Sex Roles (2013) 68:151–154 DOI 10.1007/s11199-011-0047-9

BOOK REVIEW

Menstruation Activism: Is the Personal Still Political? New Blood: Third-Wave Feminism and the Politics of Menstruation. By Chris Bobel, New Brunswick, NJ, Rutgers University Press, 2010. 238 pp. $26.95 (paperback) ISBN: 978-0-8135-4754-1 Nancy A. Worcester

Published online: 18 August 2011 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011

Chris Bobel’s New Blood: Third-Wave Feminism and the Politics of Menstruation confirms that menstruation activism is alive, well, and relevant. The book also demonstrates that this activism is now happening in ways that have not been previously studied and its political importance is broader and deeper than generally recognized. On the cutting edge of today’s menstruation activists, Bobel explains, are punk-inspired “third-wave” radical menstruation activists. Unlike groups of activists who have worked previously to influence industry and government, today’s radical menstruation activists challenge the status quo by turning their backs on industries or agencies they don’t trust and instead promote using alternatives (especially emphasizing the use of reusable safer products, even making their own washable cloth pads) and to radicalize others with art and humor through zines, websites, ezines, blogs, culture jamming (parodying and altering advertisements), radical cheerleading, and other creative forms of performance. Perhaps most profoundly, radical menstruation activists have changed the language of menstruation to talk about “menstruators” rather than “women who menstruate.” This choice of language not only reflects a commitment to a more inclusive (including trans people) movement but also demonstrates the political importance of gender neutral language and dismantling the narrowness and restrictiveness of gender binaries (Chapter 5, “Radical Menstruation”). Substantial, carefully developed chapters detail the specifics of menstrual activism. I recommend the excellent historical chapter, “The Emergence of Menstrual Activism” N. A. Worcester (*) University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI USA e-mail: [email protected]

(Chapter 3), for every women’s health course. Exploring “second-wave” feminism, Bobel traces the women’s health movement, environmentalism, and consumer activism intersecting in menstruation activism through three phases: commercial menstruation products being welcomed and associated with freedom and liberation; increased concerns about product safety and the importance of alternatives; and, Toxic Shock Syndrome inspired campaigns for tampon safety, standardization of tampon labeling, and the proliferation of alternative products. “The Emergence of Menstrual Activism” chapter could be used as a model to demonstrate how the history of this specific women’s health topic was influenced by wider social and political factors. Then, students could use this model for developing a similar historical context for other specific topics. Bobel uses two chapters for in-depth examinations of present day menstrual activism. She emphasizes that “the contemporary movement has bifurcated into two wings and their differences—both conceptual and tactical—are stark.” (p.64) Drawing on her own innovative and multi-faceted ethnographic research (including collecting a diversity of menstrual activism materials and interviewing their creators, attending/engaging in a full range of menstruation activism events, and in-depth interviews with 65 activists), Bobel shares her wealth of knowledge about both wings of today’s movements: feminist-spiritualists and radical menstruation activists. In contrast to the extremely radical political “third- wave” menstruation activists (Chapter 5, “Radical Menstruation,” briefly described in my introductory paragraph), feminist-spiritualists are presented as working in many different ways—through gatherings of workshops and conferences, dancing circles, and community healing rituals, developing body literacy by learning and charting the basics of their own menstrual cycles, and creating rituals and products to celebrate menstruation and

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menarche—to reclaim menstruation as a beautiful, empowering, pleasurable part of women’s lives (Chapter 4, “Feminist-Spiritualist Menstrual Activism”). While these chapters describing contemporary activism are used to build up to the book’s most critical insights, analysis, and questions, they simultaneously provide an abundance of specific information about the issues, tactics, and products around which menstruation activism has been/ is organized. Some examples: – –

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Annual sales for the US FemCare industry are approximately $2.3 billion and that market is dominated by four companies. (p. 107) Annual sales in the global FemCare industry are more than $17 billion annually for pads (69.4%), panty liners (15.2%) and tampons (15.1%) and “expanding markets” promise increasing growth and influence. (p. 107) The Student Environmental Action Coalition reports that annually more than twelve billion pads and seven million tampons are used once and thrown away. An average woman (calculated as using five tampons a day for five days per menstruation) disposes of approximately 1,400 menstrual products in her lifetime. (p. 63) Responses to menstruation activism have varied enormously from country to country. In Britain, in 1988, environmental activists (particularly the Women’s Environmental Network) influenced a BBC World Action program on the dangers of chlorine-bleached products and organized a follow-up letter writing campaign. This resulted in parliament demanding changes in the disposable paper products industry; within six weeks all major British menstruation product manufactures had pledged to stop using chlorine-bleaching processes. In contrast, it took US health and consumer activists ten years for the 1990 victory when the FDA finally required tampon manufacturers to standardize absorbency ratings and notify consumers to use the lowest absorbency products appropriate for their flow. (p. 61) A bill (The Robin Danielson Act, named for a woman who died of Toxic Shock Syndrome [TSS]) that has been regularly introduced in Congress since 1997 that would require the National Institutes of Health to conduct research on tampon safety and the Centers for Disease Control to collect and report TSS data, gets little attention in Congress or from menstruation activists. (p. 106) Alternative menstruation products have received growing attention and are increasingly available. Bobel’s research uncovered at least 40 active alternative FemCare businesses in English speaking countries. (p. 60) Controversial “menstrual huts”/Red Tents are important to many feminist-spiritualists who consider the huts to be sacred space for honoring menstruation. There are more than 30 Red Tents in more than 20 US cities. (p. 74)

Many small women-owned businesses cater to the needs of feminist-spiritualists able to afford items for their menstruation and menarche rituals. One web-site offers Goddess drums, ceremonial dresses, and ceremonial banners. (p. 90) Another offers a kit that can be kept as a keepsake box that includes menarche celebration invitations, ceremonial candles, a “speaking stone,” and a script designed to shape the rituals. (p. 91) Readers of New Blood will learn much more about menstruation issues and menstruation activism than they knew there was to know. But, this is not just a book about menstruation activism. This is a book in which Bobel uses menstruation activism as the lens through which to explore much bigger questions including: What are the relationships of “second-wave” and “third-wave” feminisms? What does or doesn’t transform personal insights and empowerment into political action and/or social change rather than simply remaining personal? What does menstruation activism tell us about “the on-going tug-of-war between feminists who embrace sexual difference theory and those who embrace gender theory?” (p.xi, foreword by Judith Lorber) How does menstrual activism reflect work for a more inclusive feminism that embraces the interconnectedness of oppressions and dominations and thrives on complexities and contradictions? New Blood is not only about activism, it is also both a gift to and from feminist movements. As I watched Bobel identify and then navigate mine field after mine field while exploring complexities and contradictions, I couldn’t help smiling often in recognition that this is what feminism is all about. Bobel, self-described as an “in-betweener” (between second and third “waves”) feminist women’s studies professor, never shies away from raising the hard questions even though that often leads to more questions than answers (p. 6). She uses her own voice in an impressive, never distracting, way that shows her deep connection to and curiosity about the issues she is exploring and the experiences (from making menstrual pads to participating in dancing circles and Red Tent rituals) she had as a part of her research. Her own voice is particularly powerful when she demonstrates her willingness to self-question and when she expresses personal respect for activist informants even while exploring the limitations or contradictions of their activism. More than once, I noted when something seemed to be missing or too simplistic in Bobel’s analysis only to find that there was an entire section or chapter ahead to explore the nuances of particularly challenging topics. This was particularly the case for what turned out to be entire chapters in which Bobel teased out the complexities for why only a small percentage of her interviewees were women of color but at least 63% identified as queer. For many readers (including people who think they are not specifically

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interested in the topic of menstruation activism), these chapters, “Making Sense of Movement Participation” (Chapter 6) and “When ‘Women’ Becomes ‘Menstruators’” (Chapter 7), will be the ones we read again and again and recommend to friends and colleagues for new insights and discussion of how marginalization and privilege continue to have an impact on who is involved or who we see as involved in feminist movements and how “third-wave’s” troubling gender “is smashing categories along the way to social justice” (p.170). Throughout her book, Bobel draws on and engages with feminist theorists and a broad range of feminist writing, effectively grounding her work theoretically while modeling how to make feminist theory feel accessible and relevant. Women’s Studies colleagues are already successfully using these chapters in their courses to make relevant connections between feminist theory and practice. An emphasis of New Blood is the exploration of the connections and disconnections between previous menstrual activism and today’s radical menstruation activists. In her “Encountering Third-Wave Feminism” (Chapter 1), Bobel introduces many themes to be followed throughout the book, particularly understanding and critiquing the terminology (“second-wave,” “third-wave”) and rhetoric that disconnects the continuity between generations of feminists. For example, even when Bobel is detailing the crucial changes “thirdwave” activists are bringing to feminism (“The many linkages between third-wave feminism and transgender theorizing and activism demonstrate that the grounds for inclusion in gender theorizing are much broader than originally conceived” [p.164]… “The menstrual activists show us that when we interrogate the relationships between the material body and identity, the cultural and the biological, and the social and the individual—and even when we question the very categories upon which the movement itself rests—we are better equipped to make profound change. Listen to the menstrual activists. They are living this transformation…” [p.178]), she simultaneously emphasizes that many of the strategies of today’s activism are more technologically advanced versions of tactics rooted in “second-wave” grassroots organizing/publicity/informationsharing, first person narratives, clever thought-provoking humor, performance and “self-help as a political tool.” Bobel examines how vibrant radical menstruation activism grew out of “third-wavers” intentionally turning their backs on previous “reform” activism. In contrast, feministspiritualism is painted as a fairly stagnant and marginalized (having “endured since the 1970s” [p.134]) collection of individuals and groups who still perform personally transforming rituals and individual body literacy important to the women involved, but never moving from personal empowerment to a collective movement. Bobel’s in-depth analysis of feminist-spiritualism explores how questioning privilege, questioning cultural appropriation (for example,

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white women using Hindu religious symbols to signify that they were menstruating or adapting a wide range of Native American spiritual practices), and questioning the essentializing of all women would be necessary for feminist spiritualism to be a more politically relevant movement. To add to her detailed analysis of how radical menstruators rebelled against “second-wave” efforts to engage with industry and government and why feminist-spiritualism never evolved into a more politically relevant movement, I wanted Bobel to explore how some movements/organizations started in the 70s have survived and thrived into the 21st century, applying their analyses to today’s issues and purposefully working to connect with young feminists. From my own involvement with several of “yesterday’s” organizations, I experience them as vibrant, still nationally and internationally visible, influencing the world of women’s health, and bringing together older and younger feminists. The Endometriosis Association, the international consumer-based organization credited with the groundbreaking research demonstrating a link between dioxins and endometriosis (Rier et al. 1993), has recently sent urgent emails asking members to contact Congressional representatives to support hearings on chronic pain in women (considered a major step in expanding federal research on such conditions as endometriosis) (Endometriosis Association 2010) and to support the Toxic Chemicals Safety Act requiring the chemical industry to prove that chemicals in everyday products (such a menstruation products) are safe. Ready to celebrate 40 years of empowering women, Our Bodies, Ourselves (OBOS) through the 8th edition of its book (Boston Women’s Health Book Collective 2005), website, blog, and resources based on OBOS available in more than 25 languages, continues to introduce new generations to the politics of information related to understanding their menstrual cycles, Toxic Shock Syndrome (TSS), dioxins, alternative menstrual and menstrual suppression products. The National Women’s Health Network (NWHN), the national membership organization devoted to all women’s health issues for more than 35 years, is visible on policy and product safety issues, including arranging consumer testimonies for FDA hearings (see http://www.nwhn.org). Perhaps best known for its influence on older women’s issues, particularly successfully advocating for controlled scientific studies on hormone “replacement” therapy (HRT) (Pearson 2006), this organization is equally committed to young women’s issues (such as calling for longer term studies on menstrual suppression products) and developing and relating to young feminist leadership through an ambitious internship program and making young feminists’ columns central to its newsletter. The Society for Menstrual Cycle Research (SMCR), through scholarships and active recruitment, works to make certain that young feminist voices are a part of the organization’s fascinating bi-annual conferences combining

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scientific research papers and activism. The SMCR is influential today through numerous channels, including congressional briefings on “Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder” (Caplan 2002) and policy papers on menstruation-suppression products (see http://www.menstruationresearch.org). I would have also liked Bobel to emphasize that one of the ways “second-wave’s” impact is most obvious (and I’d say revolutionary) is through its long-term, continuous politicization of upcoming generations, particularly in ways that personal health issues (including menstruation) continue to be the starting point for much “consciousness-raising.” As I read New Blood, I found myself thinking of how using Giovanna Chesler’s (2006) film, “Period: The End of Menstruation?” showing a transman road construction worker talking positively about his menstruation, in my women’s health course, had been an “ah ha” moment for my 400 women’s studies students suddenly moving towards a deeper curiosity about gender and language. (Like Bobel) I live in a community and am involved in national movements where I am constantly impressed by incredible young feminists who were politicized through personal issues, feminist organizations, and feminist classes. Indeed, as Bobel pointed out, 69% of the radical menstruation activists she interviewed had taken at least one gender or women’s studies class. In building long lasting, politically active feminist movements, more analysis is needed of what keeps people stuck at “the personal is personal” stage versus what moves people on to “the personal is political” action, what works for long term survival, and for uniting feminists across generations. Even though New Blood can’t answer all these questions, it inspires the reader to think much more about this as Bobel’s enthusiasm is contagious. She

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concludes her book saying that the tension/the crisis “between those who wish to preserve womanhood as a core category of feminism and those who wish to explode not only that category but also the gender binary on which it rests” (p. 171) reassures her of the strength of feminist movements. “Since getting to know the people and the ideas associated with this little known but nonetheless potent (menstruation activist) movement, I have uncharacteristically become an optimist” (p.171). New Blood renewed this second-waver’s vision for more multigenerational movements and activism and made me feel excited about what I have to learn from third and maybe even fourth-wave feminists.

References Boston Women’s Health Book Collective. (2005). Our bodies, ourselves. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster. Caplan, P. J. (2002, Summer). You, too, can hold a congressional briefing: The SMCR goes to Washington about “premenstrual dysphoric disorder” and Sarafem. The Society for Menstrual Cycle Research Newsletter, 1–5. Chesler, G. (2006). Period: The end of menstruation? [Motion picture]. USA: g6pictures. Endometriosis Association. (2010). Campaign to end chronic pain in women launched. Endometriosis Association Newsletter, 30(5), 1, 20. Pearson, C. (2006). What can the women’s health initiative tell us about how to age healthfully? Women’s Health Activists Newsletter. Retrieved from http://nwhn.org/what-can-womens-health-ini tiative-tell-us-about-how-age-healthfully-part-i Rier, S. E., Martin, D. C., Bowman, R. E., Dmowski, W. P., & Becker, J. L. (1993). Endometriosos in Rhesus monkeys (Macaca Mulatta) following chronic exposure to 2,3,7,8,-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin. Fundamental and Applied Toxicology, 21, 433–441.