- Anthropologist Beverly Strassmann’s research on the role of menstrual huts in the Dogon religion suggests that the practice of menstrual isolation may have developed as means to assure paternity — or as the popular press has been covering the story, to prevent wives from cheating.
- Wikipedia has recently added a new article summarizing Judy Grahn’s metaformic theory — the idea that modern day material culture is rooted in ancient menstruation rituals, called “metaforms”. It’s a pretty good summary, if I may say so — a pair of my students wrote it for a class project this quarter. As with all Wikipedia articles, your expertise is wanted; help make it a better resource. (See WikiProject Feminism for particular gaps in coverage of Feminism topics.)
- The ink is barely dry on the contract, but soon the distributor of Giovanna Chesler’s excellent movie, Period? The End of Menstruation, will make the film available for free on Hulu.
- The article is not available online, but the June/July 2012 issue of BUST features an essay by Rachel Friedman questioning the wisdom of the startling practice of more than half of prescriptions for oral contraceptives being for non-contraceptive uses.
- More scientific analysis demonstrating that Plan B is not abortion: Ms. reports on new studies showing that Emergency Contraception (EC) works not by keeping fertilized eggs from implanting in the womb, but by delaying ovulation.
- EJ Graff reminds us that the attack on reproductive rights is not the only war on women.
According to the abstract of Strassman and co-authors’ article “We show that the indigenous religion [of the Dogon people] enables males to achieve a significantly lower probability of cuckoldry (1.3% versus 2.9%) compared with Dogon followers of nonindigenous religions (Christianity and Islam).” As reported in supplemental material, in a further analysis restricted to males born after 1930 (i.e., after the advent of religious conversions) the odds of nonpaternity in the Christians was five times higher than in followers of the indigenous religion, but the Muslims did not differ from the indigenous group. This analysis was based on 1,317 father–son pairs, including 24 nonpaternity events. In either analysis, cuckoldry seemed to be a pretty rare event no matter what your religion, seemed to happen to the same man only once, and, in addition, I imagine there were many cultural changes occurring coincident with the religious changes and many cultural differences between the groups.