Objectives

• to explore perceptions of the body
• to see the limitations of a reductionist view of the body and
  to look at the body holistically
• to familiarise women with outer and inner body geography
• to introduce the processes of ovulation and menstruation

Methodology

Separation from Our Selves
Our upbringing in society affects our minds and bodies. Ideas planted in our minds of what is normal and what is abnormal mould both women and men. Women are supposed to be shy and beautiful, while men are supposed to be strong and handsome. With standards of beauty set by the world of men, a beautiful body becomes a focus of existence for women.
Other factors affect our bodies too, like work, food, clothing, education, sexuality, relationships, and restrictions of class and caste. How they mould and change our bodies could be seen in our participants.
They insisted I bathe only with cold water. I was always given curds and rice to eat, and nothing else - no spices, no chillies, no pickles or chutneys for me. Even now, I have the same diet. This was how they tried to crush my sexual desires. Allowing only bland food, making me work 'til I'm dead tired, sleep on the cold floor, cold baths always, dull white saris to wear... Even after all this, I have lots of desires,.... but I'm scared. What will people say? What will my sons say?
I am alone. I have to earn my living by working as a coolie on daily wages. Look at me - when I came here, you all thought I might be fifty, but I am only thirty-six years old! I'm sick and tired, but inside my spirit is still young. Tell me, what can I do to fulfil myself?
Look at our postures and physical make-up. When women's bodies are small, the commonest reason is lack of food because of poverty and deprivation since childhood. But shyness or timid behaviour may also be from growing up in oppressed conditions, as well as from gendered role prescriptions.
Keeping women ignorant about what our bodies really look like, and how they work and feel has long been a way of controlling us. Out-stripping social tradition, modern medical 'science' is busy building powerful myths. It medicalises and distorts our body functions. This makes us dependent on doctors, medicine and surgery and helps to maintain the power of male-dominated society.
The male body is projected as the standard human model, as if a female body is abnormal or deviant. From school and college, we see only male figures in the standard charts and textbook pictures. Important parts of women's anatomy and physiology are ignored or mis-represented. Alienating us from our bodies is the finest act of patriarchy. To counter wrong ideas and dispel our alienation, we need to explore and reclaim our bodies.

How Have Others Learned?
We looked at such attempts by other women to learn about their bodies. The book Our Bodies, Ourselves is an example of women in the west uncovering alternative health information for rediscovery of their bodies and psyches. Inspired by this Anveshi, a Hyderabad women's group, has written a book in Telugu, titled Savalaksha Sandhehalu ('A Hundred Thousand Doubts'). It is an effort to communicate experiences, insights and health information to women.
In Rajasthan, the state government's Women and Development Programme initially gave space to sathins to explore their bodies, reproduction and all the politics involved with it. In their book Sharir ki Jankari, they have shown us a new, sensitive way to depict women's bodies and body politics.

How does Modern Medicine see Human Bodies?
The modern western system of science and medicine is sometimes called 'reductionist'. This means that it reduces the human body into separate parts. It treats the body as if it were a machine. The organs are classified into a hierarchy according to the importance given to their factory-like functions. Such a mechanistic and alienating view arose along with the industrial revolution and the 'age of enlightenment' in Europe just about two or three centuries back. Before that time, europeans had a holistic concept of the body, and they believed in its natural self-healing powers. Old ideas came to be labelled as 'unscientific'. With the growth of capitalist economics, the mechanistic view became profitable as it enabled doctors to act as mechanics who fix and maintain bodies.
Traditional non-western cultures, with roots dipping thousands of years into the human past, all view the body from perspectives which are holistic, but the majority of them are also patriarchal.

How Do We Perceive Our Bodies?
We wanted to know how our participants perceive their bodies. We gave them paper and crayons, and asked them to draw the female body and the male body. Because of our experience with the role-play the previous month, we knew there was risk of the project women's perceptions distorting the sangha women’s perceptions. So we divided them.

It was very interesting observing the two groups. Without hesitating, the sangha women clustered into three teams of three partners each. Although they were new to this activity, they confidently took up the crayons over the paper. As they worked, they discussed and argued about where the parts should be, and how they are related. They used the strong and bright colours confidently. In less than twenty minutes each of the three sangha groups had drawn out a female body. The male followed shortly after.

Meanwhile, for a long time the three groups of project staff women were blank. They went looking for pencil and rubber. They prepared rough diagrams in their notebooks and were rigid about lines. First they drew a body outline. Two groups then put in breasts and vagina. The systems like digestive and urinary and lungs and heart got illustrated separately outside the body, trying to recall school text-book diagrams. The other group put clothes over the body and gave stress to extrinsic details like earrings and purses. They took three-fourths of an hour for this and did not feel free to draw the male body.

We gathered ourselves together to analyse the drawings. The sangha women began. In all the three sets of drawings, both the female and the male body were bold and colourful, and equal in proportion. Each group expressed a regional and cultural style - possibly lambadi, enadi and dalit.
They spoke about the drawings, each seemed to have a consistent logic. They gave importance to heart (gunde) and brain (medhadu). They said,We love with our hearts, and the heart sends blood to the brain.
The brain is the storehouse of our memory. We can't read or write. You depend on your books, but we depend on our memory.
Another area prominently drawn and coloured was the ribs. Why? we asked them, and they said,
We often see our ribs. They stick out. Our children are thin. All we see is their bones. This is our poverty. We see and feel the ribs every day.
Then, the mouth was directly connected to an intestinal labyrinth, and there was no idea of a distinct 'stomach'. The vulva-and-vagina (yoni) was given an important place. In the male body drawings, the penis (lingam) with testicles was given the same importance.
It was now the project staff's turn to show their drawings. Hesitatingly they began. Looking at their pictures, the sangha women grew restless. Not giving the others time to explain, they set upon them with questions.
Why have you broken up the body? Do our bodies consist of only breast and vagina? Could our intestines be separate from the body - why have you drawn them outside? Are we not whole beings?
Seeing that one of the drawings was clothed in salwar-kameez (punjabi suit), they laughed teasingly. Actually, these drawings did seem distracted, and we also felt they lacked colour and creativity.
It was difficult for the project staff women to accept this criticism. They thought that what they were trying to reproduce from textbook learning was superior. It took them sometime to get over the criticism. Everyone made an effort to diffuse the tension. We reflected on how formal education has alienated us from our bodies, how it has blocked our creativity, and how we have absorbed the messages from the media.

Body Mapping and Puzzling
The drawing exercise had explored our ideas of our body. Now, we did 'body-mapping'. One volunteered to be the 'body'. She removed her blouse and loosened her sari, lowering it from her waist. Kranti picked up a lipstick as a marker and slowly drew outlines of the internal organs over her chest and belly.
We started with the passage of air through the nose, down the wind-pipe to the lungs. The lungs take up the space in the chest on both sides, within the rib-cage, leaving space in the middle for the heart. They take in oxygen from fresh air and purify the blood. The heart constantly pumps blood, getting it fresh from the lungs and sending it to all the other parts of the body. In return, the heart takes the used blood from the body and sends it back to the lungs for cleansing and re-filling with oxygen.
The brain occupies the upper round part of the skull, behind the fore-head, behind the ears, down to the top of the neck. With our brain, we receive messages in the form of sensations, and we respond by conscious or unconscious activity in our body. It continues with the spinal cord down a canal in our back-bone, out of which pass all the nerves.
The liver takes up space under the right lung, below the ribs. It forms much of the blood content, and produces bile (pitha) which helps digest food. It de-toxifies harmful substances. When we are under stress, the liver helps us to mobilise strength and energy. The spleen takes up a similar but smaller space under the lungs and ribs on the left side. It's main job is to filter out the blood.
We came back up to the mouth, connecting it with the food-tube which passes down behind the wind-pipe and the heart. The stomach is a large, expandable sac continuing from the food-tube as it comes out below the heart and lungs. It collects the food and liquid we eat and drink, mixes it with digestive juices, and holds it for a time. The small intestines in the middle of the belly receive partly digested food in small portions from the stomach, and carry it on a 23-foot long journey. The nutrients get absorbed in the blood and taken to all parts of the body. The remains of the fully digested food passes into the large intestine in the lower right corner of the belly, travelling upwards along the side, across, down the left side, to come out as faeces at the anus. The urinary bladder was marked in front, above the pubic bone, with the womb above and just behind it.
Turning around to the back, we marked the kidneys on both sides, in the angles formed by the back-bone below the last ribs. They maintain the balance of salts and water in our body, and filter out un-needed substances.

To get a better idea of internal placement and movements of these organs, we tried exploring for signs. We looked for movements on the body surface, felt for expansions and pulsations, tapped for sounds of hollow air spaces or dullness and in the end put our ear over parts of our companion's body. We could hear the sounds these organs produced - air flowing in and out of our lungs, the heart pounding as it pumps our blood, gurgling intestines digesting the food we'd eaten. We learned to feel the pulse at each-other's wrist, too.
To strengthen our grasp of the placement of organs, we did another exercise involving a paper cut-out puzzle. Each small group was given a paper sheet with a printed body outline and another sheet with organs printed on it. The body outline had slit-marks for insertion of matching tabs attached to each organ cut-out. Scissors and blade were used to make the cut-outs and slits. Then, the women had to fix the different organs into the body outline, one by one - over-lapping and inserting parts between or underneath each other as appropriate, and according to the matching tabs and slits.
Back in the larger group, we repeated this with a full size body cut-out and actual organ sizes. The participants became confident in placing most of the organs and describing their relations with each other, and their basic functions.

The Hormone-Secreting Glands
After a break, we re-started. We considered the set of small but important organs called glands (granthi). These we located by charts, and we also traced them over our bodies -
pituitary (1)
thyroid (1)
adrenals (2)
ovaries (2),
All these glands secrete natural chemical substances called hormones which cause changes in the body. The pituitary gland is like a tiny bean or pea-shaped bundle hung by a stalk just below our brain, in the middle of our head. The pituitary is like a co-ordinator. It secretes several different hormones, most of which work by stimulating the other glands, like thyroid-stimulating hormone, adrenal-cortex stimulating hormone, and ovarian-follicle stimulating hormone (known as FSH).
The thyroid gland is in our neck over the wind-pipe. Sometimes in some people, when they don't get enough iodine, the thyroid enlarges and we call it 'goitre'. The thyroid's most important work is regulating our body's production and use of heat and energy through the hormone thyroxin. If the thyroid is over-active, our body produces too much heat, our heart beats too fast, and we get nervous and fearful.
The adrenal glands are on top of each kidney. They produce hormones which make us grow, and which make our body respond under pressure or stress. For example, when we get sick or injured, adrenal hormones called 'steroids' help our body to heal quickly.
The ovaries are glands which produce seed-cells (or eggs) along with their hormones. We shall learn more about this later.

Glands Which Secrete Outside
The hormone-secreting glands send their secretions into the blood to carry their messages and regulate our body's functions. But other glands are spread all over our body, and they secrete substances for various different purposes -

sweat and oil-secreting glands in our skin
tear-glands in our eyes
saliva glands in our mouth
mucus glands in our nose
intestinal glands that secrete digestive juices
mucus-secreting glands in the womb
acid-secreting glands in the vagina,
and so on....

These secretions are protective, and sometimes communicative.

Cells and Chromosomes
We took a little time to get familiar with the smallest parts of our body - cells. Many, many of these tiny living units make up our body tissues. Cells are of different kinds, but each one of them performs similar basic functions needed for its survival. Also, the different kinds of cells perform special activities in balance with the surrounding cells and the rest of the body - for example, blood cells, nerve cells, muscle cells, fat cells, sweat-gland cells, etc.

An important and fascinating thing about every cell is that the cell's nucleus, or centre, carries a full set of information about one's whole body, like a map or kind of guide-book! The information is actually coded in tiny rope-like strands called chromosomes.
There are forty-six chromosomes arranged in twenty-three pairs. We all get a half-set of chromosomes from our parents.

Our cells come together to form different kinds of tissues, according to information coded in the chromosomes.

Common Parts and Tissues
We moved on to explore tissues and substances which draw our body together to preserve and protect us and to communicate within our-self, and between us and others.
Smooth or roughskin covers our whole body. It is the physical inter-face between us and our surroundings. We looked at our skin, and felt it.
The skin of my hand is rough - it is hard from the work I do.
The skin over my face and body is wrinkled and dried after the hard-ships I have endured - my hair is white, though I'm only thirty-eight.
At the end of the day, I don't like to sit close to anybody - I feel my skin stinks of sweat.
Water makes up about 60 percent of body weight - as fluid in our blood and in all our tissues. Water is important to maintain the body's balance.
When I haven't drunk enough water, I've noticed I get dark-coloured urine, and it feels burning and hot...
Neeta quipped,
Ah! Now I know I'm not fat - it's water in my body!
Blood flows constantly, circulating through our whole body, pumped rhythmically by our heart.
Feeling the nadi - is it the heart-beat?
Seeing the blue veins raised up on our hands, we imagined the channels of blood running like rivers through our bodies.
The blood-stream is a carrier of many things - life-preserving oxygen and tissue-building nutrients, hormonal messages, and protective substances. It collects and conveys used and unneeded substances, enabling them to be excreted from our body through urine, sweat and the air we breathe out.
Blood is mis-believed to be a carrier of presumed social traits - hence, we hear people talking about 'good' blood and 'bad' blood, language which conveys class and caste-based or racial prejudice.
Networks of lymph nodes and channels are routes for drainage of unneeded fluid and other substances from the tissues. The nodes swell in their attempt to block the spread of harmful elements, like microbes and cancer cells.

Our Body Co-ordinates...
How do all these cells, tissues and parts work together, so that our body is one?
Under natural circumstances, all the parts of our body work together in harmony, so that we are comfortable, active and productive, and we can meet ordinary stresses and challenges easily. While all our tissues play their part, it is mainly the combined actions and connections between nerves and hormones which co-ordinate body activities. Thus, the brain-and-pituitary-gland on one extremity are linked with various tissues and organs, and on the other to nerve reflex and hormonal feed-back net-works or 'tele-systems'. Such neuro-hormonal reflexes are even involved in regulating immunity. Later, we will be exploring in detail the neuro-hormonal tele-system involved concerned with regulating and modulating our sexuality, fertility and reproduction....

Resists...
The air we breathe, the food we eat, the water we drink, and our social relationships help our body to strengthen its self-preserving and protecting processes. Our skin, the hair and mucus membranes help protect us by obstructing the entry of harmful substances and microbes.
I can feel hair inside my nose - on my eyelids - inside my ear...
Sometimes, harmful microbes are able to enter our body and pose a threat to our balance. It may be because of an injury or because of unsafe activities.
The body cells identify these outside elements and create substances called anti-bodies to single them out, to stop their over-growth and neutralise their disruptive actions. Anti-bodies are carried through our blood and in other body fluids, including breast-milk. This preserving and protecting activity of our body is known as immunity.

...and Communicates
Our body communicates within itself and also with our environment.
Effects within our body are brought about by a communication network of nerves and hormones. What happens outside us stimulates various responses within us, too.
The nerves co-ordinate the motions of our body. They transmit sensory and motor messages to and from different body parts. Suddenly, Pooja piped up,
Oooh! I pinched the nerve at my elbow - it's like a current of electricity!
Radha threw a piece of chalk at Sunita, who turned to her in surprise.
A fly came in and sat on Rani's nose - she flicked it away, unknowingly.
Vani laughed, and said, Rani, you didn't even realise...
Consciousness is a quality of our mind. ....not separate from our body, and others' bodies. It develops within social surroundings, structured by society.
A radical change in consciousness comes about in girls and boys at puberty. During these years, they become profoundly aware of their bodies.

The Awakening of Sexuality and Fertility
Getting enough good food while a child grows up is important in bringing on puberty. This is especially true for a girl, since having some fat in her body enables her to make the natural hormones which bring on the body changes.
Keeping in mind the experience of child-marriage among our participants and its prevalence in most parts of Andhra, we focused on the growth of girls' bodies. With the help of a large pictorial chart, we compared the physical development of girls in four stages - at ages eight, twelve, sixteen and then eighteen.

At puberty, external and internal changes take place in a girl's body. These changes take place because of the effects of estrogen, one of the two hormones secreted by the ovaries.

• her bones and muscles grow stronger
• some fat is stored in certain places
• hair grows in her armpits and over her pubic area and vulva
• her breasts grow and become sensitive
• her vulva and the internal genital organs develop, and
• her ovaries start to produce eggs and hormones, so her menstrual periods start.

Every girl develops differently, and at her own pace if she is given a chance. After menstrual periods begin, the body usually takes about four years to get completely ready for reproductive functions.
At the emotional level, too, there are changes. A girl becomes aware of her body developing. She has new desires. She may crave to be loved, to be appreciated and assured. She wants to be 'someone'. Powerful sexual urges arise within her, also, which she doesn't understand but she is taught to feel shame for.

... and Real Life
In rural Andhra Pradesh, girls are married off as children. Some are sent early to the husband's place, where he starts relating to the child even before she gets her periods. After that, the girl is pressed to bear a child within the first year. If she does not, she may be taken and left at her mother's home. There is no sign of the husband, and the girl is deserted with no future. Sometimes she hears he has married again.
For those girls who do conceive in the first year, it is at a terrible cost of endangering their lives. With small bodies and undeveloped parts hardly able to hold a foetus, it frequently results in miscarriage or very difficult child-birth.
We told the group a tragic story of a girl who paid both prices. It was about Janthamani, a member of a pillalu sangha (children's collective) in Medak District.

Janthamani was just ten years old when her grand-mother got her married. She had no parents. When she was twelve her periods started, and right away she got pregnant. In the sixth month, her husband abandoned her back at her grand-mother's house. Soon after, when her grand-mother was out working in the fields, Janthamani started feeling pains. She didn't know what was happening. All in the village were away at work. In the after-noon Janthamani gave birth to a premature baby. She went into mental shock, not knowing what to do until her grand-mother returned.
It was evening. We rushed to see Janthamani at her grand-mother's house. Even then, she was stunned, unable to talk. Examining her, we were horrified to see how tiny her vaginal passage was, how under-developed her other organs must be, leave aside her poor general health. We wondered in anger, Was he an animal who did this to her?!

As a mere child, Janthamani had been burdened with proof of her fertility. This incident shook up our participants who had young daughters. Subbamma's daughter had just matured. She cancelled a marriage proposal, asking the intended in-laws to wait for another two years.
I realise now, my daughter is not a burden to me. I don't want to spoil her future by sparing myself the tauntings of the others. This training has taught me a lot of lessons. I need to begin with myself, if I have to change this evil practice in the village.
We discovered that some mothers give their daughters pills to bring on periods, and then send them to the in-laws' house. Sathyamma shared,
I got my daughter married before her periods came. Usually, we keep our daughters at home until they grow up. But I sent her to the in-laws immediately after marriage. Her husband use to want sex often.
I asked the chemist for some pills to bring on her periods, and I gave them to her. Now I know better. I feel very bad about what I did.
When our participants thought and compared a girl's body at eight or twelve to her body at sixteen and eighteen, they realised how they had violated their children by getting them married at such a young age and pressurising them to bear children. But, this new personal awareness would have to withstand the whole complex of social pressures - subtly controlling the labour, property, fertility and sexuality of women - which perpetuate child marriage.

Boys' Puberty: Changes also take place in boys which start usually between ages eleven to thirteen. The pituitary gland, in his head below his brain, sends a stimulating hormone through his blood to his testicles. These glands begin to produce sperms and to secrete testostrone, the male sex hormone. This hormone causes changes like growth of hair on his face and body, deepening of his voice, his muscles becoming strong and his bones heavier. It also makes the male genitals grow. He is surprised by getting erections, and that semen sometimes comes out during his sleep while he dreams.
He may become emotional and sensitive in a new way, and he starts to have sexual feelings. This phase of life may be stormy. He is in great need of wise guidance and proper information about sex and fertility, but this he almost never gets.
Puberty changes go on for five to seven years or more.

Our Sexual and Reproductive System
Since women have been discouraged from touching, or even thinking about, the mysterious area 'down below', they often feel quite uneasy about it. They regard this tabooed region differently, and it needs special effort. We need to learn about men's bodies too, if we are to understand sex and reproduction and to expose some myths about males. The older women would crack jokes about male genitals. A spirit of anger was not hard to detect. But the younger women were as knotted up about male bodies as they were about their own.
With the help of pictures we looked at the male and female bodies. One said, There is not too much difference - men and women both have a head, two hands, two legs. We have most of the same organs inside. Only the genital parts are different. Then, how come men are more violent?

Features of Both Sexes
Let's look more carefully at the sexual and reproductive systems of men and women -
how are they different, and how are they alike?
The onset of puberty differs by about two years - around nine to eleven for girls and eleven to thirteen for boys.
Sexual and reproductive function in both women and men is regulated by the pituitary
gland, which is inter-connected with other organs through a kind of 'tele-com' system linked by the blood and nerves.
Both sexes have a pair of genital glands, the testicles and the ovaries, which secrete sex hormones and produce seed-cells - sperms in men and eggs in women.
Both have erectile organs of sexual response, the clitoris and the penis.
In both male and female, aggressive feelings can arise with sexuality, but it is socially suppressed in women and supported in men. Likewise, feelings of affection can arise in both, but are cultivated in women and rooted out of men.
An out-standing difference between men and women is in the nature of their fertility. In men, it is relatively constant from teen age to old age. In women, it is interrupted and cyclical, from teen-age to middle-age.
Only women can produce and give birth to children, and make milk to feed them - and, during menstruation, women can bleed without injury.
Only men have Y seed cells which determine the sex of a child, as we shall explain later.

A Man's Sexual and Reproductive System
Having a more limited role in biological child-bearing, the male sexual and reproductive system is simpler than the female.

The Male Genital Organs and Tissues: Slung outside the body in a skin-and-muscle pouch, the testicles respond to stimulation from the pituitary gland. They are cooler than inside, because producing sperms requires a temperature lower than the inside of the body. Each testicle is made up of about three hundred tiny compartments with soft, tightly coiled tubules, where millions of sperms are produced. The sperms take about sixty to seventy days to ripen to maturity.
Then two sperm-tubes (one from each testicle) pass under the skin over the pubic bone and enter the belly. Inside, they go over and behind the urinary bladder.
There, the sperms get stored in two semen-sacs, where the sperms get mixed with a slightly alkaline fluid that feeds them and keeps them strong. This mixture of fluid and sperms is known as semen.
Two semen tubes then pass through the prostate gland and join the urine tube which passes from the bladder into the penis and opens to the outside at the end.
The penis allows urine to come out, and ejaculates semen during orgasm. But, both things don't happen at the same time! When a man's penis is erect and he gets an orgasm, a small ring-like muscle contracts at the base of the bladder, stopping the urine.
The tip (or glans) of the penis is sensitive and is protected by a loose hood of skin (the foreskin). The inside of the penis has soft spongy tissues surrounding the urine tube. When a man feels sexually aroused, the sponge fills tightly with blood and his penis becomes erect and firm.

Male Body Politics: Some males are muscular and heavy in build. A common belief is that aggressiveness and sexual promiscuity are rooted in male biology. This belief is wrong, but it used to justify domination and oppression of women. Given the same opportunities and privileges as men, women can also develop to their full potential.

Woman's Sexual and Reproductive System
When we studied the male system, we had to depend on pictures - here we could have'live visuals'!
Medical textbooks misrepresent and distort the female body, especially the sexual and reproductive parts. The vagina is always shown as a gaping hole or an open tunnel. The clitoris, if ever mentioned at all, is pointed out as a small bump. Both of these ideas are wrong. Likewise, there are myths about orgasm. It was said that a mature woman will have an orgasm centred in the vagina whereas an immature woman's orgasm will arise from the clitoris. Furthermore, the idea was promoted that women's sexual response needs stimulation by a penis. Such myths have done a lot of harm to women. They have affected the behaviour of both men and women.

Lets look at ourselves:
We looked at our breasts first, in front of a large mirror.

First, we noticed that we don't have the same size and shape. Often the right one was smaller than the left. In the middle of the breast we noticed a circle of darker skin. Some had firm nipples while some were puckered. One had a deep pit in her right breast, a scar from an old abscess. Another was shy of her large breasts, and a third felt that her chest was too flat. They were all ashamed. The breasts of some of us sagged, while others' breasts were firm. We wanted to know, Why?
Over the years, the breasts droop as a woman's skin and inside structure becomes looser. During childbearing and breast-feeding, the breasts enlarge and stretch the skin. At the middle of the breast we could see a circle of darker skin with a nipple in the centre.
Some of us had nipples that stuck out, and others had flat ones, or even pushed a little inside. We felt the nipple and the circle with our fingers. The dark circle was soft and spongy. Some had nipples that were hardened and lengthened from breast-feeding an infant for a long time. As we were feeling with our fingers, some of us noticed that the skin puckered and the nipple stood out. It felt tickly and tingly! This had happened, too, when we've been cold or when we've been sexually excited.
Now we wanted to learn about what the breasts are like inside. From the picture, we could see how the inside of the breasts consists of fat, fibre tissue and milk-producing sac-like glands and ducts. When a woman breast-feeds her child, these ducts carry the milk from the gland-sacs to the nipples. When we go through puberty and our ovaries start secreting the hormones estrogen and progestrone, our breasts grow. During each menstrual cycle, our breasts change, becoming larger, heavier, and rounder and then smaller again. During child-bearing, our breasts grow and develop to feed the new-born child.

Among our 'lower' parts, the participants called the vulva 'manam' or 'yoni', the vagina as the 'yoni margam', and to the womb as'garbha sanchi' (the bag that holds the embryo).
We gave them paper and colours and asked them to draw pictures of the manam and the reproductive parts, not as they might have seen them before in charts, but as they understood them from their cultural background.
The women used a lot of bright colours - red, green, orange, yellow, purple. Although the drawings did show the influence of pictures of the reproductive organs that they had seen before, the forms and symbols they used to express the vulva and the womb were of bud, flower, almond, coconut. Within the vulva, they drew three 'o's.

Live Visuals
Then, we put up on the wall a blown-up text-book picture of the vulva. But the women looked puzzled. Only Nageshwari, Vasantha and Subbamma told us that it was the picture of the yoni, but no more than that. Then Sabala suggested, Why don't we look at ourselves?
The room filled with gasps and 'Aiyoo!' When we had done body mapping, we'd been so careful not to go beyond three inches below the navel, clinging to our clothes. Everyone of us tightened up. No one was prepared to take the lead. We understood that we had to allow time and space to each of the participants until she was ready. So, one of us decided to give the lead. With determination, she took off her salwar. Sitting and leaning against the wall, she spread her legs apart. Holding the mirror in front, she separated the inner lips of the vulva and explained the parts within it.
Some of the women came near, peeping from the sides. The parts inside the vulva were pink, but not very clear. With the fingers of her other hand, she started to feel and locate the different parts. One broke the silence, laughing,
Why are we so scared? We're all women. We don't feel shy with our men! See, it's so easy!
Still standing, she lifted her saree and felt her vulva. Then, she exclaimed,
Here! I've found my santosham button'!
This loosened up everyone. One, who had suppressed her sexual urges since the age of fifteen, could hardly wait to see herself. But she was nervous. All the do's and don'ts shouted inside her head. She kept looking to us for assurance. Sitting next to her, Lakshmi Narsamma stroked her back while she went ahead. Once she had broken her taboo, she relaxed. The rest of the sangha women needed no coaxing to look at themselves.
Pushpa was most open among the project staff women. But the others were literally shivering, so we gave them more time. Gradually each one took a look at her own vulva. We felt the most sensitive part of the clitoris. We all touched the urinary opening, vaginal opening and anus. Then, we looked at each-other's vulva...
My husband expects me to remove the hair. I take a lot of time rubbing with ash and stone to remove it. I was surprised to see today that many of my sisters have hair on their manam.
I never knew I was so pink down there. I was always told that it is bad to look at my manam.
I was feeling ashamed in front of you all. I always thought my manam was too big.
The group was now relaxed. They saw that just as each one's face is different, the vulva has different colours, size and shape, too. Discovery of diversity in our bodies is important, as it helps us to value ourselves. It breaks down the norm of an 'ideal' body.
We encouraged the women to keep on exploring. Alone, some ventured to stimulate the clitoris to orgasm. The next day one of them said,
I don't need a man to satisfy me! I can do it to myself. And, just think - all these years, this button was hidden from me!

The Vulva-Yoni -Clitoris
The term vulva corresponds to yoni, or manam as our sangha women called it. In a narrower sense, the yoni may be located as the vaginal opening within the vulva. The yoni is also an ancient symbol of feminine regenerative power. Taking a new view of the clitoris, we can understand it also to be nearly the same as the yoni. Our participants discovered it's most sensitive part - the glans - as their santosham (pleasure) button.
Until recent times, doctors have either ignored the clitoris entirely, or they believed it to be only a sensitive bump. But in every regional language, there is a name for it. Using the word santosham itself recognises its role. Today, we know the clitoris is much more than a button or bump - in addition to the glans, it has in-reaching spongy tissue which swells during excitement and muscles that contract during orgasm. Fine networks of nerve fibres and blood vessels stretch back and in around the vaginal opening and the urine tube.
The hairy padded outer lips of the vulva protect the sensitive clitoral structures. The thinner inner lips are hairless. Veins can be seen through the thin skin of their inside fold. Their colour varies, from bright reddish or pink on the inside to deep brown or black on the outside. They also vary a lot from woman to woman, in size, colour and texture, and can be large or small compared to the outer lips. They enclose other clitoral structures, including the vaginal opening and the urinary opening. Deeper inside are spongy masses which fill with blood and swell.
The inner lips join in front over the clitoral glans and shaft forming a hood, varying in appearance from one woman to another. With the flat of our fingers in a circular and back and forth motion, we felt above the hood to find the shaft of the clitoris. Below the hood and glans is the opening to the urine tube which leads to the bladder. This opening is often difficult to see because it is small and slit-like. The urine tube opening can be very close to the vaginal opening. Within the vaginal opening is the fringe-like hymen. On either side towards the back of the vaginal opening are two vulvo-vaginal glands. We only notice them if they get infected and become swollen and painful. Behind the vagina, beyond the clitoral area, is the perineum and the hairy area surrounding the anus.
Being very sensitive, the clitoris can be stimulated to reach orgasm in all sorts of gentle, non-penetrative ways. Modern feminist health research has re-defined the clitoris as all the structures which function together to produce orgasm.

The Brain, the Glands and the Hormones
When we think of the sexual and reproductive system, we must never forget two parts at the base of our brain - the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland just below it. They play a vital role in regulating and modifying sexual and reproductive functions through nerves and through hormones.
Being a part of the brain, the hypothalamus is influenced by our thoughts and emotions, and by any kind of stress. It is in close contact with the pituitary gland through tiny nerve fibres and blood vessels.
The pituitary gland makes two hormones important for fertility and sexuality,follicle stimulating hormone, or FSH, and luteinising hormone, or LH.
It also makes two other hormones - oxytocin and prolactin - which contract the womb muscle after child-birth and produce milk during breast-feeding.
The hypothalamus stimulates the pituitary gland to secrete FSH and LH which in turn stimulate the ovaries. The ovaries secrete their own hormones called estrogen and progestrone.

Estrogen brings about changes in our emotions and bodies - it heightens sexual desire, makes the sexual parts more sensitive and lubricative, and causes the cervix to produce mucus which protects the sperms, while an egg gets ready. It also builds up the womb lining.

Progestrone gets ready for a fertilised egg to be protected, implanted and nurtured - it turns off or lowers sexual desire, makes the womb lining thick, soft and nutritious, reduces womb muscle activity, and makes the mucus into a thick plug blocking the canal into the womb.

The levels of ovarian hormones affect the hypothalamus through feed-back. The hypothalamus is affected by negative feedback from low levels of estrogen and progesterone. The pituitary is affected by positive feedback from the peak of estrogen before ovulation.
The relations between the brain, the glands and the sexual and reproductive parts forms a kind of neuro-hormonal tele-system which regulates our sexual and reproductive functions. These functions are cyclical. Our cycles respond to various kinds of stress like excitement, worry, illness, and hunger.

The Ovaries
The two ovaries are glands on either side of the womb. Most women are not aware of them. The ovaries are sensitive, and painful if pressed. Each ovary is about the shape and size of an almond. Suspended within the ring of our pelvic bone, they rest within the broad-ligament which binds our womb to the bony wall. Above them run the egg-tubes with finger-like ends reaching over each ovary.
A girl is born with about a million unripe egg-cells in her ovaries. These stay inactive throughout child-hood. At the time she gets her first period, she has around two lakhs of unripe egg-cells. Several egg-follicles begin to mature together in each menstrual cycle, but only one ripens completely.
When an egg-cell gets ripe, it breaks out of a follicle on the surface of the ovary. This is called ovulation. Often we can feel ovulation when it happens as a brief, pricking sensation or pain. After ovulation, the empty sac of the burst follicle changes into a small micro-gland, the yellow body. Then, after about ten days, the yellow body shrinks, and the menstrual period starts.
The ovarian follicles do more than just produce egg-cells - they produce estrogen and progestrone. Every month, estrogen and progestrone cause cyclical changes in our body.

The Egg-Tubes
The egg-tubes are soft thin muscular tubes, a little longer than one's middle finger. From the top of the womb on either side, they stretch outward and backward. They contract and relax with rolling wave-like motion.
The egg-tubes have two functions:

• to transport the egg to the womb, and
• to let sperms travel to meet the egg.

Unlike sperms, eggs can not move by themselves. They are helped in two ways:

• tiny hair-like cilia lining the egg-tubes sweep the egg forward, and
• muscle contractions push the egg through the egg-tube.

The Womb
The womb, is the organ which doctors call the uterus. The womb is mostly made up of muscle, and is shaped like a pear, or a longish guava. It is about the size of one's own fist. It sits within the hollow of our pelvic bone, supported by pelvic muscles and tendons, and covered by a broad sheet-like membrane attached to the side-walls. The bladder is just in front, and the end of the large intestine (rectum) passes behind. From the upper corners of the womb, the ovaries and egg-tubes stretch backward. The inner lining of the womb is called the endometrium.
The womb has three parts:

• the upper part forming an umbrella-like roof;
• the main part, with a flat empty triangular space in the middle;
• the narrow lower part, called the cervix,.

The womb is usually somewhat bent on itself, and curved forward over the bladder. In some women, however, the womb naturally curves backwards, or is not curved at all. If one examines the womb by hand (as we will later do a 'bimanual exam'), it feels firm and is about the size of one's own fist.
The Cervix: This lower part of the womb is very important, especially because of its role near ovulation. Through it runs a canal. Its' opening is the mouth of the womb, and pokes into the vagina. It produces a special mucus secretion.
Inside the canal of the cervix are a lot of little tree-like sacs or crypts. These crypts secrete a special mucus regulated by estrogen and progestrone. Estrogen makes the mucus slippery and mildly alkaline, while Progestrone makes the mucus thick.
The cervix is also important in child-birth. If you have never given birth to a child, the opening in your cervix will look like just a dimple. But if you have given birth, the cervical opening will look and feel irregular and wide. Also, you may have relaxed support of the uterus making it difficult to feel the rising and lowering of the cervix as a fertility sign. The cervix and its secretions also slow down infections from getting into the womb.

The Vagina
The vagina is a strong, wavy muscular canal that leads from the womb to the outside. The cervix dips into its' upper end. There is a mote-like circular space in the vagina all around the cervix, which is deeper behind and shallower in front.
The vaginal membrane is usually quite tough and the lining is not very sensitive. But, its opening is surrounded by the clitoral sponge and muscles, so it becomes actively involved in sexual sensations and orgasm.
The vaginal has three important functions:

• it lets menstrual and other secretions out,
• it lets semen be put near the womb, and
• it gives passage to a baby at birth.

The Ecology of the Vagina: Just as forests and grasslands change their colours and smells with the seasons, likewise the insides of our bodies constantly undergo cyclical changes. Our genital parts also change regularly with a seasonal rhythm. There are lots of tiny 'bacteria' and other little microbes (one-celled micro-animals and micro-plants) that live harmlessly inside us. They are happy with our normal odours and secretions. One can find microbes living on our skin, in our mouth, in our breath passages, in our intestines and in our vaginal passage. Not only are most of these little beasties harmless, but they help protect us from other harmful microbes which might enter or over-grow in our body and which could make us quite sick.
We speak of nature as having a balance. At any given time and from season to season, life in a forest has it's own natural order. The vagina also has an intricate internal order, or 'ecology'.
The vaginal environment is normally somewhat acidic because of the healthy secretions from the cells of the vaginal walls. This discourages harmful microbes. Harmless microbes like lacto-bacteria prefer this acidic environment, and even help to keep it acidic. As ovulation time approaches, the fertile mucus secretion flowing out of the cervix makes the environment turn slightly alkaline. When the mucus becomes thick and infertile, the vagina again becomes acidic. The menstrual flow, mixed with mucus, is once again somewhat alkaline. Thus, the ecology changes during the phases of the menstrual cycle.
Some kinds of food change the vaginal environment. Women have a sense of these kinds of effects when they speak knowingly of 'hot' and 'cold' foods.
The vaginal ecology can be changed by several upsetting factors, like men's 'jabardasti' (force), poor nutrition, disorders like anaemia, diabetes, tuberculosis and sexually transmitted infections. Certain conditions of life like pregnancy and menopause bring with them changes in ecology. Certain medicines like anti-biotics and hormones (including contra-ceptives) tend to upset the balance. Too much physical or emotional stress may further lower our resistance to disorder. The natural flow of secretions from the vagina keeps the vaginal environment clean and fresh.
In fact, all of our body's secretions have their own importance in maintaining our whole internal ecology. As thick forests have moist air and earth, so do we have moisture.

Isn't it interesting that women's secretions are seen as 'dirty', but men's secretions are taken as symbols of masculinity!

Experiences of First Menstruation, and After
Sexuality begins to bloom with the start of ovulation and menstrual cycles. At this positive time in a girl's life, she gets cloaked with the myth of untouchability that links menstruation with pollution and shame.
It was dark. I felt myself wet and sticky, and I was worried. In the dim light I saw dark patches on my skirt. When I touched inside my fingers got covered with blood. I started crying. My mother woke up and told me that I have grown up now. She gave me a bath in the morning and made me sit outside the house for eight days. I had a special plate and tumbler. New clothes were given to me.
After I was married I was asked to sit outside for five days. Periods were seen as dirty. I could not keep my menstrual cloth inside the house. I had to leave them outside. It was difficult drying them in the sun - the dogs used to take them and run away. My in-laws told me that the rags are dirty and smelly. I had lots of problems washing the rags clean, because there was no soap.
I was married before my periods and allowed to stay at my mother's place. One day I went to harvest groundnuts. While working, I found my skirt wet and sticky. There were red patches on it. Men were working at the other side of the field. I tried to pull the skirt between my legs and go home. The other women noticed and told my mother.
There was rejoicing, because now they could send me to my husband's house. I didn't know what was happening. They bathed me and gave me coconut and jaggery to eat. My husband was informed that I had grown up. He brought me a saree and blouse, flowers, kumkum and coconut. I was made to sit outside the house on a new mat. All the women sat around me singing and dancing. I wasn't allowed to work - just had to sit dressed up, admire myself in the mirror, powder myself, apply kumkum.
Next period they didn't give anything. I was disappointed. They sent me to my husband's house to my in-laws. There I couldn't touch anything before I had a bath. Now whenever I have my period I am made to sit outside.
I got married at the age of five. My husband died two years later. I got my periods when I was twelve, at my in-law's place. I faced lots of suffer
ing. I got pain and heavy bleeding. My in-laws treated me badly. I was not allowed to touch anything. I had no celebration like other young girls. I missed my mother who died when I was very young. My in-laws use to have nice food inside but they use to make me sit outside and give me only ambil (fermented cereal) to eat, or starve me. My father-in-law use to make me sit all night and not allow me to sleep.
In my community, it is forbidden to sleep on a bed during our periods - we must sleep on the floor. At this time we do not wear red sindur, We have to wear black sindur and all these signs mark us as widows. We can't participate in religious ceremonies since we are impure. I wanted to attend a pilgrimage with my family, so I took hormone pills to postpone my periods.
Only for the first menstruation do they celebrate our fertility with a grand feast. After that, they treat us as untouchables - as dogs. Nobody cares. We have to sit outside as we are dirty. We can't touch anything. Even our shadow should not fall on the images of gods that are around the house.
In Andhra Pradesh, when a girl gets her first period, her family organises a ceremony, a rite of passage into adult-hood. This is the occasion to instruct her on the code of conduct, and from then on she must be quiet and withdrawn. Often her schooling ends, and now she is stopped from playing with boys. Certain restrictions are lessening, but the ideology that woman is impure and her body is shameful still persists.
Were there any positive feelings as the participants passed from girlhood to womanhood?
We were happy we would be going to our husband's place.
Our dreams to get married would now be fulfilled.
We had aspirations to be like actresses in the cinema.
We were happy for the attention and the new clothes.
We were attracted towards others and needed physical contact.
We were curious to explore our body.
Indeed, menstruation taboos are based not on facts but on fears. Women's blood magical - nobody knows where it comes from. Yet, all know it is related to a woman's physical ability to bear and give birth, an ability which men lack...

Ovulation and Menstruation
While women suffer so much on account of menstruation taboos, the fact that they produce an egg and how this relates to their periods is hidden from them.
The cyclical changes happen at various levels at the same time.
Each egg-producing cycle begins with menstruation, as several eggs begin to mature in the ovaries and estrogen is secreted. One of the follicles grows bigger and the other die back.
Estrogen makes the womb lining develop, and makes the cervix to secrete fertile mucus. When the egg is ripe, and estrogen reaches a peak level, this stops the pituitary from secreting FSH - it starts secreting LH, causing the ovary to release the egg (ovulation). The left-over empty follicle comes together into a little mass, the yellow body to secrete progestrone and still some estrogen.
Progestrone makes the womb lining thicker, and calms the womb muscle. It causes thick cervical mucus to plug the cervix. If the egg is not fertilised and implanted, in about ten days the yellow body stops working - the hormones stop, the plug of mucus dissolves and the cervix opens. Because progestrone no longer calms the womb its muscles start contracting. This interrupts the blood supply to the lining, which breaks up, separates and comes out as ‘menstrual blood’.
The low levels of hormones cause the hypothalamus and pituitary to start acting again, secreting FSH to act on the ovaries. So, the next egg-producing cycle starts up, and so on.

• An egg is released only once in a menstrual cycle, and hence a woman's fertility is cyclical.
• Fertility cycles vary from woman to woman, and from one cycle to another cycle in the same woman.

We've Broken the Do's and Don'ts...
This whole packed six-day session dispelled a lot of fear and anxiety. The women learned that menstrual periods are not caused by anything mysterious, and that it is not polluting or dirty. They also came to feel their bodies are beautiful, and not shameful. All gave a big sigh that, at last, we had broken a lot of dos and don'ts, and we could now look at ourselves.
The women were also thrilled about the new knowledge of the 'santosham button', and they wanted to share it back home with others! We thought that this might get them into trouble, so we cautioned them,
Just now, be selective about sharing your experience. Don't share this outside our group. We are going through a process together. In this course, there is still a lot to be learned, and much to think over. Be sure to share only gradually and selectively.
But some did share with their partners and other women at the project and in the sanghas.

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