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.
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Notes
Studies have in fact shown that HIV prevention projects targeting female commercial sex workers have often resulted in further stigmatization of this vulnerable population (O’Neil et al. 2004).
This figure was calculated based on the rural–urban distribution figures provided at the NACO (2005) Web site.
Interview with Dr. Suniti Solomon, YRG Care, Chennai, March 9, 2004.
These are two of the best-known hospitals for the treatment of HIV/AIDS patients in India. Further, I conducted 65 interviews with pregnant women in government hospitals with Prevention of Parent to Child Transmission projects and observed patient-counselor interactions in those hospitals. None of those 65 pregnant women were known to be HIV positive.
For further discussion on World Vision and its involvement with women living with HIV/AIDS in Tamil Nadu, see Van Hollen (2007).
The highest household income reported was Rs. 14,400 per month and the lowest was Rs. 250 per month. The exchange rate during the first half of 2004 was Rs. 44.00 to US$ 1.00.
Some of the women interviewed, however, had much higher levels of education: four had B.A. degrees; three had received an M.A., and one of these three had both an M.A. and an M.S. degree.
Elsewhere (Van Hollen 2007) I explain that many of the HIV-positive women I met who had converted to Christianity had done so because of referrals to World Vision, an international NGO. I discuss why those HIV-positive women who were receiving services from World Vision decided to convert to Christianity. Many converted due to a perception that Christians were more supportive of HIV-positive people or that faith in Jesus would help them or their children to heal. Some converted due to a perception that conversion was a prerequisite to receiving the World Vision services.
The youngest was 20 and the oldest was 50.
This is also discussed in a report published by the Positive Women’s Network in collaboration with the Center for Advocacy and Research UNIFEM (CFAR and PWN+ 2003).
Although in India people known as hijras are considered to belong to a “third gender” or even a “third sex,” in this paper I discuss only the two genders of man/woman, male/female.
Unless otherwise indicated, all names of participants in this research are pseudonyms to protect the confidentiality of the participants.
Unless otherwise indicated, all quotes from interviews are translated from Tamil. English words used in the original interview appear in quotations. The Tamil term tappu that Vijaya uses here literally translates as “wrong.” This term can be applied to refer to a fact being incorrect but is also used to refer to wrong or improper behavior. An individual who engages in improper behavior can also be labeled simply as tappu, and when that is the case (as it is in Vijaya’s commentary), it has the implication that someone is improper in the sense of being immoral.
In April the Government of India did initiate a program to provide free antiretroviral treatments (ARTs) and this has continued to be phased in gradually. In February 2005 the program for the Prevention of Parent to Child transmission was linked up to the ART program.
A study conducted on HIV/AIDS support groups in Thailand reports a similar phenomenon in which women outnumber men in the support groups (Lyttleton 2004).
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Acknowledgments
The 2004 research was supported by a Fulbright Scholar Program Research Award. Pilot research in 2002–2003 was funded by the Pilot Fund for Faculty-Student Research in the Social Sciences of the University of Notre Dame’s Institute for Scholarship in the Liberal Arts. My deepest gratitude goes to the women who participated in the research for this study. In addition, I would like to thank all the individuals working for HIV/AIDS prevention and care organizations who facilitated the research in India. In particular, I am grateful to the following people for helping to make arrangements for my interviews: P. Kousalya, President of Positive Women’s Network (PWN+); Dr. P. Kuganantham, UNICEF Consultant, PPTCT; Jeypaul of both INP+ and HIV Ullor Nala Sangam (HUNS Network), Namakkal; R. Meenakski, President, Society for Positive Mother’s Development, Coimbatore; and Janaki Krishnan, Treasurer, Zonta Resource Centre. I would also like to thank S. Padma, Ms. Punitha, Jasmine Obeyesekere and Sharon Watson, who have worked as research assistants on this project in both India and the United States. I am also indebted to Rajeswari Prabhakaran, Dr. Dasaratan and Sheela Chavan for their assistance with translations of interviews.