Thank you to everyone who showed up to our 38th Annual Cultural Night: Tayousei!

Cultural Night (CN) is our largest event of the year, usually drawing in an audience of over 1,000 students, staff, alumni, and community members. CN began back in February of 1986 with the Week of Remembrance, an on-campus event created to commemorate the signing of Executive Order 9066, which resulted in the unconstitutional incarceration of over 110,000 Japanese Americans during World War II. Since then, CN has evolved to showcase talented performers and feature experiences and issues relevant to the Japanese American community. This year, our 38th annual CN will take place on Saturday, February 24, 2024, at Royce Hall from 7:00-9:30 PM. It will highlight the diversity within the Japanese American community and discuss the difficulty of accepting one’s own identity. This story will be strung together with performances by Kyodo Taiko, NSU Modern, NSU Odori, a drama cast, and a choir. The rich history of these performance groups and their connection to the Japanese American community make them more than fit to tell our story: Kyodo Taiko is the nation’s first collegiate taiko drumming team, NSU Modern is a competitive hip-hop dance team, NSU Odori is a traditional Japanese dance group taught by professional Kabuki actor Bando Hiroshichiro, our drama cast consists of NSU members that auditioned and were chosen for the roles. Each performance group will add a new perspective to the Japanese American story and promote a new understanding of the overall experience. Please consider supporting CN to make sure that our long-held tradition can continue!

In the past, our drama performances have covered topics such as Japanese American identity, gentrification, mental health, and the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. This year, our drama performance is centered around Japanese American Incarceration during WWII. This story, although focusing mainly on the Japanese American community, can also be generalized to other racialized minorities who struggle to understand their intersectional identities. Thus, these themes of unity and community will hopefully resonate well with a diverse audience. Through these themes, our CN will promote empathy, understanding, and thoughtful conversation about both historic and contemporary themes among our guests.