This is an info packet I made for Big Tits 69, a one-person show written by and starring force of nature Dean Grosbard. Grosbard and I met to discuss our collaboration in January of 2019, with plans for the show to be submitted to the Son of Semele Solo Creation Festival that May. Grosbard wanted their show to be “equal parts one-person show and TED Talk,” so oodles of in- depth research on a wide array of topics was vital.

Despite being just a year older than me, Dean Grosbard’s life has run circles around my own. Big Tits 69 discusses their discomfort in their size H breasts and their journey to getting top surgery - a journey which included growing up in the elite Pasadena, CA private school system, working as a cam girl to earn money, addiction to marijuana, contracting herpes, and a diagnosis of bipolar disorder. Hope came to Grosbard when they studied Theatre of the Oppressed, and the influence of Augosto Boal is prevalent in their work today.

At the time of this writing, Big Tits 69 is currently performing at the Asheville Fringe Festival in North Carolina. Big Tits 69 Written by & starring Dean Grosbard Dramaturgical research by Mimi RuthStiver Table of contents

Breasts: a (sexual?) history 4 Let’s Talk Gender 18 Bipolar Disorder 27 Camming 31 Herpes 35 Marijuana 37 Pasadena, California 40 Theatre of the Oppressed 43 Breasts: a (sexual?) history

Goddesses & The Bible

Until the invention of pasteurized milk in the late 19th century, a mother’s breastmilk meant life or death. Our ancestors worshipped fertility goddesses, motherhood goddesses, and nursing goddesses. The breast was often emphasized in statuettes, with the goddesses’ hands placed on their bosoms or their bellies as if to say that “the womanly powers of procreation and lactation were worthy of veneration.” (Yalom, 1997).

During the 8th-6th centuries, B.C.E., in what is now Israel, almost all clay idols from the biblical period were females. When the biblical Israelites came to Canaan, they tried to eliminate these idols so that Jahweh, the (male) god of war, would be the only god. It is likely that many Israelites continued to worship these goddesses in secrecy.

At the same time, Egyptians were worshipping the goddess Isis. Isis was associated with the milk-giving cow, the Tree of Life, and the throne of the Pharaohs. Those who were to ascend the throne sat on her lap as infants - “to suckle from her breast was to receive divine nourishment that would give the king qualities of kinship.” (Yalom, 1997). Astarte, the Phoenician goddess of love and fertility. Pharaohs were nursed by Isis at birth, at their coronation, or at death - key moments in life that required smooth transitions. The suckling at Isis’s breast was assumed to give them immortality.

In 1500 B.C.E. Greece, there was a strong association between the female body and Nature. Since women had breasts and the ability to provide milk for their young, they were seen as being closer to nature than men. Greek goddesses were the most powerful deities imaginable - until they were knocked out of that spot by younger Hellenic deities. Zeus took over Mt. Olympus from Gaia Olympia (the oldest Greek deity who was known as “the Deep-Breasted one”). The goddesses became “Olympianized,” and were reduced to less-powerful deities with specified, limited abilities. During the Olympianization, Amazon warriors were still holding strong. Amazons cut off their right breast for greater ease in drawing a bow. The Greeks HATED the Amazons, seeing them as what happened when women abandoned their role as nurturers.

Men were afraid of Amazons, but other genders admired them. They saw Amazons as being able to engage in socially unacceptable behavior that we often repress; “by a willful act of breast removal, women became transformed into powerful creatures commanding fear and respect.” (Yalom, 1997).

We have early Christian theology to thank for breasts becoming signs of Jean Fouquet’s The Melun Diptych corruption and lewdness. Flesh - particularly flesh on a feminine body - was seen as a threat to spirituality because it lured human beings to engage in sinful behaviors and distracted them from God. In a lot of early Christian art, male devils can be seen sporting long, pendulous breasts, symbolizing their tainted nature. But while the breast was seen as an unclean thing, breast milk was heralded as being almost holy. During the Middle Ages, both breast milk and blood were believed to carry mystical connotations. Mary’s milk was 2nd in holiness only to Christ’s blood, with vials of “Mary’s milk” being displayed in churches as relics. Supposedly, this milk could cure blindness, cancer, and other maladies.

15th Century: The Breast Becomes Sexual

The breast changed artistic form in 15th century Europe with Jean Fouquet’s painting The Melun Diptych. The painting is of Agnés Sorel, the mistress to the King of France. Her breast is shaped not unlike a globe and is bursting out of her bodice, served up like a piece of fruit for the observer and not for the baby sitting in her lap. According to historian Anne Hollander, this was the moment where the breast became sexual: “Stripped of its relation to the sacred, the breast became the uncontested playground for male desire.” (Yalom, 1997). From this point on, the breast began to belong less and less to the baby, and more to artists, poets, and eventually consumers.

Lots of men in the Middle Ages and continuing into the Renaissance wrote about their ideal breasts. The general consensus was that breasts should be small, firm, wide apart, pale, and “round like apples.” (The comparing of breasts to fruit begins here and continues into present day).

To the disgrace of the church, bodices became highlighted in medieval fashion. As laced- up bodices came in style, Bishop Jean Jouven de Ursins called them symbols of “whoredom and ribaldry and all other sins.”

During the Italian Renaissance, people grew more comfortable revealing their bodies (with sex workers walking around more or less uncovered), and the nude bust was frequently depicted in art. Toplessness was not uncommon; showing legs and ankles was far more scandalous. Lots of poets (almost all of them men) were fantasizing about, writing about, or generally having opinions on breasts.

Jean Cousin’s Eva prima Pandora.

A telling painting from this era is Jean Cousin’s Eva prima Pandora. The subject has the ideal female form of the time - long body, small head, round breasts. She’s a passive figure, a woman simply meant to be consumed. The name gives the message of the painting away - Eve brought the first act of disobedience towards God, and Pandora let both good and evil into the world. Art only continued to get more erotic. According to Marilyn Yalom, author of A History of the Breast (1997):

“The breast became yet one more object to be conquered by enterprising men, one more object to be wrestled from the hands of priests and preachers, not to mention women and babies. Kings, courtiers, painters, poets, explorers, and photographers - all believed they had a claim to the breast. Each thought of himself, in some way, as its owner. Women’s breasts, shorn of their religious associations, became blatant emblems of male desire.”

Breasts Become Political

1858 saw the first breast revealed in public for a political purpose. Sojourner Truth, a former slave and antislavery advocate, was speaking in front of a mostly-white audience when a proslavery advocate began to heckle Truth and challenge whether or not she was actually a woman. As printed in the October 15, 1858 issue of The Liberator:

“Sojourner told them that her breasts had suckled many a white babe to the exclusion of her own offspring; that some of those white babies had grow to man’s estate; that, although they had suckled her colored breasts, they were, in her estimation, far more manly than [her persecutors] appeared to be; and she quietly asked them as she disrobed her bosom if they, too, wished to suck! In vindication of her truthfulness, she told them that she would show her whole breast to the congregation; that it was not to her shame that she uncovered her breast before them, but to their shame.”

In America during the first World War, uncovered breasts were used in propaganda, with ads and posters showing women being victimized by the enemy or protected by American men. WWII saw the rise of pin-up models: busty women in skimpy, curve- highlighting attire. Cutouts and postcards of pin-up models gave soldiers a token to hold close to them while fighting, a reminder of what they were fighting for, a nurturing bosom to counteract what the enemy wanted to take away from them. Pin-up modeling boosted the careers of many prolific Hollywood actresses, including Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe.

When pin-up clippings began to die out, banknotes with busty women filled the void. Since banknotes are seen all over the world, a country’s icon is carefully selected. The Bank of England chose the goddess Britannia (image circa 1694) while France chose Delacroix Liberty.

When France was a colonial power in Indonesia, West Africa, and New Caledonia, the banknotes of these regions showed dark-skinned, topless women. These notes have been found to be racist and exploitive, suggesting a primitive way of life.

The Pop Culture Breast

The post-WWII era reinforced the soldiers’ love for the pin-up by showing busty actresses onscreen A banknote from New Caledonia. (Gina Lollobrigida, Jayne Mansfield, Marilyn Monroe). As stated by Yalom:

“Men needed to be reminded that the nightmare of the war was over and that the breasts they have dreamed of were now available to them. The emphasis on breasts also carried a clear message for women: your role is to provide the breast, not the bread.”

Popular actresses of the 1940s through the 1960s were placed into one of two categories based off of their breasts: there were the busty Jayne Mansfield types, who starred in comedies and sex romps, and there were the petite Audrey Hepburn types, who starred in romance films. This type-casting implied that the full-breasted women were more lively and passionate than their flat-chested counterparts.

Profiting Off of Breasts

The breast market is a rare industry in which people with breasts are both the buyers and the sellers. Profiting off of breasts began in the late Middle Ages with the invention of the corset. Ever since, the breast industry has tried every which way to reshape the body - covering it up, molding it, squeezing it, padding it, training it. It’s hard to know what a natural form looks like anymore.

Until the beginning of the 20th century, corsets were the primary form of breast support. One of the first versions of the modern bra was invented by hard- partying 19-year-old Mary Phelps Jacob (later Caresse Crosby). Jacob’s corsets had started to smell after long nights of dancing, so she asked her servant to go buy her two silk handkerchiefs and stitch them together before attending her next soiree. Jacob applied for a patent in 1914 to create her design, which she sold to the Mary Phelps Jacob’s patent for what would evolve Warner Brothers Corset Company the into today’s bras (TIME Magazine). following year. Almost simultaneously, corset use began declining in America. More American women were entering the workforce due to WWI, and the corset was deemed impractical for such labor.

The 1920s brought on the invention of cups and cup sizes. Maidenform, founded by Ida and William Rosenthal, collaborated with Enid Bissett to create a bra with “cups.” At the time, this looked like a bandeau-shaped top with a center piece of plastic that was sewn into dresses. The 1930s-1940s saw the inventions of the padded bra and the push-up bra.

In 1968, second-wave feminists became known as “bra burners” during a protest of the Miss America pageant, claiming the undergarments were “instruments of female torture” (the police actually forbade the feminists from burning their bras, so they threw them in trash cans instead. The nickname stuck regardless.). What evolved into the modern-day bralette was invented in the ‘60s - it was called the “No Bra,” and was designed to look nonexistent.

1977 saw the founding of Victoria’s Secret, which was invented by Roy Raymond, a man who was too embarrassed to shop for underwear for his wife in a department store, so he created his own personal one-stop shop to do so (because apparently that’s less shameful).

Modern-day women fall somewhere between choosing to buy “breast-enhancing products” and being brainwashed to do so. The same goes for individuals who reveal their body for money - are they exercising their freedom of choice, or are they motivated by economic rewards? Are they the exploiter, or the exploited? Are they empowered, or are they victims?

The notion that “sex sells” first became relevant during the A 1964 ad for the “No Bra,” as invented by Rudi Gernreich. Renaissance. The Italian painter Titian sold paintings of topless women to royals, and his contemporary Pietro Arentino made money by selling pornographic drawings and writing. As previously discussed, the 17th and 18th centuries saw numerous paintings where a subject’s breasts spilled out of her corset. The 19th century took this further, via paintings of nude women in nature.

The late 1800s took profiting off of the breast from the private sphere (artists earning money) to the public in advertisements. Nude models began popping in advertisements, almost always to sell products that had nothing to do with their naked bodies.

A specific, modern example: in 1993, numerous magazine covers and spreads feature the “hands on the breast” pose. The image of a woman holding up her own breasts can be traced back to ancient Mesopotamia, representing a sacred offering (see the Goddesses section of this packet). Now, the pose is purely to stimulate arousal.

Janet Jackson’s iconic 1993 Rolling Stone cover.

The Bigger, The Better?

The first silicon breast implant was performed in 1962 and rapidly became a popular procedure amongst performers (burlesque performers, topless dancers, and eventually actresses). During the 1970s through the 1980s, the procedure gained traction amongst the regular population, with over 300,000 women per year getting implants as of the 2010s. Despite a commercial preference for a larger bust, there is no evidence one way or the other that having bigger breasts leads to a heightened quality of life. In fact, scientists and anthropologists still haven’t figured out what the explicit purpose of breasts is - they serve a role both in natural selection (feeding babies) and sexual selection (arousal from possible partners). If there were an evolutionary purpose for large breasts, we’d probably see a lot more of them - since small breasts can nurse an infant just fine, the trait remains.

Even without plastic surgery, breast size has gone up. The largest contributing factor has been the American diet - making men susceptible to breast issues as well. Male breast reduction surgery has become increasingly common. Other contributing factors for increased breast size include hormones in food and birth control pills, hormone replacement therapy, and estrogenic chemicals in our environment. Important Years in Topless History (Statistics retrieved from GoTopless.org):

1900: All swimsuits cover the torso of the wearer, regardless of the wearer’s gender. For female bodies, swimwear consists of a long dress complete with knitted tights and sandals.

1907: Annette Kellerman, the first woman to swim across the English Channel, is arrested for wearing a more form-fitting bathing suit.

1910: Women’s knees are deemed “decent” enough to show in public.

1920: Bathing suits are no longer full- body cover-ups, but still must cover a large amount of the upper leg.

1934: 4 men go topless on Coney Island and are fined $1 each (almost $19 in 2019). Clark Gable becomes the first Victorian Era swimwear (Library of Congress). man to bare his chest on film in It Happened One Night.

1935: 42 men in New Jersey are fined $82 for going topless on the beach (just over $1500 in 2019). 1936: The topless ban on men is lifted…for economical reasons (less swimsuit fabric = cheaper).

1946: The first bikini premieres in France. It was modeled by a dancer “because no ‘decent’ woman wanted to wear it.”

1960: Brian Hyland’s “Little Polka Dot Bikini” drastically increases bikini sales, which up to then were seen as too risqué.

1968: 7 women in Rochester, NY are arrested for going topless.

1992: The Rochester case makes it to the NY supreme court. Toplessness becomes legal.

2008: Ukrainian women’s activist group Femen begins topless protests.

The first-ever bikini, as modeled by Micheline Bernardini (The Mirror). Femen protests in Paris during a press conference held by France’s far-right National Front party (Yoan Valat/EPA)

Toplessness Across the Globe/Cultures

Australia: In 2004, in the small town of Alice Springs (population of about 25k, almost 1000 miles to the nearest city), police officers tell a group of Aboriginal women to stop dancing topless in a public park. An Aboriginal representative body called the Central Land Council demanding an apology, as topless dancing is part of Aboriginal culture.

Europe & America: As previously discussed, ankles and legs were seen as being more risqué until around 1700 (the Enlightenment). People often walked around with one or both breasts hanging out of their bodices. During her 1837-1901 reign, Queen Victoria eliminated customs that suggested sex and sexuality due to her mother’s strong conservative beliefs. - Native Americans freely went topless in public (presumably until colonization). - Hawaiians went topless until missionaries came to the islands and insisted that they cover up.

India: Depending on the region, toplessness was seen as a sign of class. In North India, only upperclass women covered their breasts (until the 12th-16th centuries, when Islam arrived). In the southwest region of Kerala, Malayali (the majority ethnic group) only allowed the Brahmin (priests and teachers) and the Kshatriya (rulers and military elite) castes to cover their breasts until 1858.

Indonesia: Breasts went uncovered until the late 1200s, when Islam emerged.

Thailand: Sometime between 1939-1942, Prime Minister and Field Marshal Plaek Pibulsonggram issued a series of 12 “Cultural Mandates” to “civilize” the country (i.e., Westernize). The 10th Mandate stated that “Thai people should not appear at public gatherings, in public places, or in city limits without being appropriately dressed. Inappropriate dress includes wearing only underpants, wearing no shirt, or wearing a wraparound cloth.” Bibliography

Clark-Flory, Tracy. “On the rack: A cultural history of breasts.” Salon, 10 May 2012. salon.com/2012/05/10/on_the_rack_a_cultural_history_of_breasts/.

Duron, Alexandra. “History of the bra.” Women’s Health Magazine, 2011. www.womenshealthmag.com/health/a18729401/bra-history/

Jennings, Rebecca. “History of bras | History of | Racked.” Racked, Youtube, 27 Nov. 2017. www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxdAFKNDGbA

Oyler, Lauren. “The history of toplessness.” Broadly, 24 Aug. 2015. www.vice.com/ en_us/article/43gy7n/the-history-of-toplessness

Yalom, Marilyn. A History of the Breast. Alfred A. Knopf, 1997. n.a. “The topless timeline: Bare skin through the ages.” GoTopless. https://gotopless.org/ timeline Let’s Talk Gender

Sex vs. Gender

Before diving deep into identities beyond man and woman, one must first accept this universal truth: sex and gender are two different concepts. Whether or not the two are in sync will vary between individuals. - Sex is biological. It’s based on sex characteristics and chromosomes. It is most common for people to be born with XX (female) or XY (male) chromosomes, but there have been many other well-documented variations (XXX, XXY, XYY, XXYY). Sex definitely doesn’t decide our gender, but even if it did, there would be more than 2 sexes. - Gender is a social construct. It tells us how an individual relates to their identity - masculine and feminine behaviors, clothing, dialect, etc.

In the Western world, visibility for identities that aren’t simply “man” or “woman” has increased immensely in recent years.

Image courtesy of Pride Pocket. Gender fluidity, nonbinary genders, they/them pronouns - these are recent inventions, right?

Issues of gender identity have been studied in the Western world since the mid-1800s.

The first gender reassignment surgeries were performed in the 1950s.

In 1980, “Gender Identity Disorder” was added to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM; the must-have text for psychiatrists to properly diagnose a patient). The potential for anyone with questions about their gender to be diagnosed with a mental illness led to a widespread misconception - one that still lingers today - that being transgender was a deviant behavior (the latest DSM has eliminated this diagnosis and instead uses the term “Gender Dysphoria” to categorize an array of gender identity and presentation experiences).

While gender identities beyond the binary have existed for decades (at least!), younger generations are more likely than older ones to identify as something other than a man or a woman. In a 2017 survey conducted by GLAAD, it was found that 20% of millennials identify as something other than heterosexual and cisgender, compared to 7% of baby boomers.

Identifying beyond the gender binary is not Western-specific.

The gender binary exists thanks to Judeo-Christian colonization. When colonizers saw that most indigenous cultures had three or more genders, they worked on eliminating the identities that went against their theology. Today, these cultures are working harder than ever to make their voices heard and prove that their gender identities are not trends. Nonbinary genders, gender fluidity, and “third-genders” around the world

Fa’afafine: Independent Samoa/New Zealand

The winner (left) and finalists in the 2016 Miss Fa’afafine pageant (Hayden’s List)

About 1000 individuals in Independent Samoa and New Zealand identify as Fa’afafine (Fah-fah- FEE-nay). Fa’afafine are born male, but assume the characteristics of men and women (directly translated, “fa’afafine” means “in the manner of a woman”). The treatment of fa’afafine differs slightly between locations. In Samoan culture, a boy’s femininity will be recognized and acknowledged at an early age. She will embrace further womanly traits, like dressing as a woman, fulfilling feminine gender roles within her village, and dancing the siva (a traditional dance performed while wearing a feathery headdress). Even after they’ve grown, Samoan Fa’afafine often remain in their family homes into adulthood to care for their parents.

Samoan culture has strong roots in Christianity. After the panic brought along by the AIDS epidemic, Samoan fa’afafine experienced marginalization that never fully went away. What has helped the community regain social recognition has been through beauty pageants - a platform for performing femininity while also gaining acceptance via entertainment.

Since New Zealand is a believer in the “traditional western gender system” and often doesn’t know how to reckon with genders beyond the binary, migrant Samoan fa’afafine face an extra level of discrimination. Fa’afafine in New Zealand often try to conform to their expected gender roles, dressing as men, taking up male occupations, and having relationships with women. Those who continue to identify as fa’afafine often end up discarding their performative masculinity as they get older, to varying degrees.

Some fa’afafine (in both locations) will undergo surgery to take hormones to adopt a more feminine appearance. Fa’afafine are deeply connected to their local LGBTQ+ communities, making regular appearances in pride parades and festivals.

Hijra: India

Hijras attending the Koothandavar Festival in Koovagam, Tamilnadu (Sindhuja P). The word “hijra” refers to a community of Indian people who are assigned male at birth, but don’t identify as such; they don’t identify as women, either. Instead, hijra are a third gender, one that wears makeup and clothes traditionally worn by women. (It must be noted that some hijras have opted to identify as transgender; some have undergone breast enlargement and sex- reassignment surgeries, which can lead to greater participation in public life. Perhaps this is easier to comprehend than the notion of a third gender?)

Hijras have been prominent members of South Asian culture for thousands of years, having frequently been employed as singers and dancers for both Hindu and Muslim rulers. In the late 19th century, the colonizing British government passed a law which criminalized entire sections of society, included hijras. Hijras could be arrested on the spot simply for performing as their gender. Many went on to form their own communities around a guru or maternal figure to provide financial and emotional security, often using a protective code language called “Hijra Farsi” for privacy reasons.

Even though being a hijra is no longer a criminal offense, young hjra individuals often leave home (or are forced out). They still seek to find a clan of hijras led by an elder, now known as a “nayak.” The new inductee is dubbed a “chela.” Both roles must follow their own specific codes of conduct. These hijra communities often still speak in variations of their local languages for the sake of secrecy and protection.

These days, hijras enjoy high visibility in India, being encountered by their cisgender peers on a daily basis. In some cities, they are highly respected and are often asked to bless ceremonies like births and marriages. On April 15, 2014, the supreme court of India ruled that hijra people would be recognized on official documents under a separate third-gender category.

This is not to say that post-colonial life is safer - while one can exercise their gender without fear of being thrown in jail, finding a job as a hijra is a daunting task. Since hijras have been blacklisted from most professions, they are most often seen as beggars or sex workers. Combined with a lack of access to welfare and healthcare, it comes as an unsurprising disappointment to learn that the rate of HIV infection is more than 100 times the national average among hijras. Mahu: Hawaii

In Hawaiian culture, a “mahu” is someone who exhibits both feminine and masculine traits - they fall in the middle of the gender binary.

Despite Hawaii being among the most progressive of the 50 United States, acceptance toward Mahu individuals went out the window when the land was colonized. The term has since become appropriated as a homophobic slur; according to Hawaiian studies teacher Hinaleimoana Wong-Kalu, “Mahu are denigrated and disrespected because of the imposition of foreign ideology.”

Muxe: Juchitán, Mexico

Muxes (pronounced “MOO-shays”) are a community of gay men who dress as women. In a piece for the New York Times, muxes were described as “[living] in a socially sanctioned netherworld between the two genders.”

Muxes can be traced all the way back to pre-Colombian Mexico (pre-1492, before Christopher Columbus arrived). Their origins are thought to stem from Aztec The poster for a Kumu Hina, an acclaimed 2014 priests who cross-dressed and hermaphroditic Mayan documentary about a mahu of the same name, gods.

Acceptance of muxes was wiped out in the 1500s after Spaniards, impressed by Colombus’s methods, colonized Mexico. Gender roles became set in stone and converting to Catholicism was forced. Any sign of gender-fluidity was all but stamped out - the muxe identity survives in the area of Juchitán, “a place so traditional that many people speak ancient Zapotec instead of Spanish.” Some believe that in order to be a muxe, you must be born in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec region, where Juchián is located.

While the concept of muxes sounds not unlike the drag queens of Western culture, being a muxe means, for many, being a third gender. Muxes date heterosexual men and often assume traditional female roles within society and the family. Gender presentation and identity expression vary greatly from muxe to muxe - some take hormones to get a more feminine body, some choose to live full-time as women, some prefer masculine clothes. In an interview with Fusion, muxe Marluu Ferretti described their identity:

“I consider myself gay and muxe. I’m gay the moment I’m behaving as a boy, and I’m muxe the moment I’m behaving as a girl. It’s a duality I have inside me. It’s two in one and that’s the only way I don’t lose my essence.” In some parts of Mexico, muxes are marginalized and discriminated against; in Juchitán, muxes can be teachers, nurses, seamstresses. The Juchitán community believes that muxes have specific intellectual and artistic gifts, and treat them as such - every November, the muxes throw a grand ball. A muxe queen is selected, and she is crowned by the mayor.

Muxes at a regada de frutas (Todd Coleman).

Two-Spirit: North America

Diversity in gender and sexuality is embraced in Native American communities. Their gender non-conforming peers are simply referred to as “two-spirit” people. According to Walter L. Williams of The Guardian:

“[In Native American culture], since everything that exists is thought to come from the spirit world, androgynous or transgender persons are seen as doubly blessed, having both the spirit of a man and the spirit of a woman. Thus, they are honored for having two spirits, and are seen as more spiritually gifted than the typical masculine male or feminine female.”

Being two-spirit is different from being a man or a woman; two-spirit individuals take on a separate gender status. However, since they carry both masculine and feminine energies, they can do the work of both men and women in Native American communities. Native American, First Nation, and Canadian Aboriginal tribes have always held the LGBTQ+ members of their communities in high esteem. Two-spirit people, historically, were held up as leaders or spiritual teachers in their communities. Unfortunately, thanks to the influence of European Christianity, respect for homosexuality and androgyny declined in the 20th century. Two-spirit people were forced by the government, Christian missionaries, and even their own communities to conform to the gender binary; those who could not conform went into hiding or committed suicide. Same-sex marriages between two-spirit people and their spouses were no longer legally recognized.

Thankfully, respect for two-spirit identities and androgyny have slowly re-emerged in recent years among Native Americans. The combo of “red power” cultural pride and LGBTQ pride has worked wonders to shift the attitudes of those who previously disapproved.

(Indian County Today Media Network). Bibliography:

Bradford, Ray. “Two-spirits among us: Celebrating LGBTQ Native American and First Nation stories. GLAAD, 6 Nov. 2016. glaad.org/blog/two-spirits-among-us-celebrating-lgbtq-native- american-and-first-nations-stories

Fernandez de Castro, Rafa. “Meet the muxes: How a remote town in southern Mexico reinvented sex and gender. Fusion. interactive.fusion.net/meet-the-muxes/

Khaleeli, Homa. “Hijra: India’s third gender claims its place in law.” The Guardian, 16 Apr. 2014. theguardian.com/society/2014/apr/16/india-third-gender-claims-place-in-law

Lacey, Marc. “A lifestyle distinct: The muxe of Mexico.” New York Times, 6 Dec. 2008. nytimes.com/2008/12/07/weekinreview/07lacey.html? %20%20%20%20%20_r=0&mtrref=undefined&gwh=3FAB183BBFA89466785BB2F285B04 E3F&gwt=pay

Letman, Jon. “‘Mahu’ demonstrate Hawaii’s shifting attitudes toward LGBT life.” Aljazeera America, 9 Jan. 2019. america.aljazeera.com/articles/2016/1/9/mahu-hawaii-gender-LGBT- acceptance.html

McGuire, Laura. “It’s not in your head: The history and science of gender fluidity.” Spectrum South - The Voice of the Queer South, 4 July 2018. spectrumsouth.com/history-science-gender- fluidity/

Schmidt, Johanna. “Gender diversity - fa’afafine.” Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, 5 May 2011. http://teara.govt.nz/en/gender-diversity/page-3

Williams, Walter L. “The ‘two-spirit’ people of Indigenous North Americans. The Guardian, 11 Oct. 2010. theguardian.com/music/2010/oct/11/two-spirit-people-north-america Bipolar Disorder

What is it?

Bipolar Disorder: A mental illness that causes drastic shifts in mood, energy, & productivity. - Bipolar I: Manic episodes that are 7+ days long, depressed/mixed episodes that are 2+ weeks long - Bipolar II: A pattern of depressive and hypomanic (less severe mania) episodes

Manic Episodes: Depressive Episodes: Feelings of elation Feelings of hopelessness High energy Decreased activity/energy levels Insomnia Difficulty concentrating Reckless behavior (excessive spending, drug Eating too much/too little use, hypersexuality) Suicidal feelings/suicide attempts

According to the Journal of Family Practice, there are 3 goals for treating bipolar disorder: 1. Stabilizing one’s mania and/or depression. 2. Preventing future relapses by encouraging proactivity (observing moods, symptom tracking, etc) and utilizing social/familial support 3. Maximizing function over a long period of time, usually via therapy Medication

A combination of medication and therapy is the most common form of ongoing treatment for bipolar disorder. The most common drugs to treat bipolar disorder are mood stabilizers (most often lithium and anticonvulsants), antipsychotics, and antidepressants.

All bipolar treatment guidelines recommended antidepressants as the first line of treatment until 2002, when the APA treatment guidelines bumped up mood stabilizers as the first line of treatment. Multiple studies have found a lack of efficacy in antidepressants in preventing depressive episodes in those with bipolar disorders; in fact, some observational data has indicated that antidepressants tend to be associated with long-term worsening (typically rapid- cycling) of symptoms. The present belief in the field is that non-antidepressant medications should be considered as mono therapy before introducing antidepressants to bipolar patients. Bibliography

Cascade, Elisa F et al. “Antidepressants in bipolar disorder” Psychiatry (Edgmont (Pa. : Township)) vol. 4,3 (2007): 56-8. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2922360/

Gitlin, Michael J. “Antidepressants in bipolar depression: an enduring controversy.” International Journal of Bipolar Disorders, 1 Dec. 2018. doi.org/10.1186/s40345-018-0133-9 Excerpts from Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo, and Me by Ellen Forney

Camming

A brief history

About 10 years ago, performers in the sex work industry would sign with a large adult entertainment company (Wicked Pictures, Vivid Entertainment, and the like) that would pay them to appear in company-produced films. They were to promote their work by attending porn conventions or appearing at strip clubs.

This routine faded when sites like Pornhub gained popularity. Porn sites didn’t depend on sales or subscriptions - they were free for the viewer and made money from advertisements.

In 2012, the state of California passed Measure B, a law that required performers to wear condoms on film. The porn industry took a financial hit after Measure B passed - the annual number of porn shoots dropped from 480 to 26 within just 3 years.

The law was a positive change for most sex workers, however - in an article for the Los Angeles Times, actress Tori Black expressed gratitude that she can now make money camming or dancing at a club 2 to 3 times a week instead of working 6 days filming sex scenes. The rise of camming brought a new level of safety that wasn’t previously available as a porn star - actresses like Black are not exposed to STDs when they’re alone in their room or a studio. Basics of camming

The basic model for a cam site is as follows: a model gives a live performance online through a webcam, and clients pay for varying degrees of intimacy (alternatively, some sites follow a tip- based model, where viewers can stream content for free but must pay tips if they wish to instruct a model to perform a desired action). On a good night, models can make anywhere from $300 to $1000 (naturally, these funds vary based on a model’s look, strategies, what sites they work, and frequency of camming).

Most of a cam model’s funds rely on their regular customers. Regulars on cam sites are usually young exhausted blue-collar workers looking for connection after work…and married men who aren’t getting laid. Emotional intimacy and friendship is not uncommon between models and their regulars. This is the side of camming that keeps people coming back for more - making a live emotional connection is an element missing from strip clubs and pornographic movies. Cam sessions often last for hours at a time, with most of the session spent talking.

It’s not uncommon for models to poach each other’s high tippers or block other models from their rooms. Websites do nothing to discourage this behavior - in fact, sites are often laid out in a way that shows who the competition is. Cam sites almost always display a “cam score” - a calculation of time online, tips, tokens, and ratings. The highest-scoring models appear at the top of the page, while new and struggling models are buried far down the list (needless to say, the cam score is wildly unpopular).

The only items one technically needs to get started in cam model are a decent webcam and a private space, but going the extra mile material-wise tends to equal a heftier paycheck. In 2013, the New York Times wrote a piece about “Miss Lollipop,” a 25-year-old cam girl in New Mexico. Miss Lollipop’s expenses included lights and light stands, props such as sex toys and paddles, and pricy foundation made for high-definition cameras. Additionally, she hired an assistant (called Lolly’s Helper) to help build a database of clients and types of shows as well as research what other models are doing to figure out what does and doesn’t work. Going the extra mile definitely paid off in Miss Lollipop’s case - she earns 6 figures a year. Social impact

Camming comes with significant pros - as previously mentioned, there’s no risk of contracting STIs, you can work in a safe place, you don’t need a pimp for protection, and the earnings are high. Camming is unlike most other professions in the sex industry, an industry that typically profits off the mistreatment of women; cam sites instead inspire women to become their own entrepreneurs.

However, the cons of camming are pretty dire - models have been blackmailed and threatened with disclosure to family and friends from refusing to perform certain sexual acts. The permanence of the internet is a big fear as well - your image is out there forever. Some have reported low self-esteem and turning to drugs to cope with a job they feel ashamed of. In the words of an anonymous women on a camming forum, “Camming is an incredibly isolating job….I spend so many hours a day [being the person I am on the webcam] that I have days where I no longer feel like my real self.”

According to The Daily Dot, there is very little legal action occurring between cam models and their websites; if a model doesn’t get paid, they simply move onto a new site or work independently. However, according to business attorney Michael Fattorosi, “Most women don’t realize that when they sign papers to cam on a site, they are giving the site the rights to everything. The site can record their videos and use them for promotion and DVDs. [The models] may come in and complain when their videos show up on other sites, but they signed the papers in the first place.” Sites & Studios

LiveJasmin.com is one of the top 40 most frequented websites on the internet, boasting about 28 million visitors per month (fellow cam sites MyFreeCams.com and ImLive.com are in the top 800).

The money earned via a cam site is usually split between the website, the affiliate marketer (the person driving traffic to the website), and the models themselves. Tip-based sites will take about half of a model’s earnings, while private sites can take up to 65-75%. Additionally, major credit card companies don’t typically provide services for the sex work; cam sites have resorted to using high-risk payment services that can charge 5-10% of revenue for processing payments. Additionally, sites must pay an annual fee of $1000 to card networks for the ability to accept card payments.

Recent years have seen a rise in camming studios (as opposed to a webcam and a bedroom). Muger Frunzetti is the founder of Studio 20 in Hollywood, CA, a 14-room studio featuring multiple bedroom sets. The models Frunzetti employs are between 18 and 35; the models do not have to pay to join Studio 20, but they are not guaranteed a salary. A Studio 20 model’s earnings are split 50/50 between the model and the studio (standard for all camming studios). Frunzetti has been in the business since 2000, when he opened his first Studio 20. 2 other located followed a few years later as well as 2 other franchises of his being sold in Romania. In 2015, Studio 20 made a $1 million profit. Camming around the world

Cam modeling is not a Western-specific profession. Cam studios exist all around the world, each with varying degrees of legitimacy.

Studios in the Philippines are notorious for being exploitative and brutal; MyFreeCams has banned all models from the country.

Colombia has become the 2nd largest player in the adult webcam market, with an estimated 30,000 models working in 2015. Most of the Colombian models are working to earn money to put themselves through school, then will exit the industry to find equally-profitable jobs with their degrees. Pornography and camming are both legal in Colombia, but due to the country’s Catholic ties, sex workers face a lot of pushback from authorities.

As of 2015, there were roughly 2000 camming studios in Romania. The average Romanian studio owner takes 60-75% of a model’s earnings on top of the site’s cut of 40-65%; many of these studios are run by the mafia to launder money, utilizing an “intentionally obscured mess” of fake addresses and subsidiaries around the world. As reported in The Stranger:

“For example, the webcam site Streamate is a subsidiary of Flying Crocodile, both of which are supposedly headquartered in Seattle, but no one answers the phone numbers I found for them online. (I couldn’t find an email address.) And when I went to the Belltown addresses these multimillion-dollar companies list online as their headquarters, I found spooky, abandoned-looking, dilapidated offices barring public entry.” Bibliography

G., Lynsey. “Why Colombia is becoming the webcamming capital of the world.” Mel Magazine, 2018. melmagazine.com/en-us/story/why-colombia-is-becoming-the-webcamming-capital-of- the-world

McGhee, Cate. “Camming is not like any other kind of sex work.” The Stranger, 10 Jun. 2015. thestranger.com/features/feature/2015/06/10/22360297/camming-is-not-like-any-other- kind-of-sex-work

Orsini, Lauren Rae. “A peep inside the camming business.” The Daily Dot, 14 Sept. 2011. dailydot.com/business/camming-cam-girls-money-business/

Richtel, Matt. “Intimacy on the web, with a crowd.” The New York Times, 21 Sept. 2013. nytimes.com/2013/09/22/technology/intimacy-on-the-web-with-a-crowd.html

Song, Jason. “As L.A. porn industry struggles, ‘web camming’ becomes a new trend.” The Los Angeles Times, 03 Aug. 2016. latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-porn-camming-20160803- snap-story.html

SpankChain. “Behind the scenes: The economics of cam sites.” Medium, 11 Oct. 2017. medium.com/spankchain/behind-the-scenes-the-economics-of-cam-sites-aa6af8b40599 Herpes

General Statistics: - 1 in 2 sexually active people will contract an STI by age 25. - According to the Center for Disease Control, almost 20 million new STIs occur every year in the U.S., with half of those among people aged 15-24. - The total estimated cost of STIs in the annually in the US have genital herpes is about $16 billion. - Herpes is transmitted if one comes into contact with a herpes sore or the saliva of an infected person, as well as skin in the oral area in the case of HSV-1 or skin in the genital area in the case of HSV-2. - Most infected individuals are symptomatic or have very mild symptoms that either go unnoticed or get mistaken for another skin condition. - Noticeable symptoms include lesions or blisters around the genitals, rectum, or mouth. - Anti-herpes medication is available and can help prevent transmission, as well as not having any kind of sex during an outbreak.

HSV-1: ORAL HERPES - About 1 in 2 people in the US aged 14-49 have oral herpes - Oral herpes has been causing increasing numbers of genital herpes cases - Globally, it’s estimated that about 2/3rds of the population (more than 3.7 billion people) have HSV-1. - HSV-1 is usually acquired during childhood. - The prevalence of HSV-1 has declined in the past few decades, and it is suspected that people have become more susceptible to contracting genital herpes from HSV-1. HSV-2: GENITAL HERPES - Every year, roughly 776,000 people in the U.S. get infected with genital herpes. - About 90% of people with genital herpes don’t know that they are infected. - The prevalence of genital herpes infection is higher than that of oral herpes infection. - It is estimated than 87.4% of 14-49 year olds infected with HSV-2 have not received a diagnosis. - HSV-2 is more common in females than males (15.9% vs. 8.2%, respectively, between 2015-2016). - HSV-2 is more common among black people (34.6%) than white (8.1%). Bibliography

American Sexual Health Association. “Statistics.” ashasexualhealth.org/stdsstis/statistics/

Center for Disease Control. “Genital herpes - CDC fact sheet (detailed).” U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, 31 Jan. 2017. cdc.gov/std/herpes/stdfact-herpes-detailed.htm Marijuana Addiction

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, 30% of marijuana users may have some degree of “marijuana use disorder,” (which is, as indicated by the name, a disorderly and frequent usage of marijuana). In 2015, 4 million people in the United States met the criteria for marijuana use disorder - only 138,000 of them voluntarily sought treatment. Those who use marijuana before age 18 are 4 to 7 times more likely to develop marijuana use disorder than those who use it for the first time as adults. The disorder turns into an addiction when one cannot stop using the drug, even when it interferes with their daily life. 47% of drug users whose primary drug of choice was marijuana met the criteria for drug abuse.

Two of the biggest contenders for developing a marijuana addiction are difficult social relationships and mental health. Our relationships give us purpose and responsibility - jobs and families help us stay connected to our world because we can clearly see the role we play in them. According to Gantt Galloway, executive and research director of the New Leaf Treatment Center:

“Those who have few choices, who perhaps don’t have as rich a set of social interactions because their family life is difficult or because they have emotional problems that are stopping them from forming close friendships…those people may find drugs such as marijuana more attractive and be at a greater risk for addiction.”

Those who battle anxiety are often at a higher risk for marijuana addiction as well - taking a hit or two can help with relaxation, at first. After the anxious person finds that marijuana helps quiet the mind, they indulge more frequently and their tolerance grows. Now, in order to relieve their anxiety, they must use more marijuana - more hits, bigger doses, etc. Worse, anxiety often comes back worse every time one tries to stop using. According to Healthline:

“When a drug enters the brain, it overrides the brain’s natural processes, boosting a specific function far above, or below, normal levels. The brain may become resistant to the effects of the drug in an effort to protect itself, so that next time the person uses the drug, it doesn’t have as strong an effect. In order to feel the same high, the person has to take larger and larger doses.”

After the brain builds up a tolerance, dependence on the drug forms. The body reacts in a way that can convince the addicted individual that they do, in fact, need the drug; in withdrawal, the brain will compensate for the lack of the drug by either raising a function that the drug lowered or reducing a function that the drug boosted. Symptoms of withdrawal often include rapid heartbeat, irritability, nausea, and insomnia. ARRESTS Because marijuana-addicted people often don’t even realize they’re addicted, they rarely show up for treatment.

Since they aren’t getting treated, a lot of them get caught up in the legal system.

Despite the legalization and decriminalization of marijuana in recent years, weed arrests have increased from 2014 to 2016 in 21 states. The U.S. wastes over $47 billion every year on the war on drugs. It comes as no surprises, then, that as of 2016, the U.S. had the highest incarceration rate in the world.

STATISTICS

• There is an average of 1 marijuana bust every 48 seconds. • In 2017, marijuana arrests made up 40.4% of the United States’ total drug arrests. • 85.4% of the U.S. drug arrests in 2017 were for possession only. • Out of the approximately 660,000 marijuana arrests in 2017, 90% were for possession only. • Despite making up just 31.5% of the U.S. population, 46.9% of people arrested for drug law violations are black or Latino, • Black people between the ages of 18-25 are 2.73 more likely to be arrested for marijuana despite almost equal usage between white people of the same age. Bibliography

Angell, Tom. “Marijuana arrests are increasing despite legalization, new FBI data shows.” Forbes, 24 Sept. 2018. forbes.com/sites/tomangell/2018/09/24/marijuana-arrests-are-increasing- despite-legalization-new-fbi-data-shows/#6e3cf1434c4b

Barclay, R. Sam. “Marijuana can be addictive: Who gets hooked and why.” Healthline, 29 May 2018. healthline.com/health-news/marijuana-addiction-rare-but-real-072014#1

Ganeva, Tana. “The war on pot marches on: In nearly half the country, marijuana arrests have gone up since 2014.” The Intercept, 20 Apr. 2018. theintercept.com/2018/04/20/marijuana- legalization-arrests-increase/ n.a. “Marijuana arrests by the numbers. ACLU. aclu.org/gallery/marijuana-arrests-numbers

Special thanks to DrugPolicy.org. Pasadena, California SEGREGATION AND THE PRIVATE SCHOOL SYSTEM

South Pasadena’s Racist Roots

The first freeway in the Western United States was completed in late December 1940 when the Arroyo Seco Parkway extended into downtown Los Angeles through South Pasadena. The freeway was built on land that had been inhabited by Native Americans; during the freeway completion ceremony, 200 Native Americans (representing 5 local tribes) were in attendance to “dedicate” the land.

Living in South Pasadena was a privilege reserved only for whites, and it was intended to stay that way. In 1941, Arroyo Parkway engineer and South Pasadena City Manager Frank H. Clough - with the help of city attorney Graeme Gigas, members of the city council, and a private group of citizens known only as the “South Pasadeneans” - began writing racial restrictions into city property deeds. Clough’s goal was to ensure that no person of color were to ever reside in South Pasadena city limits.

This wasn’t very hard to do, as South Pasadena had “all but barred African-Americans” and only allowed small populations of other minorities to live in the city from its conception. South Pasadena showed its racism via “discrimination through quasi-legal city ordinances.” For example, in October 1911, a home for black orphans was established on the outskirts of South Pasadena. Within days, the city drafted an ordinance proclaiming that “no such institution can be established within 100 feet of a residence, nor can it be outside of a district bounded by El Centro, Orange Grove Avenue, Mission and Meridian streets,” according to the Los Angeles Times. The South Pasadena Board of Trustees approved this measure in less than a week, and while the property’s owner threatened to sue them, the measure passed and the orphanage was shut down. Another example: South Pasadena boasted a thriving Japanese-American community until World War II. During and after WWII, anti-Japanese sentiment rose. On May 14th, 1942, the Japanese- American citizens of South Pasadena were ordered to meet on the corner of Mission and Fair Oaks, where they were then transported to internment camps as per Executive Order 9066 (“all persons deemed a threat to national security” must be evacuated). This provided the opportunity the town racists needed to legalize the segregation of South Pasadena.

South Pasadena was “outed” for its racism in 1946. Numerous black newspapers (including the Afro-American, the Los Angeles Sentinel, and the California Eagle) and an Asian-American newspaper (the Pacific Citizen) seized upon the story. A 1947 lawsuit followed, filed by South Pasadena resident Ernest R. Chamberlain, with the help of ACLU attorney A. L. Wirin, NAACP attorney Loren Miller, and the American Jewish Congress. This suit, in combination with others across the Southland challenging similar racist housing policies, gave all California Supreme Court Justice Stanley Musk he needed to declare racial covenants in California “un-American,” “illegal,” and not unlike policies employed by Nazi Germany. In response, South Pasadena formed a city-wide group called the “Protective League” that helped raise funds to challenge the lawsuit, with the goal of fighting any similar suits in the future. The outcome of the suit was never recorded in local press, but little difference was made.

In 1948, in Shelley V. Kraemer, the Supreme Court ruled that “racially-based restrictive covenants” were not enforceable in court. Racist housing practices continued, and South Pasadena further tightened its exclusion of people of color.

Desegregating Schools

In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court declared segregation in public schools unconstitutional; Pasadena chose to ignore this ruling. In 1970, U.S. district court judge Manuel Real discovered that the Pasadena Board of Education “knowingly assigned” black and white students to separate schools, violating the Supreme Court’s Plessy V. Ferguson desegregation mandate. In a piece for the Pasadena Independent, former PUSD student Jesse Dillon recounted witnessing the desegregation mandate take affect. As a boy he attended Washington Middle School, which, after the mandate passed, was to receive kids from Hastings Ranch, an all-white, middle-class community. On the first day of school post-desegregation, Dillon noted fresh coats of paint on school walls, new textbooks, new desks, waxed floors, and securer lockers - maintenance jobs that went ignored when the school was all black.

Through the 1970s-1980s, many school districts (including PUSD) implemented mandatory busing plans as a way to encourage children of different races to interact. Unfortunately, the bus system had an adverse effect in Pasadena: since private schools weren’t part of the plan, those who didn’t agree (and could afford to) pulled their kids out of public school and into private school. When buses started taking fewer and fewer privileged (often white) children, the plan folded in on itself, continuing the segregation rather than improving it.

Present Day

Thanks to the desegregation mandate, many white students left the public school system to attend private/charter schools or switched districts altogether. This pattern continues today - as of 2017, just 55% of school-age children residing within the Pasadena school district boundaries attended PUSD schools. 82% of those students are nonwhite. With fewer students enrolling in Pasadena public schools each year, many slots in the district’s schools remain unfilled. During the 2017-2018 school year, PUSD faced a $5.7 million deficit, partially due to low enrollment. They were looking to shut down several campuses in order to better allocate their finances.

As for overall attitudes, it’s safe to say that the wounds from the past have not entirely healed. According to Terrance Robert, a member of the Little Rock Nine and later resident of Pasadena, “The attitudes that people held in Pasadena were no different than the attitudes people held in Little Rock. They were opposed to integration on any level, schools especially.”

The whole era of South Pasadena’s racist housing policies os nowhere to be found in any official account of the city. Bibliography

Bernhard, Meg. “District asks: What will make students stay in Pasadena’s public schools?” Los Angeles Times, 06 Jul. 2017. latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-pasadena-schools-201707- story.html

Dillion, Jesse. “From the desk of the CEO: How desegregation in Pasadena 40 years ago prepared me for leadership and community involvement.” Pasadena Independent, 5 Apr. 2018. pasadenaindependent.com/community/how-desegregation-in-pasadena-40-years-ago-prepared- me-for-leadership-and-community-involvement/

Elhachem, Roxanne. “Pasadena busing controversy, Sept. 14, 1970.” Colorado Boulevard, 22 Sept. 2018. coloradoboulevard.net/today-in-history-pasadena-busing/

Hormann, Matt. “When South Pasadena was for whites only.” Hometown Pasadena, 15 Sept. 2014. hometown-pasadena.com/history/when-south-pasadena-was-for-whites-only/88641

Poulisse, Adam & Painter, Jill. “Pasadena’s history of racism trickles into present, residents say.” Pasadena Star News, 24 Aug. 2013. pasadenastarnews.com/2013/08/24/pasadenas-history-of- racism-trickles-into-present-residents-say/ Theatre of the Oppressed

“We aren’t content, any of us, to be just actors and spectators of ourselves. We also write our own scripts for every scene we are involved in. We are in charge of the wardrobe of costumes to be worn wherever we are (at home, at work, during time off). We are also the directors who stage our own actions.” - Augusto Boal

What is Theatre of the Oppressed? Theatre of the Oppressed relies on the notion that everyone is at once both an actor and a spectator in their own lives. It is based on the idea that everyone is involved in the theatre of their lives, regardless of training. Theatre of the Oppressed, at its core, is a way of working through problems theatrically. History of theatre of the oppressed Theatre of the Oppressed was founded in the 1950s by Augusto Boal. Boal was running the Arena Theatre of San Paulo, and dictators were telling the company what plays to put on (the ones that the actual theatre artists chose were either censored or banned). He then lost the theater itself when the dictators made “pointless alterations to it which [Boal and his team] couldn’t afford.”

Boal (and the Arena Theatre company) moved to doing street theatre and staging plays in union halls, schools, and churches. There was no money for scenery or costumes, so pieces were performed in regular clothes. Eventually, the police got wind of Boal’s black market theatre and banned his troupe from performing anywhere at all. “It was only then, when we had neither theatre, repertoire, scenery, costumes nor stars, that we discovered the essential thing,” wrote Boal. “Face-to-face with our audiences, we realized how like them we were, and also how different….We were like our audiences because we were human beings like them. But we were also different because we were specialists in a craft. We could help the public make use of our craft.”

Building on this idea, Boal and his troupe launched the prototype for Theatre of the Oppressed, called “Newspaper Theatre.” The troupe developed 13 different ways of turning newspaper articles (or any other non-dramatic material) into plays. They then brought what they had learned to audiences and helped them write and produce their own plays from material they had selected themselves. Instead of producing a finished play to show off, they taught the public the “means of production.” Boal’s crew gained popularity, having set up numerous sub-groups and hosted workshops, but was forced to retreat after the government cracked down even harder. Boal fled the country.

The second incarnation of Theatre of the Oppressed was born in Argentina in 1971. It was called “invisible theatre,” wherein plays were performed in plain sight; for example, Boal’s troupe (“El Machete”) put together a play about hunger that was performed in a restaurant. Boal traveled from country to country doing invisible theatre, “always very successfully but always with some anxiety and also regret that it could not be done in an open manner.” When Boal traveled to Peru, he and his collaborators devised “forum theatre” as a way to promote literacy. Forum theatre remains the most popular form of Theatre of the Oppressed: the main character is put in a difficult position where they must make a choice that ultimately feels wrong or unstable. Then, a facilitator (in this case, Boal) asks the audience what they would have done instead. The play is performed again with the same script, but if an audience wants to change something, they now have the ability to take over for the main character and alter the outcome of the play.

Boal’s focus shifted from external oppression to internal when he learned of his European friends’ feelings of isolation, fear, and emptiness. As Europe was a wealthy developed country, he didn’t take those feelings seriously until learning that the suicide rate in the richest countries was significantly higher than in Latin America. At the Centre for the Theatre of the Oppressed in Paris, Boal joined forces with Cecila Thumim to develop ways of expressing internalized oppressions. They worked on this for over two years.

When Boal came back to Brazil, he was elected city councillor in Rio de Janeiro. He hired all the staff of his Theatre of the Oppressed centre and spent his term working with communities in need, schools, trade unions, senior groups, black students, the HIV+, and others to create “legislative theatre.” Boal helped audiences write and produced their own plays, first in their own communities and then as part of “dialogues” between communities. Three times a year, he and his staff held an outdoor festival to allow the general public to get involved in forum shows. According to Boal, legislative theatre worked as follows:

“For each show, one of us wrote a proposal which was sent to the ‘city council’ where it was studied by our lawyers….[Sometimes] our team would draft a law which I would present to the real city council. In all, we presented about fifty proposed laws, all of which came from the grassroots. They were about protecting old people, children, handicapped people and witnesses to crimes (to put an end to impunity, one of the scrounges of Brazilian society), as well as measures against racism and all forms of discrimination. Thirteen of them were taken up by the council and became laws.”

How does it work?

Theatre of the Oppressed calls attention to the fact that when we are simply passive audience members, we project our desire to take action onto the characters that we identify with; when they resolve their conflict, our desire is satisfied. This catharsis substitutes for action.

Theatre of the Oppressed (specifically forum theatre) is a tool employed by teachers, social workers, and therapists. Audience members (or students) become both spectator and actor - “spect-actors.” Most often, a short scene is performed that dramatizes a situation and has a dissatisfying, oppressive ending. After the first performance, the scene is performed again, this time with the option for an audience member to yell “freeze” at any time. That audience member can now step onstage and replace one of the performers, taking the scene in another, less oppressive direction. Theatre of the Oppressed has provided people with a way to work through their problems theatrically, teaching us that no one is a victim to their circumstances. Works cited

Boal, Augusto. “The theatre of the oppressed.” UNESCO Courier, Nov. 1997, p. 32+. General OneFile, link.galegroup.com.ezproxy.pasadenapubliclibrary.net/apps/doc/A20099663/ITOF? u=pasadena_main&sid=ITOF&xid=dd624c28. Accessed 1 Mar. 2019.

Gewertz, Ken. “Augusto Boal’s ‘Theatre of the Oppressed.’” The Harvard Gazette, 11 Dec. 2003. news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2003/12/augusto-boals-theatre-of-the-oppressed/

Saxon, Levana. “Theory: Theatre of the Oppressed.” Beautiful Trouble. beautifultrouble.org/ theory/theater-of-the-oppressed/