Masculinity, power, sexual negotiation and AIDS : a discourse analysis

Bibliography: leaves 57-63.This study focusses on the relationship between masculinity, power, sexuality and AIDS. It examines how discursive positioning within discourses of sexuality and masculinity affects the way heterosexual men negotiate safer sex. Four groups of sexually active men aged 17-28 were constituted to discuss masculinity, sexual negotiation and AIDS. A vignette was used to prompt discussion. The resulting audio-taped leaderless men-only group discussions were analysed, using Hallway's interpretative discourse analysis, which draws on a. post-structuralist theory of discourse, especially as articulated by Foucault. In the accounts, it appeared that, firstly, the sexual drive discourse and male sexual drive discourse; and secondly, the discourses of sexual performance and potency, a.re the discourses offering subject positions which most directly impede the practice of safer sex. Negotiating safer sex interrupts· the impetus of the "passion" of the sexual drive. Further, it threatens the imperatives of successful "performance" which entail erection, penetration, ejaculation, and responsibility for the woman's orgasm. Rationalisations for avoiding negotiating safer sex were also offered within the discourses of mood-breaking, trust/mistrust, and stigma. Discourses present tended to embody a.n ideology of male dominance within the sexual sphere, reinforcing theories which suggest that gendered power relations in society present a. major stumbling block to safer sex. Although discourses were similar across the groups, there were contradictory discourses within the groups which were voiced by particular individuals. It is suggested that core requirements of HIV education for men would be, firstly, depictions of alternative versions of masculinity and images of sexual practice which incorporated shared responsibility and questioned the "naturalness" of dominant constructions of heterosexuality; and secondly, the provision of safe spaces in which men may be able to reflexively explore their own sexuality and begin to imagine new ways of experiencing sexual relationships