"The author effortlessly links postcolonial feminist thinking to MHM, which is commendable for a book that hails from the global north." (Aysha Farhana Chakkampully, Gender and Research, Vol. 22 (2), 2021)
"The Managed Body would be a valuable addition to courses on gender and health, embodiment, critical development studies, medical anthropology, and reproductive health and rights. This book's accessible style also makes it appropriate for a much wider audience, and The Managed Body belongs on the reading lists of development professionals, feminist activists and anyone else interested in gender, health, and development." (Leigh Senderowicz, Gender & Society, Vol. 20 (10), 2020) "This book will not only appeal to those interested in the topic but also to those who research race, globalization, transnationalism, rhetoric, feminism, public health, gender, activism, or economics." (Berkley Conner, Affilia, December 6, 2019) "The book is a timely, important and provides a fascinating read about contemporary feminism, activism and capitalism." (Camilla Mørk Røstvik, Social History of Medicine, Vol. 32 (4), November, 2019)
Chapter 1: Introduction: What a Girl Needs….- Part I: Context.- Chapter 2: The Girling of Development.- Chapter 3: Making Menstruation Matter in the Global South: Mapping a Critical History of the Menstrual Hygiene Management Movement.- Part II: Framing the Problem: Stories of Risk, Risk of Stories.- Chapter 4: “Can You Imagine?” Making the Case for a Bloody Crisis.- Chapter 5: The Spectacle of the ‘Third World Girl’ and the Politics of Rescue.- Part III.Framing the Solution: Developing the ‘Good Body’.- Chapter 6: “Dignity Can’t Wait”: Building a Bridge to Human Rights.- Chapter 7: Disciplining Girls through the Technological Fix: Modernity, Markets, Materials.- Chapter 8: Beyond the Managed Body: Putting Menstrual Literacy at the Center.- Appendix A: Methods.- Appendix B: Notes on Language.
Chris Bobel is Associate Professor of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston and past president of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research. She is the author of The Paradox of Natural Mothering, New Blood: Third Wave Feminism and the Politics of Menstruation and co-editor of Embodied Resistance: Challenging the Norms, Breaking the Rules and Body Battlegrounds: Transgressions, Tensions, Transformations.
The Managed Body is an invested critique of the discourses of ‘Menstrual Hygiene Management’ (MHM)--a growing social movement to support menstruating girls in low and middle income countries. Bobel shows how MHM organizations frame the issues by claiming menstruating girls encounter ‘a hygienic crisis’ that authorizes rescue. Faced by the challenges of capturing attention and directing resources, MHM advocates often inadvertently rely upon weak evidence and spectacularized representations to promote a product-centered, consumerist agenda that actually accommodates more than it resists the core problem of menstrual stigma.