“If we are to preserve culture we must continue to create it”- Johan Huizinga. When we think of a culture what really comes to mind. Is it the history of where someone’s from, the food that someone makes, the way one interacts with another. When I think about culture what comes to mind is the celebrations that happen year after year and in this case, celebrations help us remember the past and look towards the future. In this essay we will look at the holidays of Halloween and Day of the dead, and how they are similar as well as how they are different in their meaning and history.

How do we remember those we have lost, one of the ways I as a Mexican American remember the dead is through the holiday Day of the Dead. Day of the Dead is a special holiday that is celebrated in many places but mainly celebrated in Mexico. Day of the Dead takes place on November 1st and goes through November 2nd; it’s a celebration to help us remember the ones we’ve lost by constructing memorial shrines/ofrenda to the deceased in homes or at gravesites, as well as preparing foods and drink they liked during their life (Marchi 2013). A common depiction of spirits during Day of the Dead are skeletons from colorfully painted ornamental skulls, edible candy skulls, and many other foods and crafts with this type of iconography that are available during Day of the Dead (Marchi 2013). The major beliefs of this holiday is that on this day the barrier between the land of the living and the land of the dead fades and the spirits of the deceased are allowed to return and be with family and friends and as (Hughes 1999) puts it “It is a family reunion in which the dead are the guests of honor and are welcomed with their favorite foods, carefully chosen gifts, and ritual paraphernalia such as candles and incense”. This holiday holds a very important place in my life, and I personally celebrate Day of the Dead with my family and have a shrine in my home dedicated to my dad and my brother, a picture of both rests on the mantle along with a cross and a rosary for each, we make their favorite foods and bring them their favorite drinks, and that is how I honor the memory of both of them.

Halloween is also a holiday that I celebrate from time to time. Celebrated on October 31st, it’s only a day before Day of the Dead. Halloween has many different activities, mainly dressing up as different characters, and going trick or treating, but there are many other traditions that take place on Halloween mainly things that pertain to the fall harvest (Morton 2015). Halloween has a long history that originates from the Catholics and the day before All Saints Day (Nov. 1st) which is known as All-Hallows’ Eve which we would eventually come to know as Halloween (Morton 2015). Halloween would eventually make its way to America in the 1870s through the Irish and Scottish immigrants that would bring their traditions to the new world, one of those traditions would be Halloween which middle class America would adopt into their traditions. In the 1930s Halloween would come to have a problem with the mischievous youth that would go around and pull pranks, this would eventually lead to homeowners to “pay off” the pranksters with the promise of sweet, this would eventually lead to the advent of “trick or treat” (Morton 2015). One last tradition that is practically a staple of Halloween Is the carving of pumpkins into Jack o lanterns, a tradition that also made its way to the states from the Scotts and Irish. The origins of the jack o lantern go back to a myth of a man named jack who tricked the devil, he would eventually meet the devil in hell and the devil would turn jack away as the story goes

Jack asks for a light to find his way back, and the devil throws him a chunk of live coal from the hell furnace. Jack puts it inside the turnip he’s been gnawing, and with this jack-o’-lantern he has been wandering the earth ever since. P.8 S.10 (Morton 2011)

With all thing’s considered Halloween is a holiday that has a lot of myth and lore behind it that has been forgotten over time. I still sometimes participate in Halloween activities, but in recent years I have forgone the holiday as it doesn’t really appeal to me.

When we look at Halloween and Day of the Dead can seem very different, but when looking at them objectively we can see some similarities. Both holidays take place within days of each other, and both are derived from the holiday All Saints Day (Mortin 2015) (Marchi 2013). Both holidays have depiction of the dead, specifically skeletons; Day of the Dead uses skeletons to depict the spirits that return during the holiday (Marchi 2013), whereas Halloween uses skeletons as more of a decorative depiction. Both holidays have traditional sweets; Halloween has more of a focus on commercially available candy (Mortin 2015), and Day of the Dead has more unique sweets like candy skulls (Marchi 2013). There is another tradition during Halloween and Day of the Dead that is somewhat similar in practice but different in what it represents and that would be dressing up in costumes, but the difference lies with what people dress up as where during Halloween people dress up as whatever they want as “Costumes provide a chance to pretend to be someone else.”P.12 S.1 (Forbes 2015), whereas during Day of the Dead people dress up as skeletons to represent the returned spirits (Marchi 2013). There are also many differences between Halloween and Day of the Dead. One of the main differences being what is celebrated, where Day of the Dead is a holiday of remembrance of those we’ve lost, and Halloween is more of a celebration of the fall harvest (Mortin 2015). Halloween also has very different traditions that Day of the dead doesn’t have, things like trick or treating, and pumpkin carving. But on the other side Halloween doesn’t have any kind of memorials for lost friends and relatives (Marchi 2013).

At the end of the day Halloween and Day of the Dead are similar in some ways and very different in others, but that does not change the fact that they a both holidays celebrated by two different groups of people. It is important to remember to respect traditions that we may not know a lot about, and if you want to participate you should do your research to understand the significance of that tradition. But in the end “we’re all human beings, in the end, despite our differences.”- Timothy Morton

References

Marchi, R. (2013). Hybridity and authenticity in US day of the dead celebrations. Journal of American Folklore, 126(501), 272-301,357. Retrieved from http://168.156.198.98:2048/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.vwlmcproxy01.lwtech.edu/scholarly-journals/hybridity-authenticity-us-day-dead-celebrations/docview/1415809054/se-2

Hughes, H. G. A. (1999). Digging the days of the dead: A reading of mexico’s dias de muertos. Reference Reviews, 13(6), 14-15. Retrieved from http://168.156.198.98:2048/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.vwlmcproxy01.lwtech.edu/scholarly-journals/digging-days-dead-reading-mexicos-dias-de-muertos/docview/215220397/se-2

Morton, L. (2015). Halloween. In D. Goldstein (Ed.), The Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets (1st ed.). Oxford University Press, Inc. https://search.credoreference.com/articles/Qm9va0FydGljbGU6NDgxNzY0NQ==?aid=18199

Morton, L. (2011). The Halloween Encyclopedia (2nd ed.). McFarland. https://search.credoreference.com/articles/Qm9va0FydGljbGU6MTI3NzExNA==?aid=18199