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Environmental effects on women’s reproductive cycles: implications for fertility

Environmental effects on women’s reproductive cycles: implications for fertility. Kathryn B. H. Clancy, PhD Assistant Professor, Anthropology University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign AAAS Meetings, Chicago 2014. Boundary work: what is a normal female body? Who defines what this is?.

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Environmental effects on women’s reproductive cycles: implications for fertility

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  1. Environmental effects on women’s reproductive cycles: implications for fertility Kathryn B. H. Clancy, PhD Assistant Professor, Anthropology University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign AAAS Meetings, Chicago 2014

  2. Boundary work: what is a normal female body?Who defines what this is?

  3. “Woman is not human, but a monster.” • Menstruating women give off harmful fumes that will “poison the eyes of children lying in their cradles by a glance.” • Children conceived by menstruating women “tend to have epilepsy and leprosy because menstrual matter is extremely venemous [sic].”

  4. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pelvicdouche.jpg

  5. In menstruation, the epithelial layer separates, “leaving behind a ragged wreck of tissue, torn glands, ruptured vessels, jagged edges of stroma, and masses of blood corpuscles, which it would seem hardly possible to heal satisfactorily without the aid of surgical treatment.” http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Havelock_Ellis_a.JPG

  6. http://archives.wellcome.ac.uk/recipebooks/MS8097/MS8097_0082.pdfhttp://archives.wellcome.ac.uk/recipebooks/MS8097/MS8097_0082.pdf

  7. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Elizabeth_Blackwell.jpghttp://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Elizabeth_Blackwell.jpg

  8. http://journaltimes.com/lifestyles/relationships-and-special-occasions/groundbreaking-our-bodies-ourselves-book-marks-th-anniversary/article_ea12f470-0d8f-11e1-aca6-001cc4c002e0.htmlhttp://journaltimes.com/lifestyles/relationships-and-special-occasions/groundbreaking-our-bodies-ourselves-book-marks-th-anniversary/article_ea12f470-0d8f-11e1-aca6-001cc4c002e0.html

  9. Isbell et al 2012

  10. Context matters.

  11. Allocation to maintenance and reproduction

  12. Anthropology… • … seeks to understand causes of variation • … disrupts the pull to stereotype, intuit, universalize • … empowers people to understand, negotiate, and make their environments

  13. Towards a context-dependent normal • Does the endometrium respond to environmental stressors in a manner similar to the ovaries? • Does ovarian follicle behavior influence the menstrual cycle? • What is the relationship between systemic inflammation markers and reproductive physiology?

  14. Low constraint normal menstrual cycle

  15. Endometrial variability Clancy et al 2009

  16. Cross-sectional Polish sample Clancy et al 2009

  17. Clancy Baerwald & Piersonin prep

  18. http://www.ultrasoundpaedia.com/uploads/53003/ufiles/ovaries/normal/ovary-normal.jpghttp://www.ultrasoundpaedia.com/uploads/53003/ufiles/ovaries/normal/ovary-normal.jpg

  19. Baerwald et al 2003

  20. Clancy et al 2013a

  21. Clancy et al 2013a

  22. Log CRP Clancy et al 2013a

  23. High CRP: black Low CRP: white Clancy et al 2013b

  24. New boundaries mean new directions • How does normal variation influence conception, implantation, and the maternal environment? • Can we develop tools to help doctors ask, does the response match the environment, and what are my patient’s needs today?

  25. Come to the Annals of Improbable Research Tonight! • Collaborators: Angela Baerwald, Roger Pierson, Grazyna Jasienska, Anna Ziomkiewicz, Ilona Nenko, Laura Klein, Richard Bribiescas, Peter Ellison, Katie Hinde, Julienne Rutherford, Robin Nelson, RipanMalhi, Lorena Madrigal • Graduate students: Mary Rogers, Katie Lee • Funding: • National Science Foundation • Campus Research Board • Hewlett Foundation • Find me at: • Twitter: @KateClancy • Blog: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/context-and-variation

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