Our Bodies, Ourselves Anniversary

Small wonder that 4 million copies of Our Bodies, Ourselves have been sold worldwide, reaching an estimated readership of 20 million in its 3-plus decades. Over the years, 300,000 copies of the English-language edition have also been distributed, without cost, to groups in Africa, Asia, and Europe. This has prompted translations and adaptations of the book into 18 languages including Braille. 

“We’re part of the international women’s health movement,” says Sally Whelan, manager of Our Bodies, Ourselves ’ Global Translation/Adaptation Program. “In the early 1990s our publisher reverted most foreign rights to us. This has enabled us to transfer rights to women’s groups for $1.00, rather than to a publisher or translator, and gives these groups editorial control over language and content.” 

Since 2001 adaptations of Our Bodies, Ourselves have been produced in Bulgaria, Moldova, Poland, and Serbia. A French edition, produced in Senegal and released in 2004, has been distributed in 21 French-speaking African nations. A South Korean book is due out later this year and a Spanish language edition was released throughout Latin America in 2000. 

Each country decides its content. “In Serbia,” Whelan explains, “female bodies were recently used as war spoils, so the authors focused a lot of the book on violence against women. They also removed the chapters on exercise and nutrition. Since people were starving it was inappropriate to talk about fitness and eating well.” Similarly, in Armenia, the government’s pronatalist posture made discussion of birth control controversial. While the authors included contraceptive information, they did so fully aware of possible repercussions. 

The Our Bodies, Ourselves website offers other examples of cultural divergence. Take Senegal. “Aside from getting funds, the main problem encountered was the heterogeneity of the team involved in editing the book. It included men and women from very different backgrounds, visions, and countries. Some came from West Africa and some from Central Africa. Despite this variety of backgrounds that is enriching, the differences in perspectives [some members of the team being radical feminists, others very conservative] was a big problem.” 

In addition, high illiteracy rates forced the authors to question the wisdom of creating a written text. The website offers an explanation for the project’s ultimate resolution: “Because of the large number of African languages in the region, and the fact that these languages are not written and still oral, and because French is the working language in West and Central Africa, the book is in French.” Still, the authors state that they are soliciting funds to translate the information into local languages so that it can reach the widest possible audience. 

“Women around the world have come to know Our Bodies, Ourselves as a trusted resource that combines women’s testimonials with accurate health and medical information,” Whelan boasts. “They also recognize it as a powerful tool for organizing around issues they care about—sexuality, reproductive rights, childbearing, violence against women and access to healthcare. It positions women to influence policymakers and media so that what is at first just a book becomes a living tool for reproductive health literacy and empower- ment, a tool for advocacy and change.”

Judy Norsigian, executive director and one of the founding members of the Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, the group res- ponsible for creating early editions of the book, has seen Our Bodies, Ourselves move from a consensus-driven entity to a traditional not-for-profit organization. She has also seen the group weather internal and external strife, from funding crises to near-paralyzing con- flicts between staff members. Yet she remains upbeat. “First of all,” she says, “when you are working in a community of like- minded people, you don’t need huge successes. You take comfort in knowing that without your efforts, things would be much worse. I also know that Our Bodies, Ourselves has been lifesaving for many women. ” 

Newer issues, from AIDS to the direct marketing of drugs to consumers, from rampant eating disorders to the medicalization of childbirth, prod Norsigian. “The challenge is getting good information that is not tainted by corporate interests,” she says. “There is a lot of misleading stuff out there and the need for quality information is greater than ever. Ironically, despite greater access to technology, access to tried-and-true medical care is still hard to get. Access is a huge problem for most people, especially women.” 

This makes Our Bodies, Ourselves an essential resource. The 2005 edition is supplemented by a companion website (www.ourbodiesourselves.org) that provides links to government, community, and feminist programs. It also provides information that could not be crammed into the 850-page volume. More than 500 U.S.-based, Canadian, and African writers, editors, reviewers, medical authorities, researchers, and activists worked on the book; the result is a new Our Bodies, Ourselves , not a revision of the 1998 edition. 

“Not much [from the older editions] could be eliminated,” admits managing editor Heather Stephen- son. “But everything is updated and new issues are covered. That’s the reason the book has grown so much. There are always new topics to include,” among them: breast implants, the debate over female sexual dysfunction, direct-to-consumer marketing, the use of microbicides, and menstrual suppression.

Sarai Walker was the photo editor for the 2005 book. “The photos are of women you’d never see in a fashion magazine,” she says. “We had to rethink the whole book to find ways to illustrate ideas. We want it to be appealing so people pick it up and get hooked in.” 

Walker also wrote the section on body image. “I wanted to develop a hard-hitting chapter dealing with the media, weightism, and the objectification of women. One of the things I wrote about is plastic surgery. Gay or straight, it doesn’t matter. Women are caught up in changing who they are. I also wanted to explore the camera lens as a male eye. Why is it that the covers of both women’s magazines and men’s magazines depict women? The chapter also deals with aging, racism, and reality TV shows.” 

Despite the fact that Our Bodies, Ourselves 2005 treads new ground, Walker says that the book retains “the Our Bodies, Ourselves voice. We don’t talk about women in the third person; everything is ‘we.’” 

It was that inclusive tone that first brought Vanessa Weeks to feminism. “I was raised immersed in the utter denial of the human body and its functions,” she says. “ Our Bodies, Ourselves opened my mind, like millions of women’s minds, to feminism ‘ourselves’ and to our bodies. Without it I would not be the proud mother of three terrific, enlightened sons, 19, 14, and 9. I could well have a 32-year-old child, raised in poverty by a young, uneducated mother with a dubious, if not destructive, sense of reality.” 

As for Our Bodies, Ourselves , new books on menopause and childbearing are in the planning stages, and will expand on information provided in the latest edition of Our Bodies, Ourselves.