When students and colleagues describe English Professor Gay Gibson Cima, they use words like “involved,” “passionate,” “animated,” and “committed.” Few, if any, would use a word she uses to describe herself -- “shy.”

But her timidity, Cima suggests, is likely what sparked her interest in the empowering qualities of “performance,” a term she uses to describe diverse forms of artistic representation and social self-presentation. In her nearly 30 years at Georgetown, Cima has taught courses in performance theory, theatrical representations of gender and race, and staging social movements. In her most recent book, “Early American Women Critics: Performance, Religions and Race” (Cambridge University Press, 2006), she explores this empowerment during the 18th century.

“Historically, women have used many different types of performance -- theatrical presentations, street performances, religious conversions, poetry readings -- to contribute to the social and cultural dialogues from which they were otherwise excluded,” said Cima, describing the focus of her book.

This kind of expression, she proposes, provided the protective shield behind which otherwise invisible women could stake their claims on American citizenship. For those early American women, and for the many marginalized poets, playwrights, activists and artists that later followed them, performance afforded access to some of the most important civic debates of their times.

Through her teaching at Georgetown, she hopes to encourage her students to contribute to those important human rights debates as well.

“I want them to focus on something greater than their careers,” Cima said. “Through their experiences in my classes and at Georgetown, I want them to imagine new ways in which they can contribute to society’s ongoing debates.”

“Gay’s work is distinctive in that she uses the theories and techniques of performance studies to make political engagement and humanistic concern come alive,” said Maya Roth, director of Georgetown’s Theater Program.

“Her students bring a critical sophistication to their work in the classroom, and with us onstage,” Roth said, “largely because she exposes them to performance as it relates to civic life."

When Cima arrived at Georgetown in 1978, following a successful run with Washington’s celebrated New Playwrights Theater, she was eager to use performance to engage her students in discussions of identity, justice, and human rights. She partnered with a group of enthusiastic young actors and within a few years, they launched Friday Afternoon Theater, Georgetown’s first activist theater troupe.

During the group’s initial years, the members met in a small classroom on the first floor of Healy Hall. And while their resources included little more than a makeshift stage and a blackboard backdrop, Cima guided them through some of the most thought-provoking performances on campus.

“Gay was the inspiration, guru and ultimate resource for Friday Afternoon Theater,” said Tina Chen (C’92), the groups former executive producer and now an associate professor of English at Vanderbilt University. “She played so many roles, not only because she could, but because she is such a generous and supportive person.”

Activist theater provides Cima with the opportunity to engage students in a critical exploration of performance beyond the stage and the script. Using unconventional works by marginalized artists, Cima urges her students to imagine their performances as contributions to political and cultural debates. She challenges her students to improve the world around them with their performances.

In recent years, Cima has taken an active role coordinating lectures, conferences and other events related to the topic of social justice through the Humanities and Human Rights Initiative. Together with her colleagues, she has helped to change how the humanities at Georgetown participate in the human rights dialogue.

“Gay is a teacher whose force of personality makes you not just want to be a better student, but a better person,” said Chen of her former professor and mentor. “That’s a rare and wonderful quality, something I appreciated when I was a student, but that I value infinitely more now that I am her friend and colleague.”

Source: Office of Communications