Lunapads Blog

Any visual artists out there who also happen to be natural menstrual product fans, even activists? Thought I was in the right place.

There is a very exciting book coming out in the next few months by University of Massachusetts Boston writer/researcher/professor Chris Bobel called New Blood: Third Wave Feminism and the Politics of Menstruation - how great does that sound? All she needs now is some cover art and it’s all set to go to press, which brings me to the contest: provide Chris with the winning image, and you’ll receive $100 worth of free products of your choice from Lunapads.  The deadline for submissions is Friday July 10, 2009.

Here’s a description of the book, to help get the creative juices flowing:

“The book is an interdisciplinary, multi-method up-close -and -personal look at a little known, but persistent presence in the feminist health, environmental and consumer rights movements. With humor and verve and since the late 1960s, risk-taking menstrual activists have questioned the safety and necessity of femcare innovations. Through a host of sometimes shocking, always provocative tactics, menstrual activists boldly ask why menstruation is hidden, private and shameful. They force us to ask who, exactly, benefits from this taken-for-granted framing of a natural human process that over half of the human population experiences for about half of their lifetimes.

But this is not only a book about a fascinating movement. It is also an honest and fresh look at feminism-in-flux that illuminates the palpable and often painful tensions between so-called second- and third-wave feminists. Because menstrual activists are a diverse lot in terms of both identity and tactics used, study of the movement offers insight into how feminism is changing and how it has endured over time. In New Blood, we encounter middle-aged suburbanites who commune in Red Tents, queer urban punks who “culture jam” Tampax, teen anarchists who practice DIY health care, African-American women who espouse “holistic womb health,” taboo-smashing consumer advocates and health educators—both men and women— who use zines, blogs and sketch comedy to get the word out about the environmental and health consequences of our personal habits, and mothers of pubescent girls who refuse to pass on the shame.

This is an exciting time in feminist history.

Menstrual activism helps us see what’s at stake in the spirited debates about what to do about gender and the ongoing struggles to engage a truly racially, ethnically and economically diverse movement of social change advocates around a common issue. While exploding gender categories is discussed in every feminist classroom and journal, the conversation lingers in the abstract. After more than 30 years of feminist debate, we aren’t clear what this ideological position look like when we actually DO feminist activism. How can we talk about body-based discrimination, for example, without talking about women AS women — even with all the differences within and among women? At the same time, how can we NOT afford to incorporate a questioning of fundamental categories like gender as we develop feminist agendas for the 21st century?”

Wow - what might these ideas mean to you, and what might a visual expression of that meaning look like? I for one can’t wait to find out…

Deets: Needs to be a high resolution (300 dpi at least) jpg or TIFF. The cover is 6 by 9 inches.  Please send submissions directly to Chris: Chris.Bobel@umb.edu (and copy me, Madeleine@lunapads.com.) Good luck!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 9th, 2009 at 2:04 pm by Madeleine and is filed under Activism & Politics, Contests & Giveaways, Feminism, Women's Health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.