TY - JOUR
T1 - Health discourse, sexual slang and ideological contradictions among Mozambican youth
T2 - Implications for method
AU - Groes-Green, Christian
PY - 2009
Y1 - 2009
N2 - Despite the urgency of improving an understanding of sexual cultures in the face of aglobally devastating HIV epidemic, methodological reflection and innovation has beenconspicuously absent from qualitative research in recent years. Findings fromfieldwork on condom use among young people in Mozambique confirm the need toremain alert to the ideological and linguistic bias of applied methods. Interviewingyoung people about their sexuality using a conventional health discourse resulted inincorrect or socially acceptable answers rather than accurate information about theirsexual behaviour. Young people's resistance to enquiry, the paper argues, is due toideological contradictions between their sexual culture and slang, on the one hand, andWestern health discourses associated with colonial and post-colonial opposition totraditional culture and languages, on the other. Mixing colloquial Portuguese andchangana sexual slang is constructed around ideas of safedeza and pleasure, whiledominant health discourses address sexuality as both ‘risky' and ‘dangerous'. In orderto gain a deeper understanding of sexual cultures and to make HIV prevention effortsrelevant to young people, it is suggested that researchers and policy makers approachrespondents with a language that is sensitive to the local ideological and linguisticcontext.
AB - Despite the urgency of improving an understanding of sexual cultures in the face of aglobally devastating HIV epidemic, methodological reflection and innovation has beenconspicuously absent from qualitative research in recent years. Findings fromfieldwork on condom use among young people in Mozambique confirm the need toremain alert to the ideological and linguistic bias of applied methods. Interviewingyoung people about their sexuality using a conventional health discourse resulted inincorrect or socially acceptable answers rather than accurate information about theirsexual behaviour. Young people's resistance to enquiry, the paper argues, is due toideological contradictions between their sexual culture and slang, on the one hand, andWestern health discourses associated with colonial and post-colonial opposition totraditional culture and languages, on the other. Mixing colloquial Portuguese andchangana sexual slang is constructed around ideas of safedeza and pleasure, whiledominant health discourses address sexuality as both ‘risky' and ‘dangerous'. In orderto gain a deeper understanding of sexual cultures and to make HIV prevention effortsrelevant to young people, it is suggested that researchers and policy makers approachrespondents with a language that is sensitive to the local ideological and linguisticcontext.
M3 - Journal article
SN - 1369-1058
VL - 11
SP - 655
EP - 668
JO - Culture, Health and Sexuality
JF - Culture, Health and Sexuality
IS - 6
ER -
