Menstrual Bodies and Gender

ISBN-13: 9789811929984 / Angielski / Miękka / 2023

Eugenia Tarzibachi

Opis

This book interrogates how the so-called “Feminine Care” industry travelled from the United States to Latin America via manufactured and disposable menstrual management technologies and certain narratives about menstrual bodies. The author focuses on Argentina as a case study to deepen the analysis of transnational politics and business practices around menstruation, drawing on women’s voices to unveil why menstruation is still a bodily process that is natural yet taboo in Latin America. This fascinating volume is a must-read for anyone interested in how the “Feminine Care” industry helped reify the insidious social mandate of shame and secrecy over women’s bodily experiences.

Spis treści

1. Putting Your Body into It.

2. Menstruating, Doing Gender.

3. Advertising “Feminine Protectors:” From Hygiene to Women’s Liberation.

4. “Becoming a Young Lady:” The First Period as a Mark of Gender.

5. The First Person: From “Rags” to Pads and Tampons.

6. Conclusion: Overdue Policies on the Menstrual Cycle and Final Remarks.

O autorze

Eugenia Tarzibachi is a licensed psychologist with a PhD in social sciences from the University of Buenos Aires (Argentina), and a Master’s in clinical psychology from the University of San Francisco (United States). Author of the book Women's Thing. Menstruation, Gender and Power (in Spanish, 2017) awarded with the Ángeles Durán Prize of the Autonomous University of Madrid (Spain) for the innovation and advancement of feminist theory. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research and is an Associate Marriage and Family Therapist in California where she is currently living.

Blurb

Tarzibachi deftly illustrates how markets and gender ideologies produce a curiously bloodless femininity. Product and marketing innovations, she reveals, reify the insidious social mandate of shame, secrecy and silence in spite of industry claims to liberate and ‘protect.’ But where there is conformity, there is also resistance. In Menstrual Bodies and Gender, readers will not only encounter a powerful feminist critique of transnational discourses that discipline and commodify; they will also imagine a body positive, gender inclusive future. 
- Chris Bobel, Associate Professor of Women´s, Gender and Sexuality Studies, University of Massachusetts, USA.


A comprehensive and fascinating study of the transnational institution of menstruation. Tarzibachi analyzes menstrual flows, the industry of menstruation, and the representations of menstruating women across the Americas with a precise eye for detail. She asks astute questions that go from the intimate to the global, from bedrooms and hospitals, to boardrooms and classrooms. This book will have repercussions for research and policy for years to come.   
- Mónica Szurmuk, Senior Researcher, National Scientific and Technical Research Council of Argentina.


This book interrogates how the so-called “Feminine Care” industry travelled from the United States to Latin America via manufactured and disposable menstrual management technologies and certain narratives about menstrual bodies. The author focuses on Argentina as a case study to deepen the analysis of transnational politics and business practices around menstruation, drawing on women’s voices to unveil why menstruation is still a bodily process that is natural yet taboo in Latin America. This fascinating volume is a must-read for anyone interested in how the “Feminine Care” industry helped reify the insidious social mandate of shame and secrecy over women’s bodily experiences.

Eugenia Tarzibachi is a licensed psychologist with a PhD in social sciences from the University of Buenos Aires (Argentina), and a Master’s in clinical psychology from the University of San Francisco (United States). Author of the book Women's Thing. Menstruation, Gender and Power (in Spanish, 2017) awarded with the Ángeles Durán Prize of the Autonomous University of Madrid (Spain) for the innovation and advancement of feminist theory. She is a member of the Board of Directors of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research and is an Associate Marriage and Family Therapist in California where she is currently living.