 Hello, welcome everyone. My name is Mona Amirai. Welcome to No Summary, Golden Threads live stream series of conversations with artists that do not fit in a box. For those who may not know, Golden Thread is the first American theater company devoted to plays from or about the Middle East. We are based in San Francisco and will be celebrating our 25th anniversary this year. My name again is Mona Amirai. I'm a writer, theater maker, and critic from Lebanon. I'm currently a doctoral student at the theater history research and criticism program at the University of Washington. I'll be moderating today's session of No Summary and I am pleased to be in conversation today with Iman Aoun and Melody Brooks, the initiators of theater from the streets program, along with Lupe Gehrenbeck of Teatro Lacomarca and Malika Sarabay of Darpana Academy of Performing Arts who are also curators of the project. But before going into the project, allow me to introduce both our panelists today. Iman Aoun is an award-winning theater TV and movie actress. She holds a bachelor degree in social studies and a diploma in psychodrama. She started her acting career in 1984 with Haqawati Theater Company. She's the co-founder of Ashtar Theater in 1991. Iman has received various notifications for her work from different countries and international organizations and festivals, including the fact of her being recognized as a finalist at the Gilder County Award in New York in 2020. She runs Ashtar International Youth Theater Festival since 2012 and she is an international theater of the oppressed trainer. Melody Brooks, our second panelist, is the founder and artistic director of New Perspectives Theater Company. She is an award-winning producer, director and dramaturg who has been working in the professional theater and various educational institutions for 40 years. Brooks received the 2018 Trailblazing Woman and Arts Institutions Award from Rhythm Color Associates and the Spirit of Hope Award in 2015 from from Speranza Theater Company for her career-long support of woman theater artists. She is a board member with the League of Professional Theater Women and was co-chair of the Frienial LPTW Gilder and Cogni International Theater Award in 2014 and 2017 and executive producer of the virtual 2020 program Hello Melody and Hello Iman. I'm so happy and thrilled to be here with you and to talk about theater from the streets which is an international pilot program creating conversations across borders. So tell me more about it Melody Mona, thank you for having us. I'll just do a quick summary of how we created the program. Edamon can certainly you know add her thoughts to that. As you mentioned a couple of times, the Gilder Cogni International Theater Award is a program run by the League of Professional Theater Women and it's every three years and it supports women who are not U.S. citizens who are doing work that is artistically acclaimed but that also has an impact on their communities and in particularly supporting women and one of the things that happened in 2020 was that we had to make everything virtual and so the silver lining of that was that we were able to maintain connections to all the nominees which had been more difficult in previous years when everything was live and in pursuit of maintaining those connections and figuring out how to use an international network we had a meeting in May which was right when Gaza was being attacked and so our purpose in coming together was to really look at ways in which we could all work together but this was a much more immediate need and we decided that we would have a small group try to come up with a plan for what we could do and in the meantime the ceasefire was declared and the small group there are about eight of us including Iman and that as we talked about what we wanted our work as theater artists to do it became clear that the issues of what was happening on a humanitarian level extended beyond Palestine and that although Palestine was very much in the news at the moment and ongoing that there were in particular other nominees who were living in areas where we weren't getting the true story and that there was media bias in you know how the issues were presented there was government oppression in some areas in terms of what was really going on and that we realized that theater is uniquely suited to tell stories that can show what's going on instead of trying to just tell people and although all theater is inherently political that the stories themselves would do the talking for the most part so that's the that was our initial impulse Iman if you want to correct me on anything or add anything to that and yes Melody first of all thank you so much for this introduction to the idea and I think that it was really that was the the root that we have taken together and what I wanted to to add only the fact that usually it is not taken for granted that people can come together so often and so easily to work together on one idea the what happened with this project and although it was still called the pilot project it was immediately the fact that we all felt that there should be like an answer to a quest that was put alive on our tables by by the reality that we were living so as Melody was saying Gaza was under attack when we started to talk and the Palestinian had sent out a call internationally for reaction artistic reaction a sorry that it was a point of view that would support the people and and their oppression and so that was like the answer immediately that we should do something and and it has to be theatrical so that's the beauty of it the the second beauty of it is that we were able to use the multimedia that is that is there that had made our life quite easy and we got together and we started to really present these these stories yeah and the like the the zoom world was lucky to have 12 sessions and we'll be lucky because there are four other sessions that are accessible to everyone wherever they are and those 12 sessions so in order to explain to our audience what we are what we are having in hand is writers and playwrights from Venezuela from India from Palestine and from Lebanon sharing their texts that were written according to the call that you have made and if we want to go back to the call there are like three main areas of focus which is correcting the record combating the the hegemonic narratives that promote oppression and of orthocratic regimes a day in the life of people and what will it take to make the collective humanity engaged in making a difference so you highlighted those three main points and you made that call and you received many texts from those countries how how was the response and if you can give us a little bit of of an idea about the the the issues raised I have attended a couple of sessions and I have read many of the texts and I have a lot to say about that but as as a starting point how was how was oppression depicted in those texts and how you can see commonalities all over these areas between them so I just want to give credit to Iman because it is it really is a pilot program and she went first so she had less time than Lupe or Malika who are doing the next day and we we thought originally that we would record these and then just upload them to YouTube to New Perspectives YouTube channel and and let the work the rest of the world in but we discovered in both the technological limitations in Palestine and somewhat in Venezuela but also that the need for the conversation was was much more far ranging than we thought it would be and so we had limited the amount of people that could attend the actual session that's been growing and we've opened the doors a little bit more but the response has been tremendous and we're we're really excited to see where it goes from here and I'll let Iman talk about the response that she got from the artists and and how you know we've seen a range of work some that's comedic some that use satire and irony some that is very graphic and it's raised a lot of issues both in Palestine and now that we've finished with Venezuela there is a lot of commonality because it is the human story what human beings are actually experienced so Iman you were our guinea pig as I like to say it's not necessarily a a polite thing to say but you know what I just also want to say too is that when we decided to do this New Perspectives decided that we were just going to do it we didn't do it through the League of Professional Theater Women although they are a partner but we didn't we didn't want to get permission we didn't want to have to figure it all out we didn't want to so we just started and Iman was a great team player in saying yes and and making it happen within a question of weeks maybe six weeks or so to to get ready for it and to and to do her be the first curator so you can speak about that if you want Iman yeah of course yeah that was really brave from you as well Melody because the fact that you've given us all the technical support and and so for me it was like I had to really act very quickly and I had to jump on the idea and start to call my colleagues and my friends and put on the call like translated what had been written in English into Arabic and disseminated and then different responses started to appear and and some artists even wanted to to share two three four pieces not only one like some of them were so excited that that there will be people hearing them from around the world and and they wanted so especially those in Gaza they they felt like hello world we're here and thank you you're hearing us so that that was the feeling reminding ourselves that it was a time when when Gaza was under attack so so they had an urge to tell their story and this is how we started so I started to collect first thing came first week was from three people from Gaza and because they were the first to share and then slowly others came into the light and and I think that if we had more time we would have also had more developed pieces but the pieces that were presented maybe between the first piece at the last piece there was a piece that was written that is the sand mountain that was completely and totally different and it was much more developed the idea was also taking us towards something new and more abstract more more theatrical in in the sense of the writing of the aspect while some of them were right were writing about their life their daily life like the woman who wrote about the incidents of of the attack at her house at night so there is a variety of of issues but saying this the the other day when I was hearing the presentation from Benzuela for two weeks in a row I was feeling like yes there's so much commonality there that as if they are speaking about our life and many things are are alike just because oppression is oppression everywhere and and we are human beings that that have feelings and and so we want to eliminate oppression and when we raise our voices then we have a strong a strong presentation a strong a did to to really say it from the heart. Thank you Iman and I have to add to your point the fact that not only there is a variety of texts and forms and aesthetics what I was able from what I was able to read and see I realized that there is also a variety forms of oppressions and different layers of oppression so it wasn't only it didn't fall into binaries of oppressor and and the oppressed and the political sense you mentioned Saint Mountain by Emil Sabah and if and allow me to give one moment to speak about Saint Mountain it speaks of a woman and a man and the woman all what she wants is to create her palace from sand and there is it's a very abstract text by the way and the end is is kind of amazing on the other hand you would find the oppressor of the brother the the religious oppression the the the the oppression domestic violence in a way or another and you you would find the political oppression that took place in Gaza and the Israeli attacks on Sheikh Jarrah the uprooting of 28 families so we have all these layers together which is really very very interesting what what are the the different aesthetics that came out if you want to speak briefly about aesthetics and that sense when it comes to the text when it comes to the representation of violence in itself uh so I wanted one oh did you want to mount it I was just going to say from I just wanted to throw in here too that part of our goals with new perspectives is you know a really educating a more western audience right especially us in Europe because we get such a skewed narrative all the time and so it's one of the things that that that we the discussions that we had after the presentation of the pieces that really became much more wide-ranging and more again the the non-binary right that so many of these issues you've just mentioned and that's what led us to think about the fact that we really want to take all this work and figure out what we're creating before we put it out for public consumption later on but um but the the as iman talks about you know that things might have been more developed if there was more time it really didn't matter because the content of the pieces was very moving and very powerful um and and because it was a closed group we weren't saying this was you know polished work for the you know for the public but that it was really about the work itself and the text and and the messages and the stories and I think that came through very clearly and very powerfully for everything that was presented um in the first four weeks so iman um and aesthetically too a wide variety of of approaches to to how this would be done so iman i i didn't mean to cut you off no no no don't worry i mean um as you said it was um a variety of of presentation from from the person who uh who had written about the social issues and like in a farce mood to uh the the person who had written about the martyrs and who had given voice to the martyrs themselves who were talking after their death and so um there's and there's also uh in the um in the piece uh some of them had used uh like uh more classical use of the of the writing others had had used more abstract uh use of of the writing so so it was uh very rich and very enriching but i wanted to say something um a little bit on the side but but very much connected it this um this project this pilot had also reminded me when we did the gaza monologues and we disseminated it uh all over the world um the fact that the stories of the people the stories from uh like a first person story um the the very um real emotion that comes out and immediately like a reflection to their life it tells a lot to the people who do not know sometimes we we put so much censorship on what we want to say and what we don't want to say as artists because we want to appear really sophisticated on on stage but when you are really telling stories of from the street stories of the people so much um so much uh like growth let's say and immediate then you don't really think twice you just put it there you just say it you just become uh real um really uh authentic if you want and it really touches the hearts of the p of the listeners of everyone that that really gets in contact with with these stories yes definitely and um what is also important uh to to to highlight is the fact that aesthetics can be found in situations where uh there are no means at all no means of support no means of funding there is a oppression you know because there is this idea that hey we are doing a theater or a form of art that is socially uh that that that has a social objective so we want to focus on the content but I do believe and I think this was uh pretty much found in many texts that there is a beautiful aesthetics and there is an artistic aesthetics even in and forms that are socially or oriented in a way or another um also we have John D. Firestone who highlighted that we are this we also discovered a commonality in the restricted funds available in each of the countries and it opened up the possibility so yes thank you for highlighting that and Melody I want to go back uh to a point that that you raised around the reception which I wanted also to highlight how did the western audience receive the texts throughout uh until present moment we had um around how many sessions around eight nine sessions we've had eight sessions so we're starting okay our night sessions will be on Sunday okay um you know the first few sessions took us a while to find our feet in terms of getting people to attend and and really it's signing up for and coming um but even within that um there's been a combination of artists the artists themselves other artists um in the region in particularly uh in Palestine and then other people from around the world through the different partnerships that we're working with the reception has been very positive but to be more specific that even in pieces you know we we've dealt with because zoom is wonderful but there's also the issues of the technical limitations um in Palestine and in Venezuela connectivity is hard electricity is spotty um finding places uh to be able to to speak from um finding actors who could speak English so there was a tremendous generosity I think on the part of all of our attendees that no one was saying oh well that wasn't very good or I couldn't hear that or you know why did their their their connection keep going out the people truly listened and then the conversation that was able to result from that first of all was that we had people who could put the theater pieces in context so if there was something that was more abstract or something that wasn't quite clear either Iman or other moderators and and in the Venezuela um Lupe and moderators could say here's what's going on and then when we knew that and could see that we just let the theater pieces all go first we didn't explain them up front so it led to people really um really having a new understanding and expressing that they did and learning but the other thing for me that was important is that I wanted our conversations to understand the context to be able to reflect on the power of these theater pieces but also to find some practical steps that we could take so that when we create our follow-up to this which now things seems to be that there will be different ways of using this material that we can actually be saying if everyone in the globe that watches this does this thing do this do that do the other thing and so we've had a wide-ranging discussion one of the most powerful for me has been an understanding of of who the audience is when we have the finished product or what we want to do with this work so one suggestion is really targeting universities theater departments and universities the next generation for them not to just understand the work as theater but to understand the agency they can have as theater artists in making change we've had requests that all of the work be published together in an in one volume or that we do an international festival a rolling festival where these works across the three regions are presented or some selection is then we represent those in a more you know polished way with more rehearsal that we do another program so there's a lot of possibility and to me that's that's really exciting and when we just did venezuela the last venezuelan session was the first time in all of the eight uh you know gatherings that the three pieces were all very much about the oppression of the state directly state behavior and what was being done whereas throughout the other seven pieces even with palestine there we understood what the state was doing but it was still really about the impact on people and or people's resistance and so it was interesting to me that the discussion from that watching those three pieces was very much about people wanting more information that when we asked for feedback or we asked for people to ask questions and there was not a lot of them that the comments were that they felt like that conversation could go on for hours because they were learning so much and that they had never understood at all about the situation in venezuela so um so that was a it was interesting because the pieces still were highly theatrical and um different stylized pieces but that was the one moment so i'm really curious to see what we get from the pieces in india because we're less inclined to think of of i think the oppression in india because for so many years um we didn't see it that way but with you know the hindu government and the oppression of religious minorities but now it's extended into defunding of artists artists really being endangered for speaking out um so it'll be curious as to what forms they take as well thank you thank you melody one more sentence is is that the importance of of this pilot or this project let's say is that it is creating a momentum a momentum in in following and in in getting different countries and different artists like in a network whether we intentionally we want to create like a network or unintentionally unintentionally but we are networking somehow together and we are getting to know more of each other and of each other's countries and this continuous getting together in itself is an important artistic factor yeah so and uh in a way uh what you just said falls in under the the point of what will it take to operate the change and how to what extent is it important to make networking and highlighting all these forms of oppression and i have to say as well that there is here the role of gilder conny what was the role of gilder conny and linking you together uh because i know iman and uh also malika you were also um finalists in the gilder conny awards so how how what is what is the importance of networking today in a moment where in a momentum around the world uh where we are all feeling different forms of uncertainties so i'm just gonna say quickly about the gilder quanie award and then um which was founded in 2011 by the league of professional theater women and it's named after rosamund gilder and martha quanie who were for decades leading american involvement in theater and artistic exchange collaboration with a view to the fact that on the ground people to people artists to artists communication working together and network was really the the only avenue for peace it was the organizations they work with were started during the cold war um and so the idea of the award which is really an award program because yes there is one person who gets the award and there's an award ceremony but there's a range of activities of panels and discussions around it and what what the the significance of that in creating leading to this program was our ability to maintain contact with all the nominees there were 27 nominees for the 2020 award there were three finalists in the winner and then um the for the first time it was easy to put out a call and say let's have a meeting on zoom um not everybody can attend not all 27 nominees are are continually involved but there we are in communication with all of them so that's a first um and and it also brought a tremendous amount of attention to the program because it was all virtual and it was a global audience and that's being carried forward there is an international committee at the league under which this uh gilder quanie program falls um and they are really taking the reins and trying to move the idea of international networking forward with other projects so they're a partner in this one it's a new prospectus is really um doing this um but there there's an interconnectedness obviously I'm on the board of the league and involved with the gilder quanie award so um I think the networking aspect is is huge and Iman what you just said a few minutes ago is also really important about the momentum yeah I think I think without the the award we wouldn't have been here together or this project wouldn't have been the same because the the fact that we were all part of the of the call and the award that made it possible but also one important factor is the fact that we are all female theater makers and female theater makers are strong in making connections there is no uh kind of um like a rivalry there there's complicity in in the work and in the vision and that is the beauty of it and this is what I wanted to to stress out yeah and and also uh this is one of uh the the the very few uh positive aspects of incarceration modes because we have to act in the virtual world rather than seek uh other other levels uh if you are just joining us this is no summary golden threats live stream series of conversations with artists that do not fit in a box we are in conversation with Iman Aoun and Melody Brooks around their project theater in the streets and you may post questions to golden threats facebook live for our artists to respond to and we will handle them in a few minutes from now um Melody you already answered the final question I wanted to ask which is uh what's next and how can we really correct uh or or raise the final point which is the role our role as human beings all over the world and you just highlighted a few points and I wanted really to ask because I am an educator I teach at a university and I wanted to ask about the possibility of um sharing those texts with the students so uh you mentioned uh university uh like uh links with universities uh you mentioned also publishing possibilities of publishing what are the other possibilities that you are considering for these texts so one of the things um there's you know we're we're collecting suggestions or ideas so one is this idea of doing uh internet some festivals in different locations that we make the texts available um and that theater companies around the world could produce a festival because there are the pieces are all short they're three to five minutes um the sand mountain is a bit longer and a few may be a little bit longer than that um but to do live theater festivals in a context of then engaging in an audience discussion afterwards and that it could be promoted either a rolling festival it starts somewhere I mean it could start even at new perspectives in New York um and and then other places pick it up um we do the idea of making the texts available and publishing them um is is really attractive because we also want to be able to distill some of the things we've had talked about in our conversations what's important to understand what are some practical positive steps I mean Joan Firestone who is actually the chair of the international committee at the League of Professional Theater when she talked about that we learned about the restrictions on funding uh from US and European um funders that make it impossible for the artists to really be free to do their work so one positive thing people could do is you know um everybody write to the the foundations or the people who are supplying the funding and say stop putting these artificial barriers um because they're ridiculous they're like oh you might be a terrorist or you might be supporting terrorism or and and this is really kowtowing to this larger media narrative and the you know the western government's view of things um we also talked about uh in terms of making texts available to universities of not just sort of handing them a a collection of these pieces but again this ongoing conversation that we're having to include that and and perhaps it could be a catalyst for university theater departments to engage their students in a similar kind of project to to even locally because I think that that what this shows is that we we are all the world is an oppressive place right now um obviously it's some more life-threatening than others but you know I say even in the US but we've been an oppressive place for a very long time we just haven't been so public about it um that maybe they would go to their neighbors or they would do something locally and and and try to do a similar kind of project so that the the the ideal my you know dream as I am an idealist is that we get hundreds of thousands of people who are engaging in direct action um you know because they and and and what we create to put on YouTube because it's the um even though the corporate media is still um that it has a wide reach and that that we can put in there at some you know call this number and complain about the funding you know give this script to your local theater company or support your local theater company in these areas if you can make a donation or attend their performances so that's what we still have to think through and and and there's just a you know my brain is sort of going in lots of different directions and we we have a partnership of eight people the three curators um Fania William Sousa at the Brighton Theatre in England the league um Malini Singh McDonald who is with Theatre Beyond Broadway here which is a company of very diverse artists so when we reconvene where there's a new planning session um that needs to happen getting some other folks involved to think about what are the products that we can create from this and also what Iman said too um we haven't even begun to think about the next round because this has been successful we know better what we're doing now so we could certainly pick three more countries or regions and do the same thing with a you know a break in between to give people time to to get organized but I think the the momentum the the connection with the artists um also with the in the conversations we've been having it's not just the outsiders but the artists themselves seeing their work uh reflected in the other artists work so that that that camaraderie that um you know a community of artists so it's a community of artists and we hope eventually a community of activists who who are all focusing on making change thank you Melody Iman would you like to add something yeah I I also would like I mean Hanna in the chat just written that uh translation is also very important hello Hanna and yes absolutely um there there should be translation into Arabic and into Spanish and and Hindu probably or whatever language possible but but one more thing that is important uh I I believe at least from where I am um our people never have read or seen a Venezuelan play and they were never exposed to Venezuelan stories so I believe that one one thing that I would wish to see when we finish is that I would do a focus on Venezuela in Ramallah to read the the plays it could be all the plays but but in like a mini festival reading festival or something or even producing one or two of the plays and the same for India and and that would be wonderful if we exchange our the stories that we have been presenting and every country would present something to the people from the other from the other side that also is another dimension to to this project and it could add on to the knowledge and to the awareness that we aspire to see and the solidarity that we are wishing to to establish among artists in the different parts thank you Iman um I have a few more questions but I will stop now because we need to make room for our guests and the people who are attending our event on howl around I think we do have a question already and it's Hanan I'm not sure this is Hanan Hajj Ali or am I mistaken yes Hanan is a winner of the Guild Aquarium Award this is what I wanted to highlight she's the winner of the Golder-Kanye Award Hanan we are all ears for your question yes I'm very happy to see you all and hello I was very happy to know that you are participating in this gathering I wanted to say I would begin by the last point that Iman raised it is the same suggestion that I put in the chatting about preceding the dealing with the text with with a Zoom with Malika or Iman or Lupe or together to do a kind of focuses because for example for me it was very interesting to to know about what's happening in Venezuela especially that I saw by chance before the first session and the second session of Venezuela text a documentary about Venezuela and I was really shocked to see the similarities between the situation of Lebanon for example and Venezuela and it was very very very for me very informative and very very essential to begin with as a knowledge so the your suggestion Iman it is very valid and I can see the progression of the of this program and how we began and how little by little piece by piece the ideas are will be will be numerous and we will have a difficulty maybe we'll have a big task to to to select among them and to see what could could could make a strong homogenous action next action what what could be so I'm very very hopeful about about the future of such such initiative so thank you all thank you Hanaan I just wanted to say one word to Hanaan that and to mention to the people to the audience with us that Hanaan was also I mean curating the the text from Lebanon we did not talk much about the texts from from Lebanon and because maybe we were focusing more on Palestine and Venezuela at the moment but but of course we had also three texts from from Lebanon that were all also very powerful and and they spoke about issues that are either political or social and one of them was also about the fact that we were living in under the the covid situation situation yes that's that's a good situation for the pandemic that is eating us up allow me Iman to to say that in the beginning and through the the beginning of the of the initiative Lebanese participants were a little bit lost because the announcement in the beginning was for Palestine and then Lebanon was added and but for me it was really maybe better to focus on Palestine and maybe and another on another level and another step would be for Lebanon because but I find it I find it more logical to do it like this and just to tell you that there are two participants who delivered two texts very very strong but it was so so subjective and so risky that they asked me at the last minute to withdraw them so there is this kind of fear still especially from from women yeah from from we also had with one of the Venezuelan artists they used to pseudonym because there had been an incident in Venezuela a crackdown on artists a few days before we did it and so for our presentation they did not use their actual name because they felt it was too risky so this is another you know common a thread already in the in the two regions we've visited and we'll see you know how that plays out in India but you know there's always the artists being under attack comes at some point in all oppressive regimes and whether it's starting with limiting funding or literally arresting people for their expressions and it is it is it's everywhere right so it's another reason why this program is so important yeah well where there is oppression artists are the most fragile individuals artists and children and women which also leads me to one of the Lebanese texts which is by Dina Salim if i'm not mistaken who spoke about the green door the panda and the pepper this is the title of her text and she speaks about domestic violence which was really very interesting throughout the the areas that you focused upon which is Lebanon I repeat Palestine and Venezuela and in the coming weeks it will be India what is the level of domestic violence and gender-based violence i'm being aware of the questions of the audience but in case we don't have any questions so i'm going to ask my question I think what we've seen through the pieces in the conversation since the level of domestic violence is very high maybe some of it is prompted by different reasons there is a religious element to it in some cases there is you know we know it anywhere when there's financial difficulty and great distress in the community domestic violence really increases we learned in Venezuela that there's a lot of young women because so many people are trying to leave the country that they are fooled into thinking that they're going to Trinidad in particular for real jobs and they're brought into prostitution rings many of them are murdered and this came to light because one of the boats that was going to Trinidad sank and all these young women were killed and so there's there's you know we do three pieces each session so a total of 12 from each region but there's clearly we've only scratched the surface I think when it comes to the impact on women that's been a through line in different ways but also domestic violence it is a crisis and we are all theater women that are working on this project so you know it's something maybe to dig into a little more as we move forward with the with the project as a whole thank you yeah if I may add the I would say that that usually it's I mean violence is a vicious circle so whenever there is violent state violence whenever there is economic violence or economic despair let's say and people are attacked into impoverished or in a real dead end situation then they become really very violent and and the the first thing that they do they become violent against the segments that are weaker than themselves and usually it's the man against the women and the women against the children or the man against the children and so this is how domestic violence grows and spreads for us I mean there are so many studies done about domestic violence but one big aspect of it the fact that the men are frustrated the people are frustrated but men are really frustrated and so they are also they've been on checkpoints they are harassed so all the emotions they get back home with so negative emotions and then they explode at home and so that's how we should really when we look at violence we should look at the whole spectrum if you want of where we are living why things are so bad yeah and it's not a surprise then to when I first attended the Venezuela session the first Venezuelan session there was a question among the audience who said that what's common between all the texts is the woman-centered oppression or the woman-centered world and I can see that through other texts that I have read in Lebanon and also a little bit in Palestine do we have any questions I do want to just point out that not all the writers are women yes we've had a combination of men and women but yes the the women-centered violence or and also women bearing the brunt of the oppression right because women are all the elements that Iman just talked about but but women care for the family they try to keep the pieces together they have to feed the the kids and keep the house you know in some kind of functioning you know way whether it's needing water or electricity or you know cooking fuel any of those things that women are at the center of managing the oppression they don't have the luxury of blowing off steam because they're frustrated and you know going out and committing a lot of violence because they're they're so constrained by just trying to keep it all together and I think that that's you know across the board that whether a country like the United States is perceived as you know having that level of oppression we certainly have our share and more of domestic violence here and for many of the same reasons and so looking at sort of the beginnings of what oppression does to people and looking at sort of really full-blown complete state oppression in Palestine Lebanon and and Venezuela is could hopefully be a warning you know cautionary tale for the rest of the world that thinks we're immune to this right Sahar has a question uh Sahar uh would you like to ask the question or shall I I'm gonna ask it how would they envision the project coming to life in person if that's something they want to do and how it can maintain its international aspect so we've already talked about a couple of ways in which to bring it to life to do live theater it is the ultimate goal one of the ways is making the text available to theater companies around the world organizing some kind of joint adventure in terms of doing festivals of either all of the pieces or some of the pieces a and iman just talking about producing work from the other countries that are featured in this program if she wants to produce some pieces from Venezuela and vice versa and then where we provide the text or provide some additional resources you know maybe a questionnaire guide or a list of things to do or explore that the hope would be that people would take that and do it live do it in their communities and maintaining the international flavor I think as long as zoom remains accessible there are other streaming platforms this is being done on facebook and howl round I think that we can continue with some refinements to continue doing this just the the the weekly if you know if that's too much biweekly or whatever outreach to other areas around the globe and and have a similar kind of conversation just to keep going that's my thought Iman what do you think yeah I think the last thing that you said is very important to keep to keep this like once a week or twice a month meetings and and readings that would by itself take us into something deeper and and probably it will grow it will slowly grow this is how I feel I feel that we should not be pushing it towards going somewhere but we should be trying like a like a baby nurturing it to grow and printing a volume of the different or a book whatever of the different place that would be a wonderful thing and going into universities as we said all of that is going to happen slowly maybe not everywhere but maybe it will happen in one place not every place but maybe each one of us coming from the different countries will choose the way to to use this the material or to use the way to enhance it in in their society so that that is another way possible as well it doesn't have to be all look in one way one direction but certainly the material needs to be gathered and it needs to be translated that's yes thank you very much Iman we have reached the final minute of our session today I wish we had a little bit more time to discuss further many thanks to our guests Melody Brooks and Iman Aoun please stay connected with Golden Thread by signing up for our weekly email and follow us on Facebook I'd like to thank HowlRound for hosting this live stream event recording of this session will be available on both HowlRound and Golden Threads websites and many thanks also to our live stream technician Wendy Reyes and Kristi for managing the live stream on Golden Threads Facebook page and many thanks to all the people who attended this session and thank you for joining us today goodbye and maybe see you next time bye thank you thank you