Students from the Residence Hall Association will be hosting the Rising Against Hate Bonfire to mark the end of Social Justice and Diversity Week 4 p.m. on Friday at the Campus Pond.

The event will feature the burning of a wooden structure of blocks decorated with discriminatory or hurtful words that students have heard.

Jacob Gulso, vice president of community engagement for the RHA, described how the bonfire would remove the hate.

“This is a physical act, but it can also be a metaphor because the hate is being burned away,” Gulso said.

Gulso, a junior sociology major, has spearheaded this year’s Rising Against Hate event.

The blocks and markers to write with have been passed out to every residence hall desk and will be available until they are collected Friday morning.

The event is open to all Eastern students and residents living in the community.

Megan Corder, an RHA adviser and the Associate Resident Director of Housing, defined the purpose of Social Justice and Diversity Week, saying the whole point is to understand that there are a lot of different ways to view the same thing.

“We have to understand why it’s important to have these conversations and why it’s important to understand how these words might be hateful,” Corder said. “It’s not always their intention, but sometimes the things we don’t understand the meaning of have a lot more impact than we realize.”

This idea comes as a substitution of what has traditionally been the Writing on the Wall project.

In years prior, this project involved building and tearing down a physical cinderblock wall that had messages of hate scrawled across it.

The wall was left up for four days before Eastern attendees and the surrounding community was invited to come and tear it down.

This act, as described by the RHA web page, served to tear down “the barriers between the EIU community.”

Gulso said because of the trickle-down effect of the budget impasse for higher education funding, the initial capstone project of Social Justice and Diversity Week had to be altered to be more affordable.

Corder said that she did not think it was so much a loss of funds as it has been a change in style.

“I don’t necessarily know if it is a change in the sense of us giving up things, I think it is just providing an opportunity to have a conversation of what is the best way to get the same quality of experience without spending as much money,” Corder said. “So I think that every organization and every area on campus are all being more mindful.”

Gulso said he hopes the wall brings a diverse group of people from all different types of backgrounds to one place.

“When you do, you get all sorts of different perspectives as well,” Gulso said.

Derek Wunder can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected]