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This paper critically examines the role of transnational AIDS networks and resources in the consolidation of one of the earliest identity categories, meti, used within an emerging Nepali LGBT movement in the early 2000s. It argues that political identity formation in resource-poor contexts with limited domestic support for queer organising has been a cumulative effect of transnational exchanges between activists and resource networks. Beyond this, the paper traces the emergence and changing meanings of meti to show how a seemingly Indigenous category is more closely linked to modern configurations of male same-sex sexuality in response to opportunities available for political mobilisation. The paper is based on secondary research and interviews with 71 participants and participant observation conducted during seven months of fieldwork in Nepal, and interviews conducted outside the country between 2016 and 2019. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on anthropological research exploring women's changing sexuality within an urban context of Tanzania. The women involved were participating in an HIV prevention trial and worked in bars, restaurants, hotels and nightclubs, or sold local beer or food in Mwanza city. In ethnographic fieldwork and interviews and group discussions with women, narratives about sexuality focused on gendered and moral discourses of sexuality, the commodification of sexuality, and emotions and intimacy in relationships. This paper discusses how women's sexual subjectivies are shaped by a city where social, structural and economic changes over an era of neoliberalism and AIDS has created both disciplinary and liberalising spaces in which gendered and moral discourses of sexuality have emerged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using crip theory, specifically Barounis' formulation of antiprophylactic citizenship, Piepzna-Samarasinha's conceptualisation of care work, and Shotwell's calls against purity, this paper analyses the making of the film HIV in the Rust Belt during the COVID-19 crisis. HIV in the Rust Belt (directed by Holly Hey) documents some of the experiences of local HIV survivors. During the course of filming, however, a story emerged about the importance of an AIDS facility, David's House Compassion, which had served as a hospice and a resource centre between 1988 to 2003. When COVID-19 arrived in the USA, we were mid-way through filming. Doing this work during the COVID-19 pandemic opened up a host of questions about the porousness of bodies as well as the slippage of time and stigma between the two pandemics. As we continued filming, we were made more aware that the story of David's House Compassion could be just as much as story of COVID-19, representative of antiprophylactic citizenship, an idea of belonging that comes from an openness and vulnerability that only sickness can offer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we explore the relationship between "viral load" as a virological, immunological, epidemiological and social category and how it links the four decades-long global HIV pandemic to the ongoing response to COVID-19. We argue, metaphorically, that the response to SARS-CoV-2 contains 'genetic' material from HIV, which has (as a result of the digital age which reproduces error-filled data at incredible speed) mutated and is being transmitted into the social and political body. Using sexual health and substance use as focal points, we turn to Deleuzoguattarian theoretical insights about the assemblage of desire, affect and material factors that produce epidemics. Contrasting historical and contemporary scenes and issues, we explore the complex assemblage created by viral loads, medical and public health protocols, conceptions of risk, responsibility and fear that connect both pandemics. Finally, we consider the goal of viral eradication and related militaristic metaphors, alongside the increasing convergence of medicine, public health, the law and corporate interests, and contrast this with community responses that engage with what it means to be living and dying in viral times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explored how leaders of Black churches active in the fight against HIV conceptualised sex and sexuality when describing HIV interventions within their institutions. We analysed interviews with pastors and identified three frames through which leaders understood and communicated about sex and sexuality: (1) an evasive frame, in which participants avoided discussing behaviours and populations that have historically been disparaged within the church by emphasising involuntary risk exposure; (2) an agentic frame, which recognised sexual behaviour that differed from heteronormative conduct; and, (3) a pluralist frame, which allowed individuals to maintain their own beliefs about appropriate sexual conduct. Participants used frames to engage in a range of HIV interventions while upholding stigmatising beliefs about sexual behaviour and identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trans women engaged in sex work live at the intersections of discrimination against sex workers, women and transgender people. Dominant public health approaches have constructed trans women in sex work as a group at high risk of HIV infection. This study employed localocentricity, situated within a cultured-centred approach, as a theoretical framework to document health narratives among 29 trans women who had knowledge of or experience in sex work. This theoretical framing draws attention to the articulations between health and illness expressed by trans women in sex work in USA. Research participants emphasised how their health was affected by extreme socio-political-cultural marginalisation as well as medical poverty and mental health issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While it is clear that in many communities ideas about masculinity and circumcision are connected, it is still unclear how young Kenyan men in the former Nyanza province from the traditionally non-circumcising Luo people perceive voluntary medical male circumcision as connected to masculinity and the role of voluntary medical male circumcision in the transition from boyhood to manhood. The objective of this study was to explore norms of masculinity and the decision-making process among Luo young men to provide a better understanding of how circumcision and masculinity relate to cultural norms within this community. The methodology consisted of eight FGDs with male peer groups and 24 in-depth interviews to elicit young men's perceptions of masculinity and voluntary medical male circumcision. Findings from thematic analysis reveal that young men described several key characteristics of masculinity including responsibility, bravery and sexual attractiveness. For some young men, voluntary medical male circumcision has embedded itself into cultural norms of masculinity by being a step in the transition from boyhood to manhood and by being a marker of some of these masculine characteristics. In the case of voluntary medical male circumcision, there may be opportunities to integrate other programming that helps men transition into healthy adulthood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]