Over the royal wedding weekend, I went on the Harlem Learning Trip with my community service group to get insights and ideas on how we can improve the Winchester Project from visiting similar organizations in New York.
One of the organizations we visited was the Lower Eastside Girl's Club which is a projects that addresses the lack of services and resources available to young girls and women. Through many activities and workshops in arts, science and technology, health and wellness, and literacy, this projects helps young girls and women find their individual skills and passion and continue to develop these interests to their full potential.
Our group was warmly welcomed by the members of the Girl's Club with a special performance by a singer who sang songs about raising awareness of violence against women and also to encourage women to stand up and defend for themselves. We then had a group of girls go on stage to talk about how the Girl's Club has helped them boost their self-esteem and how it has become a home for them. One of the girl's went on stage to talk about how she recently read The Vagina Monologue by Eve Ensler. Similar to what a lot of the people said in class, she mentioned how in the beginning she was uncomfortable to read a play on vaginas but once she began talking about it with her peers, she was empowered and it became a natural topic for everyone to talk about.She loved how the play was basically a conversation and she thought that creating this framework for sharing stories about embodied experiences is really important.
I definitely agree with her and I think Eve Ensler did a fantastic job in writing these play as if they were conversations she was having with the person she was interviewing. It created such a realistic atmosphere for the audience and I think that made it easier and more comfortable for everyone. I really liked how she introduced us to the word 'vagina' in a humoristic way because it allows her readers to become comfortable and encourages them to change for the better about female discrimination.
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