Location
Spanish on her tongue (en dos lenguas) is a one-womyn show about the immigrant displacement, loss of language and denied aboriginality of a queer girl. this coming of age story begins in 1983 chile during the military dictatorship and centers around the migration of a little girl and her family to the working class neighbourhood of chalkfarm – in north york. we follow her through her excitement of learning a new language, while also re-living the shame of losing the language she was taught to love in. as she struggles with her role of translator to her family, lacking words in spanish to authentically interpret situations too mature for her age, her english vocabulary expands, placing her in between two worlds she cannot fully embrace. during her adolescence she stumbles upon her queerness, allowing us to be with her during her first crush, first love and first heart break. throughout her stories we catch glimpses of her indigenous roots, and as we are invited to delve deeper into her life we witness the impact of colonialism and understand through her questions, confusion and pain the complexities of indigenous identity.
about janet romero-leiva:
spanish on her tongue (en dos lenguas), is the first full length production by queer feminist latina visual artist and writer janet romero-leiva. janet is a 1.5 generation chilena-canadian who immigrated to canada at the age of 7 and has since been trying to find her footing between america of the north and america of the south. she has been performing around the city for the past 10 years at/with lengua latina, mayworks, lesimages, toronto women’s bookstore, pride, mujeres al frente, ocasi, etfo, black coffee poet and others. janet is a former social service worker, former staff of the toronto women’s bookstore and former translator. this mostly autobiographical piece is her attempt at creating a space and place for the many mis/under/un-represented voices that roam this land.
We regret this venue is not wheelchair accessible.
Tickets are $12 – $17 sliding scale
Advance tickets available at the Toronto Women’s Bookstore, 73 Harbord Street <http://womensbookstore.com>
sunday* ($16) @ 2:00 pm
*this performance has a fixed price of $16, which includes once, the traditional chilean tea time consisting of canela tea and home-made treats
