With the completion of the first season of MTV’s ‘Jersey Shore,’ the show’s cast members have become familiar names on Northwestern’s campus.

‘It’s basically like a car wreck,’ said Weinberg sophomore Chiarra Manzanares, who watched all nine episodes. ‘You can’t stop watching. It’s something so unreal that would never happen in your life-or at least in my life.’

Recently NU students have been trying to live the reality show dream, mimicking the Seaside Heights, N.J., lifestyle of ‘Pauly D,’ ‘J-WOWW’ and ‘The Situation’, through a growing number of ‘Jersey Shore’ theme parties.

At one ‘Jersey Shore’ party, techno music blasted as students imitated the characters by wearing skin-tight clothing, orange makeup and gravity-defying hair. Some students even drew fake tattoos on themselves with markers.

‘The party was pretty trashy,’ Communication freshman Veronica Nieves said. ‘It was a lot of fun, though.’

Not everybody is a fan of the show. The Facebook group ‘MTV’s ‘Jersey Shore’ is a Disgrace to the Jersey Shore and its Inhabitants’ has more than 72,000 members.

Some NU students said they found the show’s portrayal of Italian-Americans to be uncouth. They said controversy has surrounded the show because of its depiction of Italian-Americans as ‘Guidos,’ a term frequently used among the cast members.

‘My dad grew up in the Italian ghetto of New Jersey,’ Weinberg freshman Eric Anderson said. ‘Back then the term ‘Guido’ was very offensive.’

Anderson, who has only seen one episode of ‘Jersey Shore,’ said the cast portrays inaccurate generalizations about the Italian-American population. Still, he said the subject matter is not personally offensive.

Because of the show, students from New Jersey said they now feel more likely to be stereotyped according to the behavior on the show.

Colleen Petronchak, a Weinberg freshman, said she has spent her summers at the Jersey Shore for the past seven years. She said people now automatically associate her with the television show.

‘It’s annoying,’ Petronchak said. ‘It’s more filmed in north New Jersey, and the cast is New York people.’

Petronchak said despite her annoyance at being associated with the show, she enjoys watching it.

‘It’s like the ‘Real World’ but less classy,’ she said. ‘It’s watching drunk people do stupid things. That’s a little ridiculous and eccentric but entertaining nonetheless.’ [email protected]