Two years ago, Sammy Lifson was standing on stage performing a piece for the Vagina Monologues. Now she’s an executive producer of the series.

Vagina Monologues was put on by Students Advocating Sexual Safety and Empowerment. There were four performances this year, the first of which opened to a full crowd Thursday night in Marshall Auditorium on the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry campus.

The Saturday performance at Hendricks Chapel was the first performance by a full cast of faculty and staff. This all-faculty performance was in place of an all-greek-life cast, which was the case in previous years.

There were 16 faculty members and a couple dozen student performers in the Saturday performance. This year’s cast was one of the largest in a Syracuse University production, said Lifson, a senior advertising and women and gender studies dual major. A total of 44 girls tried out this year for the monologues, she said.

 

Each monologue in the show deals with themes of sex, love, rape, menstruation, mutilation, masturbation, birth and orgasm in connection to the vagina. The money raised for SU’s monologues went to Vera House, a local organization combating violence against women; Planned Parenthood;and SU’s Rape Advocacy, Prevention and Education Center.

The Vagina Monologues are a part of the national V-Day event, a global grassroots activist movement that was inspired by Eve Ensler’s play ‘Vagina Monologues.’ The organization oversees performances and raises money for anti violence groups in the communities in which they are performed. Lifson said the university puts on the Vagina Monologues in conjunction with Valentine’s Day every year.

 

‘It’s around Valentine’s Day to get people thinking about loving their bodies and themselves and sort of to think about Valentine’s Day in a different way,’ Lifson said.

 

During the show, all the performers showed up onstage in black, red and pink clothing and held cue cards to commemorate V-Day and the stories of the women they were telling. 

 

Lifson said the cards cast members hold serve as symbols to the women’s stories. She said the monologues were relaxed performances. 

 

Though some performances elicit laughter from the crowd, others depict heavier topics, such as transgender discrimination, sexual violence and abuse, rape and female genital mutilation.

 

The sad monologues bring an international aspect, such as’Crooked Braid,’ which is intense and powerful, Lifson said. ‘Crooked Braid’ is a re-enactment of domestic violence in the lives of Native American women. Rape is 2.5 times higher in Native American women than any other demographic, according to the monologue.

The other heavy, somber monologues were ‘My Vagina was a Village,’ which includes the stories of Bosnian women in rape camps; ‘Say It,’ a powerful plea from Japanese comfort women demanding an apology from their government; and monologues telling the pain of women who have suffered female genital mutation.

 

Cassie-Lee Grimaldi, a freshman television, radio and film major, said two monologues that stood out to her were ‘The little coochi snorcher that could’ and ‘They beat the girl out of my boy,’ due to their violent, realistic imagery performed on stage by the actresses.

 

Nakisa Nasserharif a junior math and Spanish dual major, said she was pleasantly surprised about the performances.

‘I wasn’t expecting it to be funny,’ she said. ‘I expected to cry, but I didn’t.’

 

She said her favorite monologue was ‘My Short Skirt’ because of its message.

 

‘A lot of girls get hit on for wearing short skirts, but just because you wear one doesn’t mean you’re asking for it,’ Nasserharif said. ‘You wear it for yourself.’

tadoychi@syr.edu

Published on February 13, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Tedi: tadoychi@syr.edu