Bodies, Identities and Behavioral Choices: How Focusing On the Contextual Factors that Contribute to Swazi University Students' Sex-Related Decisions Could Enhance On-Campus HIC/AIDS Campaigns

<p>In response to their country's high HIV prevalence, Swaziland's government recently produced a report that included a call to create and implement more HIV/AIDS campaigns that specifically target certain segments of the population and certain behaviors that contribute to the perpetuation of the country's HIV/AIDS epidemic. In this dissertation, I identity and describe social contextual factors that contribute to Swaziland's university and college students' decisions to engage in sex without a condom and to participate in multiple concurrent partnerships. I argue that these findings, based on 24 focus groups conducted on four tertiary-level campuses, may be used to create campaigns specifically designed to address these issues as they pertain to college and university students. Throughout the dissertation, I consider the following four factors that contribute to an individual's social context: 1. The social structures and social norms that constitute the spaces and places he or she occupies; 2. The identities that he or she strives to maintain; 3. The roles society expects him or her to occupy; and 4. His or her body. In my efforts to identity and describe these factors, I integrate the understanding of identity put forth by geographers that stresses the mutual constitution of identities, space and place with the concrete definitions of roles and identities advanced by psychology and social psychology. This tactic proved effective and, I argue, could benefit identity studies throughout geography.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Campus Access Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Geography

Year

2011

Author dc:creator

• Schwartz, Sarah Elizabeth

Contributors dc:contributor

• Edward Carr

• Geography
• Social and Behavioral Sciences
• gender
• HIV/AIDS
• identity
• Swaziland

Statement dc:rights

• © 2011, Sarah Elizabeth Schwartz

Repository record dc:identifier

https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/etd/1303

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholarcommons.sc.edu:etd-2304