Western beefs up its dress code
Leave your native headdresses and fake dreadlocks at home. And don’t bother with the Mohawks, bandanas, tank tops or short shorts, either.
Western University student leaders will arrive on campus to a tougher dress code for Orientation Week in a bid to make the school welcoming to all students and to counter accusations of cultural insensitivity.
“These are upper-year leaders who help first-year students feel welcome and make their transition to Western smooth,” said Taryn Scripnick, a student government official and co-chair of the orientation planning committee.
“In the past, some (student leaders) have worn items because of tradition and it wasn’t their intent for it to be cultural appropriation.”
Orientation Week student leaders at Western, called Sophs, are divided into teams that help firstyear students move in, get to know campus and adjust to student life.
In the past, Soph teams have dressed in similar colours or costumes to stand out from the crowd and build team spirit.
But the act of dressing in attire or headwear worn by other cultures — native headdresses with elaborate feathers or fake dreadlocks to mimic Rastafarian culture, for example — has been criticized recently in popular culture.
The planning committee has had complaints from students about frosh leaders wearing culturally insensitive garb, Scripnick said.
The committee decided to also ban bandanas worn over the face because that is “unwelcoming,” she said.
The ban on groups of frosh leaders wearing tank tops and short shorts is a few years old.
It was developed to avoid making attendees feel uncomfortable by wearing revealing clothing, Scripnick said.
“We’ve had some pushback from certain Soph teams because they say it’s tradition, but I don’t foresee anyone breaking the rules,” Scripnick said.
Orientation Week at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ont., meanwhile, is being dubbed Brockchella, a play on the popular California music festival Coachella, at which attendees have come under fire for wearing native headdresses.
But Brockchella attendees are being advised: “Don’t appropriate other cultures to make a fashion statement.”