Perceptions of AIDS and AIDS Education in Rural Benin: A Case Study in the Collines Department

Abstract

This thesis presents the findings of a small-scale, qualitative study of attitudes toward AIDS and AIDS education campaigns in the village of Sota in central Benin. Through a language ideology framework, this study reviews the overlap and disparity between AIDS discourse and other systems of meaning in Sota, particularly rumors and religious beliefs. The portrait that emerges from this analysis of the social construction of AIDS by multiple discourses suggests that the impact of AIDS education may be limited only in part because the intended recipients fail to understand the information being provided. More importantly, the context and underlying assumptions of educational presentations about HIV/AIDS are not formulated in ways that are compatible with, or directly meaningful to, lived experience.