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Northern Iowan

The student news site of the University of Northern Iowa

Northern Iowan

The student news site of the University of Northern Iowa

Northern Iowan

SAVE Forum Actors engage and educate students

The Students Against a Violent Environment Forum Actors are out to raise awareness, but not in a conventional way. SAVE uses free-verse poetry, audience participation and short skits to educate students about boundaries, gender roles and sexual assault in modern society.

Last Thursday, students gathered in the Interpreters Theatre to witness the SAVE Forum Actors firsthand. Amandajean Nolte, communication instructor, began the night by thanking Sofia Seliger, a senior in psychology, for all her hard work with the group.

“She saved the theater on more than one occasion,” Nolte said.

The lights soon went out, and five actors in pink shirts walked onto the stage. This was the free-verse group, who performed poems of their own choosing on the topics of gender expectations.

Yaw Kyeremateng, a senior in health promotion, and Jorge De Leon, a graduate student in communication studies, played the parts of two ends of the masculine spectrum.

Kyetemateng, on the super masculine side, recited pieces about growing up with an abusive father and feeling to need to constantly prove his manliness.

De Leon took a much more subdued route, playing a timid man who was confused about why society demanded he throw his weight around and why he couldn’t simply be himself.

“I didn’t even cry at my grandfather’s funeral, because I knew he would sit up in his casket and call me a queer,” said De Leon during one of his solo parts.

The free-verse group comprised only a small part of the night’s content. A second group of actors performed short, more narrative-based pieces that involved the audience in various ways.

One act challenged members in attendance to shout “stop” when they saw a gender stereotype being played out on stage, while another let the audience shape two people on stage to fit popularized gender norms. Attributes like “pants down,” “muscles” and “crotch grab” were shouted out for the male actor, while things like “chest out,” “hair tossed,” and “legs together” were suggested for the woman on stage.

After each presentation by the group, members of SAVE dispersed among the audience and asked questions about the different skits and poems. In small groups, the audience discussed body image issues, homophobia, entitlement and objectification.

SAVE also presented videos for the audience’s consideration. A Katy Perry music video, a Taylor Swift music video and a clip of Rush Limbaugh making disparaging comments about a female college student were all played and their impact on the current societal gender climate was discussed.

De Leon and Alicia Kokaly, a senior history major, ended the night by reciting different parts of a poem that juxtaposed sexual love with a more emotional kind of love. The recital was met with wild applause. The crowd dispersed and members of SAVE handed audience members pamphlets and buttons on their way out.

 

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