ABSTRACT
Women leak, inevitably and often bountifully. Menstrual blood, birth fluids, breast milk and sometimes tears lead us to be seen as leakier than men at a physical level. Women are often seen to work through a network of relationships, a web, rather than the hierarchy of male decision-making (Gilligan 1982). Within such a web of relationships, emotions, knowledge and other personal attributes flow, often freely, sometimes unconsciously. Dirt is defined by Mary Douglas as ‘matter out of place’ (Douglas 1966). In any context, appropriate place is clearly a matter of categorisation, which is usually done by the socially powerful. What leakage is dirty or threatening, and what is bountiful and fruitful, is clearly a matter of categorisation.
