First Blood First Blood A Cultural Study of Menarche Sally Dammery First Blood: A Cultural Study of Menarche © Copyright 2016 Sally Dammery All rights reserved. Apart from any uses permitted by Australia’s Copyright Act 1968, no part of this book may be reproduced by any process without prior written permission from the copyright owners. Inquiries should be directed to the publisher. Monash University Publishing Matheson Library and Information Services Building 40 Exhibition Walk Monash University Clayton, Victoria 3800, Australia www.publishing.monash.edu Monash University Publishing brings to the world publications which advance the best traditions of humane and enlightened thought. Monash University Publishing titles pass through a rigorous process of independent peer review. www.publishing.monash.edu/books/fb-9781925377040.html Series: Cultural Studies Design: Les Thomas ISBN: 9781925377040 (paperback) ISBN: 9781925377057 (PDF) ISBN: 9781876924829 (ePub) National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry: Creator: Dammery, Sally, author. Title: First blood: a cultural study of menarche / Sally Dammery. ISBN: 9781925377040 (paperback) Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index. Subjects: Menarche. Menstruation--Cross-cultural studies. Menstruation--Folklore. Menstruation--Religious aspects. Dewey Number: 305.4 CONTENTS About the Author .........................................vi Acknowledgements ....................................... vii Introduction .............................................ix Chapter 1 Of Blood and Bleeding ..................................... 1 Chapter 2 The Shocked and the Sanguine. 25 Chapter 3 Becoming Unclean ....................................... 42 Chapter 4 A Rather Special Ceremony ................................ 65 Chapter 5 Menstrual Lore .......................................... 92 Chapter 6 Concealing the Fact ......................................114 Chapter 7 What Should Every Young Girl Know? ....................... 140 Chapter 8 From Menarche to Where? ................................ 162 Conclusion ............................................ 183 Bibliography ........................................... 187 Index ................................................. 203 ABOUT THE AUTHOR Sally Dammery practised clinical midwifery for many years, developing a deep interest in the diversity of cultural beliefs and traditions among the women she attended. Travelling widely increased this interest and led to for mal study of anthropology and history, with later PhD research form ing the ba sis of this book. Previous publications include the ethnography Walter George Arthur: A Free Tasmanian? which shared the Ian Turner History Prize in 2001, and the biography of her enigmatic grandmother, She Lived in Launceston: Isobel Horner of Waratah House, winner of the Lilian Watson Family History Award 2006. Sally is currently Adjunct Research Associate at the School of Philosophical, Historical and International Studies at Monash University, Australia. – vi – ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This book is about an atypical subject but one familiar to young women: the first menstrual period or ‘menarche’. ‘The monarchy?’ I have been asked, not infrequently, and then watched confusion on the faces of the questioner when I reply. So getting started was something of an obstacle course and one I look back on with considerable gratitude to those who dared take a chance and contribute in some way. The foundation for the book lies in the willingness of the women who volunteered to participate; their interviews provided valuable primary source material and I remain profoundly grateful to them, not only for their memories shared among laughter and tears, but for their time given, and the distances they travelled to the meeting places. My gratitude also goes to the managers of the various Neighbourhood Houses and Cultural Centres who permitted me to use the facilities and who provided comfortable and quiet spaces for the interview process. Help and support came from the School of Philosophical, Historical, and International Studies at Monash University, where David Garrioch and Marian Quartly drew my attention to certain historical reports of interest, and Mark Peel, Christina Twomey and Clare Monagle saw some potential in my early plans. From the School of Social Sciences, the anthropologists Matt Tomlinson and Brett Hough responded to my calls for help and directed me to wonderfully helpful Fijian and Indonesian women who closed the cultural gap among my interviewees. Very special thanks to Barbara Caine who read and commented on the chapter drafts. Her admirable intellectual energy, humour and wisdom never flagged, and she deserves a special mention, as does my husband David, who provided the physical and mental space to devote to the research and writing. I am grateful, also, to Nathan Hollier and the editorial group at Monash University Publishing for their help and suggestions and also, most importantly, to the two young women who were the motivation throughout – my granddaughters. – vii – INTRODUCTION I remember hearing the noise, a soft jingly sound, and then, on seeing her, my surprise at how young she looked and how detached from her surround- ings she seemed to be. At dawn she had been bathed and ritually dressed, each item blessed before touching her body. She wore the traditional two- piece buckskin, the buttery-coloured tunic fringed from below shoulder to wrist and decorated with symbols of the powers that would be called upon on her behalf. The skirt rippled as she walked, each of its ankle-length fringes finished with small pressed-tin cones, striking each other musically against her symbolically decorated buckskin boots. Two eagle feathers, symbols of strength, were fastened to the back of her long hair. Around her neck she wore strands of beads, including women’s colours of black and white. Attached to the right side of her skirt was a drinking straw made from cattail reed, and to the left, a wooden scratching stick. Most noticeably her face had been daubed with pollen, the Apache symbol of life and renewal.1 The year was 1996, and the place, the ceremonial ground at the Mescalero Apache reservation in southern New Mexico where I had been invited to witness a ceremony for the young girl now walking in front of me. The reason for this important cultural occasion was female biology. She had experienced her menarche (mɛˈnɑːkɪ), a term that remains unfamiliar outside medical circles – from the Greek words mēn, meaning ‘month’ and arkhē, ‘beginning’ – her first menstrual period. She would shortly commence the deeply symbolic and ritualised activities by which she would be initiated into the knowledge of a properly lived Apache woman’s life. In other words, she was to be given a pattern for living. For four days and four nights, the young girl would be attended by an older woman, her mentor, who had a specialised knowledge of the puberty ceremony. Having prepared her, this woman would continue to guide and reassure her, explaining and interpreting the classical Apache language and actions of the ceremonial practitioner – part priest, part shaman – known as a singer. For the duration of the ceremony, the girl would remain in her traditional dress, embodying the Apache cultural heroine White Painted Woman, whose ancient instruction established the rituals that celebrate a girl’s menarche (the Apache language has a separate naming term for this event, indicating its cultural significance). Although the 1 Author’s journal (unpublished), ‘Apache Puberty Ceremony 4–7 July 1996’, Mescalero Apache Reservation, New Mexico USA. – ix – FIRST BLOOD wider community is involved in this celebration, the major focus is on the ceremonial subject, the girl, believed at this time to have the dual powers of healing and destruction. While her ability to meet the needs of many others would be tested by demands for her touch, to bless and to heal, the same touch under other conditions was thought to be potentially destructive. Hence the cattail drinking straw, fastened to her skirt, to prevent her coming in contact with water, an act which was traditionally believed to cause destructive rains and floods. Similarly, the scratching stick to relieve itches prevented her destructive touch scarring her own body. These aspects of Apache belief about menarche are not magnified, and the general impression one gets from watching the ceremony is of good-humoured support by the onlookers and a sense of achievement by the girl in having officially reached the status of young woman.2 Much has been written about the Apache puberty ceremony and observing it added another dimension to my understanding of the cultural differences I increasingly encountered, both in my work as a hospital-based midwife and in my anthropological and historical studies. From time to time the media reports that menarche is occurring at a younger age in the Western world, paralleling increasing obesity in children.3 I read about it and vaguely considered the social implications, and then something happened that brought me into direct contact with the subject. My granddaughter, a ten year-old wisp of a girl, new to the state and to her school, and with no established circle of friends, had her first period. Knowing that determinants of age at menarche included genetic and environmental 4 factors, and situations of psychological stress, it was understandable. 2 For a detailed study of this complex ceremony see ‘The girl’s puberty rite’, in anthropologist