OU's Hispanic and Latino Student Union is celebrating Día de los Muertos with food and crafts.
The Hispanic and Latino Student Union will host an event to bring students together to celebrate the dead.
Día de los Muertos is a traditional Mexican holiday during which families honor their friends and relatives who have died, according to Carla Triana, the president of the Hispanic and Latino Student Union.
“Día de los Muertos is a day to celebrate the dead, essentially, and people usually make little shrines for their dead relatives and things like that, just to commemorate them,” Diana Chaidez, treasurer of the union, said.
There will be pre-made sugar skulls that anyone can come to paint and decorate, Chaidez, a junior studying psychology, said.
“We’ll be decorating sugar skulls, which is a tradition in Mexico,” Ashley Walker, the communications chair of the union, said. “They won’t be as nice as the ones in Mexico.”
Triana, a junior studying international business, said Gran Ranchero on East State Street will cater the food for the event.
“I know when I was a child, during Día de los Muertos my mom and I would decorate (sugar skulls) and put them on the shrine to commemorate the dead,” Chaidez said.
Triana said that in Mexico, the holiday is typically celebrated by decorating shrines or graves with candles, flowers and other objects that the specific deceased person liked when they were alive.
“It is a way for us to promote diversity and for other students to know about the very special holiday that is important to Mexicans,” Triana said.
Triana said that the holiday is not only important to people in Mexico, but also Mexican-Americans in the United States.
“A lot of people have heard of Día de los Muertos, but a lot of people don’t really know exactly what it is about or what people do,” Chaidez said.
Chaidez said it is a good opportunity for students who don’t have a lot of knowledge of Hispanic heritage and traditions to come and experience a major Mexican holiday all together.
“I think it’s a good idea to (celebrate) in a group setting so that people can come in and they can experience it all together,” Chaidez said. “If you’re experiencing it alone for the first time, you’re not really going to know what you’re doing or what’s going on.”
Walker said the Hispanic and Latino Student Union always tries to educate people who come to their events about Hispanic and Latino culture, whether it is through more formal events such as panels and discussions or more informal events, such as the Día de los Muertos celebration.
“You see a lot of episodes on shows about ‘The Day of the Dead’ and usually it is very misrepresented, and a lot of the facts about why people are celebrating are wrong,” Walker said. “We figured the best way to educate people is to come together and do it with them, have fun and show them the right way.”
@_alexdarus
ad019914@ohio.edu
