ABOUT THE PLAY Stepsisters Maya and Kiara are high school students who couldn’t be more different. During an argument they acci- dently bonk their heads and awake at The Akron Women’s Rights Convention of 1851. Lost in time, they must draw from the wisdom of suffragists, abolitionists, and freedom fighters. A story of sisterhood and solidarity, Lawbreakers! (a fast and furious history of women’s suffrage) educates and entertains. Past and present collide in this funny and poignant world premiere new play by award-winning, Louisville-based playwright Diana Grisanti. VOCABULARY LIST: Abolition: The action or an act of abolishing a system, practice or institution. Anti-Suffragism: A political movement composed of both men and women that began in the late 19th century in order to campaign against women’s suffrage. Dialogue: A conversation between two or more people as a feature of a book, play or movie. Internalized Sexism: When an individual enacts learned sexist behaviors and attitudes toward themselves and people of their own sex. On a larger scale, internalized sexism falls under a broad topic of internalized oppression, which consists of oppressive practices that continue to make the rounds of even when members of the oppressor group are not present. Narrative: A spoken or written account of connected events; a story. Script: The written text of a play, movie or broadcast. Suffragist: A person advocating the extension of suffrage (the right to vote in political elections), especially to women. Triumvirate: A group of three men holding power. January 21 - February 7, 2020 Performances at 10 am and Noon The Kentucky Center, Bomhard Theatre Recommended for Grades 5 and up Estimated Running Time: 70 minutes By Diana Grisanti Directed by Sydney Chatman BY DIANA GRISANTI
Transcript
ABOUT THE PLAY
Stepsisters Maya and Kiara are high school students who couldn’t be more different. During an argument they acci-dently bonk their heads and awake at The Akron Women’s Rights Convention of 1851. Lost in time, they must draw
from the wisdom of suffragists, abolitionists, and freedom fighters. A story of sisterhood and solidarity, Lawbreakers! (a fast and furious history of women’s suffrage) educates and entertains. Past and present collide in this funny and
poignant world premiere new play by award-winning, Louisville-based playwright Diana Grisanti.
VOCABULARY LIST:
Abolition: The action or an act of abolishing a system, practice or institution.
Anti-Su�ragism: A political movement composed of both men and women that began in the late 19th century in order to campaign against women’s su�rage.
Dialogue: A conversation between two or more people as a feature of a book, play or movie.
Internalized Sexism: When an individual enacts learned sexist behaviors and attitudes toward themselves and people of their own sex. On a larger scale, internalized sexism falls under a broad topic of internalized oppression, which consists of oppressive practices that continue to make the rounds of even when members of the oppressor group are not present.
Narrative: A spoken or written account of connected events; a story.
Script: The written text of a play, movie or broadcast.
Su�ragist: A person advocating the extension of su�rage (the right to vote in political elections), especially to women.
Triumvirate: A group of three men holding power.
January 21 - February 7, 2020Performances at 10 am and Noon
The Kentucky Center, Bomhard Theatre
Recommended for Grades 5 and upEstimated Running Time: 70 minutes
BEFORE YOU SEE THE PLAY...Pre-Show Lesson #1 A Dinner with History Common Core Standard: W.5.3 - Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, descriptive details, and clear event sequences. B.- Use narrative techniques such as dialogue, description and pacing to develop experiences and events to show the responses of characters to situations.
In Lawbreakers!, our lead characters Maya and Kiara are step-sisters who travel through time. During their travels, they meet prominent members of our history including Alice Paul and Sojourner Truth. Each figure that they meet has an effect on the girls, and they learn a lot about them through their interactions.
With so many fascinating people across the course of history, it seems impossible to pick only one, but for this assignment, you will have to choose. In this narra-tive, you will answer the question, “If you could sit down with anyone from history, who would it be?” Think about this person and imagine how the conversa-tion would go: What questions would you ask them? How would they respond? Your narrative should be written in the form of a script to layout the dialogue between you and your historical figure.
*** If time, students can exchange their scripts with a partner and read their scripts aloud.
Pre-show Activity #2Where There’s a Sash, There’s a Way Common Core Standard: W.5.7: Conduct short research projects that use several sources to build knowledge through investigation of different aspects of a topic. SL.5.5: Include multimedia components, such as graphics or sound, in presentations when appropriate to enhance the development of main ideas and themes.
In Lawbreakers!, our main characters take notice of Alice Paul, a vocal leader of the twentieth century women’s suffrage movement, and the sash she wears across her body. The sash that Alice Paul is wearing was worn by many supporters of women’s suffrage, but the sash itself was often worn for rallies, parades and street speaking. They were often decked in recognizable slogans and included particular colors, deigns and symbols – all that have a particular meaning for the cause that they stand for.
For this assignment, we want students to design their own sash for a given movement during this time. Students can either be individually assigned a movement (from the list below) or they can work in smaller groups together. The three movements they will be considering are as follows:
• Women’s Suffrage/Women’s Rights • The Abolition of Slavery • Worker’s Rights/Union Once an individual/group has been assigned their move-ment, they will research their given topic to gain more information. They will then consider how to design their sash based on what they learned: Where their important symbols to this movement? Colors that stand for something meaningful to this movement? Slogans or chants used by advocates by this movement? These are things to consider when they begin drawing their designs on the sash. Students will first draw their designs on the sash figure (located on the Where There’s a Sash, There’s a Way worksheet), they will then flip the sheet over and describe their design on the back. For instance, why did they choose the color they chose? Why is that slogan on the sash? Etc.
*** We have attached an example of the Sash Design activity at the end of this document as well as a blank template for the students.
AFTER YOU SEE THE PLAY...Post-show Activity #1: Family History ArchaeologyCommon Core Standard: SL.5.4 – Report on a topic or text or present an opinion, sequencing ideas logically and using appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details to support main ideas or themes; speak clearly at an under-standable pace.WH.ST.6-8.4 – Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience. In Lawbreakers!, Ms. Dunbar’s Grandmother’s shoes are significant in two ways; they are not only a device through which the magic of time travel occurs, but they are also an important memento. The shoes connect Ms. Dunbar to her Grandmother’s story of perseverance and inner strength, and therefore, to her Grandmother, who lives on for Ms. Dunbar because of the shoes. Their magical powers are a metaphor for the power within passing on stories to others. Personal artifacts have always been useful for giving information about the people who owned them; our objects contain our stories. The best way to access that history is to get the story first hand, and history lives on when we pass the story on to others.
In this activity, students will collect their own family history using objects owned by a family member or family mem-bers. Students should choose three objects; these objects can come from the same family member or different family members. These objects should be significant in revealing something about their family member/s cultural back-ground, personality, values, ambitions, or experiences. Students should include an outline or journal entries of the story told by their family member/s about each object – encourage them to record stories on devices if they have them to supplement their outlines. Then, students are to prepare an oral presentation about their objects, and intro-duce their family member/s to the class; students may choose to bring the objects in to share with the class, or show photographs of their objects if they are extremely valuable or fragile. Oral presentations should be at least 5 minutes long.
Vocabulary:Memento – an object kept as a reminder or souvenir of a person or event.Metaphor – a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else, especially something abstract.
Post-show Activity #2: What’s the Angle?Common Core Standard: RI.5.6. – Analyze multiple accounts of the same event or topic, noting important similarities and differences in the point of view they represent.RH.6-8.6 – Identify aspects of a text that reveal an author’s point of view or purpose (e.g. loaded language, inclusion or avoidance of particular facts).
In Lawbreakers!, we witness an infamous instance of bias in the media when we meet Marius Robinson and Frances Gage and are introduced to their very different versions of the same speech delivered by Sojourner Truth. Each of these characters reported the speech in a tone that they believed would incite the biggest reaction from their desired readers. This kind of bias is still apparent in the reporting of today – the same story can be told in a very different way according to the angle of the reporter. Often, how the media outlet leans politically has an effect on how the story is spun.
Using the graphic organizer provided, students will compare and contrast 3 different new pieces on the same issue. Encourage students to find articles from reputable media outlets – a simple Google search may not provide the most reliable material. Encourage students to find articles written by media outlets that do not lean the same way politically; please find below a list of reputable news providers and their known political affiliation. Also encourage students to utilize different news mediums; for example, choosing a newspaper article, an article intended for internet publica-tion, and a televised news piece would be a nice mixture of material.
Known Left-leaning Publications: The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Huffington Post (Far Left), The Daily Show (Far Left), The Colbert Report (Far Left)
Known Right-leaning Publications: Fox News, Breitbart (Far Right), The Blaze (Far Right) Rush Limbaugh Show (Far Right), Sean Hannity Show (Far Right)
Known Centerist Publications: NBC News, CBS News, ABC News, Google News, Yahoo News, BBC News, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, NPR, CNN, MSNBC
Vocabulary:Bias – prejudice in favor or against one thing, person, or group compared with another, usually in a way that’s considered to be unfair.
Pre Show Activity #2 Example and Blank TemplateWhere There’s a Sash, There’s a Way
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