Reviewed by:

• Sistuhs in the Struggle: an Oral History of Black Arts Movement Theater and Performance by La Donna L. Forsgren
• Isaiah Matthew Wooden

La Donna L. Forsgen's Sistuhs in the Struggle: An Oral History of Black Arts Movement Theater and Performance powerfully demonstrates the importance of thoughtfully attending to the stories that Black women tell about their art, activism, and revolutionary activity. Forsgren shrewdly draws on the traditions and methods of oral history and critical performance ethnography to sharpen focus on the vital role that Black women played in shaping and sustaining one of the most catalytic periods in Black art-making. Sharply conceived, cogently organized, and compellingly written, the study grants its narrators crucial space to give voice to their experiences, perceptions, and motivations for contributing "to the creation and dissemination of Black Arts Movement theory, theater, and performance" (12). In so doing, it further exposes the shortcomings in the masculinist narratives that have come to delimit understandings of 1960s and '70s Black liberation struggles.

The book's four thematically organized chapters are rich with fresh details and insights about the manifold ways Black women helped initiate and drive the conversations on Black art amid growing calls for Black Power. Chapter 1 features several prominent and lesser-known artistic trailblazers—Micki Grant, Sonia Sanchez, Ntozake Shange, and Jackie Taylor, among them—reflecting on their relationships to some of the concepts, theories, and practices that would define the era, including feminism and the Black aesthetic. In her brief introduction to the chapter, Forsgren notes, for example, that "while none of the Black women intellectuals [she] interviewed joined feminist organizations during the seventies, some joined Black sororities and many voiced Black feminist attitudes within the Black freedom struggle" (17). Many of the chapter's narrators maintained a commitment to combating the pervasive sexism they encountered both within and outside of their creative and activist circles, even if some were ambivalent about the feminist label. They were unwavering in their view that there could be no movement for Black liberation without Black women.

Chapter 2 elucidates the urgency that many Black women in the Black Arts Movement felt to create cultural centers that would honor the experiences and aspirations of Black people. Jackie Taylor, who founded Chicago's Black Ensemble Theater in 1976, observes that she was motivated to do so, in part, because of the racism she experienced as a Black actress in the film industry. "I created a theater that would tell the truth about African American people, perpetuate the greatness of who we are, supply jobs within the community, deliver positive messages, and serve thousands of children and help them understand that they are somebody," she explains (118). Doris Derby, who cofounded the Free Southern Theatre with Gilbert Moses and John O'Neal in 1963, reveals that she and her collaborators were similarly compelled by a shared desire "to use theater to present issues to reflect our past, present, and future goals" (152). What is striking about each of the institution-builders the chapter spotlights are the ways they understood and made use of the theatre as a potent site for imagining and embodying the world differently.

This point comes into even sharper focus in chapters 3 and 4, which document the extraordinary range of projects that Black women created for the stage and other alternative venues. In addition to writing more conventional plays, Black women also innovated and experimented with new genres and forms. Many were particularly interested in producing ritualistic experiences. Shange, for example, recalls that early iterations of her landmark choreopoem, for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf, opened with ritual dances composed of "sounds of breath and movement [End Page 109] tracing life from the womb to womanhood before you heard somebody sing a black girl's song" (197). Other narrators share how they likewise became interested in centering music and movement—both with and without text—in their work. For the writer, performer, and composer Grant, this investment led to...

审核人：

• 斗争中的 Sistuhs：黑人艺术运动戏剧和表演的口述历史La Donna L. Forsgren
• 以赛亚·马修·伍登

La Donna L. Forsgen在斗争中的 Sistuhs：黑人艺术运动戏剧和表演的口述历史有力地证明了认真关注黑人女性讲述她们的艺术、激进主义和革命活动的故事的重要性。Forsgren 精明地利用口述历史和批判性表演民族志的传统和方法，更加关注黑人女性在塑造和维持黑人艺术创作中最具催化性的时期之一中所起的重要作用。该研究构思巧妙、组织严谨、写作引人入胜，为叙述者提供了关键空间，让他们能够表达他们的经历、看法和动机，以“为黑人艺术运动理论、戏剧和表演的创造和传播”做出贡献 (12) . 这样做，它进一步暴露了男性主义叙事中的缺陷，这些缺陷已经限制了对 1960 年代和“

这本书的四个按主题组织的章节富含关于黑人女性在对黑人权力的呼声越来越高的情况下帮助发起和推动关于黑人艺术的对话的多种方式的新鲜细节和见解。第 1 章介绍了几位著名和鲜为人知的艺术开拓者——Micki Grant、Sonia Sanchez、Ntozake Shange 和 Jackie Taylor，他们反思了他们与定义该时代的一些概念、理论和实践的关系，包括女权主义和黑人美学。例如，在对本章的简要介绍中，福斯格伦指出，“虽然 [她] 采访的黑人女性知识分子中没有一个人在 70 年代加入女权主义组织，但有些人加入了黑人联谊会，许多人在黑人自由斗争中表达了黑人女权主义的态度” (17)。尽管有些人对女权主义标签持矛盾态度，但该章的许多叙述者仍致力于打击他们在创意和活动圈内外遇到的普遍存在的性别歧视。他们坚定地认为，没有黑人妇女就不可能有黑人解放运动。

第 2 章阐明了黑人艺术运动中的许多黑人女性认为创建文化中心以尊重黑人的经历和愿望的紧迫性。1976 年创立芝加哥黑人合奏剧院的杰基·泰勒（Jackie Taylor）观察到，她之所以这样做，部分原因是她作为电影业的黑人女演员所经历的种族主义。“我创建了一个剧院，它将讲述关于非裔美国人的真相，延续我们的伟大，在社区内提供工作，传递积极的信息，并为成千上万的儿童服务，并帮助他们了解自己是一个人，”她解释说(118)。多丽丝·德比，1963 年与吉尔伯特·摩西和约翰·奥尼尔共同创立了自由南方剧院，揭示了她和她的合作者同样被一种共同的愿望所驱使，“利用戏剧来呈现问题以反映我们过去、现在和未来的目标”（152）。本章聚焦的每个机构建设者的惊人之处在于他们理解和利用剧院作为以不同方式想象和体现世界的有力场所的方式。

这一点在第 3 章和第 4 章中得到了更加突出的关注，其中记录了黑人女性为舞台和其他替代场所创造的非凡项目范围。除了编写更传统的戏剧外，黑人女性还创新并尝试了新的流派和形式。许多人对产生仪式体验特别感兴趣。例如，尚格回忆说，她的标志性编舞诗歌的早期版本，为那些考虑过自杀的有色人种女孩/当彩虹消失时，以由“呼吸声和运动声”组成的仪式舞蹈开场[结束页 109]在你听到有人唱黑人女孩的歌之前，从子宫到女人的生命追踪”（197）。其他叙述者分享了他们如何同样对在他们的作品中集中音乐和运动（无论有没有文字）产生兴趣。对于作家，表演者和作曲家格兰特，这项投资导致...