Ford Andrea, De Togni Giulia, Miller Livia
University Of Edinburgh United Kingdom.
University Of Chicago United States.
Engag Sci Technol Soc. 2021 Oct 5;7(1):48-66. doi: 10.17351/ests2021.655.
Period tracking is an increasingly widespread practice, and its emphasis is changing from monitoring fertility to encompassing a more broad-based picture of users' health. Delving into the data of one's menstrual cycle, and the hormones that are presumed to be intimately linked with it, is a practice that is reshaping ideas about health and wellness, while also shaping subjects and subjectivities that succeed under conditions of surveillance capitalism. Through close examination of six extended interviews, this article elaborates a version of period tracking that sidesteps fertility and, in doing so, participates in the "queering" of menstrual technologies. Apps can facilitate the integration of institutional medical expertise and quotidian embodied experience within a broader approach to the self as a management project. We introduce the concept of "hormonal health" to describe a way of caring for, and knowing about, bodies, one that weaves together mental and physical health, correlates subjective and objective information, and calls into question the boundary between illness and wellness. For those we spoke with, menstrual cycles are understood to affect selfhood across any simplistic body-mind division or reproductive imperative, engendering complex techniques of self-management, including monitoring, hypothesizing, intervening in medical appointments, adjusting schedules, and interpreting social interactions. Such techniques empower their proponents, but not within conditions of their choosing. In addition to problems with data privacy and profit, these techniques perpetuate individualized solutions and the internalization of pressures in a gender-stratified, neoliberal context, facilitating success within flawed structures.
经期追踪正日益普遍，其重点正从监测生育能力转变为涵盖更广泛的用户健康状况。深入研究个人月经周期的数据以及被认为与之密切相关的激素，这种做法正在重塑关于健康的观念，同时也塑造了在监控资本主义条件下取得成功的主体和主体性。通过对六次深度访谈的仔细分析，本文阐述了一种避开生育能力的经期追踪版本，从而参与到月经技术的“酷儿化”之中。应用程序可以在将自我作为一个管理项目的更广泛方法中，促进机构医学专业知识与日常身体体验的整合。我们引入“激素健康”的概念来描述一种关爱身体和了解身体的方式，这种方式将身心健康交织在一起，关联主观和客观信息，并质疑疾病与健康之间的界限。对于我们采访的那些人来说，月经周期被理解为会跨越任何简单的身心划分或生殖需求而影响自我认同，从而产生复杂的自我管理技巧，包括监测、假设、在医疗预约中进行干预、调整日程安排以及解读社交互动。这些技巧赋予其支持者力量，但并非在他们所选择的条件下。除了数据隐私和利润问题，这些技巧在性别分层的新自由主义背景下延续了个体化解决方案以及压力的内化，在有缺陷的结构中促成成功。
