Sex worker activism, feminist discourse and HIV in Bangladesh.
Cult Health Sex
; 17(6): 777-88, 2015.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-25588539
ABSTRACT
This paper explores the relationship between sex worker activism and HIV-related discourse in Bangladesh, relating recent developments in activism to the influence of feminist thought. Following their eviction in 1991 from brothels from red light areas, Bangladeshi sex workers started a social movement, at just about the same time that programmes started to work with sex workers to reduce the transmission of HIV. This paper argues that both sex worker activism and HIV-prevention initiatives find impetus in feminist pro-sex-work perspectives, which place emphasis on individual and collective agency. However, by participating in these programmes, sex workers failed to contest the imagery of themselves as 'vectors' of HIV. In this way, they were unwittingly complicit in reproducing their identity as 'polluting others'. Moreover, by focusing on individual behaviour and the agency of sex workers, HIV programmes ignored the fact that the 'choices' made by sex workers are influenced by a wide range of structural and discursive factors, including gender norms and notions of bodily purity, which in turn have implications for the construction of HIV-related risk.
Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Sex Work
/
HIV Infections
/
Public Health
/
Feminism
/
Sex Workers
Aspects:
Determinantes_sociais_saude
Limits:
Female
/
Humans
Country/Region as subject:
Asia
Language:
En
Journal:
Cult Health Sex
Journal subject:
CIENCIAS DO COMPORTAMENTO
/
CIENCIAS SOCIAIS
Year:
2015
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Australia