The group breaks up. Women hold their positions, facing in the same direction, but stopped.

III

The third part is about why it's hard to move from individual personal growth to political action and structural change. Women come onto the floor wearing labels, standing in a semi-circle.

Alex (Self-doubt) takes Cathy by the hand and takes her to Aisla (Self-esteem). Aisla walks with Cathy. When they pass Karen (Fear), she turns on Cathy with a belt, saying in an angry voice, "What do you think you're doing?"

Aisla backs away. Alex comes back in to Cathy. Then Mary (Support) joins them and walks with Cathy to Dianne (Voice) who hands her a lit candle.

Cathy walks over to Debbie (Literacy) who hands her a book. "Why don't you try this? It's a literacy program." La Vera (Family responsibilities) comes over and angrily throws the book down. "You can't do this. Who will take care of the kids?"

Alex walks over and blows out the candle. Shirley (from outside) reaches in and relights it.

Sharing our work

When we came together after working in these three groups all day, women sat and lay down around the edges of the room. We looked at the drawings and fans as women talk about the meanings behind the images. We heard the women from the documentation group talk about their exploration of words and meanings. The women from the theatre group then presented their performance piece as Alex Keir, their recorder, videotaped it.

We stayed very, very quiet after the performance. A few women then talked about how seeing the words and images acted out brought them close to tears. Others talked about the theatre group's questions. Why would we - how could we - separate personal growth from political action? Can there be structural change or group action if each of us has not had a chance to work through our own hopes and fears?

Does our funding require us to undervalue women's individual growth through literacy or through research? Why do we always have to search for ways to quantify our experiences? How can we, in the documentation for this research, show the extent of the change in individual women, groups of women and programs in a way that does not suggest one achievement is better than another?