Red moon rising: Breaking the cycle of menstrual shaming through countercultural rhetoric.

摘要

Menstruation is often interpreted as unclean, humiliating, and awkward. This study explores the causes of this source of sociocultural discomfort and disrupts the often misogynistic discourse situated around and within it. Through the merging of anecdotal data and critical theory from radical menstrual scholars such as Inga Muscio (Cunt, 2002), the disjointed American psyche, as it relates to menstruation and the female body, is identified and dismantled.;In recent decades, studies on menstrual consciousness, capitalism, and activism have surfaced in the fields of economics, body politics, and women's spirituality. Today, despite menstrual activism such as artwork, blogging, and performance art, "menstruation-positive" culture remains somewhat elusive. This thesis investigates the origins of menstrual shaming and how, more recently, feminist menstrual activists have reclaimed the bleeding body and appropriated its meaning and visibility in mainstream culture.;Detailed explications of print and video advertisements correlate with the pervasive shame and embarrassment of menstruation. A critical feminist lens locates and disarticulates the symbiotic relationship between advertiser and consumer. The rhetoric of activism, such as abstaining from the use of generic products like disposable pads and tampons, and even painting with menstrual blood, boasts a subculture of neo-feminist resistance and a rejection of anti-menstrual propaganda that seeks to further inferiorize the placement of women and girls in a culture that vulgarizes the vagina and its menstrual blood.