AIDS

Medical and Health > Medical Studies
Sociology

AIDS

This paper examines the sociological implications of AIDS through an analysis of the societal institutions that shape and influence the understanding and stigmatization of this most controversial of epidemics.

2,380 words () | 9 sources | MLA | 2008 United States

Paper Summary:

This paper stresses that the effects of the AIDS epidemic on modern societies are tantamount in scope to those of the bubonic plague of the fourteenth century. The author points out that the victims of epidemic encounter and suffer from rigid, blind and irrational stigmatization; however, there is not a great deal of research about AIDS and the social stigma it breeds. The paper relates that, in the United States, the legal system paradoxically has served to both protect AIDS victims and strengthen their social stigmatization. The author underscores that the legal protections that the government has extended to the confidentiality of AIDS victims are superior to those that have been offered to other individuals with a communicable disease. The paper states that discrimination against HIV or AIDS victims in their places of work is more obvious than that which exists in religious institutions, although a considerable amount of progress has been made in the workplace.

Table of Contents:
A Brief Definition of Stigma
Law and Stigma
Media and Stigma
Religion and Stigma
The Work Force
Health Insurance
Education
Conclusion

From the Paper:

"Anyone who lived during the 1980s will recall the media's inadequate coverage of the AIDS outbreak. For those who didn't, it is sufficient to write that mainstream media coverage in those days was laced with mean-spirited jokes in bad taste, ridicule, rampant irreverence, and a woeful grasp on the facts. Today, very few dispute the argument that, in the early days of the outbreak, the media contributed a great deal to the general ambiance of hysteria and relentless stigmatization."

Sample of Sources Used:

Brandt, Allan M. "AIDS: From Social History to Social Policy." AIDS: The Burdens of History. Ed. Fox, Daniel M. and Elizabeth Fee. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
Fox, Daniel M. and Elizabeth Fox. "Introduction: AIDS, Public Policy, and Historical Inquiry." AIDS: The Burdens of History. Ed. Fox, Daniel M. and Elizabeth Fee. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988.
Franzkowiak, Peter and Eberhard Wenzel. "AIDS Health Promotion for Youth: Conceptual Framework and Practical Implications." Health Promotion International 9:2 (1994): 119-135.
Herek, Gregory M., and John P. Capitanio. "Symbolic Prejudice or Fear of Infection." Basic and Applied Social Psychology 20: 3 (1998): 230-241.
Herek, Gregory M. and John P. Capitanio. "A Second Decade of Stigma: Public Reactions to AIDS in the United States, 1990-1991." Journal of Public Health 83 (1993): 574-577.