Gurira weaves together a story that brings the audience into the women’s lives, using experiences that we can identify within our own lives. documentary Pray the Devil Back to Hell and the Human Rights Watch report “ Roles and Responsibilities of Child Soldiers”. The characters in the play reflect the histories of those women, as well as Gurira’s research, including the award winning. Gurira interviewed thirty women including former women soldiers and women in the Peace Movement who are credited with forcing an end to the Civil War. Instead, the style and swagger of the young women covered over the deep trauma of having lived through unspeakable horrors during the civil war including being gang-raped, watching family members murdered, their homes looted and mothers and sisters raped by soldiers. Gurira traveled to Liberia in 2007, setting off on a journey that would reveal that the intensity of the young women fighters in the photo was not empowerment, or a fierce loyalty to the rebel forces and brotherly rebel male fighters. The number of women in her unit, she said, is a military secret.” Colonel “Black Diamond” (C/with glasses) is flanked by her women bodyguards, members of the LURD (Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy) 09 August 2003 as they return from a patrol Photo: Georges Gobet, AFP. Her fellow guerrillas were equally fashionable, wearing tight-fitting jeans, leopard-print blouses and an assortment of jewelry. ![]() In 2003, the Wall Street Journal interviewed a 20-year-old fighter calle1d Black Diamond, and described her appearance in an almost romantic way: “ A pistol and a cellular phone hung from her trendy, wide leather belt. Gurira was struck by their attractive appearance, the fierce and intense look in their eyes, and by their guns and their stylish fighting gear. The impetus for writing the play came from a 2003 photo appearing in the Western press of Liberian women fighters. However, the current situation in Liberia, where Covid-19 restrictions have increased the number of Sex and Gender-based attacks by fifty percent, is compared to the same high rate of attacks during the Liberian civil war (1999-2003) That statistic was challenged by American writers because, they wrote, it seems like an improbably high rate. A World Health Organization report estimated 75% of women in Liberia at the end of the civil war had experienced rape. It is difficult to collect meaningful statistics as to the rate of rape in Liberia. Police tear-gassed thousands of anti-rape protesters. There were 5,000 anti-rape protesters, and there were violent clashes with authorities. Why is Eclipsed relevant now? In September of 2020, President George Weah of Liberia declared rape a national emergency following a three day protest in the capital city of Monrovia. Her work portrays the humanity of the captive women, and the difficult choices they must make during a time of war, and how the trauma of those experiences, particularly rape, changes them. Gurira’s work transcends the rationalizations created by terms such as “rape as a weapon of war” that are used to characterize the human experience of sexual violation and violence. The national lockdowns imposed to counter the spread of the coronavirus in many African countries have created a fertile ground for violence against women and girls. United Methodist Women parade the streets in Marshall City, Liberia, to protest sexual violence against women and girls during the group’s 72nd annual session held Jan. “Narrative is in my toolbox, and what I find powerful about narrative is that it actually allows people to be connected, to be disarmed, to see other people across the world that they might perceive of as statistics, as actual fellow people that they care about and that they want to see freed to live self-determined lives,” she said in an interview. The playwright wants to create awareness about injustices encountered by girls and women around the world by the stories in her plays. Eclipsed was on Broadway in 2016, with Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o in the lead role. Written by Zimbabwean-American playwright Danai Gurira, Eclipsed made history by being the first Broadway show with an all-female cast, and the first all African-American cast, and an all-female creative team. The story follows a 15-year-old African girl as she escapes from the encampment to become a child soldier in the rebel forces. The play, Eclipsed, transports the audience into the intimate dwelling of women struggling to survive while living as sexual slaves in a rebel forces encampment at the end of the Liberian civil war in 2003. ![]() Activism and Art are a potent combination for addressing problems that are both enduring and unendurable.
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