moonxtal:

communismkills: cowsgomooandidotoo: Sometimes my university does cool stuff. 😊😊 … isn’t that cultural appropriation tho?

I was waiting for this lol

There is a difference between cultural appropriation and cultural appreciation. Cultural appropriation is the theft/adoption of a cultural practice, tradition, icon, ritual, etc from one culture to another. It is applied when the culture being appropriated is deemed as subordinate (socially, politically, economically) in relation to the culture doing the appropriation. Cultural appropriation occurs when there is no understanding for appreciation for the true meanings of what this culture is and how it came to be that way. It is when the appropriating culture takes a practice and turns it into what they want it to mean, cheapening the actual meaning and taking away the history of that culture, turning it into something mindless and not meaningful, usually to make profit off of it.

Cultural appropriation is a direct effect of racism, oppression and marginalization by a group with privilege of a group without it. Cultural appropriation treats all marginalized cultures as if they are theirs for the taking, to take whatever aspect of it they want to hate and make fun of and adopt whatever else they like. It is why lady gaga and her fans can take the burqa, something that is religiously and culturally important to many people, and twist its meaning into something they want it to be. They trend it on twitter with the hashtag ‘burqa swag’. Doing so cheapens the burqa and dehumanizes the women everywhere who wear it. Women all around the world are harassed, beaten and discriminated against for wearing it but white people do not have to feel the implications that might come with it. In this sense, they are protected by their privilege and skin color. You can’t wear a burqa and then turn around and make fun of Muslims, calling them terrorists and calling Muslim women oppressed.

In this specific situation, the event is being held by the Sikh Student Association, who is inviting people to learn about their culture. Every few weeks, a group of Muslim girls will rent a table in the student center of my university and invite people to try on a hijab and take some pictures while learning about the meaning of it. I am a Muslim who wears the hijab and I am not offended by this in the slightest. Rather, I encourage it. If people of a culture want to educate people about their own culture, why should someone outside of that culture be offended? If you want to learn about a culture, and will appreciate and respect it, its history, and its byproducts, what is the problem?