Single women in urban african areas faced with the risk of AIDS : from an anthropological understanding to a policy of prevention in Ouagadougou (I. BARDEM, I. GOBATTO).
1.1. Abridged title:Single women and AIDS in urban african
areas.
1.2. Discipline: ethonology, sociology
1.3. Calendar
- beginning : January 1993
- end : December 1993
1.4. Attachment :
Département : Conditions de Vie et Développement,
Unité de recherche : Santé, Programme SIDA
1.5. Partners
National Committee of Fight against AIDS in Burkina Faso
2. Presentation
2.1. Research Problem
In the capitals of Africa, one of the main manifestations of modernism is
revealed through a complex process of individualisation. Regarding women,
this is seen through the increasing rate of celibacy which is sometimes
suffered by them but which is equally desired because of new demands which
call for the multiplication of partners. The need for women to be independent
is shown through the desire, not to say, the necessity for women autonomy.
Faced with the extremely restricted nature of the employment market due
to the inequality situation of men and women in matters of education and
training, these « free women » find in venal sexual
relations one of the principal sources of material gains. The serious situation
and the generalised accomodation of these practices within the female population
constitute a social phenomenon whose incidence on the propagation of HIV
is important. Our hypothesis is that these practices turn young girls and
women in urban areas who are in the process of individualisation into a
specific population capable of being the object of a policy of adapted prevention.
2.2. Objectives
To understand the logic of these women faced with AIDS, their acceptance
or non acceptance of it, the explicative models to which they refer to control
it. Their practices reflect the social logics whose understanding is necessary
for the understanding of what influences their behavior. It is necessary
to replace these representations and the practices issuing from them in
the biographies of these women and their strategic way of life and survival.
2.3. Methods
The research will be based on interviews and sociological inquiries.
3. Publications : BARDEM I., GOBATTO I. 1994 Vingt-quatre prostituées face au risque
du sida à Ouagadougou. ORSTOM, Ouagadougou, 30 p.
BARDEM I., GOBATTO I. 1995 Maux d'amour, vies de femmes ; sexualité
et prévention du sida en milieu urbain africain. L'Harmattan, Coll.
Santé et Sciences Humaines, Paris, 174 p.
GOBATTO I., BARDEM I. 1995 "Sexualité et prévention du
sida en milieu urbain africain, une enquête auprès des femmes
célibataires de Ouagadougou", communication à l'Atelier
de synthèse des recherches menées en Sciences de l'Homme et
de la Société sur le sida en Afrique, ANRS, orstom, Paris,
20-21 sept. 95.
