The Tactics of Menstruation in Dutch Cases of Sexual Assault and Infanticide, 1750-1920

This article analyzes menstruation talk in Dutch cases of sexual assault and infanticide as an example of embodiment: of the interaction between cultural models of menstruation and their interpretation by contextualized and sometimes resisting bodies of women acting in court cases. It argues that the French philosopher Michel de Certeau's notion of tactics can be applied to the strategies women used when discussing menstruation in court. Since many different models of menstruation coexisted and were often contradicting, as recent research has shown, this offered some leeway to choose those interpretations which possibly served women's judicial fate; for instance, claiming not to have known of their pregnancy because of continuing menses, asserting having miscalculated their due dates, and avowing they were simply severely menstruating while actually giving birth. Women played with knowledge and ignorance in regard to bodily functions like menstruation, indicating their use of tactics, while resisting normative images of the body.