Transcript The “Other” embracing the “Othered”:

The “Other” embracing
the “Othered:”
Afro-Brazilian Religious Circles
Forging a Collective Identity around
Vulnerabilities to HIV/AIDS
Jonathan Garcia, M.Phil.
Department of Sociomedical Sciences
[email protected]
Support
 The presentation is based on data collected from two Studies both sponsored
by the U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development:
Religious Responses to HIV/AIDS in Brazil
(PI: Richard Parker, R01 HD050118)
Responses of Afro-Brazilian Religious Groups to HIV/AIDS
(PI: Jonathan Garcia, F31 HD055153)
The content is solely the responsibility of the author and does not
necessarily
represent the official views of Eugene Kennedy Shiver National Institute of
Child Health and Human Development
Central Arguments
 Principles and discourses of
solidarity and citizenship in
tension with identity-based
mobilization
 Framing transversal
vulnerabilities related to class,
race, gender and sexuality.
 Impacts on HIV and AIDS policy
Ethnographic Method
 Participant observation
 Oral History narratives
Race and Collective
Identity
 Solidarity and African Heritage
 Construction of the “black health
movement” and African heritage
 Place budgetary priority of
“vulnerabilities of the black
population”
 Intersectoral approach to public
health
Gender and Sexuality
 Role of priestess as matriarch
 HIV positive women’s groups
 Violence and drug governance
 Acolhimento (Inclusion and care) of
non-heterosexuals
From Acolhimento to
Resistance
 Resolving tensions between
solidarity and identity for a common
cause: reform health
 The “other” embraces the “othered”
 Collective identity based on
solidarity and transversal
vulnerabilities has been effective in
mobilization
 Resistance and Project Identities