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Latinx Heritage Month

Latinx/e Heritage Month (nationally known as Hispanic Heritage Month) is celebrated September 15 - October 15. The university community host a variety of events and installations which aim to educate on Latinx/e stories, histories, cultures, and issues, along with building community on campus. 

At Northwestern we celebrate this month with a bit of a longer stretch than the nationally recognized timeframe, so that our community can focus on the transition to the start of the year. Please visit this site for up-to-date information on activities in the weeks ahead for opportunities of connection and celebration!

Latinx Heritage Month 2023 Events

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Events:
SANA SANA Kick-Off | MSA x CAPS
September 29, 2023 | 1:00 PM - 2:30PM | Multicultural Center Living Room

SANA SANA (a Latinx/e wellness initiative) continues and we're excited to keep growing! Join us for our first SANA SANA of the academic year with a kick-off gathering!

Multicultural Student Affairs (MSA) and Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) presents, SANA SANA, a monthly gathering space and wellness series centering Latina/e/x/o-identifying students to make, feel, and just be. SANA SANA is a healing phrase used when remedying pain or a wound that honors connection across geographies and generations. SANA SANA will include conversation, creative workshops, and space for rest, joy, and sustenance in relation and support with one another. In facilitating and co-creating this space with students, we hope to support community building, themes related to wellness, intersectional identities, and lived experiences.

Food will be provided. Undergraduate and graduate students welcome. More info and RSVP here. Make sure to RSVP by Sept 22.

Bienvenida | ALIANZA x MSA
Saturday, September 30 | 5:00 PM - 8:00 PM | Multicultural Center

Alianza and MSA are collaborating to welcome you to campus and kick-off LHM! Join us at the Multicultural Center to enjoy food, play games, dance to music, watch performances and make connections with students. 

Latinx/e Student Leaders Mixer | MSA 
Wednesday, Oct 4th | 5:00 PM -6:30 PM

The Latinx/e Student Leaders Mixer is for leaders of Latinx/e student organizations at NU to convene, plan, build, and envision collective goals with one another. Latinx student organization leaders will receive an email with more information to RSVP. 

Unbound: Latinx/e Multimedia Club | MSA
Wednesday, Oct 11th | 5:00 PM - 6:00 PM

unbound: a latine/x multimedia club is a way to build small community gatherings grounded in a particular text or sets of media that explore themes in relation to constructions, experiences, complexities, and challenges of Latinx/e identities. unbound uses the framework of a book club but opens us to different modes and senses of learning and engagement that are valuable. Sometimes we’ll read books, poems, zines, articles; sometimes listen to an album, podcast, or playlist; sometimes look at photographs or murals; sometimes watch a film or music video; but we’ll always talk about whatever it is. Each piece is meant to open conversation about identities, politics, geographies, memories, race, place, gender, sexuality, culture, love, joy, and more.

This time around we are so excited to announce we'll be focusing on *Latinx photography* by looking at the virtual exhibition, "You Belong Here" curated by Pilar Tompkins Rivas.

You can view the virtual exhibition here prior to our discussion on Oct 11th. 

In addition, the first ten students to both RSVP and attend the discussion will receive a gorgeous copy of Latinx Aperture 245 magazine that inspired the exhibition, which we will be also be exploring and discussing. More info and RSVP here. Make sure to RSVP by Sept 29th.

Displays and Installations:
Everybody Gets Their Flowers Book Exhibition  @ The Main Library Book Nook
On view Sept 15th - Oct 31st | Main Library Book Nook

This year for LHM, “Everybody Gets Their Flowers,” is a guiding phrase and theme, which refers to giving people their flowers while they can still smell them—when they are still with us on this earth. This small exhibition is giving its flowers to all the phenomenal writers who penned books to share a story with the world about a specific sliver of Latinx/e experiences. From poets to Latinx/e Studies scholars, the books on these shelves are brought together and to the forefront from the library’s collections for LHM. Some of these books are filled with Latinx activism and community histories across cityscapes; some highlight Afro-Latinx stories; some are migration stories; others are love letters to Central American and Caribbean diasporas; and all of them are centering a particular truth. Throughout these books are themes of migration, memory, water, borders, cultural geography, lore, gender, popular culture, and so much more.  

There are many more books out in the world than were able to be included on these shelves and there is always more than a month to continue sharing, learning, and asking questions. For now, there’s a flower for every writer here and every cultural geography on the map porque todos merecen sus flores—because everyone deserves their flowers. 

Everybody Gets Their Flowers Gallery Wall @ The MCC
On view Sept 20th - Oct 31st | Multicultural Center

Check out the Multicultural Center (1936 Sheridan Road) for an extension of book exhibition, which highlights people, media, shows, student organizations on campus and local businesses for LHM on the first-floor gallery wall of the MCC. 

Día de los Muertos Community Altar Installation
Oct 31st - Nov 20th | Multicultural Center

Starting October 31st, MSA will install a community altar for Día de los Muertos. Once installed, students, student organizations, and NU community members are invited to add a remembrance card, photos, and/or momentos to the ofrenda to honor their departed loved ones.

There will also be materials that acknowledge the Indigenous and Afro-Indigenous roots of Día de los Muertos, along with the significance of some of the practices and symbols of Día de los Muertos and honoring the dead across various Latin American and Caribbean geographies. 

If you would like to share an event for LHM, you can add your event to the campus-wide calendar through the Office of Institutional Diversity and Inclusion (OIDI) by submitting through their process here.

OIDI’s website will be the central hub to view University programming for Heritage Months/identity-based recognitions for faculty, staff, and students. This will allow our NU community to view all the events and programming happening across the University for a specific month (or day) in a central location – along with Planit Purple.

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