By Ari Ebert-Standard
Edgewood’s Office of Student Inclusion and Involvement (OSII) cancelled its trip to see the Overture’s production of “Miss Saigon” on April 6.
“Miss Saigon” has been protested on a global scale due to yellowface (its portrayal of East Asians,) romanticizing the Vietnam War, and perpetuating stereotypes about Asian women.
Jenny Kim, the president of Edgewood’s Asian Student Association (ASA), said attending the show “should not have been endorsed in the first place.”
“We were shocked that this was an event being endorsed by the Office of Student Inclusion and Involvement,” she said.
According to Kim, Assistant Director of Student Engagement Randy Ferguson reached out to her to “clear it with ASA about OSII going to the show and supporting it.”
During what was described as a five-minute meeting, Kim said that ASA disagreed with the event, and therefore asked to have it cancelled. Ferguson was not immediately available for comment.
On March 29, OSII tweeted, “Due to the controversial themes of the show, the Office of Student Inclusion and Involvement will cancel the ‘Miss Saigon’ trip on Saturday, April 6th, 2019.”
The next tweet in the thread said that the cancellation was influenced by ongoing protests in Madison. “We in OSII will not support anything that shows any person of gender, color, nationality, creed, sexual orientation, in a negative portrayal. That is not of this office’s nature nor Edgewood College’s nature,” the thread continued.
Kim said that ASA “cannot speak for the entire Asian population” as it is “only a small portion of the Asian community on campus.”
She said she believes OSII should “do more research prior to supporting or hosting an event.”
“This event should have been cancelled once the problems about the show were brought to OSII’s attention,” Kim said.
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