The longlife AIDS-advocacy intervention: an exploration into public disclosure

This paper explores the Longlife AIDS-art advocacy intervention. This intervention was designed to support the AIDS treatment agenda by publicising the life narratives and art of a group of HIV positive people (all but one of whom was female). The research draws on in-depth interviews with twelve HIV-positive African women (known as the Bambanani Women’s Group) who were central to the intervention. Their experiences of public and personal disclosure highlight the complex relationship between their activist and private lives. In order to minimise the potential negative consequences of public disclosure, choice of audiences for their disclosure messages was mediated by a range of factors. These included social distance, type of media, activist ideologies, subjective constructions of community, and most importantly, perceptions and fear of AIDSstigma. This paper reflects critically on the intervention by highlighting some of the social and individual problems experienced by people living with HIV when they disclose their HIV status publicly in their communities