Books by Chris Bobel

“Bobel has written many books about periods and has long had a really interesting scholarly approach to it. In this particular book, she does what she calls an invested critique of the menstrual hygiene management movement. In particular, the international movement where it’s mostly white Westerners, white women, going into other countries with their imperial feminist thoughts and saying, ‘We know what’s best for you. It’s more period products, or, more attention to sanitation conditions, or whatever.’ Some of those things may actually be true. The problem is…that the project of imperial feminism, of white women going in and imposing their ideas on others, is one that’s been around for over 100 years, if not far more. It deserves being interrogated, because all people can speak for themselves. And when adult women from one culture decide that they know what’s best for the adult women or people of another culture, that’s concerning. They’re not even right all the time.” Read more...

The best books on Menstruation

Kate Clancy, Anthropologist