Background: Female genital mutilation (FGM) practice is mostly carried out by traditional circumcisers, who often play other central roles in communities, such as attending childbirths. Increasingly, FGM is also performed by health care providers. However, FGM is recognized internationally as a violation of the human rights of girls and women. The study investigates a broad cross-cultural study...

In this article, we offer a critical examination of the tendency to segregate discussion of surgical alterations to the male and female genitals into separate compartments--the first known as circumcision, the second as genital mutilation. We argue that this fundamental problem of definition underlies the considerable controversy surrounding these procedures when carried out on minors, and that...

Nontherapeutic female genital modifications can cause short- and long-term consequences. Caregivers should promote women's self knowledge on genitals' anatomy and physiology, and psychophysical and sexual health. They should also inform on possible negative consequences of vulvar nontherapeutic alterations requested and avoid the medicalization of female genital mutilation.

Ingvild Lunde, a research fellow at the Norwegian Centre for Violence and Traumatic Stress Studies (NKVTS), has studied campaigns against genital cutting in Hargeisa in Somalia. She has also examined attitudes towards female genital mutilation (FGM) and to the possible abandonment of the practice. She interviewed 22 representatives of organizations working on FGM issues, and 16 individuals from...

It is estimated that around 130 million women and girls worldwide have undergone female genital mutilation (FGM), with a further 2 million girls thought to suffer the same fate every year. In general FGM is thought to occur mainly in 28 African countries, although the practice has been recognised in Asia and the Middle East. The practice comprises all procedures that involve partial or total re...