Premium
HIV‐Related Risk Practices among Glasgow Male Prostitutes: Refraining Concepts of Risk Behavior
Author(s) -
Bloor Michael J.,
Barnard Marina A.,
Finlay Andrew,
McKeganey Neil P.
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
medical anthropology quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.855
H-Index - 55
eISSN - 1548-1387
pISSN - 0745-5194
DOI - 10.1525/maq.1993.7.2.02a00020
Subject(s) - situated , sociocultural evolution , psychology , ambiguity , social psychology , psychosocial , safer sex , unsafe sex , discretion , sociology , human immunodeficiency virus (hiv) , criminology , political science , medicine , computer science , law , condom , family medicine , syphilis , artificial intelligence , psychiatry , anthropology , programming language
Based on ethnographic data on relations between 32 male prostitutes and their clients, this article examines variability in HIV‐related risk practices. It is argued that risk behavior should be seen as a situated product, emergent from the immediate situation of the sexual encounter. A minority of the prostitutes engaged in unsafe sex with at least some of their clients. Unsafe sex and violence were both associated with client control—with sexual encounters of such covertness and ambiguity that the client was allowed maximum discretion to decide terms and conditions. Safer sex was associated with countervailing prostitute techniques of power. This situated view of risk behavior sits unhappily with conventional psychosocial and sociocultural models of risk behavior. An alternative heuristic framework, based on Schutz's (1970) work on “systems of relevance,” is suggested.