The Mount Holyoke College Department of Theatre Arts, Mount Holyoke College Innovation Fund, and Five-College Multicultural Theatre Committee present "Staging Black Femininity: A Semester-Long Investigation Of Race, Gender, and Representation"

The Mission:
Historically, institutional racism has been tightly wound with representations of race in expressive culture. As spaces for the public imaginary, theatre and film have contained both reifications of racist stereotypes as well as reclaimings of subjectivity for oppressed people of color. Through a series of public lectures, films and discussions as well as performances of Suzan-Lori Parks' challenging play Venus, "Staging Black Femininity" hopes to initiate campus-wide conversations about representations of race, and, specifically, of the black female body.

Events:
(All events on the campus of Mount Holyoke College, unless otherwise noted)

Film/Lecture: Daughters of the Dust (1991)
An evening with Alva Rogers Bessie award-winner Alva Rogers will screen scenes from Julie Dash's celebrated film and discuss her own work as an actress, playwright, and performance artist.
Wednesday, September 22, 7:00 pm, Dwight 101

Film: The Josephine Baker Story (1991)
Wednesday, October 6, 7:00 pm, Dwight 101

Film: Introducing Dorothy Dandridge (1999)
Wednesday, October 13, 7:00 pm, Dwight 101

Film/Lecture: The Life and Times of Sara Baartman (1998)/"Black Venus" by T. Sharpley-Whiting
After a documentary film on the African woman called the "Hottentot Venus," French and African American Studies scholar T. Sharpley-Whiting will reflect on Baartman's impact upon cultural constructions of black femininity.
Thursday, October 28, 7:00 pm, Reese 302

Lecture: Alberto Sandoval-Sanchez
Alberto Sandoval-Sanchez, a professor of Spanish at Mount Holyoke, will discuss his latest book project, in which he examines Parks' Venus and the racialized "freak" in American drama.
Monday, November 8, 7:00 pm, Reese 302

Staged reading: Wine in the Wilderness
Rochelle Calhoun '83, executive director of the Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College, will direct a staged reading of Alice Childress' play Wine in the Wilderness, which revolves around the differing perspectives of what represents black womanhood.
Thursday, November 18th, time TBA, Herter 227, University of Massachusetts.

Mount Holyoke Department of Theatre presents:

VENUS
A play by Pulitzer Prize-winner and MHC alumna Suzan-Lori Parks. Directed by Julia Whitworth

Wednesday, November 3 through Saturday,
November 6 at 8:00 pm
Sunday, November 7 at 2:00 pm
Rooke Theatre, Mount Holyoke College

Venus is based on the tragic and true story of Saartjie Baartman, an African woman lured to Europe in 1810 and exhibited nude in a London circus on account of her (purportedly) sizeable posterior. Her keepers renamed her the "Hottentot Venus." Venus deconstructs the act of viewing itself in order to examine racist and sexist acts of objectification and stereotyping. The play's deliberately ironic tone and considerable humor creates a disturbing and thought-provoking political vaudeville.

Tickets: $5.00 general public / $3.00 for students
To reserve, please call 538-2406.

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PANEL DISCUSSION: "Staging Black Femininity"
Saturday, November 6, 2:00 pm
Rooke Theatre, Mount Holyoke College

Acclaimed playwrights, actors, and directors will discuss the problems and possibilities of representing race and gender on stage. Invited participants include Ntozake Shange, Robbie McCauley, Adina Porter, and several local theatre artists. Moderated by Rochelle Calhoun '83, executive director of the Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College.

Admission is free of charge and the event is open to the public.