Menstrual Cycles PDF

Menstrual Time: The Sociocognitive Mapping of "The Menstrual Cycle" Author(s): Johanna Foster ource: Sociological Forum , Sep., 1996, Vol. 11, No. 3, Special Issue: Lumping and plitting (Sep., 1996), pp. 523-547 Published by: Springer table URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/684899 STOR is a not-...

Menstrual Time: The Sociocognitive Mapping of "The Menstrual Cycle" Author(s): Johanna Foster ource: Sociological Forum , Sep., 1996, Vol. 11, No. 3, Special Issue: Lumping and plitting (Sep., 1996), pp. 523-547 Published by: Springer table URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/684899 STOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide ange of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and acilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. our use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at ttps://about.jstor.org/terms Wiley and Springer are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Sociological Forum Sociological Forum, Vol. 11, No. 3, 1996 Menstrual Time: The Sociocognitive Mapping of "The Menstrual Cycle" Johanna Foster1,2 Despite the many angles from which the biological phenomenon now known as "the menstrual cycle" has been addressed, no work explicitly focuses on how social groups actually draw lines around and mentally partition these complex biological processes into discrete temporal units. This paper examines not the meaning of "the menstrual cycle," per se, but hegemonic Western culture's intersubjective notions of how to carve up this inherently unstructured phenomenon in the first place. Although sociologists of cognition have still to consider this sociomental structuring of "the menstrual cycle" as a case of mental cartography, and sociologists of time have still to consider "menstrual time" as a case of sociotemporality, I conclude that the mental mapping out of what constitutes the elements of this rhythm is a highly social act with serious implications for women's lives. KEY WORDS: menstrual cycle; menstruation; sociology of cognition; sociology of time; so- ciotemporality. Menstruation per se has no meaning, for menstruation per se does not exist. Louise Lander, 1988, p. 187. INTRODUCTION Biology teaches us that, at regular intervals, the levels of ovarian pituitary hormones in the female body rise and stimulate the growth Graafian follicles within the ovary. One of these follicles eventually matu as an ovum and is released by one of the two ovaries into a Fallopian 1Department of Sociology, Rutgers University, P. 0. Box 5072, New Brunswick, New J 08903-5072. 2To whom correspondence should be addressed. 523 0884-8971/96/0900-0523$09.50/0 ? 1996 Plenum Publishing Corporation This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 524 Foster As the unfertilized egg descends into the corpus of the uterus, hormonal fluctuations activate the production of a membrane lining of the uterine wall within which the ovum becomes embedded. Unless fertilization takes place, the lining and the ovum detach from the uterine wall and exit the body via the vagina. Much has been written about this biological phenomenon now known as "the menstrual cycle." Poetry, religion, mythology, folklore, anthropol- ogy, and medical science have repeatedly taken this natural female rhythm as the focus of inquiry. Such literatures include cultural analyses that in- vestigate how women give meaning to the regular changes in their bodies (e.g., Snowden and Christian, 1983; Kay, 1986; Martin, 1987; Lee, 1994); investigations of associated rites, taboos, and symbolism (e.g., Weideger, 1976; Delaney et al., 1978; Shuttle and Redgrove, 1978; Golub, 1983; Sjoo and Mor, 1987; Grahn, 1993); description and debate over the physical, psychological, and emotional effects (e.g., Chadwick, 1932; Fluhmann, 1939, 1956; Deustch, 1944; Maddux, 1975; Dalton, 1983; Fausto-Sterling, 1985; Tavris, 1992); and behavioral effects on women's lives (e.g., Ferdman, 1973; Snowden and Christian, 1983). Such explorations include empirical studies examining physiological and morphological changes including amount of blood loss (e.g., Haynes et al., 1977); duration of parts of the rhythm, such as the time of bleeding (e.g., Rothstein and Sanchez Mena, 1975); the amount of time it takes for the egg to move from the ovary to the uterus (e.g., Bailey and Marshall, 1970); or the duration of the entire cycle itself (e.g., Foster, 1889; Treloar, 1974). Yet despite the many angles from which "the menstrual cycle" has been addressed, no work explicitly focuses on how social groups mentally parti- tion these complex biological processes into discrete temporal units. Al- though science is relatively certain about what sorts of biological changes take place in women's bodies periodically, it is not at all certain how to structure "menstrual" time. For example, does "the menstrual cycle" consist of two parts or six parts? Is the "postovulatory stage" identical to the "pre- menstrual stage?" Why does the "proliferative stage" sometimes include the "menstrual phase" but other times not? Does an egg have to be re- leased for "the menstrual cycle" to be considered complete? Is "premen- struation" a more critical stage than "regeneration?" Simply put, medical science has yet to produce consistent mental maps that structure collective thinking about how many discrete phases actually constitute "the menstrual cycle," what to call these phases, how long each of these phases should take, what must be included in the cycle for it to count as a full cycle, or which phases of the cycle carry the most significance. More fundamentally, science takes for granted that "the menstrual cycle" is a cycle. In this paper, then, I examine not the meaning of "the menstrual cycle," per se, but This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 525 hegemonic Western culture's intersubjective notions of how to cognitively carve up this inherently unstructured phenomenon in the first place. MAKING "MENSTRUAL " TIME: LOOKING AT WOMEN'S PERIODICITY THROUGH VARIOUS MODELS OF TIME The conceptualization of "menstrual" time as akin to a spinning wh traveling along the road of a woman's fertile life is the one that car the most currency in popular and medical discourse in the West. Yet th is nothing inevitable about conceptualizing "menstrual" time in precise this way. Rather, this time is better understood as a social invention result of similar social processes of "making time" that have produced "hour" and the "week" (Zerubavel, 1985). Each of these temporal unit a consequence of what I call sociomental cartography, and suggests that ways in which social groups cognitively organize "menstrual" time, like organization of the week, is neither an individual interpretation nor a versal measure, but a social process of temporal differentiation. For example, the demarcation between sacred and profane tim (Durkheim, 1915/1965:21-33) is one of several alternative ways of org izing women's periodicity that betrays the conventionality of "menstr maps." Here, all social life is constituted by ongoing transitions from p fane moments to sacred ones, from unmarked moments to marked on or as the inherently social process of constructing temporal discontin between ordinary moments and extraordinary moments. As such, wom periodicity might be structured by the marked and therefore sacred m ments when the lining and unfertilized egg are released from the body the unmarked and therefore profane moments when this is not occurr (Fig. 1). Alternatively, the rhythm could manifest itself in a double-extrao dinary beat, marked by the sacred moments when the egg is released f the ovary but marked again when the egg and lining exit a woman's bo The profane moments would thus correspond to all other moments in tween (Fig. 2).3 This process of temporal separation is never inevitable essentially about the relationship between the individual and the gro the drawing of boundaries between subordinate individual (profane) ti and superordinate collective (sacred) time ultimately solidifies the collec 3In stark contrast to this perspective, Penelope Shuttle and Peter Redgrove (1978) argue women's periodicity is by nature a bipolar fluctuation between "ovulation" and "menst tion," and that it is this bipolarity that is the root of all social bipolarities. This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 526 Foster Sacred Sacred 1' Profane Profane egg and tissue egg and tissue exit body exit body Fig. 1. Sacred Sacred Profane Profane egg and tissue egg released exit body from ovary Fig. 2. consciousness of social groups by subjugating purely personal routines to collective patterns (Durkheim, 1915/1965). "Menstrual" time could also be understood as akin to the swinging of a pendulum, or the repeated fluctuation between two polarities (Leach, 1961). Here, temporal differentiation might manifest itself not just in the "flipping of sides" but complete stops (Leach). For example, the temporal period when the egg and tissue exit a woman's body might be conceptual- ized as merely the opposite time from when this activity is not occurring. This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 527 egg and egg and tissue exit tissue not body (on) exit body (off) Fig. 3. The very phrase, "I am on my period," implies that at some opposite time, the pendulum will swing to a position that is "'off' my period" (Fig. 3). Social groups might understand "menstrual" time not just as the con- struction of oppositions, but an asymmetrical relationship between these two poles as well (Waugh, 1982:299). The relationship between two con- trasting types of time characterized by the markedness of only one of these temporal elements as endowed with x and the nonmarkedness of the other as nonendowed with x (Waugh, 1982:299) could also be interpreted as an unequal separation of units into a temporal hierarchy where the marked segment naturalizes the superiority of the unmarked4 (1982:299). The un- marked temporal element might constitute the ground, while the marked temporal element constitutes a figure located on that ground. Such cogni- tive mapping might mark the moment when the egg and tissue are released from the body as a "figure" against the unmarked "ground" when the egg 4For an example of the use of markedness in naturalizing social hierarchies, see Wayne Brek- hus (this issue). This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 528 Foster Ground: all other moments Figure: egg and tissue exit body Fig. 4. and/or tissue is not released (Fig. 4). Or the moments when the egg is released from the ovary and when the egg exits the body could be mapped as discrete entities, and all time in between these two figures understood as a period during which nothing significant occurs (Fig. 5). Alternatively, the moment when the egg is released from the body might be conceptu- alized not as a figure, but as a marked subset of the unmarked set (Fig. 6; Waugh, 302-303). Unlike in other models, however, where the marked element can be imbued with either positive or negative moral value (Durk- heim, 1915/1965), as in the notion that both "god" and "devil" are marked and therefore sacred, here the marked element, or figure, or subset, is that which necessarily carries social stigma. In a very different model, "menstrual" time could be understood as discontinuous, but also linear and irreversible. Here, the "menstrual" rhythm might be understood as a chain of unique events such that the first drop of an egg is point A, the shedding of the egg and tissue is point B, and the next dropping of the egg is point C. Or instead, the rise in hor- mones might be point A, the maturation of the follicle as point B, the release of the egg from the ovary as point C, the next rise in hormones as This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 529 Ground: all other moments Figure: egg Figure egg and tissue exit released from body ovary Fig. 5. point D, etc. (Fig. 7). Such mapping would be accomplished without ever mentally equating the next point in time with any point that has come be- fore it, nor any point thereafter. In contrast to this totally linear map of time, women's periodicity might be understood as a wheel with "wedges" positioned at various temporal distances that are reexperienced as the wheel spins. Points A-D described above might mark the "wedges" on this wheel, and the recurrence of "wedge A' would be the return of the same type of phenomenon at regular intervals, or the reexperience of typified events rather than totally unique moments (Eliade, 1959:68-113; Fig. 8). Such reexperiences of essentially the same type of time suggests that what is returning again and again may not even be a typified event, but a return of the very same unique event as it first occurred (1959). Using this conceptualization of time as constituted by "eternal returns" (1959:90), the recurrence of "wedge A' would be the return of the one, first, or unique entity over and over again. Lastly, "menstrual" time could be understood as rhythmic patterns that combine elements of separation, linearity, circularity, and reversibility, such as in the model of time as wheels (cycles) traveling along an historical road This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 530 Foster Set L Subset Fig. 6. A B C D a I ~~~~~~~Rl rise of release of rise of maturation ovarian egg from ovarian of folliele hormones ovary hormones Fig. 7. (linear progression; Zerubavel, 1985:83-86). Not only would cycle selves be cognitively mapped into distinct segments, but these se cycles could rotate along historical continuums that are themselve into distinct segments, patterns that include both regular returns at same time that they include irreversibilities. Women's periodicity mi understood, then, not as the transition between ordinary and extraor This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 531 ,w D A egg and rise of j /tissue ovarian hormone exit body release Imaturation of egg of from follicle ovary C [ ^ B Fig. 8. moments, or a swinging pendulum, but as a cycle carved up like a wheel with distinct "wedges" spinning along the historical road of a woman's fer- tile life (Fig. 9). This popular and clinical conceptualization of "menstrual" time as akin to a wheel spinning along road could be just one of a number of ways that social groups might make sense of natural changes in the fe- male body. Whether thought of as a "bipolar beat," an "eternal return," or a "menstrual cycle," that these rhythms are socially produced is further illustrated, as I will show, in the lack of consensus over how to partition the cycle itself. Mapping Out "the Menstrual Cycle": The Creation of Discrete Entities To think of supposedly isolated occurrences as constituting "the men- strual wheel" involves a process of "making time" not unlike the manner in which collectives "make space": This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms  532 Foster Y D A egg and rise of tissue ovarian exit body hormone release maturation of egg of \from follicle ovary C B -L L~~M _ A -L Woman's Age in Years (Linear Progression) Fig. 9. Just as we cut supposedly discrete chunks like countries and school districts off from ecological continuums, we also carve seemingly insular segments such as "The Renaissance" or "adolescence" out of historical continuums. Such discontinuous experience of time is quite evident from the way we isolate from the flow of occurrences of supposedly freestanding events such as meetings, classes, and shows, some of which we further subdivide into smaller though still discrete particles-meals into courses, baseball games into innings. It is also manifested in our ability to create stories with beginnings and ends as well as in the way we break down novels, sonatas, and plays into chapters, movements, and acts. (Zerubavel, 1991:9) Yet, it would be a mistake to assume that medical science is certain about the distinctiveness of the "wedges" of "the menstrual cycle" (Maddux, 1975:53). On the contrary, although science is relatively certain about what sorts of changes take place during "the menstrual cycle," there is some discrepancy over how many discrete phases (re: "wedges") best represents such changes. For example, during the 19th and early 20th century, "the menstrual cycle" was thought to proceed through a series of at least four to as many as eight stages (Laqueur, 1992). Today, "the menstrual cycle" is described in some instances as an essentially bipolar beat, the first occurring when This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 533 the egg leaves the ovary, or "ovulation," and the next at the time of bleed- ing, or "menstruation" (Shuttle and Redgrove, 1978:29). At other times this basic twofold beat is described as two phases, namely, the "proliferative stage," when the follicles in the ovary start to grow and the "secretive" or "destructive stage" (Maddux, 1975) when the lining of the womb starts to detach. Other accounts find not a bipolar rhythm but three discrete stages, namely the "proliferative," the "secretive," and "menstrual phase" when the lining of the womb is shed (Laqueur, 1992). Stranger still, others argue that the "menstrual cycle" is mapped as having not two, not three, but four major stages (Shuttle and Redgrove, 1978): first, the "preovulatory phase" when follicles ripen and mature; second, the "ovulatory phase" when the egg leaves the ovary; third, the "premenstrual phase" when estrogen and progesterone hormone levels drop; and fourth, the "menstrual phase" when the lining of the womb is shed. Yet others claim five phases in toto, begin- ning with the "menstrual phase," then the "follicular," followed by the "ovulatory phase," the "luteal phase" when the body produces the corpus luteum, and last the "premenstrual phase" (Asso, 1983). Perhaps most in- teresting is an account from one text that contradicts its earlier map to argue for six discrete phases, namely "beginning of cycle [sic]," "follicular," "preovulation," "ovulation," "luteal," and "premenstrual" (Asso). Finally, there are those that demarcate six major phases but refer to them in order as "regeneration," "preovulation," "postovulation," "premenstruation," and "menstruation" (Fluhmann, 1956). There is much evidence to illustrate that the cycle is a nexus of proc- esses sometimes lumped together and other times split apart into discrete "natural phases." For example, an inherently unsegmented flow of physi- ological changes is in some cases lumped into just two distinct parts called "ovulation" and "menstruation" and more increasingly into three distinct phases with the recent attention to "premenstruation." In other instances, the same biological processes are split into several distinct phases, such as when the "proliferative phase" (e.g., Maddux, 1975) is separated into the "menstrual phase" and the "follicular phase" (e.g., Asso, 1983), or when the "stage of secretion" is split into the "postovulatory" and "premenstrual" phases (e.g., Fluhmann, 1956). At other times, the "secretory stage" is split into the "luteal" and "premenstrual phase" (e.g., Asso, 1983). Yet it would be a mistake to assume science has committed a bundle of errors; these differences in how to draw the boundaries around particular moments of "the menstrual cycle" are not errors at all, but the result of sociocognitive mapping. Not only do the literatures reflect disagreement over the number of distinctive phases comprising "the menstrual cycle," there is evidence that the same "wedges" of change have been given different names. For exam- This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 534 Foster pie, the nexus of changes that occur after the lining of the womb has been shed has been termed both the "regenerative phase" and "postmenstrual phase" (Fluhmann, 1939; Cavanagh, 1969), and the "postovulatory stage" has also been termed the "premenstrual phase" (Fluhmann, 1956). Such mapping is illustrative of an emic perspective (Pike, 1967), operating here as the ability of "insiders" to interpret dissimilar signs as referring to an identical entity. For example, both whistling and raising a hand serve to signal a taxi cab, although the two actions are seemingly dissimilar; this dissimilarity makes no difference "emically" speaking. On the other hand, "menstrual cycle" elements that are actually some- what different biologically have nonetheless been given the same name. These instances suggest not acts of conceptual splitting but collective acts of conceptual lumping or the collapsing of distinct processes into a single unit. For example, what has been termed the "proliferation phase" has re- ferred to each of the following series of changes: first, the changes that occur in a woman's body after "menstruation" and prior to the release of the egg from the ovary (e.g., Laqueur, 1992); second, to those changes that occur from the onset of "menstruation" and continue until after the egg has been released from the ovary (e.g., Maddux, 1975); and third, to those changes that begin after "menstruation" and continue until the beginning of "ovulation" (e.g., Fluhmann, 1956). Despite the fact that each of these three instances refers to a distinct set of changes, again, all have been con- sidered emically similar. That such "menstrual maps" are purely conventional is perhaps most hotly debated in the contemporary controversies in the West over the ex- istence and nature of "premenstrual syndrome" ("PMS"). "Premenstrual syndrome" has garnered significant medical attention in the past 25 years, and significant popular attention in America since the 1980s (e.g., Tavris, 1992; Martin, 1987). Yet for at least 150 years, there has been debate in Western medical communities over the impact of the "menstrual phase" on women's mental health, and particularly on women's ability to do paid labor. Interestingly, this attention to the "menstrual phase" as the time of pathology has now become refocused on the time before "menstruation" as the period of danger. Many feminists are wary of the equation of physi- ological changes with psychological, emotional, or behavioral changes given the pervasive use of such connections, often unsubstantiated, to justify the continued subordination of women. Other feminist critics welcome the re- cent attention given the history of collective ignorance and denial of such natural bodily changes, even as other feminists respond that there is noth- ing purely natural about "PMS." Such debates are, among other things, an excellent example of the current cultural marking of what was formerly an unmarked phase of "the menstrual cycle." Yet none of the positions on This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 535 "PMS" explicitly addresses the issue in the terms of "border disputes" (Zerubavel, 1991:3). Nowhere in the discourse is there specific attention to the fact that the very existence of such a "syndrome" relies not only on the sociocognitive mapping out of a distinct or discrete entity called "pre- menstruation" but that this process is part of a larger mapping of "the menstrual cycle" itself. Unlike other "border disputes" that reflect chal- lenges either to where the line is drawn or to whether it should be drawn at all, the various wars in the West include both, namely, whether to lump certain phases of the cycle together as a period where nothing distinctive occurs, or to actually split them off as distinct "islands of meaning" (Zerubavel, 1991:5-6). "Menstrual" Time as Standardized Time: "Allo-Phases" and "Allo-Cycles" Not only are there discrepancies over how many phases constitute "the menstrual cycle" and what to call these supposedly distinct phases, but there is also contention in the literatures over how long some of these stages should last, particularly "ovulation," "postovulation," "premen- struation," "menstruation," and perhaps most importantly, the whole "men- strual cycle." Each of these often unbeknownst debates over the appropriate amount of time needed to complete these stages, and even the "full cycle," are additional illustrations of collective acts of mental cartog- raphy, namely the lumping together of dissimilar units of mathematical time to construct standardized phases of "the menstrual cycle" as well as to standardize the rotation of the entire "menstrual cycle" itself. In contrast to the popular and often clinical notion that certain phases of "the menstrual cycle" are not only distinct but have a fixed length, con- sider the following examples. First, "ovulation" is allotted only one day in some instances (e.g., Fluhmann, 1956), while in others, three days (e.g., Asso, 1983). Second, in some cases "ovulation" is reported to occur on day 14 of a 28-day cycle, implying that the "postovulatory phase" is fixed at two weeks (Asso, 1983). Others suggest that "ovulation" actually occurs at variable points during the cycle (e.g., James, 1965; Baily and Marshall, 1970). Third, the stage often called "premenstruation" is sometimes allotted one week (e.g., Bickers, 1954) while in other places refers to a three- (e.g., Fluhmann, 1956) or five-day period prior to bleeding (e.g., Asso, 1983). Fourth, in some instances, the length of the bleeding phase itself is set at five days (e.g., Asso, 1983); in other instances, four (e.g., Fluhmann, 1956), and in others, seven days (Shuttle and Redgrove, 1978). Empirical evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the length of the "menstrual phase" is quite This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 536 Foster variable, spanning anywhere from two to eight days in duration (e.g., King, 1926; Goldzieher et al., 1947; Maclennan and Maclennan, 1962; Matsu- mota, 1962; Koshi et al., 1970; Rothstein and Sanchez Mena, 1975). Yet, regardless of whether it takes one hour or one day or three days for the egg to leave the ovary, these dissimilar units of mathematical time are con- ceptually lumped together and called "ovulation." Regardless of whether it takes 14 days or 17 days after the egg is released for the cycle to begin again, dissimilar units of mathematical time are again lumped together and called "postovulation." Likewise, regardless of whether it takes one day or one week to complete the phase prior to bleeding, these units are each called "premenstruation." And regardless of whether the bleeding phase takes two days or nine days, such mathematical discrepancies are consid- ered irrelevant and lumped together as the "menstrual period." Such evidence suggests something called an "allo-phase" (Pike, 1967; Zerubavel, 1991:17). Just as there are emic units of time called "allo- chrones" (Zerubavel, 1979:4), as when both February and August count as a "month" even though August is always at least two days longer than Feb- ruary (Zerubavel, 1991:17), the same process of temporal clustering could produce "allo-phases": despite the fact that such "menstrual periods" that last two days or eight days are obviously not mathematically equivalent, they are nonetheless understood as identical segments of time sociocultu- rally (Sorokin, 1937-41). This process returns in the widely recognized, but undertheorized, myth of "the 28-day menstrual cycle." Conventionally understood to require 28 days, medical science has long debated (e.g., Foster, 1889) and now con- cedes that such a figure is only an average, meaning that it is quite possible that no woman has a cycle that lasts as long as, or for only, 28 days (e.g., Arey, 1939; Burch, 1967; Chiazze et al., 1968; Treloar, 1974; Bean et al., 1979; Rice et al., 1981). It is also well understood that the length of an individual woman's cycle does not remain fixed from one cycle to the next (Gunn et al., 1937; Treloar, 1974; Golub, 1992) nor over the course of her life (Vollman, 1956; Chiazze et al., 1968). Much has been written about the 28-day average and its strikingly close approximation to the 29.5 days of the lunar cycle (e.g., Gunn et al, 1937; Menaker and Menaker, 1959; Wat- son, 1973; Sjoo and Mor, 1987; Grahn, 1993), a connection exemplified in the shared linguistic origin of the words "menses" and "month" (Bickers, 1954:3; Sjoo and Mor, 1987:151). Interestingly, such works fail to address the obvious connection between 28 days and the conventional under- standing of the month as consisting of four weeks of seven days. What pro- vocative analyses of the relationship between "menstrual cycles" and lunar cycles overlook is the manner in which the weekly organization of social life has influenced our conventional understanding of both of these cycles. This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 537 As Zerubavel argues, "[t]he artificial nature of social scheduling is... evi- dent from the sheer fact that so many events in our daily life are scheduled for 'rounded off' times such as 'on the hour"' (1981:9). That we take for granted the appropriate length of "the menstrual cycle" to be a neat, "rounded-off," four weeks (not 32 days or 27 days) is more than just a coincidence. Regardless of whether women experience a 21-day cycle or a 45-day cycle, these cycles are still collectively called "menstrual"-as well as monthly-cycles and suggest the existence of an "allo-cycle." Despite assumptions about the naturalness of a "monthly" rhythm, it appears that this understanding of "menstrual time" is based not on mathematical units of time, but sociocultural ones. Even if the overwhelming empirical evi- dence against a "normal" cycle length were disregarded, the fact that social groups call the "menstrual cycle" a "monthly cycle" in and of itself betrays the conventionality of "menstrual time"-the very temporal unit "month" is also not a purely mathematical unit. Illustrative of this phenomenon of standardization, a local radio station recently encouraged listeners to call in and discuss "premenstrual syn- drome." One caller's joke reveals much about collective understandings of the internal structure of the cycle. He asked if we had heard about the club that opened for women's jazz music: "One week out of the month for ragtime, and another week for the blues" (my emphasis). Embedded in this joke is the assumption that both the "premenstrual" and "menstrual phase" constitute a week, not two or three days, of the full cycle. On the same show, a woman noted the predictability of the "menstrual" rhythm by ex- plaining that "you can set your watch to it" [meaning the onset of bleeding]. "I know it will come either Sunday night or Monday morning" (my empha- sis). In the same breath, the caller illustrates more generally the assumption of standardized "menstrual units" as well as an implicit recognition that these units have been constructed by lumping mathematical units of time into sociocultural ones. THE RIGHT PLACE AT THE WRONG TIME: "MENSTRUAL " TIME AND TEMPORAL ANOMALIES Related to this phenomenon of lumping mathematical units of tim into sociocultural units is the cognitive splitting off of "disordered" par of "the menstrual cycle," not because they are inevitable health problem but because they are threats to attempts at standardization. Although c lective understandings of the internal structure of "the menstrual cycl rely on "allo-phases" and "allo-cycles," the existence of the following "me This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 538 Foster Table I. Percent Distribution of Women With All Cycles Ovulatory During a Three-Month Period, N = 254a Age in Years Percent Ovulatory 15-19 68.2 20-24 62.0 25-29 87.9 30-34 90.9 35-39 90.9 aData from Metcalf and (1983). strual disturbances" indicates that not all periods of bleeding or cycle ro- tations can be lumped together. Apparently, some just do not count. For example, it is popularly assumed that "ovulation" and "menstrua- tion" must occur in the same monthly cycle for it to be considered a normal period. It is often taken for granted that the "menstrual" rhythm must pass through both of these stages in order for the entire cycle to "count" as normal. Paradoxically, medical science is aware of the phenomenon called "anovulatory menstruation," or the natural movement into the "menstrual phase" despite the absence of "ovulation" since the last "menstrual phase" (Asso, 1983). Such a phenomenon often reflects more than a random miss- ing of "ovulation." Upon menarche, many girls experience a consistent pe- riod of "anovulatory menstruation" that may last a period of years (Collett, 1954; Doring, 1969; Maddux, 1975). Evidence suggests that it is quite nor- mal that the first "menstrual cycles" may not include the release of an egg, nor might the cycles that approach menopause (Doring, 1969). Aside from the patterns of "anovulatory menstruation" that occur at these "poles," a significant number of women apparently experience "anovulatory cycles" throughout their lives (Table I). Not only is it assumed that ovulation must occur at least once to "count" as a normal cycle but "ovulation" must occur only once during any one rotation. However, some women can ovulate twice in any one cycle, and some women bleed quite naturally, or "spot," either before the "offi- cial" period is supposed to begin, or after it has apparently finished (Ste- wart et al., 1987:84) Here, the same process of blood exiting the body via the vagina is understood as quite different from the blood that is excreted during the menstrual period. In other words, from an etic ("outsider") per- spective, these processes may indeed be identical, yet from an emic per- spective ("insider"), they are considered quite distinct. Moreover, if women bleed, say, for ten days, this is not considered a case of what I have termed an "allo-phase" but rather considered bleeding "too much," or "menorrhagia." Likewise, if women routinely "skip" men- This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 539 "Normal Menstruation" iodic Interval Hemorrhage" or bleeding that occurs around the time of "ovulation" igomenur-lear"or prolongation ofrthe menstrual cycle" beyond "average" 28 days Il LII I "Polymenu-rhea" or too frequent bleeding, or intervals shorter than the "average" 28 days I Fig. 10. Disorders of the incidence of "menstruation." Width of column represents du- ration of flow; space between each column represents time between bleeding; height of column represents amount of blood. Adapted from Fluhmann (1939:168). strual periods and do not bleed, say, for 90 days, such a cycle is considered "too long," and called "oligomenorrhea." Both conditions are considered malfunctions of the cycle even though the medical literature admits that much of this "irregularity" is often natural, particularly in the cases of "anovulatory menstruation," or "spotting" during "ovulation" (Fig. 10). The strangeness of ovulating twice a cycle, or the dangers of "inter- menstrual bleeding" is better understood in terms of "temporal anomalies" (Zerubavel, 1981:21-30). Here, certain events become problematic not be- cause there is anything inevitably perilous or even peculiar about them but This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 540 Foster because they transpire at times other than those prescribed by convention. Such "anomalies" are cognitively disturbing precisely because they are re- minders that the temporal rhythms that groups depend on so readily to ensure the smooth functioning of day-to-day living, such as the weekly cycle or the rotation of work shifts, are not inevitable patterns, but ones that collectives have themselves produced. For example, there is nothing cog- nitively troubling about a graduate student working in a research lab at 10 o'clock on Thursday night. Nonetheless, the same scenario seems slightly strange if it occurs at 10 o'clock on Thursday night in a department where graduate students routinely socialize at a local pub on Thursday evenings. Here the sense of strangeness is a result of an event located outside of the conventional temporal framework, not from anything particularly ab- normal about the activity itself. Similarly, what is so often disturbing about "menstrual anomalies" like "spotting" is that such events unmask collective attempts to standardize what are otherwise highly variable rhythmic patterns. Much of this so-called problematic cycling is in many cases not a threat to a woman's health,5 but rather a threat to collective notions of temporal regularity, an alarm that some event has occurred outside of the bounds determined via sociotem- poral maps. Such concern for these "irregularities" in the face of uncon- firmed evidence of inevitable consequences for women's good health suggests that part of this panic is again better understood as a response to calendrical irregularities, or those otherwise normal occurrences that are problematic precisely because they happen at the wrong time. Such "anomalies" reflect a social process of cognitive splitting such that some "menstrual" activity is conceptualized as abnormal in order to normalize cultural assumptions about, for example, discrete cycle phases or fixed cycle lengths. Ultimately, such collective mapping allows a conventionalized "menstrual clock" to masquerade as a purely "natural" clock to which all women's bodies are inevitably set. SHADES OF REIIEF The contention that the internal structure of "the menstrual cycle a product of social invention is evidenced again by the changes in so importance given to these distinct phases. To return to the metapho cartography, at various times or in various contexts certain moments "the menstrual cycle" are described "in relief" or are "colored" (Brekh 5To suggest that such "disturbances" are not inevitably dangerous is in no way to suggest all patterns of "menstrual" bleeding should always be considered unproblematic. This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 541 this issue) in ways that reflect no change in the biological or physiological processes themselves but rather a change in how social groups collectively value such changes. For example, the now popular assumption that "the menstrual cycle" is split into at least two important parts ("ovulation" and "menstruation") really only surfaced in the medical literature in the 1930s when Papanico- laou developed the first reliable marker of the release of the ovum in hu- man females (i.e., the Pap smear; Laqueur, 213). The notion of a relevant period called "ovulation" was thus not even a consistent part of the socio- cognitive map of "the menstrual cycle" prior to the 1930s. Ironically, until the mid-19th century, it was not "ovulation," but "menstruation, which [was understood as] a relatively benign purging of plethora, not unlike other forms of corporeal self-regulation of estrus in animals, marking the only period during which women are normally fertile" (Laqueur, 213). Before Papanicolaou, "menstruation" may have been understood as sacred time in the Durkheimian sense, while all other moments were relegated to the realm of profane or ordinary time. Perhaps with the knowledge provided by the pap smear, the mark of sacred has been afforded to both "ovulation" and "menstruation," with "ovulation" shaded as the benevolent sacred given notions of compulsory motherhood, and "menstruation" as the ma- levolent sacred. Recently, however, menstrual maps are showing other parts of the cy- cle "in relief" in ways they have yet to do. I am referring again to the "border disputes" over "PMS." Aside from those who argue that such a phase does not really exist as distinctive, there are those who concede that such a stage does indeed deserve to be demarcated, but that it should not be shown in such "relief." The same critics might find it interesting that women never mention they are "preovulatory," only rarely do they proclaim they are "ovulating," yet are more likely to talk about "menstruation" and perhaps most publicly about "premenstruation." Currently, there is more clamor over the impact of the "premenstrual stage" than even the "men- strual stage" on women's psychological and behavior states, suggesting a shift of both scholarly and popular attention away from the time of bleeding as the most relevant "wedge" of the cycle and toward "premenstruation." Now the determinant of "woman" as naturally unstable, emotional, and even dangerous to her family and workplace can be found in the phase just prior to the time of bleeding rather than actually during the bleeding phase as was the case only a few decades ago. It is possible, and alarming, that such cognitive rearrangements are not about a shift in focus away from one phase and toward another but rather a widening of the angle of vision such that more and more of the previously unmarked, and irrelevant, parts of the cycle are being lumped This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 542 Foster together as socially important. As more and more of the cycle becomes stigmatized, more and more of women's daily lives become marked as prob- lematic. As it stands, at least two weeks out of every month of women's fertile lives can be interpreted as potentially onerous, the "week" of "men- struation" and the "week" of "premenstruation." Many argue that it is not at all coincidental that such changes in the "shading" of "the menstrual cycle" are correlated with significant changes in the status of women in contemporary Western society; the more gains women have made, particu- larly in the labor force, the greater is the area of the "menstrual map" that is shown in relief as a potential source of "natural" dysfunction (Martin, 1987; Tavris, 1992). These different ways of telling the "important parts" of the story of "the menstrual cycle" could be understood as historical changes in "plot structure" (White, 1978/74). Borrowing from some historians' notion that history is not distinct from story, but rather the reduction of very complex processes into very simple structures or formulas, the focus of the debate here becomes not the "facts" of "the menstrual cycle" but how these facts are emplotted in particular narratives. Competing historical narratives plot chains of events in different ways such that in one account, event A is considered most critical; in another account, event B is the climactic event; and in yet another account, event C is most important. The facts or events themselves do not change, but the "tone" (Davis, 1984:17) in which these events are interpreted may conflict with other formulas or may be reinter- preted as present conditions are altered. In this case, as present conditions are restructured, so will the "events" of "the menstrual cycle" be changed to tell a different story-another way of saying that the "relief maps" of what happens during the cycle have been and may continue to rearrange to reflect cultural beliefs about the meaning of "woman." WHAT'S IN THE NAME? The implications of the conventionality of "menstrual time" become even more evident when these elements shown "in relief" are those that reinforce the superior status of the unmarked elements. A now well-un- derstood illustration of this process is the ability of the term "mankind" to operate in standard English as an unmarked category that lumps together both men and women, while the marked category "womankind" refers only to women. Here, the marked and the unmarked terms reflect the relative power and value of men vis a vis women in a particular social order. In this case, the social marking of the "menstrual phase" as the most relevant period of the cycle may distinguish this temporal unit as inferior in com- This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 543 parison to the unmarked segments of the cycle, particularly when the un- marked portion is understood to be the preparation for pregnancy, or preg- nancy itself. If this is indeed the case, then it is quite paradoxical that the entire cycle is apparently named after this supposedly marked phase. Rather, this naming might suggest that the normative element is actually the unmarked "menstrual cycle" or entire set that stands for both the "menstrual phase" and all other phases while these remaining elements within the cycle be- come split off as subsets. However, the very term "menstrual" comes from "menses" and is a reference not to the location of these biological changes (i.e., ovary, uterus, vagina) nor to what controls these changes (pituitary hormones, ovarian hormones) nor to its apparent functions past or present (i.e., purging of excess fluids, cleansing, fertilization, reproduction). Instead, this complex of biological processes is apparently named for the centuries- long belief that the rhythmic appearance of blood is akin to the cyclical movement of the moon-hence "menstruation" and "month" sharing the same linguistic origin. Thus, one resolution to this paradoxical split between marked and unmarked might come with a reminder that, historically, the bleeding phase was erroneously thought of as the only time that women could conceive. Thus, the lumping of the entire cycle under the name "the menstrual cycle" would have legitimated the supposed period of fertility as the superior element, and all other periods as inferior. (Interestingly, some argue that "menstruation" is actually an evolutionary anomaly in the human species [Landers] since for much of human history, high infant mortality rates and relatively short average life spans would have demanded that ma- ture females spent most of their fertile lives pregnant or lactating to ensure the life of the group, making the experience of "menstruation" relatively infrequent perhaps as late as the 1700s in America.) Another plausible interpretation of the naming of "the menstrual cy- cle" after "the menstrual phase," however, is that the entire "menstrual cycle" itself is a subset, a marked entity in female bodies in comparison to the unmarked, and supposedly superior, set of biological cycles that occur in male bodies. Surely, much evidence suggests that men's bodies are also influenced by rhythmic patterns, particularly the "monthly" changes in beard growth, pain thresholds, and testosterone levels (Landers, 1988:137). Nonetheless, over centuries, it is only the female body that has been marked as particularly susceptible to the forces of "monthly" periodicity, inevitably more tied to nature, as those bodies outside of rational control, and consequently, in need of regulation. Beliefs that women's bodies, and not men's, are governed by, for example, the phases of the moon, have been used to justify women's subordination to men as naturally rather than socially produced. Perhaps the retention of the name "menstrual cycle," This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 544 Foster despite medical science's admission that "menstruation" is an extremely variable process and not one that inevitably occurs, like the full moon, "once a month," reflects an attempt to retain the belief that the male body is naturally "unfettered" by periodicity while the female body is forever bound by cyclical change. CONCLUDING REMARKS The construction and enforcement of standardized "menstrual" time and the marking of some parts, if not all, of "the menstrual cycle" as "sa- cred" has had and may continue to have serious implications for women's daily lives. The standardization of "the menstrual cycle," for instance, is not unlike other attempts to control women's bodies, such as the construc- tion of height and weight charts that normalize fat-free female bodies. In the former case, such standardization ultimately legitimizes assumptions that the category "women" is constituted not by sociohistorical/political practices, but rather by the supposedly shared experience of a purely bio- logical process. Similarly, for instance, the centuries-old biblical reference to the time of bleeding as "the curse" of Eve's original sin is suggestive of not just any "eternal return," but to the hegemonic notion that "woman- hood" is categorically shameful, dirty, even evil. To give yet another exam- ple, if the experience of "profane time" is about living as an individual, while the experience of "sacred time" is about living as a member of a social group, then such sociotemporal patterns will continue to remind in- dividual women at various "extraordinary moments" (which are becoming more and more frequent) that they are part of a class of people necessarily defined by biological difference, and that this membership currently carries negative social value. Ultimately, this investigation of the sociomental mapping of "the men- strual cycle" is far from complete: aside from discussing each of these in- stances of mental cartography at greater length, I might have discussed the paradoxes of where such cycles are thought to begin and end or whether there is not just one, but two or even three cycles operating simultaneously. Despite the many questions left to answer, sociologists of cognition have still to consider the way social groups think about the internal structure of "the menstrual cycle" as a case of mental cartography, and sociologists of time have still to consider this mental structuring of "the menstrual cycle" as a case of sociotemporality. Yet it appears that the mental mapping out of what constitutes the elements of this rhythm, so often taken for granted as a purely natural pattern of time, is a highly social act. Perhaps most importantly, this particular take on "the menstrual cycle" as a social inven- This content downloaded from 50.113.78.7 on Thu, 30 Jan 2025 06:25:49 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Menstrual Time 545 tion makes Zerubavel's more general argument that a "discussion of regular and routine sociotemporal patterns" is not just a trivial intellectual exercise, but is necessary "in order to stress the point that a social order is at stake, as well as a moral one" (1976:93). ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am grateful to Eviatar Zerubavel for encouraging me to write t paper, and equally thankful for his consistent enthusiam at every stag the project. Many thanks to Heather J. Foster for her graphical assist REFERENCES Asso, Doreen Chadwick, Mary 1983 The Real Menstrual Cycle. New 1932York: The Psychological Effects of Men- John Wiley & Sons. struation. New York: Nervous and Arey, L. B. 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