Fun For Whom?

Amherst College — I’m disappointed.

For a school that prides itself on diversity and belonging, fun here too often feels segregated — by race, by sports team, by party preference.

In high school, I was one of only six Black kids. Yearning for community, I began to strip myself of my Blackness and conform to appease my white “friends,” and my cultural identity slowly began to disappear because of it. The acceptance I once felt in middle school gradually disappeared in high school, where integrating meant suppressing pieces of myself to be tolerated. When I was searching for colleges, I knew ethnic diversity mattered to me. While Amherst is still a predominantly white institution, the college presents a vibrant, diverse community, though diversity has decreased post-SFFA (Student for Fair Admissions) decision — one that I thought would finally allow me to feel seen. 

Weeks before my arrival on campus, I was ecstatic. In high school, I was excluded from parties, and I felt isolated. Coming to college, I was ready for a fresh start. When orientation began, I had one thing on my mind: “Where are the parties at?” Fortunately, a few days later, there was a massive party in Morris Pratt.

The night was electric — people rapped on tables along to Playboi Carti and Lil Uzi Vert, and I felt a sense of collective energy I hadn’t experienced before; for the first time in a long time, I felt like I belonged. But the feeling was merely temporary.

In the second week of school, I learned what a “mixer” was — a small party between two or more sports teams. As a non-athlete, I quickly realized I wasn’t accepted in that world. Mixers felt exclusive, like trying to get into an A-list Miami club without a wristband. Mega mixers, which opened up later in the night, gave me a glimpse into Amherst’s social life, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that something deeper was dividing the student community. 

Motivated by that exclusion, I decided to host my first-ever party before the 2021 fall break. I made a quick, generic flyer on Canva, posted it online, and hoped people would come. When the time came, I was sweating bullets. As people began to trickle in, hosting my first-ever party had its own set of problems: The speaker kept cutting out, my playlist was too niche, and people trickled out early. But rather than feeling discouraged, I felt challenged. I wanted to create a space where all community members, including both athletes and non-athletes, could come together and have a good time.

Before coming to Amherst, I learned what an inclusive community could look like at home. I attended middle school in Rockland County, New York, which was known for bringing students from all the neighboring towns together. I grew up with Dominicans, Haitians, Jamaicans, and Mexicans, and I was able to see glimpses of their respective cultures through our friendships. I was even going to be the chambelán escort for my friend’s quinceañera (my mom didn’t want me interacting with girls at the time, so she put a hard stop on my plans). On weekends, kids would flood to backyard parties in my neighboring town, Spring Valley. While my parents, terrified by the town’s reputation for violence, rarely let me go, after much pleading, my dad finally dropped me off at my first party. 

I’ll never forget it. The moment I heard soca playing from the backyard, I sprinted from the car, waving my dad goodbye. “Do my eyes deceive me?” I thought as I stepped into the backyard. This was no Disney Channel party.  People were dancing — really dancing — with freedom and joy. To outsiders, it might’ve seemed lewd or chaotic, but to me, it was self-expression. Whining and daggering weren’t acts of defiance; they were acts of liberation.

In white spaces, these dances are often labeled as inappropriate, reinforcing negative stereotypes and promoting hypersexualization of women of color. When those moves are policed, women of color lose the freedom to move without judgment. What I learned from those parties was simple: Fun can be political, and belonging often lives on the dance floor. 

A few weeks after hosting my first party in 2021, I took a medical leave to deal with depression. When I returned a year later, I wanted a fresh start — not just for myself, but for the campus. I teamed up with my friend and one of my biggest inspirations, IK Agba ’23, a high-spirited individual whose infectious laugh can be heard from one side of campus to the other. I talked to him about hosting the first party of the school year, and he excitedly agreed. The Back2School series was born. 

We went all in — lights, speakers, and of course, a return to Morris Pratt. At 10:15 p.m., waves of students began to flood in, and people started singing along to the music in unison. Agba and I even stood on a table rapping along to “Mo Bamba,” “Jimmy Cooks,” and “Sold Out Dates” like we were concert headliners. For a moment, it felt like everyone was enjoying themselves together.

Then, my smile quickly disappeared when someone told me, “You have to play more white girl music so they can dance.” 

That line stuck with me. It revealed what I’d been feeling all along— that Amherst’s party culture wasn’t just divided by interest or affiliation, but by race and comfort. To some, music centered in Black culture was “niche.” To me, it was home.

When I stepped back from hosting to focus on academics, Amherst’s social life began to dry up. Students became dissatisfied with the typical mixer, which prompted a change: The rise of NDot Odot — a creative collective that combined musicians' talents with entertainment, led by, unsurprisingly, Agba.

Charles Drew House, once a quiet dorm, suddenly became the epicenter of campus life. Lines to get in wrapped around Drew to Cohan Hall, and ACPD parked outside before the events even started. For once, Amherst’s Black community wasn’t hidden in the background — we were setting the tone.

NDot didn’t curate their playlist for the comfort of white students; instead, it celebrated their sound, and by doing so, the parties bridged gaps between athletes, non-athletes, and students of color, but they also exposed a deeper truth. When Black culture becomes the foundation rather than the exception, discomfort from others often surfaces, whether it be through chastising the style of parties or evading them altogether.

When Agba graduated, he passed the torch to me. I promised not to compromise. I began hosting multiple parties, even collaborating with University of Massachusetts, Amherst students and organizations like Tres Leches, an Instagram account that promotes parties, broadening the party network. Each party in the Back2School series was marked as a success, with the quality improving successively. My parties gained traction both on and off campus, but then, slowly, there was a change in the racial demographics of attendees. My parties soon became overpopulated with Five College students of color, filtering out white Amherst College students.

To adapt to this rapid change, I adopted a different style of parties, one that embraced Caribbean culture. In addition to rap, I played soca and dancehall — the music that had originally invigorated me. This bore reputational consequences, as my perception at Amherst changed negatively. Some even went as far as to call the dancing at my parties “ghetto” and “repulsive,” expressing open disgust toward the style and energy that made those spaces feel alive.

While I was accepted and commended by Five College students for opening up spaces that embrace Black and Caribbean party traditions centered on expressive dancing and communal energy, Amherst College students slowly began to resent me, even labeling me as a UMass student in Amherst clothing. Beneath it all was a quiet racial current — a discomfort with spaces that didn’t center whiteness.

Still, I continued to throw parties that felt true to me. Soca, rap, dancehall, R&B — music that made people move. Over time, though, I realized that while I had built community across other campuses, I had lost part of it at home.

On Sept. 13, 2025, I threw my last ever party — Back2School IV — a six-way DJ collaboration that marked the end of an era. With 500 students attending from across the Five Colleges, the party was shut down in under two hours. It was chaotic, joyful, and deeply bittersweet. There’s no other way I would’ve wanted to end my party-hosting career. 

As I write this, I realized that Amherst’s party culture mirrors the same racial and cultural divides I once saw in high school — divides between who gets to be seen, and who gets to belong. But it also mirrors something more hopeful: that joy, even when misunderstood, is an act of resistance.

If Amherst is to live up to its values of diversity and belonging, it must start by recognizing that inclusion requires discomfort and sharing space means learning to dance to someone else’s rhythm. White students must be willing to experience joy that doesn’t center them, and students of color must be empowered to celebrate without apology.

For anyone trying to build something here — whether it’s a club, a movement, or a party —don’t just blast your own music. Invite others to listen and challenge them to show up, to learn, and to move differently.

That’s how real community building begins.