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Date Added to Site: 28th April 2008 |
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Short Summary
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| Title |
‘Brothers are Doing it for Themselves’: Remaking Masculinities in South Africa
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| Author |
Robins, S |
| Publication Date |
October 2007 |
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Short Summary
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The AIDS pandemic in South Africa has contributed towards prising open questions on sexuality, sexual rights and masculinity in ways that were unprecedented in the past. Parents and politicians are increasingly compelled to talk openly about sex and sexual rights in the home and in public domains. Meanwhile gender, gay, AIDS and anti-rape activists have responded to the pandemic by highlighting the need to activate and realise the gender and sexual rights provisions in South Africa's progressive Constitution. It is within this context that a handful of men's support groups such as Khululeka - a Cape Town township-based support group for men living with AIDS - have emerged. These groups are also emerging at a time when African men are increasingly singled out as the source of sexual aggressiveness and HIV infection. While men are generally conspicuously absent from clinics, they are regularly portrayed in the media and by the public as being irresponsible, violent, dangerous and morally and psychologically flawed. The 'Zuma Affair' - the rape trial of the former Deputy President Jacob Zuma - did not help men's cause in this regard. Yet, this paper argues that men's support groups such as Khululeka are signalling the possibility of changing this negative image by promoting ideas and practices of male responsibility, and thereby challenging stereotypes of African male sexuality. Initiatives such as Khululeka reveal how community-based activism can, under certain conditions, contribute towards the conversion of HIV-positive men into “responsiblised citizens” who will adhere to treatment regimes and healthy lifestyles.
This paper was written for an international symposium on 'Politicising Masculinities', organised by the Institute of Development Studies (IDS). The symposium took place in October 2007 in Dakar, Senegal.
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