AIDSImpact.com:: - Santa Fe, USA 2011

Abstract #222 - “We do everything but sex”: Comparing female and male Christian students’ experiences and responses to sexual temptation at a university campus in Zimbabwe
Authors: Presenting Author: Dr Tsitsi Masvawure - Columbia University
Additional Authors:
Aim: In this paper we seek to move beyond the question of the effectiveness of abstinence as an HIV prevention method and to focus instead on the following: a) how some church groups at a university campus in Zimbabwe talk about abstinence; b) the multiple meanings that female and male Christian students attach to the concept and; c) the implications of these multiple meanings for Christian students’ subsequent sexual behaviour.
Method / Issue: The role of the Christian church in HIV prevention in Africa is highly contested. Much of the existing literature on the topic is polarized between those who consider the church’s abstinence-only approach to be an impediment to HIV prevention efforts in the continent and those who see pre-marital sexual abstinence as a viable prevention strategy. Unfortunately both views do very little to enhance our understanding of why the abstinence-only message continues to be very popular in the Christian Church despite overwhelming evidence of its limited effectiveness. This paper draws on a larger ethnographic study that was conducted with twenty female and twenty male students at the University of Zimbabwe between August 2006 and December 2007. Data for this particular paper is based on participant observation of eleven, one-hour long, church meetings that I attended on campus and on in-depth interviews that I conducted with five male students and six female students who self-identified as ‘devout’ Christians. I also include data from numerous informal conversations with both Christian and non-Christian students on issues of dating and HIV.
Results / Comments: The church groups observed distinguished between “courtship” and “dating”: the former was encouraged while the latter was not. Courtship was described as a ‘preparation for marriage’ and was seen as equipping couples with important life-skills, such as the ability to invest in, and work towards a future goal without giving in to temptation. In contrast, dating was associated with ‘modernity’, the ‘clandestine’ and instant [sexual] gratification. The church groups also had different ways of policing and enforcing romantic liaisons among their members. Christian students’ interpretations of abstinence ranged from no physical intimacy whatsoever to “everything” but penetrative sex. “Everything” here included embracing, kissing, fondling and even mutual masturbation.
Discussion: Abstinence is not a straightforward and static concept as it is often made out to be. Furthermore, abstinence should be viewed as a concept that allows some church groups to situate sexuality in a wider discussion around personal agency.
Go Back