Bodily Integrity and the Politics of Circumcision

Every year 13.3 millions boys and 2 million girls are subjected to circumcision, the involuntary removal of part or all of their external sex organs.

Bodily Integrity and the Politics of Circumcision illuminates the vulnerability of human society to medical, economic, and historical pressures. It provides a much-needed, thoughtful, and detailed analysis of the devastating impact of circumcision on bodily integrity and human rights, and it provides hope for change.

Résumé

Circumcision is a cultural phenomenon that affects 15.3 million children and young adults annually. In terms of gender, 13.3 millions boys and 2 million girls are subjected to the involuntary removal of part or all of their external sex organs every year. Few people, however, ask why such practices persist or how modern societies can tolerate this inherent violation of human rights. The problem of female circumcision is being addressed on an international level, while male circumcision remains a subject many academics are reluctant to fully or impartially examine. This book explores the problem of male and female circumcision in modern society from religious, anthropological, psychological, medical, legal, and ethical perspectives.

Bodily Integrity and the Politics of Circumcision: Culture, Controversy, and Change illuminates the vulnerability of human society to medical, economic, and historical pressures. It provides a much-needed, thoughtful, and detailed analysis of the devastating impact of circumcision on bodily integrity and human rights, and it provides hope for change.

Contenu

Circumcision as a Memeplex.- The Life of the Flesh is in the Blood: The Meaning of Bloodshed in Ritual Circumcision.- Zipporah and the Bridegroom of Blood: Searching for the Antecedents of Jewish Circumcision.- At the Roots of Ethnic Female Genital Modification: Preliminary Report.- Psycholinguistic Approaches to Ritual Labia Minora Elongation Among the Baganda Women of Uganda.- Graphic Reproduction of Genital Stretching in a Group of Baganda Girls: Their Psychological Experiences.- Survey on the East-African Female Students at the University of Padua.- Female Genital Mutilation Among African Immigrants in Greece: The First Cognitive Study.- Deinfibulation in Italy.- Research Center for Preventing and Curing FGM and Its Complications.- Preliminary Research Into the Psycho-Sexual Aspects of the Operation of Defibulation.- Addressing Female Genital Mutilation in Germany: The Work of the Women's Rights Organization Terre des Femmes and the Situation in Germany.- Male Circumcision in Italy.- Genital Integrity and Gender Equity.- Increasing Awareness of Iatrogenic Damage Consequent to Male Circumcision.- A Survey of Subjective Foreskin Sensation in 600 Intact Men.- Human Rights Advances in the United States.- Toward Regulation of Non-Therapeutic Genital Surgeries Upon Minors: A Preliminary Legal Strategy.- Strategies for Litigation.- Of Waste and Want: A Nationwide Survey of Medicaid Funding for Medically Unnecessary, Non-Therapeutic Circumcision.- A Campaign for the Eradication of Infibulation Within an Extended Family: Khartoum, Sudan.