Book Description
Menstruation, seen alternately as something negative--a "curse" or a failed conception--or as a positive part of the reproductive process to be celebrated as evidence of fertility, has long been a universal concern. How women interpret and react to menstruation and its absence reflects their individual needs both historically as well as in the contemporary cultural, social, economic, and political context in which they live. This unique volume considers what is known of women's options and practices used to regulate menstruation--practices used to control the periodicity, quantity, color, and even consistency of menses--in different places and times, while revealing the ambiguity that those practices present.

Originating from an Internet conference held in February 1998, this volume contains fourteen papers that have been revised and updated to cover everything from the impact of the birth control pill to contemporary views on reproduction to the pharmacological properties of various herbal substances, reflecting the historical, contemporary, and anthropological perspectives of this timely and complex issue.






From the Inside Flap
Historical and anthropological studies of the practices of women use to affect their menses have largely failed to consider their perceptions of menstruation and their intentions over the course of time. Do women view their period as something negative--a "curse," or a failed conception--or as something to be celebrated because it signals either that they are not pregnant, or that they remain fecund? This unique volume considers women's attitudes toward their menses and the ambiguities inherent in regulating them. Covering a wide range of topics from the impact of herbal substances to current views of reproduction and the Pill, this multidisciplinary work by historians, anthropologists, demographers, and health specialists sheds new light on the culture of reproduction.



About the Author
Etienne van de Walle is a professor of demography and a member of the Population Studies Center at the University of Pennsylvania. He coedited Mortality and Society in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Elisha P. Renne is an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology and Center for Afroamerican and African Studies at the University of Michigan and author of Cloth That Does Not Die: The Meaning of Cloth in Bunu Social Life.

FROM THE PUBLISHER