The Latin American Student Organization of UCSD’s Graduate School of International Relations and Pacific Studies treated the campus community to the festivities and fun of its annual Latin American Festival at the IR/PS complex on May 15.
Guardian
Festivities included an authentic Argentine dance performance from the Grupo Argentino Folklorico, Salsa dance demonstrations, a performance by Latin jazz band The Danny Green Trio and finished off with Capoeira — a Brazilian form of martial arts and dance.
Apart from studying Latin America, LASO members said that festivals like this have been organized to encourage students upon experiencing the culture outside of the classroom.
“”The significance of this event, which is the significance of all events, is that it’s a time for all students to come together and learn about the culture of the regions that they’re studying,”” said Julieta Mendez, a second-year graduate student at IR/PS. “”It’s not something that is really focused on in class, so it’s a good change to learn about it and live it at the same time.””
LASO members also said that the festival’s specialty is its concentration on a particular region of the world.
“”This event brings focus toward a region. In this festival, we focus attention on one of the regions that the school focuses on, which is Latin America,”” said Rithya Tang, a first-year graduate student at IR/PS and vice president of student affairs in LASO. “”So, for the school this is their day, their moment and light.””
Recently, the Graduate Student Association reduced their funding for the IR/PS school, but this does not hinder graduate student organizations like LASO from putting together festivals.
“”That’s more of an issue separate from what this festival is all about,”” Tang said. “”We were out-voted, but we don’t know the real reason.””
Such issues however were of no concern to attendants of the festivities, and to the organizers. According to Tang, IR/PS aims mostly to diffuse Latin American culture to the UCSD community and to let the IR/PS graduate school be better recognized.
Tang also noted that IR/PS has been relatively obscure compared to the other graduate schools on campus.
“”This program has been kept a secret. I don’t think a lot of people know about the program,”” Tang said. “”This festival is more about Latin America, the school in UCSD and to tell the community what we’re about.””
The Latin American Festival has typically been organized by the IR/PS language department, but this year the event was primarily planned by the students. The event was created for exclusively IR/PS graduate students and anyone else who held interest.
“”We decided to keep this year’s festival within IR/PS, even though the language department wanted to expand it and possibly open it up to the undergrads,”” LASO President Gamaliel Salazar said.
Each year, LASO and the language department at IR/PS organize festivals that are dedicated to specific regions of the world. The Asian Festival is held at the timely month of February for the Chinese New Year, and a Latin American festival is celebrated in the spring.
Salazar said that the festival was dedicated to the graduate students, but also to act as a precursor to other celebrations.
“”We felt that this year, we should keep it here in honor of the 15-year alumni reunion,”” Salazar said. “”We felt that this would be a good jump-start for that event.””
