Starting from late afternoon, children walk around dressed up as TV characters, superheroes, witches, zombies, and monsters. They line up before front porches of houses elaborately embellished with spider webs, witch statues, and "trick or treat" signs filling the neighborhood. Yes. It’s that time of year again: Halloween.
In American culture, Halloween is a holiday targeted for kids. On the night of Halloween, kids dress up in various costumes and go trick-or-treating for candy with their friends. However, this Americanized Halloween we experience actually has a deeply rooted connection to ancient Celtic practices.
The origin of Halloween can be traced to Samhain, an ancient pagan festival celebrated by Celtic people over 2,000 years ago. Samhain was celebrated at the end of the harvest season. The ancient Celtics were various population groups who lived in Europe north of the Mediterranean region from the Late Bronze Age onwards. They believed that during Samhain, the walls between the world of the living and dead would dissipate, allowing the spirits to pass through, come back to life, and damage their crops. To protect their harvest from the evil spirits, Celtic people would offer gifts and host feasts and bonfires. Some also wore ghoulish costumes to ward off wandering spirits who would mistake them for one of their own and leave.
The gifts and food left out offered to the spirits eventually evolved into the trick-or-treating we see today. Additionally, the practice of wearing ghoulish costumes altered into dressing up as your favorite fictional character or celebrity. Of course, some still go for a more classic approach and dress up as a ghost, vampire, werewolf, witch, or zombie.
Although Halloween is dominantly celebrated in Europe and the Americas, sights of Halloween decorations and small scale trick-or-treating are increasing in other countries like Japan and the Philippines. While more and more kids in China are beginning to celebrate Halloween by dressing up, traditional Chinese culture also has their own version of Halloween celebrated on a different date—the festival of Teng Chieh, or the Festival of the Hungry Ghosts. Similar to Halloween’s Celtic origins, the Chinese Festival of the Hungry Ghosts is a day when food, spirit money, and other gifts are offered to the dead to pacify the angry spirits who might otherwise come back to the living world seeking revenge. Nowadays, this traditional festival is celebrated more often in rural areas of China, while those in the city are likely to involve themselves in the "trend" of celebrating Halloween as Westerners do.
In Shanghai, neighborhoods where many foreigners live mirror the typical American neighborhood during Halloween. Next year, if you’d like to go trick-or-treating again, no problem! Dress up with your friends and go to Forest Manor, the Shanghai Racquet Club (SRC), or Westwood Green, where many SAS students go trick-or-treating each year.
Too many of us celebrate Halloween by simply following the mainstream without really understanding why we do it. Next year, may your Halloween be spent in a more meaningful way rather than just watching the elementary school Halloween parade and dressing up on Halloween day of Spirit Week.
Allison Ma
In American culture, Halloween is a holiday targeted for kids. On the night of Halloween, kids dress up in various costumes and go trick-or-treating for candy with their friends. However, this Americanized Halloween we experience actually has a deeply rooted connection to ancient Celtic practices.
The origin of Halloween can be traced to Samhain, an ancient pagan festival celebrated by Celtic people over 2,000 years ago. Samhain was celebrated at the end of the harvest season. The ancient Celtics were various population groups who lived in Europe north of the Mediterranean region from the Late Bronze Age onwards. They believed that during Samhain, the walls between the world of the living and dead would dissipate, allowing the spirits to pass through, come back to life, and damage their crops. To protect their harvest from the evil spirits, Celtic people would offer gifts and host feasts and bonfires. Some also wore ghoulish costumes to ward off wandering spirits who would mistake them for one of their own and leave.
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| Celtic People Celebrate Samhain. |
Although Halloween is dominantly celebrated in Europe and the Americas, sights of Halloween decorations and small scale trick-or-treating are increasing in other countries like Japan and the Philippines. While more and more kids in China are beginning to celebrate Halloween by dressing up, traditional Chinese culture also has their own version of Halloween celebrated on a different date—the festival of Teng Chieh, or the Festival of the Hungry Ghosts. Similar to Halloween’s Celtic origins, the Chinese Festival of the Hungry Ghosts is a day when food, spirit money, and other gifts are offered to the dead to pacify the angry spirits who might otherwise come back to the living world seeking revenge. Nowadays, this traditional festival is celebrated more often in rural areas of China, while those in the city are likely to involve themselves in the "trend" of celebrating Halloween as Westerners do.
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| The Chinese leave food offerings to angry spirits on the day of the Teng Chieh festival. |
Too many of us celebrate Halloween by simply following the mainstream without really understanding why we do it. Next year, may your Halloween be spent in a more meaningful way rather than just watching the elementary school Halloween parade and dressing up on Halloween day of Spirit Week.
Allison Ma
