If you think culture is just something you experience at the opera or an art museum, Greenfield Community College plans to challenge your view. \tOn the week of Oct. 22, GCC will host a series of performances, demonstrations and talks about the myriad cultures represented at GCC and throughout the Pioneer Valley.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\"We want to raise awareness that the meaning of culture goes beyond ethnic and national differences,\" said Cristin Carpenter, chair of the English for Speakers of Other Languages department and chair of the college Affairs committee. \"Cultural practices are found in different areas of life \u2013 in different age groups, different musical styles and occupational structures. There are many different ways to express culture.\"<\/p>\n
Different events will be going on throughout the week at the main building on the main campus as well as the east building and the downtown campus. Some of the exhibits and events include traditional foods and story-telling from Venezuela and Russia, among other countries, a drumming workshop where people can try African drumming, an exhibit on the Mexican celebration of the Day of the Dead and Japanese flower arranging and calligraphy, which the public is welcome to try their hand at.<\/p>\n
There will also be a faculty and staff performance based on a year's worth of discussions around diversity and how one defines an identity that is not easily categorized. \"We wanted to expand the notion of culture by enjoying some exposure to different ideas that would remind us of what a rich group of people we have in the college and the community,\" Carpenter said.<\/p>\n
Leo Hwang-Carlos, associate dean for humanities at GCC, said he is excited to see how people express their different versions of culture. \"One of the things we hope to do is to help people celebrate the multiple ways we define culture and help them recognize the richness of their own heritage, what they value about community, and how the diversity of cultures increases opportunities for learning about all that life has to offer,\" Hwang-Carlos said. He said the hope is that the public will come and share their culture as they experience the culture of others. And culture is not just limited to race and ethnicity. Hwang-Carlos said that the manufacturing past of the area is a kind of culture, as is the farming heritage of the area. \"We have a rich heritage of different ethnic cultures and art and crafts cultures,\" Hwang-Carlos said. \"These cultures and how they blend with the agricultural and manufacturing cultures can be celebrated and are unique to our region.\"<\/p>\n
Carpenter said the hope is to not just make this one event that has a beginning and end, but something organic that will continue to grow on campus and in the community. \"It's more like opening a dialog and bringing people in, and hopefully we will keep going and generate some thought and understanding,\" Carpenter said. \"In terms of global understanding, there is no substitute for connecting with folks and learning about their lives.\" For more information please contact Carpenter at 775-1226.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If you think culture is just something you experience at the opera or an art museum, Greenfield Community College plans to challenge your view. On the week of Oct. 22, GCC will host a series of performances, demonstrations and talks about the myriad cultures represented at GCC and throughout the Pioneer Valley.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gcc.mass.edu\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}