The (Hetero)Sexualization of the Military and the Militarization of (Hetero)Sex: Discourses on Male (Hetero)Sexual Practices among a Group of Young Men in the South African Military

Abstract

The article is framed in the context of the challenge of HIV/AIDS in South Africa and recognizes that military men are particularly vulnerable to infection. This is argued on the basis of their specific contexts of mobility, isolation and being among communities where they have greater economic and political power, as well as in relation to their identities and sexualities as men, and how these are exaggerated by the institutional framework of the military. Drawing on data from a larger study exploring a group of military men's narratives on their masculinity, sexuality, sexual relationships and HIV/AIDS, the discussion is presented in four broad thematic areas. These point to core aspects of the dominant construction of male sexualities in the military and the complex intersection of hegemonic masculinities and military masculinities, which facilitate a particular vulnerability to unsafe sexual practices. The article concludes with a recommendation that tackling HIV in the military needs to involve rigorous examination of how constructions of masculinity in the military context, at the level of material conditions and in terms of normative discourses on what it means to be a man in the military, exert specific pressures on men to adhere to traditional models of being a man with their attendant sexual practices.