As college students, we often find ourselves overwhelmed with school, clubs, jobs, and the list goes on. With so much else on our plates, we find that we don’t spend enough time on the little things that make us happy and bring us fun. My two loves of this life—other than my friends and family—are music and reading, both of which bring fun into my eccentric life. I was lucky growing up in South Florida, which is a place rich in culture; you could walk down different blocks and hear an array of languages, cultures, and music. Don’t get me wrong, I love a classic Hozier, Sabrina Carpenter, and A$AP Rocky, but it’s important to expand your field of vision.
I found love, even if temporary, with Rosalía and Prince Royce, felt sexy with NEXTIME’s “Светлана!,” and read about a life different than my own in Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner. Even though I am not bilingual by any means, I find it important to listen to music from an array of cultures to get away from our American-centric perspectives. By translating or reading translations of books and music, we begin to understand how we are not so alone and have more empathy in general. In American culture, I have seen a trend where we include Spanish artists in our English songs, and sometimes it’s wonderful and fun, but there may be an underlying “exotic” nature that fetishizes cultures other than our own. To be fair, over 40% of the U.S identifies themselves as not white. And yes, race and ethnicity are two separate entities within themselves; it’s key to remind ourselves of this and appreciate different cultures to understand each other.
I was one of the lucky ones, exposed to more culture than my own at such a young age, but others are not so lucky, so where does one start? My biggest suggestion for entry in terms of music is Bad Bunny. I mean, there is a reason he was the number one artist of 2025. He combines modern reggaeton with more classic Latin sounds; it’s beautiful.
There are countless beginner books for learning about multicultural stories, but I would suggest beginning with Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo, concerning the history of India, explaining how both atrocities and sadness can exist in a place with such deep, beautiful culture.
Now, maybe more importantly, get up and dance. While I was researching the link between music and reading with empathy, I found a study explaining the important connection between dancing and listening to music with others. Stupacher, Mikkelsen, and Vuust’s conclusion is “temporarily aligned movements increased social bonding with the virtual other and higher empathy was associated with increased social bonding in movement interactions that featured music.” As I mentioned, it is important to seek fun despite being busy as a college student, and what’s more fun than an impromptu dance party?
All in all, during a time when people are losing or lacking empathy, it’s of the utmost importance to read, listen to music, and dance! Sometimes, even when I’m a bit sad, I turn on some music and dance my heart out, and it always makes me feel a bit better.