Towards menstrual mobilities and period positive ecologies

Abstract

Global organizations have long identified and declared women s health, wellbeing, and em- powerment as critical development goals with a push on leveraging information communication technology (ICT) to accomplish the same (e.g., Sustainable Development Goal-5). More recently, women s health has been receiving growing attention in the field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), with efforts acknowledging the need and value of studying the social impact of women s health issues. Menstrual health has drawn exponential interest in the last decade, with researchers extensively studying mobile application-based tracking practices and ethical concerns around col- lecting and managing intimate data through such apps. However, most of these studies represent experiences from the Global North. In this dissertation, I extend these ongoing conversations within the HCI community by investigating how technology can play a role in addressing cultural taboos and systemic barriers toward supporting a menstruator s journey. In India, as in several other countries, menstruation has historically remained a taboo, mak- ing it challenging to facilitate conversations around menstrual health and wellbeing, eventually contributing to negative menarche experiences, low self-esteem, and fear of embarrassment among menstruators. I study the broader ecosystem of the urban Indian middle-class population to investi- gate how menstrual taboo is sustained, menstrual silence is learned, menstrual literacy is cultivated, and how the design of contemporary ICTs can and does support the emergence and operation of these forms of socio-cultural sensemaking and meaning making. Through a series of qualitative and design studies conducted in Delhi, India, this dissertation broadly attempts to unpack avenues for technology design to build intellectual and human infrastructure and support civic and mate- rial infrastructure toward nurturing period-positive ecologies.