Correction appended.
For an organ that's located right at a woman's center, the vagina can seem awfully remote sometimes. It's an alien planet, a dark cellar, a jungle unseen and often uncharted by its female host, alternately neglected or hyper-sexualized by a society that's obsessed with it. It's also the subject of "The Vagina Monologues," a play by Eve Ensler, performed this past weekend in the Englander Studio in the Perry and Marty Granoff Center for the Creative Arts.
The play was sponsored by the Coalition Against Relationship Abuse, and all proceeds from the performances were donated to Sojourner House, a foundation committed to ending domestic violence.
"The Vagina Monologues," which was written in 1996 based on the testimonials of hundreds of real women, has become a worldwide phenomenon, dedicated to empowering females by shedding light on the enigmatic vulva. It's a daunting task, but, fortunately, nobody has to do it alone— the 16 strikingly talented and beautiful performers are all onstage for the entire show, responding to one another's monologues with snaps, laughter and shouts of support.
Among the voices represented are a 72-year-old woman discovering masturbation, a lawyer-turned-sex-worker with a proclivity for props and a victim of sexual war crimes. To hear these narratives is to gain a newfound appreciation for the relationship every woman who has ever lived has had to navigate with her own anatomy. The stories to be told about the vagina are endless. As stated in the show's introduction: Even "looking at your vagina is a full day's work."
Simultaneous with the production of "The Vagina Monologues" was The Brown Monologues/Dialogues, an ongoing blog comprising personal essays by students discussing sexuality and experiences of gender. The project was spearheaded by Aida Manduley '11 and aims to rectify some of the problems the production team had with Eve Ensler's play, namely its lack of diversity, Western bias and occasionally prescriptive tone.
Despite these shortcomings, "The Vagina Monologues" is a force to be reckoned with, a play of miraculous sincerity on a subject that has been taboo for what feels like forever. Though some of its content is shocking, it's never vulgar. Any discussion of sexuality in the play abandons cynicism in favor of a touching innocence.
"The Vagina Monologues" transcends the specific experiences of the stories it tells in order to reach anyone who knows what it is like to search for a connection with the self and with others. As a male audience member commented in the talk back that followed Saturday evening's performance, "I've definitely changed how I regard my interactions with vaginas." If that's not the power of the arts, then nothing is.
A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that the Brown Monologues/Dialogues project was spearheaded by Raisa Aziz '11.5. In fact, the project was initiated by Aida Manduley '11. The Herald regrets the error.
