Pedagogy of the Panza Featuring Carla Della Gatta

Each and every time we learn of a teacher, activist, scholar, artist, professor, organizer, coordinator, or facilitator who is or has used The Panza Monologues as a teaching tool, we are extremely gratified and thankful. Our second edition of the play in publication was specifically conceived of and designed to help facilitate its use in classrooms of all kinds. We included numerous kinds of materials to accompany the script in order to inspire its use as a wide reaching teaching tool.

Our blog series "Pedagogy of the Panza" celebrates and profiles teachers and their innovative instruction using The Panza Monologues, Second Edition. These posts showcase important, determined, and ingenious teachers of all kinds who are taking our work to the next level of its manifestation. Are you using The Panza Monologues, Second Edition in your classroom? We’d love to hear your story – contact us! panzapower@gmail.com

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Name:  Carla Della Gatta

Hometown:  Los Angeles, where I currently live.

Where do you teach?  

I am an Assistant Professor of Critical Studies at the School of Dramatic Arts at the University of Southern California. I taught The Panza Monologues at Northwestern University earlier this year.

In  what class/type of class did you use The Panza Monologues in?  

It was an upper-division seminar called “Latina Theatre & Feminisms” that was cross-listed in Gender & Sexuality Studies, Latina and Latino Studies, and Theatre. 

Why did you choose to teach The Panza Monologues in your class?

I chose The Panza Monologues for a number of reasons. First, the class included the term “Latina Theatre” in the title but I wanted to challenge any limits that the term implies. The students read plays written by Latinas, but the subject matter of the plays varied widely. They also read a play written by a Latino with a strong Latina lead role and discussed various Latina performance pieces. Second, the class discussed the Latina body as a site of memory in the theoretical readings on Chicana Feminism and in discussions on other plays, so having The Panza Monologues as the penultimate text really brought a lot of the course themes together. Third, Virginia & Irma’s voice and Virginia's performance style are essential to discussing Latina performance as a genre today, and where it falls in the trajectory of Latina and Latino theatre history.

How did you teach The Panza Monologues (any fun or meaningful activities or panza teaching tools you want to share)?  

The class first watched the DVD of the performance without reading the book. This allowed students to experience the piece with the dramaturgy and performance elements. I also showed clips from Eve Ensler’s The Vagina Monologues, and the students discussed the different methods for solo performance, especially the use of voice and music.

After watching the video, we discussed some of the book’s contents, especially Virginia & Irma’s research process that led to the stories in the piece and the emphasis that Virginia and Irma place on pedagogy. Because of the first-person narration and the physicality of the storytelling style, the students initially thought that these were Virginia’s personal stories. We talked about theatre as a tool for raising consciousness and the ethics of performing other people’s narratives, especially when they focus on the body, sexuality, and violence. 

Why is The Panza Monologues important to your field of study? What conversations/issues did the book raise?  

The Latina body is often eroticized or maternalized in the media and in popular culture, but in Virginia & Irma’s work it is presented as a site of collective and personal memory.  The collective memory includes a history of structural violence toward the Latino community, especially Chicanas/os, in the form of food deserts and mis-education about diet and the body. We devoted a unit solely to Xicanisma early in the term, and the students related the concept of Theory in the Flesh and ideas about embodied knowledge to The Panza Monologues. Virginia & Irma’s piece brought all of it together.

What did you learn about your teaching or about your students from teaching The Panza Monologues?  

I learned that my students, who were from a variety of backgrounds, would each relate to something different in the piece. I expected to talk about solo performance as a genre and performance elements (the use of the altar, music, and physicality), but the discussions ranged from the representation of the female body in the mainstream media to the historical relationships of food and cultures to making the body an agent of activism.  

Favorite Quote from The Panza Monologues Book?

"I never wanted to look like her, but slowly the image of my mother crept into my own body." From "Cha-Cha to Panza" 

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Carla Della Gatta is an Assistant Professor of Critical Studies at the USC School of Dramatic Arts. She has published articles and reviews in academic journals, and served as a dramaturg, translator, and scholar for the theatre. Her research areas include early modern drama and theatre history, Latina/o Theatre, Spanish Golden Age theatre, adaptation theory, postcolonial feminism, and critical race theory.

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DIY Panza Featuring Kayleigh Melite at SUNY, Oneonta

This is the first post in a new series on our blog - "DIY Panza" - highlighting the work of college students and cultural workers that produce Panza Monologues events of their own on their campuses and in their communities. Over the years, students have produced The Panza Monologues on college campuses across the nation, including Cal State Monterrey Bay, Cal State Long Beach, University of Colorado Boulder, Oregon State University, University of Texas at San Antonio, Mills College, and most recently, University of California Riverside and SUNY Oneonta. We are always grateful, humbled and honored by these efforts because we know first hand just how hard it can be to make theater. Our second edition of the play in publication was specifically conceived of and designed to help make the process of making theatre just a little bit easier. We included numerous kinds of materials to accompany the script including a DIY Production Manual, full of guidelines, advice and good wishes for staging The Panza Monologues. 

Kayleigh Melite recently used this manual to direct and produce The Panza Monologues at SUNY Oneonta. We were impressed by her professionalism and care throughout the process - just look at her request letter to produce the show HERE to see what we mean. Gracias Kayleigh for making our panzas yours. 

Power to the Panza!

Name: Kayleigh Melite 

Kayleigh Melite

Hometown: Clifton Park, NY

A lot of people who aren’t from New York don’t realize that there is more to the state than just a big, bustling city at the southeastern corner. I’m from a suburban town in Saratoga County, and have only been to “The City” a handful of times. When I do make a trip downstate, my favorite restaurant of all time is Bareburger. I come from a relatively large family and am the second oldest out of five children. 

What school do you attend?

I’m currently a Senior at SUNY Oneonta, majoring in Biology and minoring in Theatre. I have no idea what I want to do when I graduate. Right now I’m President of the Theatre Honor Society on campus, which has just partnered with another group that I’ve been involved with for the past few years - The Identity Play Reading Series. 

The Identity Play Reading Series is a group of students, faculty, and community members who seek to produce staged readings of plays about different facets of identity, including but not limited to:  gender, ethnicity, age, disabilities, occupation, and interpersonal relationships. We explore the differences, but more importantly the similarities, between individuals. We hold an open dialogue at the end of each staged reading to discuss the pertinent issues of the play and ask the audience for their thoughts and reactions. I recently produced and directed a staged reading of The Panza Monologues as part of the series. 

Can you describe the event you produced? 

The Panza Monologues was performed in the Hamblin Theater, SUNY Oneonta’s black box space. I ended up casting four women to tackle this one-woman show. One thing instilled in me by my experience with collegiate theatre is that theatre is a collaborative art form. I wanted to involve many students in my staged reading of The Panza Monologues for this reason. Each one of my actresses/readers brought something unique to the performance, and I tried to utilize their contrasting energies to bring alive the stories in the script. 

What did you learn producing The Panza Monologues on your campus? 

There was one significant challenge I faced while trying to put together this staged reading:  the majority of my campus is white. For any other play this wouldn't matter, but The Panza Monologues calls for a strong female lead that can speak Spanish fluently. I needed a woman who could deliver the Spanish, and deliver it authentically. I am not embarrassed to admit that I don’t even speak 

Spanish myself. I know some of the basics, and can understand some Spanish if I’m reading it, but I sure as heck can’t roll my r’s or pronounce the tricky stuff. Even so, I have a good ear and could tell right away when I found the right actress/reader to carry the Spanish-intensive stories. When she and I both got stuck on some of the language, Dr. Alvarez of SUNY Oneonta’s Africana and Latino Studies Department was there to guide us. 

In our post-performance discussion, somebody asked me why I chose to direct The Panza Monologues. My reply was this:  I’m very picky when it comes to directing. I had been reading a bunch of scripts because I knew I wanted to direct a staged reading, but nothing was grabbing my attention. One of my peers had a copy of The Panza Monologues and let me borrow it. I wasn’t even halfway through when I knew I absolutely had to do it. I heard that little voice that said, “Direct me!” The script was funny. It was sad. It was so many things at once. I think that everybody has experienced something the play addresses, or at least knows somebody that has. 

In our discussion we also talked about how important The Panza Monologues is, regardless of one’s ethnicity. There is a certain universality that arises when we realize that we all have a panza. At the same time, the script does contain material that is specific to the Chicano/a experience. Two of my actresses/ readers expressed how good it felt to be part of a production that was relevant to them because of their family’s heritage. The feeling of empowerment was an overall theme that many people took away from the performance.

Our staged reading of The Panza Monologues was the best-attended reading that The Identity Play Reading Series has produced thus far, or at least since I’ve been involved. It meant the world to me that so many people were there to listen with their ears and with their hearts. 

What is your favorite quote from The Panza Monologues?

My favorite quote is definitely, "I decide not to tell them that the blood of the conqueror takes up more space than anything else inside my body..."  - "The International Panza" 

First and foremost, I think this line is hilarious. During rehearsals I would smile before the line was even delivered. But it's more meaningful than that. We all have information that we may choose to withhold from new people we meet. Choosing to tell them or choosing to not tell them certainly depends on the situation.

Do you want to stage a full production or reading of The Panza Monologues? 

Contact us at panzapower@gmail.com

Pedagogy of the Panza Featuring Irene Mata

Each and every time we learn of a teacher, activist, scholar, artist, professor, organizer, coordinator, or facilitator who is or has used The Panza Monologues as a teaching tool, we are extremely gratified and thankful. Our second edition of the play in publication was specifically conceived of and designed to help facilitate its use in classrooms of all kinds. We included numerous kinds of materials to accompany the script in order to inspire its use as a wide reaching teaching tool.

So, for the summer, we begin a series on our blog - "Pedagogy of the Panza" - celebrating and profiling teachers and their innovative instruction using The Panza Monologues, Second Edition. Over the next few months we will feature posts that showcase important, determined, and ingenious teachers of all kinds who are taking our work to the next level of its manifestation. Are you using The Panza Monologues, Second Edition in your classroom? We’d love to hear your story – contact us! panzapower@gmail.com

Name:  Irene Mata

Hometown:  El Paso/Juarez (currently living in Wellesley, MA)

Where do you teach? What’s your home department?

Wellesley College in the Women’s and Gender Studies Dept.

What class did you use The Panza Monologues in?

WGST 218—Stage Left: Chican@/Latin@ Theatre and Performance

Why did you choose to teach The Panza Monologues in your class?

Putting together a coherent syllabus that includes the diversity of theatre and performance in the Chican@/Latin@ community is a daunting task, and I chose to teach texts I believed encompass the complexities of this community. I decided to include The Panza Monologues because the text engages with multiple issues affecting the Chican@ community through the important lens of intersectionality. As a queer Chicana professor, the construction of identity and the intersecting role that race, gender, sexuality, class, and accessibility play in that construction is always at the center of my teaching. While the performance piece deals specifically with Chicana bodies, the stories of the panza go beyond any one group, and I knew students would be able to engage with the text regardless of their own background. Students at Wellesley are very familiar with, and quite critical of, The Vagina Monologues, and I wanted to introduce them to an example of a performance piece that more responsibly represents the voices of women. The Panza Monologues entertains but also educates an audience without appropriating the stories of the women whose lives the characters are drawn upon.

How did you teach The Panza Monologues (can you offer any fun or meaningful activities or panza teaching tools you want to share)?

I chose to teach The Panza Monologues at the end of the semester in order to help students bring together the multiple aspects of identity formation we had been discussing throughout the class. The performance piece focuses attention on the multiple structures of oppression that affect how we see and treat out bodies. The specificity of the panza as a site of analysis helped students think critically about how our bodies are constructed beyond the individual. We had an amazing discussion of body politics that intersected with a larger discussion of structural violence, including poverty and food justice.

Unlike traditional scripts, The Panza Monologues provided a rich set of texts to widen the discussion of the performance piece. Students loved reading the script and had much to say about it. Having access to secondary material included in the text, especially the narrative history of the play’s development, allowed students to understand the creative process involved in the production. We were able to discuss the script but also how the larger themes analyzed in the secondary materials were represented in the performance. The book as a whole provides a powerful example of a feminist praxis of creating activist art. Our college library also purchased the video of The Panza Monologues, which gave me yet another pedagogical tool in teaching the performance piece. Students watched the recording after reading the script and wrote responses on how watching Virginia perform the monologues added to their initial reading and understanding of the piece.

Why is it important to your field of study? What conversations/issues did the book raise?

Dr. Irene Mata (with Inigo Montoya)
reading The Panza Monologues,
Second Edition

The Panza Monologues invites its readers to think critically about how our ideas of our bodies are constructed through ideologies of worth and beauty. The performance piece roots its discussion of this construction in its analysis of multiple systems of oppression, including the medical establishment and a patriarchal structure that perpetuates violence against women. The book encourages a discussion of larger structural inequality through its emphasis on the panza and the role of the panza in the construction of womanhood.

What did you learn from teaching The Panza Monologues?

Unfortunately, teaching The Panza Monologues has made me aware of how much young people continue to struggle with their body image and the continued role that race and culture play in that struggle. I learned to use the book as a tool, as a counter-narrative to the very loud and destructive message young people receive about their panzas and marginalized communities. Brilliant students surround me, and I often forget that students, regardless of their level of intelligence, continue to battle external messages that dictate what constitutes beauty and worth. I feel, however, that teaching The Panza Monologues gives me an opportunity to intervene in their internalization of dominant ideologies of beauty and offers me the chance to talk back to ideologies that position our culture as deficient or lacking.  The performance piece has helped me teach students about our bodies, our culture, and love in our community in a way that challenges the medicalization of our bodies.  

Favorite quote from The Panza Monologues Book?

“Now someone’s panza story is a sacred story, and to share it with someone else is to tell them about the condition of your life” (42).

Finally - any new news? Or things/reflections you would like to share re: Panza? Or about your recent accomplishments?!

I loved teaching The Panza Monologues Book! It was a powerful educational experience for my students and myself, and I can’t wait to teach it next year!

Read more about Dr. Irene Mata HERE.

N.B. from Irma & Virginia: we are very, very proud to note that Dr. Mata recently received tenure at Wellesley - ajua!

Do you have a "Pedagogy of the Panza" story to share? Let us know! panzapower@gmail.com