SUNDAY 22 JANUARY, 2017 – UWI TODAY
23
Dr Gabrielle Hosein is a Lecturer and Head of the Institute for Gender and Development Studies. She has been involved in Caribbean feminist movement building for two decades.
She also writes a weekly column, Diary of a Mothering Worker, for the Trinidad Guardian
CAMPUS ACTIVISM
Towards the end of the last semester,
a handful of first-year
students sent cupcakes with frosting in the form of vaginas,
some of them with swirls of red to represent menstruating
vaginas, to the Campus Principal. This wasn’t just youthful
generosity, it was part of learning that to raise awareness
about an issue, first you have to draw people’s attention.
The students were undertaking the final assignment
for the first year course, Introduction to Women’s Studies,
offered by the Institute for Gender and Development
Studies, St Augustine Campus. The assignment required
them to raise awareness about contemporary women’s
issues and global women’s rights struggles amongst their
campus peers. These ‘popular actions’ aim to teach students
to connect scholarly analyses to public engagement in order
to advance gender equality. It also encourages them to see
dialogue and debate amongst their generation as a core part
of their learning and university experience.
Students chose their own topics, ranging from sexual
harassment to sexism in media to child marriage. Clear
messaging was key as were their use of creative and
interactive methodologies, for making learning fun and
building allies.. Most of the groups created pamphlets that
explained the concepts they were mobilising, whether these
were patriarchy, androcentrism, gender-based violence or
child rights, and they included places for their campus peers
to leave transformative ideas and recommendations.
‘Vagina cupcakes’ might seem frivolous, but they can
spark discussion about the shame, silencing and hiding
associated with women’s bodies, and with menstruation
in particular, about which students were concerned. They
also allow students to connect with art by hijabi women,
resistance to Instagram’s initial banning of Rupi Kaur’s
photo-essays on menstruation, as well as the Periods for
Pence campaign when women sent then-Governor Pence
thousands of messages about their periods after he signed a
law imposing new limitations on abortion earlier this year.
Medical students could benefit from better training
in ending taboos around menstruation and so could
future HR managers, psychologists and sociologists, for
those taboos are part of a larger culture that reproduces
women’s subordination and violence against women, as
well as silences regarding matters of women’s bodies and
sexuality. A campus now dominated by women students
is the first place to practice changing norms about what is
considered ‘private’ versus ‘public’, especially when those
distinctions have traditionally cast women’s issues as private,
although they are collectively experienced, and despite their
implications for public funds and public spaces.
As two of the students, Kadija McClure and Raqiya
Alexis, wrote, “We chose the issue because we were weary of
having to hide and be ashamed of something that is natural
to us. Menstruation is perceived as impure, disgusting,
and dirty. We chose the issue to inform the public that,
no, menstruation is not a taboo, it is not disgusting, but is
powerful, as it was once seen.”
Their idea was inspired by campaigns like Binti Period
which promotemenstrual dignity through access to sanitary
protection and education, as well as through enabling
women to produce sanitary towels as a sustainable social
enterprise, in India and Nairobi.
Raising Consciousness with
VAGINA CUPCAKES
B Y G A B R I E L L E H O S E I N
Their key message was that “menstrual
taboos reflect patriarchal ideologies which
devalue and stigmatize femininity.” They
started conversations with dozens of
students, asking them “Have you ever
thought of menstruation as powerful?”
They created a ‘hopscotch’ game in which
different squares contained empowering
facts which highlighted that, before the
addition of contemporary religious beliefs,
menstruating women were thought to have
special powers that if not used properly
could harm others. In ancient Egypt,
menstrual blood was used in medical
treatment. Ancient Greeks spreadmenstrual
blood with wine over fields to increase the
fertility of the soil.
Citing Cherise Charleswell, in her
2016 article published by working class
think tank, The Hampton Institute, “How
Patriarchy and CapitalismPenalize Periods,”
the group, which also included Mika Ali,
Jade Marchand and Jernece Vialva, created
a petition calling for free pads and tampons
to be accessible in the female bathrooms on
campus – 330 students signed their petition.
They met with UWI Guild president,
Makesi Peters, who agreed that the Guild of
Students would provide support.
Themed cupcake
A student defining her feminism
PHOTOS: ATIBA CUDJOE
