Managing the Menstrual Communication Taboo in Lithuania: Past and Present

Abstract

The paper is based on anonymous questionnaire surveys and interviews of women. One sample involved 423 young women (mean age: 21.04) surveyed by means of an anonymous questionnaire in 2016–2018. The survey produced a collection of 896 words and phrases used to denote menstruation. These lexical finds may be regarded as euphemisms/dysphemisms for taboo words representing an integral part of a secret language shared by women. Another sample involved 208 significantly older women (mean age: 73.66) interviewed individually in 2005–2012. The interviewing produced 117 lexical substituted for menstruation. This research is a part of a wider inquiry into the ways in which everyday practice, experience and knowledge affect the social and cultural constructions of menstruation. Seeking to record the widest possible range of popular knowledge and discourse about menstruation, including menstrual beliefs and practices, we shall try to interpret these data, focusing on how everyday experience, everyday knowledge, and encrypted language can shape behaviour, experience, and attitudes of contemporary people.