Annalisa’s talk is called “Embodied Menstrual Rituals as Healing Praxis: Affirming Female Power in the Myth of Mary Magdalene”
Throughout Western history, powerful women, such as Mary Magdalene, have long been symbols of dangerous femininity. In particular, female bodies have been sites of patriarchal fantasies and projections of feminine danger. “The myth of menstrual danger” is one such feminine danger that has been a destructive legacy leading back to the early stages of Western civilization.
The dehumanizing depictions of “the myth of menstrual danger” have been used to control women’s bodies and devalue women’s place in society. Even more troubling, I believe this myth contributes to women’s internalized menstrual shame through a process termed “internalized sexism.”
Locating myself within the traditions of feminist spirituality, archeomythology, women’s history, and performative embodiment techniques, my presentation illuminates how I re-mythologize Mary Magdalene—and other goddesses and heroines—in ritual menstrual art performances to affirm female power and heal “the myth of menstrual danger.”
I do this in two primary ways: first, by framing Mary Magdalene within the Neolithic Great Goddess worshipping traditions, and second, with enactments of ritual performances that re-potentiate menstrual blood to symbolize feminine powers of death and regeneration. By remythologizing Mary Magdalene within a tradition that views the bleeding female body as life-affirming, menstrual embodiment becomes a radical act of self and collective healing.
About Annalisa
Annalisa Derr is a professional actress turned ritual theatre creatrix, budding goddess scholar, and doctoral candidate in Mythological Studies at Pacifica Graduate Institute. The working title of her dissertation is _Healing “the Myth of Menstrual Danger”_. Her current performance series, “She Bleeds the World into Existence,” utilizes menstrual art as an embodied research method and as sacred activism. She is founder of Journey to the Goddess TV on YouTube, an interview and soon-to-be travel series with the aim to regenerate ancient feminine wisdom for modern women.
