LAB 3 - In a Dark Dark House

Sunday 2 November 2008

The first exercise of the day was actually a continuation of an idea that emerged from LAB Two – the concept of child brides. To provoke political debate, Raz and Maryam created a scene last session between a 40 year old man and an 11 year old girl who were in a relationship. So… we put a series of photographs on the wall, all depicting child brides, and the group were asked to complete a character profile worksheet for one the brides from one of the pictures.

See some of the pictures at the following website:
http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2006/07/06/magazine/20060709_BRIDES_SLIDESHOW_1.html
From this, they then worked in groups to generate questions that the issue of child brides raises in their minds (direct or rhetorical). For each question, they then generated three more questions that were prompted by the initial questions (creating nine questions)… and then three more for each of these questions (now 27 questions)… We then discussed any broad, general themes that these questions suggested.

Some of the Questions raised:
Is this / Am I normal?
-What is normal?
-Does this happen everywhere?
-Am I supposed to enjoy this?
-What do we mean by ‘this’?
-Why would anyone enjoy it?

Why would a 40 year old man want to be with a child?
-Was the 40 year old abused as a child?
-Is there money involved?
-Does he enjoy this?
-Sexually or psychologically abused?
-Social or business gain?
-Is he a paedophile?
-Are his actions legal?
-Does he get a thrill out of it?
-Is it natural for him?

How did the concept of child brides become acceptable?
-Has it always acceptable?
-What is meant by acceptable?
-Does anyone refute it?
-Is it a cultural thing?
-Is it tradition?
-Is it ingrained into society?

Could you learn to love your older husband?
-Is the child being deprived of their childhood?
-How would you be able to cope?
-Would you use your imagination to escape?

What culture is making these rules?
-Is it down to religion?
-Does the man have the right to control?
-Is a woman the object of a man?

After the break, some people were asked to write monologues from the perspective of their child bride; some completed a newspaper exercise, Commenting on Child Brides, using an article on child brides as stimulus; and the remaining group improvised a short scene between a parent and his young son who he caught having underage sex.

The scenes were great. Jess wrote a fantastic, but disturbing, monologue from the perspective of a four year old boy who had an unnatural relationship with an adult male. Aisha wrote a piece from the perspective of a child bride who had more in common with her husband’s children, of the same age, than with him; and Yasemin performed an interesting piece from the perspective of a 19 year old woman who had escaped from an arranged marriage with a much older man.

Girls – why not share your monologues on the BLOG?

After lunch, we read Act Two of In a Dark Dark House. The issue of child brides provided the perfect segue into the scene between Terry, who is in his late 30s, and Jenny, who is a 15 year old girl. We read the scene and discussed the behaviour of both characters in the scene – why was Jenny flirting with an older man? And why was Terry interested in someone half of his age? We also talked about what might’ve come before this scene and what might have come after. The group then divided into pairs and worked on an improvised scene assuming that something illicit had happened between Jenny and Terry. They were asked to create a scene either between Jenny and her psychiatrist, or between Terry and a criminal psychologist / policeman. Next, we took the same scene and, working in groups of four, two people were asked to play the actual lines of the characters and the other two were asked to play aloud the subtext – what were the characters actually meaning or implying through their words even if they weren’t saying it directly?

We finished the day thinking not only about the repercussions of abuse (for Terry) but also about the effect that a common or shared experience can have on siblings – after all, up until the last moment of the play, Terry and Drew appear to have experienced the same ordeal. In pairs, participants were asked to script a short scene between siblings who have a shared experience and demonstrate how this experience has influenced their relationship and the way that they behave towards each other.

Pairs then swapped scripts so that they were not working with their own words but were asked to interpret the words of others in order to play the relationship between the siblings.

All in all – another really good session. And as always, we could have done with another few hours to continue exploring the ideas that we were beginning to touch on.

And finally… Tanya set some very specific tasks for individuals and pairs in the group:

Alex – to research the legal classification of a paedophile Grace – to research who the clients are of the young Chinese prostitutes in Britain (see http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/oct/11/immigration-people-trafficking).
Shanice – to research the Romeo and Juliet law.
Desara – to research exactly what young boys are getting up to, if this is all about young brides…
Romany / Jess – write a scene set in an internet chat room between an 11 year old child bride from a different country and an 11 year old in Britain.
Yasemin / Aisha – write a scene where a 12 year old girl has a closer relationship with her husband’s 13 year old son than she does with him.
Louie / Maryam – write a scene between two friends – one is very confident and ‘beyond her years’ and the other is quite shy and not as advanced emotionally as her friend.
Chloe / Layla – write a scene between a mother (who was herself a child bride) and her daughter (who is soon to be one).
Mollie - what about the husband? Write a monologue from the perspective of a 40 year old man married to a child.
Naomi - write a name poem for Aisha Camara (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/inatl/longterm/africanlives/ivory/ivory.htm).

Pius - write a name poem for Mwaka (http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so142/News_stories/Child_Marriage_in_Africa.html).

Hannah - write a name poem for Beatrice.

Darshanie - write a name poem for Nojoud Mohammed Ali (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7351336.stm).

Razvan - write a monologue for Ms Muanyongo - what has she had to endure?

Ilmi - you are the son of a man who has three wives. The newest wife is 11 years old - the same age as you. How does this make you feel? Write a monologue to express your feelings (you will also need to decide what country/culture you are from).

Post your findings / scenes on the BLOG – or email them to Tanya.