The power of the blood: myths and practices surrounding menstruation in Indonesian diamond mining

ABSTRACT

This paper is a feminist investigation into the beliefs and practices surrounding menstruation among traditional artisanal diamond mining women in the Muslim Banjar ethnic community in rural parts of South Kalimantan, Indonesia. Based on feminist ethnographic field methods, it investigates how these women interpret the religious and cultural restrictions in their everyday lives as miners, and how their beliefs influence their attitudes toward diamond mining. While the women have different economic and social backgrounds, and have experienced and experience menstruation differently, they are all involved in diamond mining. This article shows that, contrary to popular belief, menstrual blood is considered lucky in this traditional diamond mining community, and it considers the wider implications for a deeper understanding of gender in mining.

KEYWORDS:

• Menstruation beliefs
• diamond mining
• Indonesia
• Banjar women

The gender of diamonds

Diamonds occupy an important place in modern society and the global economy (Grynberg and Mbayi 2015); they embody wealth and are part of an intricately detailed commodity value chain that is often associated with conflicts and war (Rodrigues and Bryceson 2018). While they are an integral part of rural livelihoods in many developing countries (Maconachie and Binns 2007), diamonds have always been shrouded in mystery and closely intertwined with mythology. Moreover, diamonds are considered to be sacred in many societies. In central India, for example, members of the Gond tribe believe that their original man was born with a diamond in his navel.

Rural communities living in diamond tracts believe that diamonds are shrouded in magic, myths and the occult (D’Angelo 2014), and those who are involved in diamond mining invariably relate their finds to luck and how this luck can be enhanced by doing certain things or performing certain rituals (D’Angelo 2015). For centuries, for example, people have believed that diamonds are like organisms: they grow together as male and female, are nourished by the evening dew and bring forth small children who grow throughout the year (Davies 1984, 6). Crider (1924, 182) documents that Indians believe ‘diamonds grow like onions, and a that new crop appears every twenty or thirty years’. Even today, many rural people believe that diamonds have the potential to bring unimaginable fortune to the wearer (or the owner) or, on the contrary, they can be poisonous and might even lead to the death of the owner if they do not suit the person.

These myths point to the value of diamonds and the respect that the stone has commanded and continues to command, and they intend to create an aura of mystery. Diamonds, then, can be seen not only as a material made of solid carbon, but as a repository of the phantasmagorical, cultural, spiritual and imaginative pre-modern world (D’Angelo 2014, 270–271). That ideas about the magical powers of diamonds have never completely died reveals the existence of a realm where modernity and tradition are enmeshed with one another (Lahiri-Dutt 2018).

There are also close links between blood and diamonds, with many blood myths surrounding diamonds and vice versa. The specific link we deal with in this paper is not necessarily that which invokes the bloodshed of war and conflict, popularized by the film Blood Diamond (Davidson 2016). Instead, many artisanal mining communities extracting diamonds see a symbolic value in blood. For example, traditional communities often engage in blood sacrifice to bring luck in finding diamonds (Crooke 1906, 135). The relationship between blood and diamonds is also a gendered one, and there is nothing more gendered than menstrual blood, a bodily, physical expression of the essence of femininity (Kissling 2011, 1996; de Beauvoir 1949). As Bobel et al. (2020) show, mining for diamonds is essentially embodied work for people engaged in artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM), and menstrual blood is part of that embodied existence. However, blood, in general, and menstrual blood, in particular, is negatively presented in discourses surrounding diamond mining. Bobel (2015, 25) argues that the biological process of menstruation cannot be separated from the sociocultural aspects that surround it. Mondragon and Txertudi (2019, 358–359) support this argument and suggest that menstruation cannot be viewed in isolation as it is a complex issue influenced by multi-layered social, ideological and emotional contexts. Factors such as age, education, socio-economic background, geographical area, occupation and beliefs influence the way women manage their menstruation, which in turn influences the women’s attitudes to daily life and activities (McCarthy and Lahiri-Dutt 2021). For Indonesian women, motherhood (and menstruation) are primary identity markers (Dewi 2020) and the country’s labour laws also recognize the importance of this sentiment by allowing two days’ paid ‘period leave’ for all working women (Lahiri-Dutt and Robinson 2008). The fact that women are legally exempted from work during their periods clearly reveals the prevailing attitudes in Indonesia about menstruation. Consequently, researchers and activists have focused on aspects of women’s work in Indonesia, but no such research has so far investigated artisanal mining communities of Indonesia.

While there are different attitudes and opinions towards women in mining in general, there are various tasks that are important for the existence of mining communities that have been undertaken by women in underground and above ground mines (Romano and Papastefanaki 2020, 194–195). Romano and Papastenafaki further explain that the women’s labour contributions in the ASM sector are rooted in various socio-economic and cultural barriers, namely the lack of education, lack of training in mining techniques, lack of access to bank credit and minimal compensation for women's labour (2020, 213). Yet, Arthur-Holmes and Busia (2020) note that women still get involved in the artisanal, informal, mining sector to make a living for or to support their families. Lahiri-Dutt describes this increasing participation of women in artisanal mining as part of the ‘feminisation’ process (2015a) and links the growing informal mining in lower income countries or regions with agricultural transition and lack of job opportunities in rural areas (2018). There is no concrete evidence whether the involvement of women in artisanal mining increases women’s bargaining power and changes gender dynamics within the household; in some instances in Africa, women’s involvement in artisanal mining reduces the overdependence of female miners on their partners for their individual and household needs (Arthur-Holmes and Busia 2020, 8–9), whereas in Asian countries that is not necessarily the case (Lahiri-Dutt 2022, 11).

Based on ethnographic accounts from women from various social backgrounds within the Muslim Banjar ethnic community, this paper investigates the culturally-rooted beliefs and practices surrounding menstruation and the mining of diamonds in South Kalimantan, Indonesia. The relation of menstrual management and artisanal diamond mining is crucial because this key reproductive event happens often and regularly, and influences every part of the lives of women. Despite the ‘period leave’, menstruating women usually do not stop economic activities, unless they are working ‘out there in the field’ (Lahiri-Dutt 2006). This is why it is important to examine how women who artisanally mine diamonds interpret everyday experiences, the religious and cultural restrictions with regard to menstrual management in relation to diamond mining, and how their beliefs influence their perception of the mine and diamonds. In so doing, this research illuminates the pre-modern and gendered world of extractive industries. The article further draws upon the concept of purity and pollution (Douglas 1966) and the argument that the local cultural context influences perceptions of bodily purity and pollution (Duschinsky 2013, 74). Mary Douglas’s conceptualization is at the root of the medicalization of menstruation that sees this normal bodily function as an ailment that can be only treated by medical experts, not the women whose own bodies are menstruating. The medical approach to menstruation ignores the complexity and diversity of the menstrual experiences of different women from different backgrounds, and strips women of their autonomy over their own bodies (Lahiri-Dutt 2015b, 1162). Bobel (2019) critiques these normative views of menstruation as generalizing the varied experiences of women, and turning women’s bodies into laboratories for medical experiments. By offering an in-depth understanding of women’s work in ASM enmeshed with the gendered biological process of menstruation, this paper aims to enrich the literature on ASM in general, and on the relationship between ASM and gender in particular.

We used feminist ethnographic approaches to gather and analyse data. Ethnographic studies on menstruation are popular because of their ability to capture detailed and personal experiences (Burrows and Johnson 2005, 237) and they are useful in exploring issues that are considered sensitive and private (Britton 1996, 646). Approval for the study was sought from the Human Research Ethics Committee of the Australian National University, and the field study was carried out from 2017 to 2020. Participants were chosen using various methods. Initially, we approached the local married women’s organization, Pemberdayaan dan Kesejahteraan Keluarga (Empowerment and Family Welfare). To encourage the participation of younger women, we circulated a Google form among college students in the Banjarbaru and Martapura areas. These two methods yielded twelve participants. Thereafter, to acquire more participants, we used the snowballing method, whereby a participant nominates other people to participate. The final sample comprised thirty women of various ages and from different socio-economic and educational backgrounds from the diamond-mining Banjar community.

The women with whom we spoke about their menstruation beliefs and how these relate to diamond mining live in villages near Banjarbaru city, or the nearby regency, Banjar, in the historical capital city of Martapura, South Kalimantan province. While it may have been densely forested in the past, the region is now extensively deforested because of larger-scale mining. The nearest port city and airport is Banjarmasin, but to reach the diamond mining tracts one must travel by car or bus. Even though it is only about an hour from Banjarmasin, the area feels strangely isolated from the bustling port city, which is awash with recently generated wealth from the coal and gold extractive industries. Diamond mining has been a traditional livelihood activity for the rural Banjars for many generations, and the activities remain small and keep the communities at a subsistence level (Sani 2017). The women we met did not all speak Bahasa Indonesia and were more comfortable speaking in Banjar.

Eight of the women grew up in rural areas of the region: two in the rural Cempaka subdistrict of Banjarbaru, which is famous for its traditional diamond mining; two in the upriver area of South Kalimantan; and four in the rural area of the Banjar regency. Ethnicity could be further divided into two categories: women for whom both parents belonged to the Banjar ethnic group and those who had only one parent from the Banjar ethnic group, usually the mother. The ages of the participants varied from fifteen to sixty-four years.

We deployed two qualitative tools in the field: face-to-face interviews conducted one on one, and larger discussions within groups. Follow-up interviews were conducted if necessary and further questions were adjusted and re-asked if deemed relevant. To ensure the comfort of participants, interviews were conducted at a place determined by the participants – their house, place of work, or a public place like a café. Before each interview, we explained the research project and gave each participant an information sheet explaining the ethical concerns that may arise from the research. Interviews were recorded with prior written consent using a voice-recording device. Each interview lasted approximately seventy-five minutes and was conducted in Banjar language in the case of some elderly women. Physical gestures and social cues were also observed during interviews to assess communication not expressed verbally. Since the interviews were conducted during work hours, a small compensation was offered to each participant. All names and identifying information were removed from the transcripts and field notes, and a pseudonym was assigned to each participant.

Diamond mining in Indonesia

Irrespective of location or the specific mineral commodity, the scramble for resources in Indonesia has reached a crescendo as peasants compete with multinational mining companies on the mineral-rich tracts throughout the country (Devi and Prayogo 2013). Innumerable rural people are toiling to extract enormous quantities of mineral, creating long supply chains that cross borders and posing many problems related to environmental destruction, health and the greater common good. These miners inhabit the margins of the mainstream mining economy (Barney 2018). In Indonesia, some are known as gurandil (literally, ‘those who jump from cliff to cliff’) or by a more derogatory term, PETI (Penambangan Tanpa Izin or ‘people mining without a permit’) – terms that reflect the mobility and stealth of the miners (Lestari 2011). Yet, Indonesia’s diamond mining is unlike the artisanal and small-scale diamond mining in most African countries in that it has a long history. In Africa, diamond mining comprises ‘a concealed economy’ (Makhetha and Maliehe 2020) where the artisanal miners conceal their activities and the existence of diamonds as a means to protect themselves against government and multinational corporations’ aggressions and criminalization. Contrary to this, Indonesian diamond mining is recognized in law as a traditional activity carried out by many rural communities. ‘People’s mining’ dates back to ancient and colonial times in Indonesia. Banjars claim that for many generations they have been mining for diamonds in locations such as Martapura. This long history of mining is recognized in Mining Law No. 11/1967 (previously Law No. 37/1960) and Mining Law (UU Mineral Batubara or UU Minerba) No. 4/2020, with the term ‘people’s mining’. By using that term, the state not only recognizes the traditional mining heritage of indigenous peoples, but also gives local populations the legitimate right, provided they hold mining authorization or a permit from the district head to exploit minerals on their lands (Lahiri-Dutt 2017).

During Dutch colonial times, fifteen diamonds were found in prospecting samples (Soetaryo 1996; Koolhoven 1935) but the geologists decided that Kimberlite, the source rock, did not exist in the archipelago. There still is ‘speculation’ about the possibility of a fragment of ancient diamondiferous lithosphere that was torn off a fragment of the Gondwanaland continent, but no strong evidence exists as to its presence (Smith et al. 2009, 823). The country’s diamond deposits are alluvial in nature, and are found in four main clusters on the island of Kalimantan, which literally means ‘river of gold and diamonds’. It is likely that the placer diamonds of Kalimantan come from the ultrabasic rocks of the Bobaris Mountains near the headwaters of the Pamali River, 35 kilometres east of Martapura. Indonesia’s diamond production is meagre, and in his account Seavoy (1975, 79) describes the purpose of diamond mining as not for profit, but to acquire extra funds to allow a deeply religious Banjar community to make a pilgrimage to Mecca. While that is not exactly the purpose of diamond mining today, this reveals the spiritual significance of diamonds in Banjar community life. However, diamond mining is not entirely ‘non-economic’, as the hajis do aspire to gain something of material value. Information from the field suggests that during the last twenty years or so, as the intensity and mechanization of diamond mining have increased, more overseas traders have arrived from countries such as India and Israel.

Banjars prospect by sinking shafts of about one square metre in diameter into the bedrock. These shafts are usually dug by men, but women erect logs of wood or bamboo poles along the walls of the shafts to strengthen them. If diamondiferous beds are found, women generally work the shafts in groups of two or three, bringing up dirt that has been dug with a shovel and washing it in a large linggangan, a pan about a metre in diameter and 20 centimetres deep. Until about the late 1990s, these pans were made of wood so that they could float in water, and they were painted black so that the diamonds would stand out to the untrained eye. But most contemporary linggangan are made of strong plastic. The diamonds recovered by the women in this way are traded, usually by middlemen who sell them to overseas traders who visit the area from time to time.

As in other diamond mining sites in Indonesia (Devi et al. 2022), there is gender-based role demarcation in Martapura: women are generally engaged in manual labour, whereas men carry out their work mostly using machinery. Men dig the sand and rocks in the mining shaft, and women pass the sand from the hole to the surface. Both women and men begin work early in the morning and end their day late in the afternoon. If discoveries are made, they continue working until late at night. In addition to their mine work, women are also burdened with household chores and taking care of family members. However, with the rise in use of heavy machinery, the numbers of women involved in diamond mining have decreased. Elsewhere in Indonesia, the industrial mines have also introduced the use of heavy machines, and hired women (Lahiri-Dutt 2006). The intrinsic difference between industrial mining and informal, artisanal mining is in the nature of production arrangement which affects gender and is affected by gender in turn. Much of the production is organized informally through family links, friendships and acquaintances play a role, and most importantly, the family labour unit works together to earn their subsistence and/or small profits. Consequently, women’s labour is often unpaid or unacknowledged, poorly recorded and invisible. Like any other subsistence production sector, the introduction of machines either marginalizes or pushes women out to ensure that men access the possibilities of larger economic gains. It is for this reason that Romano and Papastefanaki (2020, 208) note that the mechanization of mining makes women’s labour redundant, as they are considered ‘unskilled’.

Larger machines take their toll on the environment as well. The machines can remove more earth and dig deeper, producing more dirt that is dumped on the local riverbeds. The disruption of local terrain caused a catastrophic flood in one of the sites in 2018. The specific cause, in this case, was the shaft striking the underground water table. The flooding was so sudden and massive that the pumping system failed to cope with the gush of water coming out on the surface. This flooding has been a main factor in reducing the number of work sites in the area. The decrease in women’s involvement in diamond mining is also due to the reduced number of mining sites in the area, influenced also by the shift of livelihoods of people around Cempaka. Increasingly, sand mining has come to dominate people’s livelihoods and turned into the main occupation. In general, women are not involved in the sand-mining activities due to the use of machines, the higher risk of work accidents and harsher working conditions.

Influence of Banjar belief systems on menstruation management

Menstruation has been examined through a number of scholarly lenses, including in public health, anthropology and development studies. For example, menstruation has been studied through the public health lens by Critchley et al., who present an overview of how menstruation studies have reached a crescendo globally (2020, 651). Coast, Lattof and Strong present a study of menstruation through the lens of public health in context of development, explaining that young adolescent girls are not prepared for puberty and menstruation, and that there is a need for intervention in terms of a ‘standardised way of delivering knowledge on how to manage menstruation’ (2019, 302). Medical science views menstruation as a natural and universal bodily process (Hasson 2016), a central marker of sex and gender, and an indication of the healthy state of a woman’s body (McPherson and Korfine 2004, 193). Each religion also has its views on the purity of the body, which is often associated with the absence of menstrual blood. Bhartiya (2013, 523–525) stated that Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Sikhism and Hinduism prohibit women to enter temples and mosques or to perform religious rituals, as women who are menstruating are considered unclean and impure. While Sommer et al. (2015, 1303) argue that menarche (the first menstruation) is celebrated in many cultures as a rite of passage, conversations about menstruation or menstrual blood, even among Western scholars, are still regarded as taboo because it is perceived as dirty and polluting. Montgomery (1974, 140) notes that menstrual taboos vary across cultures, from informal rules about hygiene or sexual intercourse to isolation of menstruating women: men are separated from these women to avoid contamination, and such women are often barred from participation in religious rituals, especially if holy symbols or places of worship are in the care of men. Further, Lahiri-Dutt (2015b, 1161) suggests that secrecy around menstruation has led to its medicalization and its portrayal as a threat, marking women’s bodies as a disruption of the norm. Thus, despite being an important marker of adulthood, taboos formed by sociocultural aspects surround menstruation.

Islam was first introduced to the Banjar people by traders who visited the coastal settlements in the early sixteenth century (Hawkins 2000, 31). Today, Islam is a central and unifying aspect of their lives. Thus, attitudes to and perspectives on menstruation are also significantly influenced by Islam’s rules and regulations. In Islam, menstruation is classified as normal blood that comes out of women naturally; it is not blood caused by illness, a wound, miscarriage or childbirth (Al-Utsaimin 1971, 6). To be able to practice religious rituals one must have attained the age of responsibility or aqiilbaligh (maturity): for men this is the ability to ejaculate, for women it is menarche. Both stages mark the transition from childhood to adulthood, and they usher in the new responsibilities of an adult human. However, during menstruation, Muslim women are forbidden from performing prayers and reciting the Qur’an, and are exempted from fasting.

With its heavy reliance on rivers, the Banjar ethnic group, like Islam more generally, has a close relationship with water, which influences their sanitation and hygiene practices. When cleaning menstrual blood from their bodies, Banjar women not only observe the rules of Islam, but they are also influenced by pre-Islamic belief systems. For example, some respondents in this field study told us that they wash their soiled menstrual pads before disposing of them to prevent kuyang (a person who can transform into a blood-sucking ghost) from feasting on their blood. These beliefs surrounding magic and supernatural powers that are beyond logical reasoning are influenced by the Dayak culture or Kaharingan, which is a mix of Hindu and Islamic traditions (Sani, Ainah, and Syadzali 2013, 22). Kaharingan includes the adoption of beliefs regarding charms and amulets, magical creatures and rituals such as kuyang, and the ritual of seeking wealth by using magic and charms. The mix of Islamic rules and pre-Islamic belief systems is integrated within the everyday practices of women in managing their menstruation. This integration shows that there is a strong influence of pre-Islamic belief systems that are passed down from one generation to another.

Currently, there is limited research on the sociocultural aspects of menstruation among Banjar women, and studies that exist are dominated by research within the public health domain and those focusing on the medical aspects of menstruation. Fennie, Moletsane, and Padmanabhanunni (2022, 93–100) investigate the socio-cultural aspects of menstruation amongst adolescent girls and focus on the perception of menstrual hygiene management through the lens of public health. Therefore, this study contributes to an understanding of the relationship between religion, belief systems regarding supernatural beings, and cultural practices in the everyday management of menstruation among Banjar Muslim women. Our conversations with diamond mining Banjar Muslim women revealed that not all of them consider menstruation as polluting, nor do they always believe that menstrual blood might reduce their chances of finding diamonds. In fact, we found quite the opposite: that menstrual blood is sacred and powerful enough to bring luck in diamond mining.

Aminah, a woman in her sixties, was born and lives in Cempaka in Banjarbaru, near the diamond mine. She is married and has several grandchildren. With her entire extended family, she worked as a diamond miner because there was a lack of other livelihood options. She started working as a diamond miner to care for her sick parents when she turned seventeen and worked well into old age; she stopped only because the area got flooded. In Cempaka, women like Aminah make up almost half of the workers. Diamond mining is risky work, and involves hours of physical labour that women perform in addition to their household chores. If other livelihood opportunities were available, many women, including Aminah, would have moved to alternative employment.

Aminah stated that during working hours, menstruating women usually wore menstrual pads and changed their pads during the day: ‘We go to the river to take a bath, and then wash the menstrual pads. We usually bury the used pads. There are a lot of women like us who are menstruating doing the same thing’.

However, while it is acceptable for menstrual blood to flow through the river, the blood is not permitted inside the mining shaft. Aisah, Aminah’s older sister who worked as a miner from the age of nineteen, said:

When we are menstruating, we would generally avoid going into the mining shaft because the hole is full of water, so for those few days we would work on the surface [around the entrance to the mine] doing other jobs such as hauling the sand from inside the mining hole, preparing food and water for our teammates, and other such work.

All participants confirmed the belief that menstrual blood is considered dirty but not polluting. They know that working inside the shaft while menstruating might scare away diamonds, and that men are wary about coming into contact with menstrual blood inside the shaft. Siti, in her sixties, who had worked as a diamond miner since her youth said: ‘Inside the hole, we must be free [from menstrual blood] because the diamond is a supernatural being. We wouldn’t get the diamond if the hole becomes dirty with blood’.

Other female participants also believed that menstruation did not hinder their work in the mine; they still contributed significantly even while they worked on the surface. Salamah, a former diamond miner in her fifties and Aminah’s sister-in-law, started working in the mine after she married her husband. She stated: ‘If we were not working, we would not be paid’. Aisah confirms this: ‘We are still able to contribute by working on the surface, hauling sand from inside the hole and doing other chores necessary for mining’.

Menstrual blood is also believed to bring good luck and has a significant role in the ASM diamond mining industry in Cempaka. According to Aminah:

The first menstruation blood of an orphaned girl child definitely attracts the diamond. I am not sure about the reason that these girls are asked to give their bloods. It could be because it is easier to ask an orphaned child rather than asking girls with protective families. Sometimes people ask the child who is menstruating to enter the mining hole and even their underpants are besought by diamond miners to herald good luck. There are so many beliefs like that, carried over from olden times. Even children’s umbilical cords are sought for luck by diamond miners.

Rusnani, a former miner now in her fifties, confirmed this and added: ‘[A menstruating child is] asked to dig in stones and bring them into the surface, for good luck ritual. People say first menstruation blood is good’. Elders believe that diamonds have the power of a supernatural being. They consult local elders who are more knowledgeable about traditional cultures or those who possess supernatural wisdom for a good location to dig the mining hole and for advice on rituals that can ensure success.

This knowledge is passed down through generations. Siti stated that following this tradition gives results, which is why people continue to follow it closely:

It is passed down by the elders in charge of the diamond mining to their workers. All people in Cempaka also already know about this tradition … The tradition is passed down through generations via verbal stories. People say it is superstition, but many people believe it because they got results … 

When asked about the enforcement of tradition and the myths around menstruation in diamond mining, the interviewed women stated that all diamond miners enforce this tradition, including male miners. Siti said:

Yes, people believe and enforce this tradition. If we want to get diamonds, we shouldn’t speak casually, and if we’re menstruating, we don’t carelessly go inside the mining hole. People in Cempaka know about it. But people outside Cempaka don’t believe in such things because they’re not mining diamonds.

From these responses it is evident that menstrual blood carries meaning in the diamond mining site beyond its biological function. On the one hand, menstrual blood is considered taboo inside the shaft, and on the other hand, first menstrual blood has the power to attract diamonds. This contradiction is interesting, especially in relation to the concept of purity and impurity (as implied by Douglas 1966). Perhaps it reveals the complexity of the relationship of menstrual blood and diamonds.

Kuyang and the power of the blood

Beliefs surrounding kuyang and worldviews of the supernatural influence how Banjar women manage menstruation. All female participants, except one, across all age groups, washed off all blood before disposing of used pads fearing that kuyang would feed on the blood left on them. Yasmin, a fifteen-year-old high school student, said:

If we do not wash the menstrual blood off the used pads, kuyang will come. I believe in it, because incidents have happened in Banjarbaru – not in our house, but in other parts of Banjarbaru. I heard this story from my friends. My friend told me that the kuyang was her neighbour, and she was menstruating at that time. When she woke up in the morning, there were bruises on her thighs.

This statement shows the blurriness of the boundary between the real and unreal, because a strong belief in the existence of a phenomenon has not only led to a behavioural practice but also to physical manifestation of consequences of not following the practice by the book. Women, however, have ways to deal with these consequences. Thirty-five-year-old Frida described her rituals to ward off evil:

During menstruation, we need to protect ourselves by chanting prayers, because there are a lot of kuyang. I chant prayers, wear black trousers, and apply jeringau [a special herb] to protect myself so that the kuyang does not come close to me.

Many women believe in the special power of menstrual blood. Galuh and Hanim, residents of Cempaka, Banjarbaru, noted that diamond miners, especially older ones, believe that first menstrual blood has the power to attract diamonds. Galuh, a thirty-eight-year-old woman, said that a man had asked her to rub her first menstrual blood on a piece of white fabric:

There was a man who asked for my first menstrual blood. He asked me to rub the blood onto a piece of white fabric. I was nervous giving it to him. But people said that menstrual blood is clean. It is not like dirty blood from wounds. He rubbed the blood onto the linggangan [a traditional device resembling a plate to mine diamonds]. However, I did not see it, so I do not know the exact method.

Hanim, a thirty-nine-year-old woman living near Galuh’s house, related the same experience: that when she attained menarche, her neighbours asked for some of her blood so they could attract more diamonds. Galuh in turn did the same thing with her daughter’s first menstrual blood. She believed it has the power to make miners richer. Attaining menarche is a major event in the lives of girls, and marks the arrival of puberty. Many mothers readily inform other villagers that their daughter has attained menarche because they will be paid for giving some of that blood away to friends and neighbours. The payment is more if the menarche is attained when women are touching diamond-bearing ores. Alternatively, as a girl attains menarche, she may be requested by neighbours or other members of the community to haul one or two pieces of ores from inside the mining shaft. As Aisah recalled: ‘I was being paid to haul stones for good luck when I reached menarche. [I was being paid] because it can bring good luck’.

Hanim keeps a piece of cloth that is stained with her daughter’s first menstrual blood in the cupboard of the kiosk she runs, believing that it attracts customers:

My daughter came home from school and told me that she got her first period. I asked her for some blood and rubbed it onto a small piece of white fabric. I did not give it to anyone. I saved it. People said that it would be good for my business.

Furah also noted that older people keep first menstrual blood as a charm to attract better luck. The belief that menstrual blood is pure is strong among people in the Cempaka region and in other rural areas too.

The narratives of women centring on menstrual blood show its complex relationship with diamond mining. Generally, the blood is believed to be a harbinger of good luck, and worthy of preservation so that its powers can be invoked in the future. When a girl attains menarche, it is a matter of joy and celebration within the community. Yet, the same menstrual blood, if mixed with the water inside the mineshaft, is considered dirty.

Discussion

With regard to our considerations of gender in ASM, these menstrual blood narratives reveal their power to blur the sex/gender binary, and underline women’s very physiological being. As Simone de Beauvoir noted, ‘Menstrual blood represents the essence of femininity’ (1949, 150). Like all other work, ASM is also known as shaping one’s gender identity, and the way an individual becomes a man or a woman (Cuvelier 2014). In recent decades, feminists have argued about what gender truly means, especially contesting the widespread acceptance of the constructive nature of gender. The critiques have come from feminist philosophers such as Gunnarsson (2011) and even well-established, second-wave feminists Cornwall (2007) who have rose in defence of the category ‘women’. Gunnarsson (2013) observed how the ‘nature-phobia’ of feminists has changed in feminist theory turning towards embracing and sympathizing with nature. Women – especially those who present as ‘different’ in one way or another, such as women of colour – who have struggled to be recognized within the ensuing identity politics have also underlined the need to focus on the body (hooks 1984; Mohanty 2003). Some feminist scholars feel that the primacy of the language of gender subsumes the identities of women (Baden and Goetz 1997). McIntyre (2011, 30) offers a powerful statement that the idea of ‘gender mainstreaming is a pox for women’ because women are nowhere near being at par with men. Moreover, feminist scholars have argued in favour of embodied experiences that are more sex specific in nature, although perpetrated by gendered ideologies in societies (Lahiri-Dutt, Amor, and Perks 2021; Pursley 2016; Scott 2010). These debates remain unresolved, and this study might contribute to them only marginally by offering an understanding of how women’s work in ASM is enmeshed with the gendered biological process of menstruation. The narratives of the diamond-mining Banjar women help us to understand a hitherto unexplored terrain and underline the need for similar culturally informed and contextually grounded understandings of traditional mining practices.

These ethnographic narratives show how the Banjar women of South Kalimantan, Indonesia interpret their religious and cultural beliefs in relation to menstrual management in everyday diamond-mining practices. They tell us hitherto unheard stories of how their beliefs influence their perception of diamond mining. Without a doubt, these stories reveal a gendered world in extractive practices. Further, they demolish certain myths around the concepts of purity and pollution as propagated in modern society, and show that culture and cultural beliefs determine what is seen as bodily purity and pollution, and how these perceptions interact with beliefs about luck in diamond finds.

How do these gendered narratives throw new light on our understanding of extractive industries or on gender in extractive industries? This research adds gendered notions of culture to the extensive and growing literature on extractive industries, particularly with regard to the extraction of valuable minerals and gemstones by communities using traditional means. As we have shown, the various changes in the region have affected gender relations in the diamond mining communities, and transformed the nature of women’s work. Most of these changes are related to regional economic developments, thereby showing how cultural beliefs run deeper than them. ASM is still considered to be a sector of larger extractive industries, with the concept of scale located at the heart of many of the understandings of how people see and manage their day-to-day interactions with valuable commodities. The menstrual blood narratives of Banjar women, therefore, destabilize the conventional wisdom of treating ASM as a smaller or scaled-down version of modern, industrial, capitalized mining practices. In doing so, they illuminate a hidden end of the spectrum which all mining inhabits.

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge and thank all the women of the Banjar community who generously shared their time and personal life stories. They also express their gratitude to Dr Bernadetta Devi, Queensland University of Technology, for her generosity in sharing time and comments on an earlier version of this paper.

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

No funding was received for this study.