HIV/AIDS and the Gendering of Stigma in Tamil Nadu, South India

Cecilia Van Hollen

doi:10.1007/s11013-010-9192-9

Abstract

Drawing on the seminal theoretical work on stigma by Goffman, this article analyzes stigma through the lens of Parker and Aggleton, who call for the joining of Goffman and Foucault to better grasp relationships among stigma, power and social inequality. Studies on the social impact of HIV/AIDS globally have demonstrated that women tend to be blamed for the spread of HIV/AIDS, and as a result, HIV-positive women face greater stigma and discrimination than HIV-positive men. Based on ethnographic research among 50 HIV-positive women in South India in 2002-2003 and 2004, my research supports this standard argument. However, my findings suggest that the gendering of stigma and discrimination is more complex and context specific. The gendering of stigma varies depending on the social context of private versus public spheres. The tendency to stigmatize women is due in part to cultural constructions of gendered bodies and not only to a gendered double standard of sexual morality, as has been previously reported. Even when a cultural argument about women's wayward sexuality is evoked, this rhetoric must be understood in part as a strategy to mask economically motivated responses, rather simply being attributed to sexist ideology per se.

Highlights

Pulli Raja had become a household name in Chennai by the end of 2003. Like his Mumbai counterpart known as Balbir Pasha, Pulli Raja was a fictitious character created by Population Services International’s (PSI) media blitz HIV prevention campaign launched under the aegis of the Tamil Nadu State AIDS Control Society in September 2003
By the time that I arrived in Chennai, the capital of the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu, in January 2004 to spend 6 months on a research project on HIV/AIDS and gender, I discovered that I had just missed the Pulli Raja ads, since women’s organizations had successfully put an end to the campaign
This paper has examined some of the ways in which constructions of gender in Tamil Nadu, South India, result in different meanings attributed to HIV-positive women vs. HIV-positive men and, different social responses to HIV-positive women versus men

Summary

Introduction

Pulli Raja had become a household name in Chennai by the end of 2003 Like his Mumbai counterpart known as Balbir Pasha, Pulli Raja was a fictitious character created by Population Services International’s (PSI) media blitz HIV prevention campaign launched under the aegis of the Tamil Nadu State AIDS Control Society in September 2003. This ‘‘self risk perception’’ social marketing campaign, which targeted men between 18 and 34 years of age from lower socioeconomic groups, began with what in media-speak is called a ‘‘teaser,’’ in this case an advertisement placed on giant hoardings (billboards), posters and television screens, posing the question: ‘‘Pulli Rajakku AIDS Varumaa?’’ (‘‘Will Pulli Raja Get AIDS?’’). The Pulli Raja hoardings had been painted over, the perception among members of some women’s organizations (especially HIV-positive women’s organizations) that women in India bear the brunt of the stigma and discrimination that have crested in the wake of the HIV/AIDS epidemic was still very palpable

Methods

Findings

Conclusion