ABSTRACT
In sub-Saharan Africa, about two-thirds of HIV infections occur among young people aged 15-24 (UNAIDS 2006). An estimated 15.5 per cent of South African women aged 15-24 are HIV infected, compared to 4.8 per cent of men (Pettifor et al. 2005) and 15 per cent of the world’s HIV-infected population aged 15 to 24 lives in the country (Hallman 2004). Unequal gender and power relations mean that women are particularly vulnerable to HIV (Susser and Stein 2000; Campbell and MacPhail 2002; Jewkes et al. 2003). Within heterosexual relationships, women often lack the power to negotiate with whom, how and when to have sex (Bhana et al. 2007). These vulnerabilities are further compounded by age, constraining prevention choices (Dowsett and Aggleton 1999; MacPhail and Campbell 2001; Harrison et al. 2001). Both sexual coercion, which is common, and the practice of partnering with older men increase young women’s HIV risk (Dunkle et al. 2004; Gregson et al. 2002). In southern Africa, historical inequalities, widespread social dislocation and long-term disruption in family and social organisation reinforce these gender dynamics (Gilbert and Walker 2002). Entrenched gender beliefs also influence young people’s socialisation regarding sexuality, and often mandate deferential behaviour for young women in sexual relationships (Varga 2003). Understanding the social construction of young people’s sexuality requires attention to the range of meanings and definitions attached to sexuality and relationships. Studies of African young people’s sexualities highlight several common themes. First, a rising age of marriage has created an extended adolescence, making premarital sexual activity more common (Mensch et al. 1998). Second, sexuality is contested, highlighting generational differences between youth and their parents, who remain invested in sexual regimes based on marriage and reproduction (Smith 2000; Wight et al. 2006). Third, young people often rely on peers for information (Rivers and Aggleton 2000), which may reinforce unsafe behaviours. Fourth, the stigma or shame associated with sexual activity outside marriage may further constrain access to appropriate advice and information (Harrison 2002; Morrell 2003; Haram 2005). Ultimately, young people rely on a range of competing social influences to negotiate and construct their sexuality, often drawing simultaneously on conservative social norms, modern romantic aspirations about relationships and the community discourse through which these changes are contested (Dilger 2003). In South Africa, there has been intense recent public scrutiny of young women’s sexual mores (Harrison et al. 2000; LeClerc-Madlala 2001; Scorgie 2002). Yet most scholarship on sexuality has addressed either the historical context (Delius and
Glaser 2002; Reid and Walker 2005), the evolution of cultural practices, such as virginity testing (LeClerc-Madlala 2001) or changes in men’s behaviour (Hunter 2004). In contemporary discourse (Burns 2007), popular notions of sexuality are generally assumed to reflect African ‘traditions’, often with little examination of historical practice (Delius and Glaser 2002; Burns 2007). This ‘neo-traditionalism’ is often highly conservative, interpreting cultural practices as static and immutable rather than dynamically contested and adaptive (Spiegel and Boonzaier 1988). However, ethnographic accounts provide historical insight into the management of young people’s sexuality in Zulu culture. Puberty rituals (umhlonyane) prepared young women for marriage, with an emphasis on premarital morality and decorum, as well as sex and procreation (Krige 1950), after which a young woman became eligible for courtship (Gluckman 1950). Communication about sexual matters was conducted through older girls or elder ‘sisters’ (amaqikiza), who introduced suitors and provided instruction in sexual conduct, including ukusoma, non-penetrative ‘thigh sex’ permissible prior to marriage (Krige 1950). Engagement and marriage proceeded through a series of formal steps, including public acceptance of a lover (ukuqoma) and payment of bridewealth (ilobolo). A girl’s moral status and virginity were central to this negotiation, with higher bridewealth accorded young women deemed chaste and pure (Ngubane 1981). In the late nineteenth century, Christian missionaries sought to eliminate such ‘primitive’ or ‘backward’ practices (Gaitskell 1982; Marks 2002). Over time, Christian beliefs became interwoven with cultural practices, so that ‘traditions’ owe as much to a Christian as to an Africanist heritage (Burns 2007). The recent rise of ‘independent’ churches based on both Africanist and Christian beliefs, and Pentecostalism, as in the popular Zionist and Apostolic churches, has reinforced this (Muller 1999). This chapter uses qualitative data to examine how young men and women engage with these sociocultural influences to construct and enact their sexuality in rural KwaZulu/Natal, South Africa, with discussion of the implications for HIV prevention, an urgent priority given South Africa’s severe HIV epidemic.
