Bounce houses, tacos, and the celebration of queer identities will all be found at the first annual DePride festival this Friday in Bowman Park.
The event was born out of senior Lizzy Gering and junior Aislee Nieves’ desire for the queer community to get together on campus. “I think it’s important just because it’s a casual setting that the queer community can come to together and just be together,” Gering said. The women noted that DePauw lacks spaces in which the queer community can come together.
Nieves also noticed the lack of casual social spaces for the queer community. “The queer community of color, or not of color, we’re not put in the same space all the time… There’s not enough events or spaces or spots in the Hub or anywhere, just like a social space or utopia for queer people to just meet,” Nieves said.
In the spirit of bringing people together, the event is co-sponsored by multiple DePauw organizations such as Queer Students of Color, the Women’s Center, United DePauw, and the Rainbow House.
Overall, the women want to bring people together to have fun. They plan to have an inflatable obstacle course, catered tacos, popcorn and snow cone machines, a student DJ, and many more activities.
Gering hopes that the event will both bring people together and benefit a great cause. “I hope people walk away from it feeling good, feeling relaxed, feeling like maybe they met somebody new or they created a bond, I guess feeling a sense of community,” Gering said.
Gering also hopes to help out the Indiana Youth Group, an Indianapolis-based organization that supports LGBTQ+ youth. Donations of granola bars, toilet paper, and other basic items will be accepted at the entrance to the event.
This is the first year of the event, but the coordinators hope it can be an annual function. “I’d also just like to see some effort from DePauw,” Gering said. “We’d like to see some effort to make this really a commitment to be an annual event because it’s something that I think could be really fun and valuable for many years to come.”
Sophomore Joshua Selke, Rainbow House resident and Vice President of United DePauw, has the same hope for the function. “This seemed like the perfect event; I’m shocked that we haven’t done it before,” Selke said. “And we’ve all expressed interest in keeping this going, to keep moving forward and seeing this happen every year.”
All three students emphasized the event’s importance in providing visibility for the queer community. “This [event] is very important,” Nieves said. “I think it highlights one of the communities that needs to be highlighted that goes unnoticed here, and [we’re] just being intersectional with it, and having fun.”
Selke expressed the same desire for visibility and support. “It’s so great to see large groups of people supporting the queer community, especially because queerness can be very invisible,” Selke said. “It’s really great to see an event where both queer people and allies stand in solidarity, both to enjoy a celebration and to celebrate our differences.”