Women living with HIV have a variety of reproductive health and psychosocial needs. The purpose of this critical ethnographic study was to examine how HIV, empowerment and reproduction are experienced by a volunteer sample of HIVpositive women attending public health care facilities in Gauteng. Feminist and critical approaches were used to guide the methodology of the research and the interpretation of the findings. Data were collected through in-depth interviews and observation. An overview of literature pertaining to the social construction of HIV-AIDS, women’s empowerment and reproductive decision-making is presented. A discourse of “healthy lifestyle” as technologies of the self is considered. Women’s empowerment as an ideal is described and structural barriers to its achievement are discussed. Stigma and discrimination as products of hegemony are discussed as important issues in the disempowerment of women living with HIV. HIV-AIDS as illness experience is reviewed with reference to the social context and to the individual context. Reproductive decision-making models and theories are critically analysed for their applicability to women living with HIV. The need for a conceptual shift in the notion of empowerment in order to understand constrained decision-making for women living with HIV is propagated. The stories of women living with HIV and dependent on public health care services are presented. Through the principles of a critical ethnography the lived experiences of these women are described by means of emerging themes. A historiography of family planning and HIV-AIDS services throws the narrations of the research participants into broader historic relief. Findings revealed that biomedical hegemonic power contoured and marked the lived experiences of women following an HIV-positive diagnosis. Taken-for-granted views of passivity and of own responsibilities regarding reproductive health are challenged. The women in the study were dependent upon public health care personnel for treatment, testing, dietary advice/supplementation and recommendations for a social xii disability grant. ARV-treatment was regarded as a low point in the illness career. All of the participants reported that the overriding problems in their lives were having too few material resources and not having the means to change this. This made them vulnerable to compounded health problems and decreased their ability to voice their own opinions about treatment. They did not regard themselves as having been at risk for contracting HIV and some harboured resentment towards men who were seen as being absolved from testing and responsibilities towards female partners, born and unborn children. Women who were not tested as part of antenatal sentinel groups tended to suffer symptoms of ill health for some time prior to being tested for HIV. Social support systems were either absent or consisted of trusted family members and friends. In many cases, women became the silent care-givers for those affected and infected by HIV. Anticipated stigma permeated the participants’ narrations of living with HIV and disclosure of their statuses was difficult. The use of male condoms, stressed during counselling sessions, was narrated as a difficult burden for women to bear. Although the research participants expressed low fertility preferences, HIV-AIDS was seen as disrupting the link between heterosexual conjugal relations and the taken-for-grantedness of procreation. HIV-AIDS also disrupted norms in infant feeding practices and bottle-feeding was regarded as a sign of possible HIV-infection and hidden. The research participants were not empowered with knowledge about how to deal with side-effects, condom failures and the reluctance of male partners to be tested for HIV. They enacted, resisted and lived with HIV in different ways, incorporating some of the biomedically prescribed posturing as women living positively and blending it with stigma-negating performances and gender-prescribed ways of dressing, walking and acting. Participation in a support group validated their experiences and promoted positive self-perception. The formation of a collective voice in the support group was hampered by irregular attendance, the interference of community leaders and horizontal violence. Power relations, yielded by biomedical hegemony, androcentric sociocultural practices, material deprivation, fear, discrimination and stigma potentially undermined the women’s abilities to become empowered. Expansion of choices in various spheres or fields and collective action xiii are proposed as dimensions to be added to an empowerment-of-women approach to the problems of reproductive health in the age of HIV-AIDS. The contribution of the study as an emancipatory project is evaluated and implications for policy and practice are suggested. On a methodological level, this study is a demonstration of the contribution to be made by a micro-level, critical analysis to the body of knowledge about female reproductive health in the era of HIV-AIDS in South Africa. On a theoretical level, this study contributes to a wider conceptualisation of women’s empowerment by recognising the interplay between micro-level elements of situated experience, knowledge and preferences and the macro-level elements of sociocultural, biomedical and material influences on health and reproductive behavior.

In the Maoist era, the quest for beauty was regarded as decadent Western bourgeois culture. However, more and more Chinese women have been shopping for a youthful and beautiful appearance by undergoing cosmetic surgery in recent decades. Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Beijing, China, in 2006--2007, this study examines the phenomenon of the rapidly growing popularity of cosmetic surgery among Chinese women and considers the relationships between the remaking of female body image through cosmetic surgery, the reconstruction of self identity, and the reconfiguration of state power and market forces with the expansion of global consumerism in post-Mao China. The thesis suggests that the alteration of female body features through cosmetic surgery reflects in microcosm the transition of China from a Maoist socialist regime to a post-Maoist consumer society within a few decades, following its own "Chinese characteristics." Therefore, Chinese women's involvement in cosmetic surgery must be understood within the broader historical and socio-political context of China, and also must be seen both as the empowerment of Chinese women and also their ongoing subjugation to men, markets, and the state. / Wen, Hua. / Adviser: Gordon Matthews. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 72-04, Section: A, page: . / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 392-421). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract and glossary also in Chinese.

published_or_final_version / abstract / Sociology / Master / Master of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / abstract / Sociology / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The effects of attitudes and perceived constraints on behavior and the choices females make about involvement in recreational sports, exercise, and other physical recreation activities are important to consider if females physical, social, and emotional quality of life is to be enhanced. The main aim of this study was to explore the perception held by female undergraduate students at UWC regarding the physical and socio-cultural constraints that influence their participation in recreation sport.

published_or_final_version / Sociology / Master / Master of Philosophy

The impact of a female sportswriter's presence on a newspaper staff was examined by content analysis, studying photo and copy space devoted to both male and female sports coverage. Composite weeks, one each from each quarter of the year following the woman's date of hire were selected from the only four newspapers in the state of Indiana hiring female sportswriters. Compared to similar Indiana newspapers without female sportswriters, those with female staffers were found to devote more copy and photo space to women's coverage in the entire sports section, and on the sports section front page, papers with female sportswriters used more photos of women and devoted more total space (photos and copy) to women's sports coverage. The effect was consistent regardless of the newspaper's market size. / Department of Journalism

The effects of attitudes and perceived constraints on behavior and the choices females make about involvement in recreational sports, exercise, and other physical recreation activities are important to consider if females physical, social, and emotional quality of life is to be enhanced. The main aim of this study was to explore the perception held by female undergraduate students at UWC regarding the physical and socio-cultural constraints that influence their participation in recreation sport.

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree Master of Technology: Graphic Design, Durban University of Technology, Durban, South Africa, 2014. / The aim of this study was to investigate how images of women in the media that espouse women’s empowerment can indeed have the opposite effect and may even contribute to lowered self-esteem in women. To this end, this project is intended to explore issues such as body image and image manufacture in order to find a possible answer to the question of what is ‘real beauty’ in the South African context. A semiotic approach seeking to review the ways in which women are seen through visual communicative images was undertaken. This visual research revealed the importance of the ‘gendered gaze’ at the centre of issues that relate to self-esteem. An in-depth analysis of the literature, pertaining to self-esteem, interrogated the works of Naomi Wolf, John Berger and Susie Orbach, amongst others. This was carried out in order to understand more about how the dictates of consumerism pervade the work of the style industries. These sectors are well supported by the diet, food and cosmetic surgery industries who tend to effectively increase and add to a sense of body related insecurities. In addition, content analysis of selected South African editions of Cosmopolitan magazine was conducted. The images described represents a significant development period in the emergence of certain beauty ideals in South Africa. The British Unilever marketing campaign, The Dove Campaign For Real Beauty, was used as a base model for the applied design component of this study. In addition an action research approach was employed through a series of interviews and questionnaires directed at mostly female participants in South Africa. This method revealed that self-esteem issues have far reaching implications, affecting women of all ages. As a response to the perceived need for a South African based campaign, this research project informed the development of The Sisterhood Self-Esteem Crusade. In contrast to The Dove Campaign For Real Beauty which was created to promote increased sales of beauty products, The Sisterhood Self-Esteem Crusade’s focus is to interrogate and raise awareness of self-esteem. Underpinning this was an attempt to build confidence, cascade new ways of understanding and to propagate sense making, informed through action research, amongst South African women.

Thesis (MA)--University of Stellenbosch, 2004. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The HIV/AIDS pandemic is steadily growing throughout the world. Global estimates have revealed that forty million people are living with HIV/AIDS. Approximately 5.3 millions South Africans have been indicated to be living with the illness and within South Africa HIV/AIDS is having catastrophic effect. The burden of the HIV/AIDS epidemic has not fallen evenly. In South Africa, African women have borne the brunt of the illness. This study presents a focus on developing more effective ways of caring and therefore impacting the health of Black South African women living with HIV. Social support understood broadly as different aspects of relationships in which needs are met and individuals feel cared for, loved and valued (Cobb, cited in Friedland, McColl, & Renwick, 1996) was indicated as having a powerful impact on health. For this reason social support was considered crucial in the development of effective strategies of care. Studies examining the role of social support in the management of chronic illness such as HIV/AIDS underscore the ability of social support to provide a sense of health within illness. From within a South African context, however, a gap in social support research has been apparent. Although frameworks for understanding social support as a broad concept were available, social support research failed to provide adequate foundations for understanding social support in terms that could implicate strategic intervention and contribute to the development of more effective strategies of care. The aim of this study was to develop a deeper understanding of the lived experience of social support for a sample of nine Black South African women living with HIV. The study was conducted qualitatively within a phenomenological paradigm. A phenomenological paradigm encouraged participants, through in-depth interviewing, to provide information based on their own lived experiences of social support. The interviews were then transcribed and analysed using rigorous data analysis methods. Initial findings were presented to the sample and then developed further. Final findings were written up as rich descriptions of the lived experience of social support for the sample. Fourteen themes emerged as comprising constituent aspects of social support. Descriptions of the fourteen themes, including health care professionals, partners, family/children, support groups, meeting others needs, story telling, Memory Box Project, media and books, organisations within the community, activities, the community, being involved in research and spirituality, provide rich understandings of the interpersonal relationships constituting the lived experience of social support for the sample. A polarity was identified in the lived experience of social support. Interactions had the potential to be satisfactory and supportive as well as non-supportive. The research findings are discussed within a greater theoretical body of knowledge and considered in light of three contexts considered influential in impacting the lived experience of social support. The study assisted in the development of a culturally contextual understanding of the lived experience of social support. This understanding has implications for effective intervention strategies seeking to purposefully care for those living with HIV in South Africa / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Die MIV/vigs-pandemie neem wêreldwyd steeds toe. Internasionale beramings dui daarop dat sowat 40 miljoen mense tans met MIV/vigs saamleef. Altesame 5,3 miljoen Suid-Afrikaners ly na raming aan die siekte en dit het ’n katastrofiese uitwerking. Wat bevolkingsgroepe betref, is die siekte egter nie eweredig versprei nie. In Suid-Afrika is dit die swart bevolkingsgroep, en in die besonder die swart vrou, wat die meeste deur die siekte geaffekteer word. Hierdie studie fokus op die potensiële ontwikkeling van doeltreffender versorgingsmetodes wat dan ook die lewensgehalte sou kon verbeter van swart Suid-Afrikaanse vroue met MIV/vigs. Sosiale steun het ’n sterk invloed op gesondheid. Hierdie steun verwys na die verskillende aspekte van verhoudings wat geaffekteerde individue vervuld, versorg en gelief laat voel (Cobb soos aangehaal in Friedland, McColl, & Renwick, 1996). Daarom word sosiale steun as belangrik beskou in die ontwikkeling van doeltreffende versorgingstrategieë. Verskeie studies oor die rol van sosiale steun in die bestuur van chroniese siektes soos MIV/vigs, bevestig dat sosiale steun ’n deurslaggewende rol speel in die vestiging van ’n gevoel van gesondheid binne ’n siektetoestand. Binne die Suid-Afrikaanse konteks blyk daar egter ‘n gebrek aan navorsing te wees wat betref die rol van sosiale steun. Hoewel daar wel werk beskikbaar is wat die rol van sosiale steun as ’n breë konsep verklaar, bied navorsing op hierdie gebied nog nie ’n geskikte grondslag vir ’n beter begrip van sosiale steun wat betref strategiese intervensie en die bydrae wat dit kan lewer tot doeltreffender versorgingstrategieë nie. Die doel van hierdie studie was om ‘n groter begrip te ontwikkel vir sosiale steun soos beleef deur ’n steekproef van nege swart Suid-Afrikaanse vroue met MIV. Dit studie is kwalitatief uitgevoer vanuit ’n fenomenologiese paradigma. Deur die voer van diepte-onderhoude binne hierdie fenomenologiese paradigma is deelnemers aangemoedig om inligting te verskaf oor hulle eie ervaring van sosiale steun. Die onderhoude is vervolgens getranskribeer en geanaliseer deur middel van streng data-analise-metodes. Daar is terugvoering oor die aanvanklike bevindinge gegee aan die vroue in die steekproef en die data is hierna nog verder ontwikkel. Die finale bevindinge is in die studie weergegee as ’n omvangryke beskrywing van die steekproef se deurleefde ervaring van sosiale steun. Veertien temas is geïdentifiseer wat kernaspekte van sosiale steun omvat. Hierdie temas sluit onder meer in gesondheidsorgwerkers, metgeselle, familie/gesinne/kinders, steungroepe, behoeftevoorsiening, die vertel van stories, die "Memory Box"-projek, die media en boeke, gemeenskapsorganisasies, aktiwiteite, die gemeenskap, betrokkenheid by navorsing, en geesteslewe. ’n Beskrywing van die veertien temas het bygedra tot ’n veel groter begrip van die interpersoonlike verhoudings wat deel uitgemaak het van die deelnemers se beleefde ervaring van sosiale steun. Daar is egter ’n polariteit geïdentifiseer ten opsigte van hierdie beleefde ervaring van sosiale steun. Dit het geblyk dat interaksie potensieel bevredigend en ondersteunend van aard kan wees, maar ook afbrekend. Die navorsingsresultate is verder bespreek binne ‘n uitgebreide teoretiese kennisraamwerk en is beskou in die lig van drie kontekste wat as belangrik geag word betreffende die invloed daarvan op die beleefde ervaring van sosiale steun. Hierdie studie het bygedra tot die ontwikkeling van groter begrip binne kulturele konteks vir die beleefde ervaring van sosiale steun. Hierdie begrip is belangrik vir doeltreffende intervensie.