What started off a few years ago as an investigation of state sales taxes on menstrual products has taken my work in many unexpected directions.
My colleague Emily Gold Waldman (Pace) and I have combined forces (and expertise) to write a book that takes a 360-degree look at the many ways that menstruation intersects with the law. We undertake a sustained investigation of the intersections of menstruation and sales tax, for sure, but also poverty, education, employment, prisoners’ rights, environmental issues, corporate law, and cultural taboos, to name some of the major topics we cover. The book will be published this coming June by NYU Press. The book is called Menstruation Matters: Challenging the Law’s Silence on Periods.
The work on menstruation has led—unexpectedly and wonderfully— to a series of three related forthcoming pieces, co-authored with Naomi Cahn (UVA). In that trio, we look at menopause as another life-cycle event with unexpected intersections with the law. We focus on menopause in the employment context; the legal treatment of menopause as compared with pregnancy, breastfeeding, and menstruation; and how menopause is conceptualized both as a medical problem and something that can be “managed” through technology (with all of the attendant privacy-related concerns). For anyone who is interested, here are those three menopause papers:
- Working Through Menopause, 99 Wash. U. L. Rev. (forthcoming)
- Contextualizing Menopause in the Law, 43 Harv. J. Gender & Law (forthcoming 2022)
- Managing and Monitoring the Menopausal Body, 2022 U. Chi. L. Forum (forthcoming 2022)
We’d be excited to hear from anyone else working on similar issues or in related areas!
