Abstract
ABSTRACTWhile kinship used to be considered a backbone of the creation of mutual obligations for care in pre-industrial societies, economic and social change has altered how care is provided. Notwithstanding changing kinship obligations, relatives continue to provide much of the care for those in need. In this article, I consider the active production of relationships among siblings through individual biographies, to understand how mutual obligations are created and affect the care provided to HIV-positive persons. I draw on two phases of ethnographic research conducted in Zambia, in Southern Province and Lusaka, between 2002 and 2011. Findings revealed that siblings are normally considered an important source of support, but their willingness and capacity to provide support may be limited by resource constraints and biographical experiences. Helping or not is at the conjunction of kinship-based obligations and a sense of connectedness, deriving from the history of growing up together, often in the context of disrupted families. The experiences of siblings in their past reach beyond individual histories. Structural factors jeopardise the support between and within generations, and must be addressed while promoting social protection programmes.
Highlights
During an interview on uptake of HIV-related healthcare services in a rural area in the Kafue Flats of Zambia, a young woman explained to me that she was about to leave her husband and move to her sister’s house for recovery
I consider the active production of relationships among siblings through individual biographies, to understand how mutual obligations are created and affect the care provided to HIV-positive persons
In Zambia, free antiretroviral therapy (ART) is available (Ministry of Health and Community Development Mother and Child Health, 2013), but social protection programmes to compensate for illness-related income loss, such as nutritional support packages for vulnerable persons living with HIV, were inaccessible for many (Ministry of Finance, 2014; Ntalasha, Malungo, Merten, & Simona, 2015)
Summary
During an interview on uptake of HIV-related healthcare services in a rural area in the Kafue Flats of Zambia, a young woman explained to me that she was about to leave her husband and move to her sister’s house for recovery She had been sick for some time and had recently been diagnosed HIV positive. Empirical research in various African settings, in the case of HIV-related care (Gysels, Pell, Straus, & Pool, 2011; Moyer & Igonya, 2014; Niehaus, 2007), and in the case of food crises (Cliggett, 2006), has illustrated that neither marriage nor classificatory kinship need provide a secured and reliable social safety net. Kinship prescribes who has to provide care to whom: taking continuous care of a relative is a way of showing respect (Dilger, 2010)
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