Public Secrets and Private Sufferings in the South African AIDS Epidemic

This book tells the story of the HIV epidemic in South Africa, and asks why, after more than three decades, it has not normalised. Despite considerable efforts to prevent infection, and ambitious targets set to end the epidemic by 2030, HIV infections are increasing among young women and treatment uptake and adherence have been uneven. Focusing on the years preceding and following treatment access, this book addresses why an end to AIDS may be misplaced optimism. By examining public discourses and private narratives about infection, illness and death, this work reveals the contradictions between the lived experiences of AIDS suffering on the one hand, and biomedical certainties on the other. Based on long-term ethnographic research in rural villages of the South African lowveld, and within HIV prevention interventions in South Africa more generally, this book offers an intimate perspective on the social and cultural responses to the epidemic. Acknowledgements Contents Abbreviations List of Table Chapter 1: Ending AIDS: An ``Epidemic of ARVs ́ ́ 1.1 AIDS in Bushbuckridge 1.2 A Tale of Two Eras 1.3 Two Funerals and a Party 1.4 Public Secrets and Private Sufferings References Chapter 2: Culture and Difference: From Medical Mission to HIV Prevention 2.1 Race, Culture and HIV 2.2 A ``Civilising Influence ́ ́: Missionary Medicine in the Lowveld (1931-1976) 2.3 (Un)Healthy ``Homelands ́ ́ (1968-1994) 2.4 HIV Prevention and the Production of Difference 2.5 Conclusions References Chapter 3: Truth and Harm: Dangerous Knowledge and Popular Epidemiologies of HIV 3.1 HIV Testing: Technologies of Truth and Harm 3.2 Proof of an AIDS Death 3.3 Narratives of Moral Personhood 3.4 Narratives of Unruly Bodies 3.5 Narratives of Mobility and Space 3.6 Conclusions References Chapter 4: Intentional Infections: Public Discourses of HIV Spread 4.1 Conspiracies and Condoms 4.2 ``Beware of Beautiful Ladies ́ ́ 4.3 Coffin-Cash and Worm Man 4.3.1 Buy Your Own Coffin 4.3.2 Worm-Man/Hummer Guy 4.4 Conclusions References Chapter 5: Revenge and Remembering: Idioms and Accusations of Witchcraft and AIDS 5.1 Knowing and Experiencing AIDS Through Witchcraft 5.1.1 Married to a mfenha 5.1.2 Farius ́ nwa ́mlambo 5.1.3 Theko Magagule ́s munjhonjhela phansi 5.2 Revenge and Remembering 5.2.1 The Easter Weekend Deaths 5.3 Conclusions References Chapter 6: Hope and Loss: Illness Narratives from the Margins 6.1 Pretty and Philemon 6.2 Home Is Where Hope Lives 6.2.1 Philemon ́s Loss of Heart 6.3 Conclusions References Chapter 7: Death and Dying: Narrating the End of Life 7.1 Narrating a Life at the End 7.2 Childhood: Escaping Hunger and Witchcraft 7.3 Young Adulthood: ``I Started to Run Wild ́ ́ 7.4 Infection, Accusation and Revenge 7.5 Final Days: ``The machine inside Controls me ́ ́ 7.6 Conclusions References Chapter 8: Conclusions 8.1 A New Pandemic, a Familiar Narrative 8.2 The Past in the Present References Index