What does it mean to wear the Red and Black?
There is pulse felt around campus, a surging heartbeat, which resonates within each student, athlete, teacher and fan alike. It’s that feeling you get on Saturdays, when the sun greets you and you’re still half-asleep. Then you remember: Holy CRAP! It’s gameday. Better than Christmas and an entire semester long, you slip on your red and black and race out your door, ready to help cheer on the Dawgs. Roaring with life every day of the week, Athens, Ga. explodes after Fridays. After all, during football season: weekends are for the warriors.
When the loud speakers blare, “It’s SATURDAY in ATHENS!” fists pump, voices crack and everyone shouts on their feet at the top of their lungs. But what exactly does this all mean? When the student section erupts with cheers, “U-G-A, U-G-A, U-G-A,” the spirit is contagious! The core of this enthusiasm began the moment that the University of Georgia adopted the colors red and black. Not only are these colors essential to a 200-year-old tradition, it extends to beyond just school spirit. After all, what is in a color? More than you could ever imagine.
Red and black is perhaps one of the greatest pairings of colors to have ever graced an academic community. Beginning on Herty Field, Georgia Football is apart of an epic that has outlasted the test of time. Chosen initially by a school not only to represent athletic endeavors, these colors represent all forms of identification for a specific academic community. Colors themselves exist as a form of non-verbal communication with the meaning of colors varying based upon individualized experiences. Existing as a key component for boosting morale among the student body, red and black speak to the entire university population on a conscious and subconscious level.
Red: ENERGY
Red is essentially the backbone and soul of the university. It’s rooted deeply to our primitive background, inspiring humanistic characteristics and acting as source of strength around campus. Vibrant and full of life, red raises our pulses in the stadium, stimulating our energy and raising our sprits. Acting as an element that sets us apart from other universities, it has the ability to draw immediate attention and is associated with good luck or fortune. Bright and warm, it provides the perfect foil to black, which is mysterious and powerful. Varying in shades, the idea of “red” expresses an overarching sense of unification within a stadium full of people cheering, thousands of different notions of reds being expressed at once. While the color red acts as a unifying element for Georgia, one can guarantee that all the shades of red present will be unique.
Black: MOTIVATION
Black is real. It is rustic, powerful and a compilation of everything and nothing at the same time. Devoid of color, while at the same time absorbing all lights in the color spectrum, black is an indicator of authority. Black is a color of power and strength, essential to a student’s soul. It describes the limitless amount of potential and endless opportunities allotted for improvement in academics, as well as life. Black isn’t just a color, it accents and highlights greatness. Used in tandem with red, black provides the defense motivation to achieve goals. Be certain that black is not a color that should invoke fear; it is modern and hopeful, as it looks towards an unclear future of our making.
Needless to say, nothing feels quite like sitting in Sanford Stadium on a Saturday. Better yet, there’s nothing that can describe the amazing amount of camaraderie and energy present. Win or lose, rain or shine, red and black till I die. At the end of the day we all know that no matter what: it’s always great to be a Georgia Dawg.
