Creating Tradition is Easier than You Think, Harder than You Want

Most people on campus have something to say about Amherst traditions, or better yet, the lack thereof. While we may speak of certain Amherst quirks, physical traits, and ideological beliefs as parts of a larger culture, we sorely lack a set of true, long-lasting traditions. We can attribute parts of this issue to those previous pre-Covid traditions lost by distance and disarray, but the Covid problems lie in a larger mess: Students and the administration have been unable to successfully create and sustain such tradition. In tackling this obstacle, I believe we all need to carefully consider core values in the tradition-creating process: ambition, consideration, and humility.

Ambition is usually the most prominent feature is an attempt to create tradition. It involves meeting with all sorts of people, planning things out, and running around to put things in place. For quite some time, I’ve seen too many people involved in creating tradition lacking such ambition, but recently that has not been the case. Most students trying to do good for our campus have been ambitious at one point or another, but very few have kept up this drive. Perhaps it’s due to feeling overwhelmed by the overall process, or maybe the idea itself loses interest within the student body or the student leaders involved, and they decide to not pursue it any further. While I believe that most current students leading their respective charges are ambitious and passionate, the problem persists because at some point we all leave Amherst — students and administrators alike. Some people have been ambitious throughout their entire time here, but ambition alone will not support a tradition across multiple generations of students.

Consideration means to cast a wide net and democratically find popular ideas that everyone wants to include as informal or formal traditions. Student leaders must do their best to consider what students want and what the administration can likely accomplish. If you choose a project that very few students want or need, the project will have little to no long-lasting effect — the same goes for creating traditions. The ambitious energy of students and their traditions can be more easily transferred if we consider how interested fellow students truly are and what other students would likely want to continue during their time here. Consideration also involves our administration and the practical logistics involved. Neither the students nor administrators can ignore each other in this process. Doing so would only create animosity and poor relations between the two sides if so. Consideration does not mean full submission to one side or the other, but it does involve accepting that one’s ideas are made with the hope of bettering Amherst life, whether or not the action is perceived as such.

Humility is the aspect most neglected in creating something bigger than yourself. Consideration and humility are quite similar — they both include a certain level of compliance and reflection for all parties involved. The biggest distinction between the two is that humility involves thinking about how we exist within an institution that has lasted over two centuries. Throughout the college’s lifetime, it has had many wonderful and dedicated people push for a better tomorrow through good will, passion projects, and attempts to create something that lasts longer than themselves. We may like to believe, especially at institutions like ours, that we are one in a million, and want to pave paths for ourselves like no other at Amherst. Humility looks past creating your own, unique, memorable path for yourself. Humility denies creating organizations, projects, and traditions to be remembered for them. Humility means to push for not only the ideas that inspire you, but also for ideas that inspired past leaders. 

For example, Sterling Kee ’23 and James Hulsizer ’23 didn’t advocate for what we now know as Late Night so that they could then be memorialized for it. They both wanted to create something that would last longer than either of them, and current Association of Amherst Student Senator Tony Wang ’29 has continued their legacy by improving ice cream selections at Late Night. By adding onto what exists currently, creating new within the old and building on traditions started by students, we may not get the name recognition for starting the initiative, but we create a truly meaningful project for years to come. Whether you may be part of continuing an ongoing tradition or the person starting one, we all must realize that the only way to have that continual and long lasting impact is to acknowledge it requires something more than what any one person could do.

These parts of creating tradition are not mutually exclusive, and when treated like such, end up forming failing traditions. It is imperative that people are ambitious about improving Amherst, and making projects and traditions that consider the campus’ broader sentiments and desires. To contribute to a meaningful tradition, we must contribute to the community and avoid pursuit of solely self-gain. We must continue what has come before us and consider adopting legacies which may have been broken. We also must do our best to instill traditions and their importance in the students and administrators to come: Without passing the torch and showing why we care about certain beliefs and norms, the very meaning of our communal work is lost.