Asian Alliance on Campus
Members of the Asian Allaince at the Diwali celebration. Courtesy of Marist College.
The Asian Alliance is a social club on campus dedicated to students who are interested in celebrating and learning about Asian cultures. The club focuses on exploring differences while also promoting diversity and unity among all students.
“My favorite part about the Asian Alliance is that it taught me to celebrate my own ethnicity,” Ayana Murphy '23 said. “In elementary school and throughout high school, I just wanted to be white because everyone else was.”
Murphy serves as the treasurer and secretary of the Asian Alliance. The club has about eight board members who help set up events, communicate with the club members and finance their variety of activities. The faculty advisor for the club is Dr. Bowu Zhang.
The club typically holds four to five meetings per semester. They often collaborate with other diversity groups on campus who celebrate cultures such as the African Student Association (ASA) and the Muslim Student Association (MSA).
The most common events for the Asian Alliance revolve around food throughout the semester. They hold a mid-autumn festival where they serve boba. During the fall semester, they held a popular Asian street food event where they served five different dishes.
In October, the Asian Alliance joined with clubs and faculty across campus to hold their largest event of the year, the Diwali celebration. Diwali is the five-day Hindu festival of lights and one of the biggest and most important holidays in South Asia.
Typically to celebrate Diwali, people dress up in their finest clothing, light lamps and candles inside and outside their homes and participate in family prayers. Prayers are followed by fireworks, a family feast and an exchange of gifts.
For the Marist Diwali Celebration, the college holds events for an entire week. In the past, the college has held special campus-wide activities such as movie screenings and a celebration of Indian culture featuring Mehndi (henna tattoo).
In the fall of 2021, Marist faculty and students came together to enjoy Indian dancing, music, food and a fashion show. The Center for Multicultural Affairs, the Asian Alliance and Marist’s Indian graduate students were the organizers for the fall semester Diwali events.
Last week, the Asian Alliance held an event in the student center with food and drinks to celebrate China’s Lunar New Year which began on February 1. In addition to the events revolving around food and community, the Asian Alliance also holds discussion-based events. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the rise in Asian-Hate crimes have increased across the United States.
“During the beginning of the pandemic, Asian Americans were being assaulted due to the coronavirus originating in China,” Communications Officer Lily Paul ‘24 said. “Hate crimes increased throughout the globe. We had multiple speaker events addressing this to share our experiences and provide resources for those who may need it.”
According to a report from Stop AAPI Hate, there were more than 10,000 documented hate incidents against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders since 2020.
“We've seen this rise unfortunately because of hate-filled rhetoric and language around the origins of the pandemic," White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a February 15 press conference. “That is something that Asian Americans across the country have been feeling.”
The issues regarding hate crimes across the country and in the world continue to influence the events held by the Asain Alliance. During the 2020-2021 year, the club conducted a series of panel discussions about anti-Asian violence and the Myanmar coup.
“One of our goals is to effectively spread awareness about affairs going on around the globe related to Asia and Asian people,” Murphy said.
If interested in learning more about the Asain Alliance or joining their club, reach out to the President of the club Phuong (Dakota) Le '22 or the Communications Director Lily Paul ‘24. The club welcomes all students and has a mission to make campus a more inclusive space through their events and programming.