Vagina Monologues returns

The Vagina Monologues , the internationally acclaimed play by Eve Ensler, will be presented by Grand Valley State University for the third year in a row in recognition of the worldwide V-Day campaign to end violence against women and girls. Two current monologues and local 'Vagina Warriors' are new features of the groundbreaking play.

The Vagina Monologues  will be performed at 8 p.m. on February 12, 13 and 14 at Wealthy Theatre, 1130 Wealthy Street. Tickets are $8 for students, $16 general public. Purchase in advance by calling Tickets PLUS at (616) 222-4000 or (800) 585-3737, or at the GVSU box office in the Performing Arts Center, Allendale Campus. For information, call the box office weekdays after noon at (616) 331-2300. Tickets are also available at the door; however, due to past sell-outs, advance tickets are recommended.

This year's production will feature two new monologues: one featuring Native American women and the second on the war in Iraq from the perspective of women living in Baghdad. Both scenes were added by Ensler, who bases the play's stories on the lives of real women she meets.

This year's production also features V-Days 2004 theme, 'Celebrating Vagina Warriors,' which honors women (and sometimes men) throughout the world who have experienced violence or who have witnessed it in their communities and are now working to end it. Four local Vagina Warriors have been chosen to read the statement, including two GVSU students who have experienced violence in their own lives, and representatives from the YWCA in Grand Rapids and the Center for Women in Transition in Holland.

Proceeds from the performances will benefit local programs working to end violence against women, with 10 percent going to the V-Day campaigns national spotlight cause: Missing and Murdered Women in Juarez, Mexico. According to V-Day statistics, in the past decade, 300 women and girls have been killed or have disappeared in Juarez, located just across the border from El Paso, Texas.

The Vagina Monologues is sponsored by the Women's Issues Volunteer Corps (a GVSU student organization), with funding from The Nokomis Foundation and additional sponsorship from the GVSU Womens Center.