The workers work and the pigs eat. Or at least in the late George Orwell’s captivating novel, the pigs drink milk and lounge in beds. Baltimore Center Stage recreates this classic novel telling the story of a revolt against forced labor. Orwell’s political satire, “Animal Farm,” has come to life through striking movement and robust songs. The story follows an old boar named Major, who inspired freedom for all animal-kind against their common enemy — man — only to discover not too long after their leader is put to rest, so are his dreams for equality.

Instead of a utopia, audiences are first greeted by the flickering light of a blood-spattered Manor Farm, in shambles. Watch the uprising amongst comrades and friends turn into a reign of terror and greed. Director May Adrales executes a stirring vision of the war on industrialization and the many victims of its outright abuse of power. From bull plows to bullhorns, a vibrant band of animals fight to govern themselves but soon find themselves in the fight of their lives.

“All Animals Are Equal!”

The mistreatment by Farmer Jones has gone on long enough. It is time to bite back and learn the alphabet. With the ‘Beasts of England’ anthem and the seven commandments, justice will finally see its day under the soaring flag of Animal Farm. But with every new balance of power comes those who try to tip it over. Under the rule of Comrade Napoleon and his gang of pigs, being rewarded for bravery is soon replaced with blind obedience. A rallying cry ignites as the rebellious animals take over the farm. But as quickly as they have obtained these rights, they are soon after stripped away.  As conditions worsen under a false impression of progress, equality becomes uncertain for one, let alone all.

Baltimore Center Stage manages to submerge their audience into a work that exposes the fragility of morals in a dog-eat-dog society. Costume designer, Izumi Inabi, combined elements of unique puppetry and uniformed looks that served the world of the play. Her elaborate pieces allow for a range of mobility and expression that actors used as the groundwork for their transformations. The cast successfully embodies their inner animal through vocal and physical work. And by utilizing specific gestures, they neatly capture the characteristics of different roles in a society.

In Adrales’s director’s note, she explains, “My direct aim in this production is not to sway political affiliations, but rather for us to think critically on the very nature of civilization and governance.” Animal Farm sends a revitalizing awareness to audiences of the changing tides of revolution.

“Animal Farm” will be running at Center Stage until April 1. Tickets are available online.

We're raising $750 to help out the fifth-grade students from Calvin Rodwell Elementary School. We are arranging to bring these young, bright minds to the UMBC campus to display their unique STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) projects.This gives our students a unique taste of a professional academic event and encourages them to keep pursuing STEM after the end of this year.

Your gift will make it possible for the S.T.A.R. program to assist students at the Calvin Rodwell Elementary School with creating STEM projects, assist with transporting the students to the UMBC campus and provide lunches for them while on campus.
We hope we can count on your support, today.

Yearning for a better life, desiring escape from patriarchal institutions, and hoping to see more of the world are all themes that play in Jayro Bustamante’s debut film “Ixcanul.” The 2015 film was shown in the Performing Arts and Humanities Building on May 8 as part of the Spanish Film Club series, and as part of the larger Modern Language and Linguistics & Intercultural Communication (MLLI) Department film festival.

“Ixcanul,” or “volcano” in English, is set in a village built on the slopes of an active volcano in Guatemala and tells the story of Maria, a seventeen-year-old girl who feels restricted by the expectations of her family and her people and who longs to escape the bleak life that she sees for herself in her home.

Maria hopes for the chance to see the United States, clinging to an idyllic vision of a beautiful nation brimming with big houses, nice cars and a better future. All of this perceived fortune awaits Maria behind the volcano, which serves as a backdrop for the film, providing a barrier between Maria and her dream life.

Countless trials are sent Maria’s way and her troubles increase as she struggles to reconcile her own desires with her hesitation to do anything that might bring shame upon her family.

Ixcanul is the first film in history spoken primarily in Kaqchikel, one of almost 30 Mayan languages, many of which are currently being revitalized in an effort to restore a culture that was threatened and destroyed by colonization in Latin America.

Occasionally, Spanish is spoken in the film, providing some moments of the extreme tension for the viewer because it is only spoken in key moments when Maria’s family needs information. Her family is taken advantage of time and again because of their inability to access the language more widely spoken in Guatemala.

Freshman Media and Communications Studies major Anjali DasSarma spoke about the importance of the film to exploring the customs and life of the Mayan people in their original language, saying, “It was opening my eyes to another culture in looking at the gestures and hearing the intonations of the language. I was interested because there was very little Spanish, but what little I heard I was able to understand despite only being in Spanish 102.”

In his first feature, writer and director Bustamante did not shy away from tackling important and difficult issues, such as a stringent cultural adherence to tradition, gender inequality, selling children, unplanned pregnancy, abortion, unwilling arranged marriages, and the desire to shirk custom. The MLLI film festival will continue with more showings later in March and in April for students who have a desire to immerse themselves in films that explore another culture and language.

Before you leave for Spring Break, you’ll need to do a few things.  Following this checklist below will help to reduce the risk of fire, minimize pest problems and increase the security of your room and its contents.

• Unplug all appliances and extension cords from electrical wall sockets.  Exception:  You may leave refrigerators and fish tanks plugged in after checking to make sure electrical connections are safe… that is, not running under rugs, not hanging loosely out of the wall, or plugged into a thin extension cord.
• Turn off all water completely.  Make sure faucets and shower heads are not dripping.
• Clean your bathroom well.  Suggestion:  to avoid a stuffy bathroom when you return, leave your bathroom door open to allow air to circulate.  Make sure it’s okay with your suitemates before leaving the door unlocked.
• Remove all trash/recyclables and dispose of it in the trash room or in a dumpster.
• Check your window to be sure it is securely locked.  If you should find your window unlocked and cannot lock it, notify your RA or FXIT (x53948).

• Leave blinds and shades open except for first floor – first floor rooms should fully CLOSE shades or blinds

• Feed your fish and water your plants.  Remember, you won’t be able to get back in until 12 Noon on Sunday, March 25.
• Turn off your lights.  If you’re the last one to leave from your suite, make sure the bathroom light / fan is off.  Also turn off your alarm clock.
• Remember to pack any medications or others necessities you might need.
• Lock your door and take your key with you.
• Tape this checklist to your door on your way out.
• Secure your vehicle if you are leaving it on campus.

Your RA will conduct a pre-break inspection of each room.  Please help save time by following checkout procedures.

Communities reopen Sunday, March 25, 2018 at noon. If you have any questions feel free to contact Residential Life at 410-455-2591.

Program coordinator Amelia Meman reminisces about her feminist friendships and analyzes how these relationships foster empowerment and powerful networks.

This Women’s History Month, the Women’s Center was inspired by feminism’s legacy of collective action. While feminism is very much based in the personal and individual, it is also a movement built through the camaraderie, collective consciousness, compassion, and connections between people. That’s why, this March, the Women’s Center is celebrating feminist friendships. That’s also why I’m writing this blog post.

Every time I come to think about this theme, I feel all warm and fuzzy inside, because I immediately think of the bonds I made at UMBC that have continued on. More on this later, but I’ll tell you this much: nothing brings you together, like the hot crucible of simultaneous existential crises via The Patriarchy. Our angst-ridden mental toil aside, describing a friendship as “feminist” might feel weird to some people, but I wonder what it means to those it resonates with.

For me, it’s not about the friends who encourage me to burn my bra and always validate my decision to not shave–although they also do that. It’s also the friends who affirm me and remind me that I am a person with power who deserves good things in the world. My feminist friends go to rallies with me and talk Butler with me, but they also are the first to watch Neighbors 2 and they’re the best at recommending sci-fi and fantasy novels.

The personal is political… and the political is personal

I think that all of my relationships are political. This is probably by virtue of being a feminist and a philosophical thinker, but it’s also because my friends are my political allies. We are constantly thinking about the political power that comes with being women, being queer (AF), being trauma survivors, being white and/or people of color, being (dis)abled, etc. and being radically together. We’re friends who empower each other to live when so many other things in this world act to kill us. We’re constantly navigating privilege and oppression, and we get a lot of things wrong. We teach other, call each other in. We are committed to the process of constantly learning how to be better humans to one another and all of the people we interact with.

Does anything scream friendship more than this group shot of the Great British Baking Show judges?

So when I say that the personal is political, I mean that things we like to keep in private (i.e. whether or not we’re having sex, what kind of sex we’re having, birth control, abortions, survivor status, etc.) are personal experiences that are also–with feminism–political. Rather than continue to make the prudish world of vanilla, purely procreative sex comfortable, feminists talk reproductive justice, use the words “vagina,” “penis,” “vulva,” “anus,” etc. Those things that people would rather sweep under the rug? We dig those out and we burn the rug.

Just so, the political is personal. This, for me, is feminist friendship. My unity and belonging with other feminists is tied, not just to our affinity for one another as funny weirdos, but also to our political mindset. As we dance, we move toward liberation. As we laugh, we banish the silence pressed into us as women and femmes. As we eat together, we feed each other the love and power we deserve.

The political is personal, because my liberation is tied to theirs, and we both know that as we watch the latest season of The Great British Baking Show.

Shine theory

So as we move throughout Women’s History Month and think about all of our herstorical sheroes who give us life (often literally), think about those friends that are around you who make you shine brighter. Whether that’s your mom, your professor, Oprah, think about the women who inspire you.

Take a breath, and think about your best memory with that person. How did you become friends? What do you all do best together? How do you feel when you’re around each other?

Seriously take like 15 seconds to meditate on that.

Alright, now you can come back to me.

Didn’t that make you feel shiny?

In the Women’s Center, we like to talk about shine theory. Jess is the one who introduced me to this concept a while ago (see her awesome UMBC Women Who Rock series), but basically, shine theory is a lens through which we can think about friendship. Ann Friedman and Aminatou Sow (of Call Your Girlfriend) coined the term “shine theory” in an article on powerful women as best friends. Friedman wrote: “when you meet a woman who is intimidatingly witty, stylish, beautiful, and professionally accomplished, befriend her. Surrounding yourself with the best people doesn’t make you look worse by comparison. It makes you better.”

Friedman and Sow add that in its simplest form, shine theory is this: “I don’t shine, if you don’t shine.”

Feminist friends, to me, push you and support you so that you can shine as bright, if not brighter, than them and we all get a little better for it.

GWST-ers 4 Life

I would be remiss to not note that the thing that brought some of my best, most steady feminist friends together was our journey through the UMBC Gender and Women’s Studies Department. We were knit together through a shared affinity for feminist politics, and I know I was able to find myself through them. Not because they showed me a self I wanted to be, but because they allowed me to actually BE the person I always wanted to be.

It wasn’t all hearts and rainbows and radical self-care quotes from Audre Lorde. It was a lot of shit. We went through heartbreak together, we grieved together, we powered through classes like beleaguered Weather-people in a hurricane. In queer theory, we read Michel Foucault’s interview, “Friendship as a Way of Life,” in which he lays out this idea of queer community:

The notion of mode of life seems important to me. Will it require the introduction of a diversification different from the ones due to social class, differences in profession and culture, a diversification that would also be a form of relationship and would be a “way of life”? A way of life can be shared among individuals of different age, status, and social activity. It can yield intense relations not resembling those that are institutionalized. It seems to me that way of life can yield a culture and an ethics. To be “gay,” I think, is not to identify with the psychological traits and the bisible masks of the homosexual but to try to define and develop a way of life. (p. 137-138)

Being “gay” or “queer” or, in our case, “feminists,” is not about defining who we are, but about creating a way of life that suits our needs and that is, potentially, radical. When the institution is so often your oppressor, molding new culture and ethics through friendship becomes a way of also creating new futures and pathways that the institution did not initially have open to you. For example, I don’t know where my self-confidence would be without my therapist and the power of my friends, but I know that the impacts of sexism, racism, ableism, etc. were limiting my self-confidence, and when I learned about myself as someone who was strong and capable of loosing that sort of weight, I was able to achieve more and better. I have a job, I’m pursuing my (very high) educational goals, I’m publishing this blogpost; this is all enabled through this alternative way of life that teaches me that I have power, I am power, and that my friends and I disrupt oppression.

Feminist friendship, shine theory, all that glorious glowing goodness that brought us together–it created power.

So the next time you think about your friends, your shiny people, your feminist sheroes, think about the power you all cultivate and bring forth by being your badass selves together. Think about how that power can grow with you and the friendships you share. Think about what your perfect world would look like for you and your feminist friends–and then make it. 

More resources, if you’re interested:

Michel Foucault, “Friendship as a Way of Life”

Dan Willey, “Gay Hair”

Gaby Dunn, “It’s A War Out There: How Queer Female Friendships Can Save Us All”

Cori Wong, “Feminist Friendship” TEDxCSU

Make feminist friends and build up your network at our Women’s History Month celebration on March 28th from 6 pm to 8 pm in the Skylight Room! RSVP via myUMBC!