Discourses on the Menopause and Female Sexual Identity

Abstract

Over the last century, discourses in the West have variously regarded the menopause in negative terms. Feminist historical research on medico-moral discourses that focus on the female body, for example, has shown it to be a sign of sin, to evidence of madness and hysteria, through to an evolutionary process and, more recently, a deficiency disease (Kaufert, 1982; McCrea, 1983; Jacobus et al., 1990; Greer, 1991; Vines, 1993). Medical intervention in the menopause has corresponded to changes in these meanings, thus changing the way it is medically experienced. Such responses have ranged from locking women up as mad, to operating on them, through to today’s attempts to eliminate the menopause through hormone replacement therapy (HRT) (Greer, 1991).