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Review

The Messy Politics of Menstrual Activism

Chris Bobel  1 , Breanne Fahs  2
Chris Bobel  1 , Inga T. Winkler  2 , Breanne Fahs  3 , Katie Ann Hasson  4 , Elizabeth Arveda Kissling  5 , Tomi-Ann Roberts  6
, editors.
In: The Palgrave Handbook of Critical Menstruation Studies [Internet]. Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan; 2020. Chapter 71.
.
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Review

The Messy Politics of Menstrual Activism

Chris Bobel et al.
Free Books & Documents

Excerpt

In this chapter, Bobel and Fahs first describe a brief history of menstrual activism alongside its more recent iterations in both policy and radical social activism. They review the collective call to reduce stigma and shame around menstruation as part of the enduring project of loosening the social control of women’s bodies. The authors then turn to an analysis of menstrual humor, menstrual art, and menstrual activism today, respectively. This is followed by an examination of the hazards and possibilities of doing menstrual activist work, including politics of menstrual language and the trivializations and hostilities that can plague this work. Finally, Bobel and Fahs offer a politically charged outline for the future of menstrual activism.

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References

    1. Arriaga, Alex. 2017. “Tampons in Men’s Rooms? It’s Just a Small Part of ‘Menstrual Equity,’ Campus Activists Say.” The Chronicle of Higher Education. http://www.chronicle.com/article/Tampons-in-Men-s-Rooms-/240091.
    1. Barkardóttir, Freyja Jónudóttir. 2016. “Hope of Failure: Subverting Disgust, Shame and the Abject in Feminist Performances with Menstrual Blood.” Masters Thesis, Central European University.
    1. Bloomfield, Mandy. 2015. “Unsettling Sustainability: The Poetics of Discomfort.” Green Letters 19 (1): 21–35.
    1. Bobel, Chris. 2007. “‘I’m Not an Activist, Though I’ve Done a Lot of It’: Doing Activism, Being Activist and the ‘Perfect Standard’ in a Contemporary Movement.” Social Movement Studies 6 (2): 147–59.
    1. ———. 2010. New Blood: Third-Wave Feminism and the Politics of Menstruation. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

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