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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSisterhood, Herstory and Talking Circles: Inside Gloria's Life
Sisterhood, Herstory and Talking Circles: Inside Glorias Life
Stepping into Daryl Roth Theatre, just steps from Union Square, now feels like stepping into a feminist time machine. Throughout the lobby and the stairs down to concessions, the walls are covered with covers of Ms.; songs such as Its a Mans Mans Mans World and Woman in the White House play as you enter. The stage is covered with colorful rugs and ottomans, with stacks of books and pillows the only props, and the theater is set up in an amphitheater style, with those accoutrement in the center surrounded by rising stadium-like seating.
But this is no stadiumthe overall atmosphere is one of comfort and ease. This is Gloria: A Life, the theatrical production telling Gloria Steinems story. Audio-visual screens introduce the performance, playing clips and videos of Steinem speaking before Christine Lahti enters dressed as the icon herself and begins to narrate their now-shared story. The ensemble castJoanna Glushak, Fedna Jacquet, Francesca Fernandez McKenzie, Patrena Murray, DeLanna Studi and Liz Wisanwill come to take the stage, acting out different scenes from Steinems past that span workplaces, protests, colleagues and partners-in-crime.
In the first act, Lahti guides the audience through Steinems life. They see her early yearsher youth in Toledo and her time at Smith college. They watch along as Steinem begins her career as a political journalist in New York, and even take an inside look at the makings of her now-infamous Playboy expose. They follow Steinem along on a 1969 assignmentcovering her first feminist gather in Albany, a protest for abortion liberalizationand travel together, too, to 1977, when she appears at the National Womens Conference. Though not chronological, the narrative-heavy play hits all the highlights: the college campus tours, the fight for the Equal Rights Amendment, the founding of Ms., even the Womens March. Audience members meet Steinems compatriots, many of whom have been erased from mainstream feminist herstory but offered Steinem pivotal wisdom: Dorothy Hughes, Bella Abzug, Wilma Mankiller, Florynce Kennedy, Pauli Murray, Audre Lorde, Alice Walker and Aileen Hernandez.
The second act is a good old-fashioned Talking Circle. Lead with love, low ego, high impact, move at the speed of trust. The actors come out and help facilitate a conversation about the play that expands into an exploration of personal stories, feelings about the current political atmosphere, worries and anger. For some, this is not their first consciousness-raising. For others, it will likely be the impetus to host more on their own. Tony-nominated director and playwright Emily Mann, who wrote Gloria, said in a message to the audience in the playbill that the production is a very healing piece and its a way for people to find a way to cope and to find community. She added: We need that right now. It seems an appropriate salute to Steinem herself for the production about her life to involve community-building, and the cast does an excellent job at facilitating that kind of relationship with their audience.
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http://msmagazine.com/blog/2018/12/07/sisterhood-herstory-talking-circles-inside-glorias-life/
rusty fender
(3,428 posts)I would love to see that someday
Was just thinking yesterday of one of my favorite books when I was a teen: Sisterhood is Powerful. It is a compilation of essays written by feminists, but you, niyad, would know that
niyad
(113,306 posts)Robin Morgan
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The Sisterhood Is Global Institute
https://sigi.org/
The Sisterhood Is Global Institute
The Think Tank of International Feminism
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The Sisterhood Is Global Institute (SIGI) is celebrating over 30 years of trailblazing work in the global Womens Movement. Since our founding in 1984, weve pioneered many firsts, including:
The first Womens Urgent Action Alerts, now widely adopted by NGOs throughout the world;
The first Global Campaign to make Womens Unpaid Labor visible in national accounts, GNPs, and GDPs;
The first Human Rights Manuals for Women in Muslim Societiestranslated into 12 languages;
The first global crowdfunding initiative created specifically to strengthen front line womens groups (Donor Direct Action).
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The Sisterhood Is Global Institute (SIGI), an international nonprofit NGO with consultative status to the United Nations, has for more than three decades functioned as the worlds first feminist think-tank. SIGI has also developed a global communications network through which an umbrella of NGO interest, advice, contacts, and support can collectively be mobilized for greater, more cost-effective impact in connecting and empowering the global womens movement.
At the moment, SIGIs main project is Donor Direct Action, a global initiative which links front line womens groups to money, visibility and popular support.
rusty fender
(3,428 posts)Thanks for the info! Ill check it out