All Events
Art Exhibition
The MultiCultural Center’s 35th Anniversary: An MCC Staff Art Exhibition
MCC Gallery/Lounge
Exhibit runs 1/24/23 - 3/24/23.
Reception 2/2/23, 6-8 PM
The MCC "Staff" (permanent staff, student-staff, and interns) are not just staff! We are creative in the ways we seek to change the campus and the larger community. Some of us are also artists! In honor of the MCC’s 35th Anniversary, this special art exhibition honors the current caretakers of the MCC and the theme for this exhibition is MultiCulturalism & Social Justice.
Cup of Culture
The Reason I Jump
MCC Theater
Based on the best-selling book by Naoki Higashida, later translated into English by author David Mitchell (Cloud Atlas), The Reason I Jump is an immersive cinematic exploration of neurodiversity through the experiences of nonspeaking autistic people from around the world. The film blends Higashida's revelatory insights into autism, written when he was just 13, with intimate portraits of five remarkable young people. It opens a window for audiences into an intense and overwhelming, but often joyful, sensory universe.
Moments in the lives of each of the characters are linked by the journey of a young Japanese boy through an epic landscape; narrated passages from Naoki’s writing reflect on what his autism means to him and others, how his perception of the world differs, and why he acts in the way he does: the reason he jumps. The film distills these elements into a sensually rich tapestry that leads us to Naoki’s core message: not being able to speak does not mean there is nothing to say.
The film will have Closed Captioning enabled.
In celebration of Autism Acceptance Month, audience members will have the opportunity to enter raffles to win a copy of The Reason I Jump, or a copy of Loud Hands: Autistic People, Speaking, a project of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network. Loud Hands is a collection of essays written by and for Autistic people. Spanning from the dawn of the Neurodiversity movement to the blog posts of today, it catalogs the experiences and ethos of the Autistic community and preserves both diverse personal experiences and the community’s foundational documents together side by side.
Co-Sponsors: Commission on Disability Equity, Disabled Students Program, Koegel Autism Center
Race Matters Series
Cameroon: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow
Elisabeth Ayuk-Etang, Gilda Forbang, Glaydah Namukasa, William F. Ndi, and Aloysius Ngalim
MCC Theater
The symposium centers Cameroon, a unitary multi-party republic comprised of four geographic regions and numerous ethnic groups, with a developing market economy based on petroleum, agriculture, and a growing services sector. It brings together Cameroon scholars and researchers to discuss literature, history, culture, and the dynamics of Cameroon’s current crisis and surrounding regions.
Co-sponsors: Walter H. Capps Center, UCSB Global Engagement, Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies
Bazaar
MCC Lounge
Middle Eastern, North African, South Asian Resource Center and the MCC present: Bazaar
Get a blast of Middle Eastern, North African, and South Asian music, fun, and culture at this year's Bazaar brought to you by the Multicultural Center and EOP’s MENASARC! Join us for a day of festivities and cultural celebration with participation from various organizations and creatives, delicious food, FREE self-care goodies, and so much more. We especially invite YOU to celebrate the Arab community as we highlight their rich and prevalent culture during April as it is National Arab American Heritage Month!
