Abstract

Research show that men and women often do not converse freely about menstruation. Shame, taboos and myths associated with menstruation silence the conversation. Silencing conversations about menstruation have negative consequences on women, including: objectification of women's bodies, stereotyping of women as physically, morally and emotionally inferior to men and to extreme cases women losing their uterus due to unhygienic means of menstrual management. On the one hand, not addressing menstruation openly has devastating consequences on women but on the other hand, most men seem oblivious about the impacts on women. Therefore, it is important to engage in open dialogues about menstruation because research have found that such acts empower women and for men, it helps them to understand the construction of societies at a deeper level. I argue that despite considerable development in Science improving understanding of human biology, men in general do not have enough knowledge about menstruation and its effects on women. The purpose of this research study is to examine the knowledge and perspectives about menstruation of culturally diverse male students of Minnesota State University, Mankato. A qualitative semi-structured interview was conducted with nine male participants. It was found that most participants do not have adequate knowledge about biological process of menstruation. Menstruation was also supposed to be a women's issue hence not important for men to understand it. A few participants who considered themselves allies of women had worked on their own to change their perspectives into positive ones. This thesis will contribute to narrowing a gap in literature available on the topic.

Advisor

Shannon Miller

Committee Member

Ana Perez

Committee Member

Christopher Brown

Date of Degree

2015

Language

english

Document Type

Thesis

Degree

Master of Science (MS)

College

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

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