Virtual Special Issue

HIV/AIDS and the sociology of health and illness
Editorial by Clive Seale

In the initial stages of the discovery of HIV/AIDS in Western countries, sociologists were eagerly sought after by those designing strategies for preventing HIV transmission. They were regarded as sources of intelligence about somewhat hidden populations and areas of human behaviour, access to which appeared to require methodological skills – largely involving qualitative and ‘field work’ methods – in which sociologists (and anthropologists) had specialised.  At the same time, sociologists were interested in documenting societal responses to what appeared to be a growing epidemic threat, and in charting the effects of this on these same groups of people.  As time passed and access to antiretroviral treatment changed the survival picture for people with HIV, additional questions became relevant, so that studies of life with HIV and medication regimes appeared. The history of papers on HIV/AIDS in the journal reflects these developing concerns. In addition to describing these trends in this Virtual Special Issue editorial, I make observations about some limitations that papers in the journal have shared and point to potential future directions for sociological research in this field.

Read the full editorial

List of articles appearing in the Virtual Special Issue

Lydia Bennett, Jan Duke
Research note: Decision-making processes, ethical dilemmas and models of care in HIV/AIDS health care provision
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 17, Issue 1, Date: January 1995, Pages: 109-119

Mildred Blaxter
Editorial
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 12, Issue 3, Date: September 1990, Page: 247-248

Chris Bonell
The politics of the research-policy interface: randomised trials and the commissioning of HIV prevention services
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 24, Issue 4, Date: July 2002, Pages: 385-408

Jan Browne, Victor Minichiello
The condom: why more people don't put it on
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 16, Issue 2, Date: March 1994, Pages: 229-251
 
Danièle Carricaburu, Janine Pierret
From biographical disruption to biographical reinforcement: the case of HIV-positive men
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 17, Issue 1, Date: January 1995, Pages: 65-88

Fabian Cataldo
New forms of citizenship and socio-political inclusion: accessing antiretroviral therapy in a Rio de Janeiro favela
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 30, Issue 6, Date: September 2008, Pages: 900-912

Elizabeth Chapman
Conceptualisation of the body for people living with HIV: issues of touch and contamination
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 22, Issue 6, Date: November 2000, Pages: 840-857
 
Desire´e Ciambrone
Illness and other assaults on self: the relative impact of HIV/AIDS on women's lives
Sociology of Health and Illness
Volume 23, Issue 4, Date: July 2001, Pages: 517-540

Michele Crossley
'Sick Role' or 'Empowerment'? The Ambiguities of Life with an HIV Positive Diagnosis
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 20, Issue 4, Date: July 1998, Pages: 507-531

Mark Davis
The 'loss of community' and other problems for sexual citizenship in recent HIV prevention
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 30, Issue 2, Date: March 2008, Pages: 182-196

Mark Davis, Graham Hart, Graham Bolding, Lorraine Sherr, Jonathan Elford
E-dating, identity and HIV prevention: theorising sexualities, risk and network society
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 28, Issue 4, Date: May 2006, Pages: 457-478

Carrie E. Foote-Ardah
The meaning of complementary and alternative medicine practices among people with HIV in the United States: strategies for managing everyday life
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 25, Issue 5, Date: July 2003, Pages: 481-500

James Gillett
Media activism and Internet use by people with HIV/AIDS
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 25, Issue 6, Date: September 2003, Pages: 608-624

Anna Green, Sophie Day, Helen Ward
Crack cocaine and prostitution in London in the 1990s
Sociology of Health and Illness
Volume 22, Issue 1, Date: January 2000, Pages: 27-39

Gill Green, Stephen Platt
Fear and loathing in health care settings reported by people with HIV
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 19, Issue 1, Date: January 1997, Pages: 70-92
 
Graham Hart, Mary Boulton, Ray Fitzpatrick, John McLean, Jill Dawson
'Relapse' to unsafe sexual behaviour among gay men: a critique of recent behavioural HIV/AIDS research
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 14, Issue 2, Date: June 1992, Pages: 216-232

Janet Holland, Caroline Ramazanoglu, Sue Scott, Sue Sharpe, Rachel Thomson
Sex, gender and power: young women's sexuality in the shadow of AIDS
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 12, Issue 3, Date: September 1990, Pages: 336-350

Rhidian Hughes
Considering the Vignette Technique and its Application to a Study of Drug Injecting and HIV Risk and Safer Behaviour
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 20, Issue 3, Date: May 1998, Pages: 381-400

Ann Marie Kofmehl Kinnell
'So why are you here?' Assessing risk in HIV prevention and test decision counselling
Sociology of Health and Illness
Volume 23, Issue 4, Date: July 2001, Pages: 447-477
 
Jenny Kitzinger
Audience understandings of AIDS media messages: a discussion of methods
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 12, Issue 3, Date: September 1990, Pages: 319-335

Seung-Hee Lee, Nicolas Sheon
Responsibility and risk: accounts of reasons for seeking an HIV test
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 30, Issue 2, Date: March 2008, Pages: 167-181

Chih-Yin Lew-Ting, Li-Hsin Chen
The surrogate marker and its discontents: pluralism in immunity maintenance among HIV-infected persons in Taiwan
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 30, Issue 7, Date: November 2008, Pages: 1039-1054

Deborah Lupton
Archetypes of Infection: People with HIV/AIDS in the Australian Press in the Mid 1990s
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 21, Issue 1, Date: January 1999, Pages: 37-53

Deborah Lupton, Sophie McCarthy, Simon Chapman
'Panic bodies': discourses on risk and HIV antibody testing
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 17, Issue 1, Date: January 1995, Pages: 89-108

Neil McKeganey, Marina Barnard, Michael Bloor
A comparison of HIV-related risk behaviour and risk reduction between female street working prostitutes and male rent boys in Glasgow
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 12, Issue 3, Date: September 1990, Pages: 274-292

Liza McCoy
Time, self and the medication day: a closer look at the everyday work of 'adherence'
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 31, Issue 1, Date: January 2009, Pages: 128-146

Asha Persson, Christy Newman
Making monsters: heterosexuality, crime and race in recent Western media coverage of HIV
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 30, Issue 4, Date: May 2008, Pages: 632-646

Janine Pierret
Interviews and biographical time: the case of long‐term HIV nonprogressors
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 23, Issue 2, Date: March 2001, Pages: 159-179

Elizabeth Plumridge, Jane Chetwynd
Identity and the Social Construction of Risk: Injecting Drug Use
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 21, Issue 3, Date: May 1999, Pages: 329-343

Elizabeth Plumridge, Jane Chetwynd, A. Reed
Control and condoms in commercial sex: client perspectives
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 19, Issue 2, Date: March 1997, Pages: 228-243

Robert Power, Steve Jones, Gerry Kearns, Jenni Ward
An ethnography of risk management amongst illicit drug injectors and its implications for the development of community-based interventions
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 18, Issue 1, Date: January 1996, Pages: 86-106

Tim Rhodes
Risk theory in epidemic times: sex, drugs and the social organisation of 'risk behaviour'
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 19, Issue 2, Date: March 1997, Pages: 208-227

Tim Rhodes, Linda Cusick
Love and intimacy in relationship risk management: HIV positive people and their sexual partners
Sociology of Health and Illness
Volume 22, Issue 1, Date: January 2000, Pages: 1-26

Tim Rhodes, Gerry V. Stimson
What is the relationship between drug taking and sexual risk? Social relations and social research
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 16, Issue 2, Date: March 1994, Pages: 209-228
 
Damien Ridge, Ian Williams, Jane Anderson, Jonathan Elford
Like a prayer: the role of spirituality and religion for people living with HIV in the UK
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 30, Issue 3, Date: April 2008, Pages: 413-428

David A. Rier
Internet social support groups as moral agents: the ethical dynamics of HIV+ status disclosure
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 29, Issue 7, Date: November 2007, Pages: 1043-1058

Marsha Rosengarten, John Imrie, Paul Flowers, Mark D. Davis, Graham Hart
After the euphoria: HIV medical technologies from the perspective of their prescribers
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 26, Issue 5, Date: July 2004, Pages: 575-596

Scott Edward Rutledge, Neil Abell, Jacqueline Padmore, Theresa J. McCann
AIDS stigma in health services in the Eastern Caribbean
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 31, Issue 1, Date: January 2009, Pages: 17-34

Graham Scambler, Rita Peswani, Adrian Renton, Annette Scambler
Women prostitutes in the AIDS era
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 12, Issue 3, Date: September 1990, Pages: 260-273
 
David Silverman, Anssi Peräkylä
AIDS counselling: the interactional organisation of talk about 'delicate' issues
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 12, Issue 3, Date: September 1990, Pages: 293-318

Milena Simić, Tim Rhodes
Violence, dignity and HIV vulnerability: street sex work in Serbia
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 31, Issue 1, Date: January 2009, Pages: 1-16
 
Philip Strong
Epidemic psychology: a model
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 12, Issue 3, Date: September 1990, Pages: 249-259

Rachel D. Thorpe
'Doing' chronic illness? Complementary medicine use among people living with HIV/AIDS in Australia
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 31, Issue 3, Date: April 2009, Pages: 375-389

Deborah J. Warr, Priscilla M. Pyett
Difficult Relations: Sex Work, Love and Intimacy
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 21, Issue 3, Date: May 1999, Pages: 290-309

Ian Warwick, Peter Aggleton, Hilary Homans
Constructing commonsense—young people's beliefs about AIDS
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 10, Issue 3, Date: September 1988, Pages: 213-233

Dawn Whittaker, Graham Hart
Research note: Managing risks: the social organisation of indoor sex work
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 18, Issue 3, Date: June 1996, Pages: 399-414
 
Daniel Wight
Cultural factors in young heterosexual men's perception of HIV risk
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 21, Issue 6, Date: November 1999, Pages: 735-758

Christopher Williams
Sex education and the AIDS epidemic in the Former Soviet Union
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 16, Issue 1, Date: January 1994, Pages: 81-102
 
Sarah Wilson
'When you have children, you're obliged to live'1: motherhood, chronic illness and biographical disruption
Sociology of Health & Illness
Volume 29, Issue 4, Date: May 2007, Pages: 610-626