This weekend, the South Asian Sisters-Madison, a student organization of progressive South Asian women, will be presenting their sixth production of "Yoni Ki Baat." I had the opportunity to sit down with a cast member, sophomore Nita Sharma, to talk about the show.
“’Yoni’ is the Sanskrit word for ‘vagina’ and ‘Ki Baat’ means ‘the talk of’ so it roughly means ‘the talk of the Yoni’,” Sharma explained. “It’s kind of like the ‘Vagina Monologues’ but for women of color. The show will address issues such as race, gender, and sexuality.”
I attended the first night of the show last year and was so captivated by the power of the performances that I came back the next night to see it again. I asked Sharma, who also performed last year, if audiences could expect a similarly dramatic performance and how this year might be different from last year.
“This year we have a wide variety of monologues. There are some very serious pieces addressing issues such as violence against women, but there are also a couple of funnier more lighthearted pieces, as opposed to last year, where most of them were very serious. Also this year there are a few that focus more on the racial identity aspect, and fitting in to American culture and balancing that with Indian culture.”
I also asked Sharma about why its important that people at this university in particular go to see a show like this. She stated that she, “think[s] it’s important at this University mainly because it is a pretty homogenous, mostly white place. It’s great that ['Yoni Ki Baat'] does exist because it’s a platform for women of color who usually don’t get their stories out to be heard.”
"Yoni Ki Baat" and other productions that focus on issues of diversity or oppression are especially important in that they use art as a means of affirming people’s identities and helping outsiders to empathize with what it means to be of a certain identity.
"Yoni Ki Baat" is being performed Friday, April 25 at 7 p.m. as well as 3 and 7 p.m. on April 26 in the Rotunda Studio at the Overture Center. Admission is free.
