flasher")
• Costumes that degrade or dehumanize sex workers, dancers etc.