Women's body of thought

They came from countries as diverse as Senegal, Turkey, Japan, Israel, Serbia, Chile and Nepal. They talked about their commonalities and their cultural challenges as they translated the renowned resource known as Our Bodies, Ourselves . They demonstrated how sisterhood — and the women's health movement — is powerful, political, and global.

At a symposium called ‘Our Bodies, Our Future: Advancing Health and Human Rights for Women and Girls', held in Boston, the Boston Women's Health Book Collective, now known as Our Bodies Ourselves (OBOS) ( >www.ourbodiesourselves.org ), celebrated its 40th anniversary with the release of the ninth edition of its world-famous book.

The iconic book has come a long way since it began as a stapled, newsprint booklet called Women and Their Bodies in 1970. That small publication spread like a bushfire, positioning women's health as a politically charged issue within a deep social context. Simon & Schuster published an expanded version in 1973, known for the first time as Our Bodies, Ourselves . The rest, as they say, is “herstory”.

The newest edition focuses on women's reproductive health and sexuality, and includes dozens of personal stories and essential, up-to-date information about gender identity, sexual orientation, birth control, abortion, pregnancy and birth, menopause, and other health issues such as breast and ovarian cancers and sexual health as women age. It also addresses changes in the healthcare system, safer sex, environmental health risks, body image, and local and global activism. And for the first time, it offers an entire chapter on relationships based on women's conversations that took place online over the course of a month. “Creating a book of this size and scope, one that provides evidence-based information and addresses the political, economic and social forces that shape women's health, takes an incredible amount of work and collaboration,” managing editor Christine Cupaiuolo says. “More than 300 women and men shared their knowledge and expertise to ensure the book's accuracy and comprehensiveness.”

From the time OBOS became a bestseller in the US, it has inspired women around the world to produce their own versions, which led to the creation of the Our Bodies Ourselves Global Initiative in 2001. Since then, the Boston-based OBOS has worked with women's organisations all over the world, providing information, technical assistance and support as its network partners, now numbering 22, grapple with how best to deliver reliable, culturally meaningful resources in their respective communities.

In Japan, for example, editor Miho Ogino and her colleagues had to invent new language to replace expressions that treated women's body parts in derogatory and negative ways. Indian activist Shamita Das Dasgupta recalls that when she was growing up, “women's bodies were not to be talked about, touched, or seen. To speak of such things was shameful. Women's bodies were wrapped in invisibility and silence”.

Says Gamze Karadag, “In Turkey, women go about their daily routines giving little thought to obtaining information about their rights, health and body. At the same time, they have difficulty finding sources of information if the need arises.” One of her challenges as she worked to translate OBOS was the “separation points in the women's movement [in Turkey], including ethnicity, religion and sexual identity.”

The challenges in Senegal were similar, with the added problem of growing religious fundamentalism that doesn't want women to feel comfortable about discussing issues related to the body or to sex. “Women must address power relations and sexuality in a difficult cultural context,” activist Fatou Sow says. That is partly why OBOS is so vital to women everywhere: It uses a human rights framework to help them realise the political nature of their sexual repression. “It talks about a whole range of issues we don't usually think of as ‘health issues',” Loretta Ross of SisterSong Women of Colour Reproductive Justice Collective points out. “It's one of the most subversive books out there!”

In addition to OBOS translations in more than two dozen languages, multilingual Web sites have been launched, networks established, training material disseminated and workshops held. Nevertheless, the work continues. “We can't be complacent,” Black Women's Health Imperative founder Byllye Avery counsels. “We must continue the work worldwide. As women activists we are a force to be reckoned with.”

Nothing proves that better than the global impact and success of the important and timeless resource known as OBOS that millions of women everywhere have come to rely upon.

© Women's Feature Service

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