Hit & Run : Reason.com: Since the 1990s, students from Mount Holyoke College, an all-women's school in Massachusetts, have staged an annual production of The Vagina Monologues. Not this year. The college is retiring the ritual over concerns that the play—penned by Eve Ensler in 1996 as a way to "celebrate the vagina" and women's sexuality—is not inclusive enough.
3 comments:
In essence, I understand the concept of why this show could be cancelled, but I agree with the author of the article. Just because the Vagina Monologues do not include anything about trans women does not mean that it is transphobic. The play was written before transsexuality was a large issue in American society. So yes, it is a little outdated, but I wouldn’t say it is offensive in that respect. Also, as my high school director would always say, theatre is risky. There is controversy in most shows that are produced, and so resistance is almost always met. Most directors that I have worked with have changed scripts, even though they are technically not allowed to do so. If it was so disconcerting to the producers, they could have written in a new work to account for transsexual women. Theatre is an ever evolving art form, and plays shouldn’t be thrown away because they are outdated and therefore considered “offensive.”
I agree with Sasha and the author of this article. Just because a female empowering play written 20 years ago before transsexuality was as big as it it now does not mean the play is offensive and should be completely written off. Sometimes there is only so much you can do to encompass all genders races and sexualities, but also sometimes you can change or add things to a script to make it more encompassing, and that is really good. It also seems like some of the angst against this play is because of a lack of dramaturgical understanding of the time period this play was originally written in. Like the author said, the time this play was written in, people were discouraged to talk about female sexuality at all. Theatre is constantly changing and evolving and taking risks. Transexual talk aside, I think to some extent women still are discouraged from being completely open about their sexuality and I think writing off this play as transphobic simply because some trans women don’t have vaginas fits into the category of discouraging women from talking about their sexuality. Yes, it is important to talk about and acknowledge transexual women, but it is also important to continue talking about women in general.
This is one of those articles that excites me because I get to witness change and reform in a positive connotation within a higher educational environment. I believe the acceptance of all genders and identities is very important, regardless of genetalia. The author makes a denomination of the decision to rid of Vagina Monologues at Mt. Holyoke that is very plain and get the point across. She says “the argument is premised on the idea that a) not all women have vaginas, and b) some men do have vaginas, because some trans individuals identify and live as a different gender than they were born without getting genital reconstructive surgery.” I’m not at all saying that the connotation of women having vaginas is bad, just that it is traditional and maybe needs to be pivoted in a more accepting direction. And while I also like to see groups of people having movements to change the higher powers’ ideas and connotations, seeing the higher system doing it all by itself is just as gratifying.
Post a Comment