By Aleah Green

The Department of Women’s Studies hosted its monthly Social Justice Hangout Oct. 3 to address an issue that tends to surface around Halloween: cultural appropriation.

As students start to plan their Halloween costumes, Dr. Sydney Lewis, a lecturer in the Department of Women’s Studies, talked about making sure someone’s culture is not mistaken for a costume.

“We do have a diverse campus, but [it’s] also kind of versed with discrimination and hate crimes,” said Dr. Sydney Lewis, a lecturer in the Department of Women’s Studies.

Many students in attendance agreed that it can be difficult to draw the line between cultural appreciation and appropriation — but that when a culture has been racialized and sexualized, it definitely becomes an issue.

For example, borrowing elements from someone else’s race, culture or ethnicity — Mexican sombreros, traditional Native American dress, Japanese kimonos, to name a few — and turning them into a costume for Halloween, is considered to be cultural appropriation.

Senior communications major Kelsey Stewart said the first step to determining whether your costume is deemed cultural appropriation is by asking yourself why you liked it in the first place.

“You wore it because you liked what you saw,” Stewart said during the discussion. “You didn’t wear it because you liked what it was.”

Lewis suggested considering the 3 S’s: source, significance (or sacredness) and similarity. She said if the community as a whole has a history of harmful exploitation, for example, then it might be best to reconsider wearing a particular garment.

Often times cultural appropriation allows another person to gain social capital from someone else’s culture, she added, which makes it even more important to find the difference between appropriation and appreciation.

Several students felt that it was important to bring this conversation to the University of Maryland.

“Having these conversations, hopefully there can be more understanding about the issue,” senior women’s studies major Mekdes Sisay said.