The core group of actors from Aagaaz, have been engaging with regular conversations about gender and sexuality. The adolescent girls meet me on a weekly basis to co-create a safe space.
I have always been fascinated by the prospect of exploring gender as a theme with adolescents. However, this group at Nizamuddin is responsible for opening my eyes to the struggles and significance of such crucial and controversial work. I feel that I have come a long way as a learner, if not a facilitator. My initial conversations with the girls were primarily scientific and factual. We discussed the details of menstruation and spent a whole lot of time naming body parts and critically examining myths and taboos around menstrual health. Gradually, we moved towards understanding personal space, ideas around consent and objectification and slowly transitioned into exploring the notion of pleasure.
Aagaaz’s vision statement says “we relentlessly question ‘what is’ to probe ‘what could and should be’ to learn ways to act and perform beyond just the stage”. We constantly strive to understand the world through theatre, and sometimes we dramatic work based on our lived experience. Being selected for Gender Bender in 2016 ( a festival co-curated and supported by Sandbox Collective and Goethe Institut, Bangalore) with Urban Turban, was more of the latter.
As I watched the three actors perform the work-in-progress piece in Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti on the 23rd of April, I saw how beautifully they are negotiating their understandings and confusions around their bodies, identities, and their worlds through the thin overlapping space between performing on and off the stage. Urban Turban explores how gender plays out in the everyday lives of three girls living in Nizamuddin Basti. The play explores their struggles, their confusions and their attempts to make their space in the world. It explores their stories, yet manages to encapsulate bits of their next-door neighbour’s story, bits of their school friend’s story, bits of my story and maybe bits of the story being lived by a woman you saw walking on the street.
Our director, Dhwani Vij uses aspects of physical theatre, object theatre and immersive theatre to create an experience that makes the intricacies of these everyday episodes come alive.
In the play, we see the girls in their familiar environments doing the things they do. There is a morning routine, going to school, interacting with the neighbourhood and being at home. The theatrical technique is highlighted when the girls start singing about all the things they don’t understand about the world. The lyrics of the song are comical yet powerful. There is a point where the girls say that ‘sadkon par masti nahi karna samaj nahi aata’ and the simple statement blatantly outlines the patriarchal power structures and the restrictions they create.
Coming back to the show I watched in Hazrat Nizamuddin Basti, we performed for the community workers of Aga Khan Foundation. This show will remain in our memories for posterity. It was extremely special. This is the school the girls went to as children, this is the neighbourhood where they live and the audience comprises of the people who co-exist in this environment and share this ‘lived experience’. Performing in these circumstances takes a lot more strength, especially when it has potential to confront reality. There is no possibility for the actors to remove themselves from the context after the curtain call.
Process oriented theatre is slow work. Sometimes, it takes a while to notice small yet significant insights that emerge over a period of time. This performance for the community, and a few other instances have marked a major shift in how the girls interact with world. 17 year old Jasmine feels that change doesn’t happen overnight and little interventions can make a difference in the way people perceive gender. She feels optimistic about using performance to challenge mindsets and hopes that these messages would influence her environment at home. 18 year old Nagina was glad to see that the questions thrown at the actors, were answered by the women in the audience themselves. She felt that it signified common experience and a relatable understanding of the context. The play triggered moments of self- evaluation for some of the women in the audience and that was also a crucial response, according to her. A moment from the audience interaction that stands out for me was an older woman in the audience saying,” I am going to stop gossiping about young girls from now onwards.”
16 year old Nagma, has other perspectives to offer. She talks about the fear of performing in front of people who might tell her parents what her ‘theatre’ is all about. At the same time, there is acknowledgement of the fact that performances such as these, have potential to show a mirror to society. She strongly believes that change starts from the self, and Urban Turban is a trigger in that direction.
Suddenly, I am able to see how the girls are understanding th larger purpose and long term impact of their work. They feel the need to create more sustainable and frequent exposures in their community. In addition to the performative element, our Darpan sessions have also seen some beautiful turning points. One such moment happened during a recent workshop exploring personal perspectives on gender. We used improvisation games, embodiments, visual arts and scene work to talk about society and the moral standards it imposes on girls. We also managed to do deeper into it, by looking at our narratives of ‘Ideal Women’ and detecting the loopholes there as well. This snippet from a short piece they improvised during this session, highlights their ability to understand the topic with respect to both context and privilege.
(An interaction between a low caste scholar, a middle class housewife, a wealthy socialite and feminist activist)
Scholar: मेरी बेटी को तो देखो कैसे कपड़े पहन के बाहर घूमती रहती है| समाज क्या सोचेगा?
Activist: उसे जो करना है करने दो| समाज समाज समाज!! क्या समाज तुम्हारी थाली पर खाना रखता है या तुम खुद?
Housewife: हम इस समाज का हिस्सा हैं और अभी हम यहाँ से बाहर नही निकल सकते| ह्मे खुद को लोगों की बातों से बचाना है, क्योंकि ह्में ही सुनना पड़ता है|
While dialogues in Nizamuddin are becoming more nuanced by the day, we are still quite new to creating similar spaces with unfamiliar adolescents. Our work at Pehchan Centre in Jaitpur, is taking a different trajectory. Recently, we realised how engaging with the arts consistently can transform an exercise from an intimidating instruction to an opportunity for personal expression. And this hardly took us a few weeks. However, the challenge now lies in pushing ourselves to go deeper into the ideas and the processes.