Sexual Cultures and Migration in the Era of AIDS is the first demographic anthropological study of what happens to sexual behaviour and the rules of risk-taking in sexual encounters when people migrate from countryside to city, from one city to another, or from one country to another culture. It represents a milestone in the study of cross-cultural sexuality and sexually transmitted diseases. At the foreground of the study are commercial sex and prostitution, sexual tourism, heterosexual marriage and social pressure, and homosexuality and bisexuality in emerging sexual cultures. The volume brings together quantitative and qualitative case studies by an international panel of anthropologists, demographers, and sociologists aimed at better understanding the impact of human movement and mobility on sexual change and fertility.

Globally, action to prevent HIV spread is inadequate. Over 16,000 new infections occur every day. Yet we are not helpless in the face of disaster, as shown by the rich prevention experience analyzed in this valuable new compendium. “Best pr- tice” exists—a set of tried and tested ways of slowing the spread of HIV, of persuading and enabling people to protect themselves and others from the virus. Individually, features of best practice can be found almost everywhere. The tragedy, on a world scale, is that prevention is spotty, not comprehensive; the measures are not being applied on anywhere near the scale needed, or with the right focus or synergy. The national response may concentrate solely on sex workers, for example. Elsewhere, efforts may go into school education for the young, but ignore the risks and vulnerability of men who have sex with men. Action may be patchy geographically. AIDS prevention may not benefit from adequate commitment from all parts and sectors of society, compromising the sustainability of the response. In some countries matters are still worse—there is still hardly any action at all against AIDS and scarcely any effort to make HIV visible. It is no wonder that the epidemic is still emerging and in some places is altogether out of control.

This book contributes greatly to our understanding of contemporary sexual behaviour and sexual attitudes in both rural and urban India and in different strata of society, including adolescent girls, sex workers (male and female), college students and slum dwellers. Presenting case studies from around the country, the original essays in this book identify the contextual, cultural and social factors that contribute to the risk of infection. They cover three broad areas:/-//-/ - An overview of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in India and the response of both the government and the public./-/ - Perspectives from diverse communities concerning premarital, marital and extramarital sexuality./-/ - Lessons learned at the national level in terms of research methodology and in the development of new approaches to HIV/AIDS./-//-/Overall, the book stresses the need to view sexuality and risk in a broad cultural and social context, as also emphasizes the need to learn directly from the community in order to develop innovative programmes.

This book explores social memory in the context of cultural crises of modernity in Thailand and Laos. It explicates the ways in which social memory constructed by the people enters modernity, and how this in turn causes fundamental ruptures with their past, as well as the various ways cultural crises are experienced in their lives. The essays in this book consider how in these crises the people constitute their cultural, social, or individual identities, particularly focusing on the theoretical issues of identifications and their relevance to distinct historical processes in Thailand and Laos. Both countries, particularly in the two decades since the 1970s, have been undergoing radical social and economic changes. Whilst Thailand has travelled down the road to industrialization, neighbouring Laos experienced a communist revolution in 1975 and only since the late 1980s has attempted to follow a reformist path to development. Increasingly influenced by globalised economic and social institutions, both countries have come to face crises that have made people insecure in the present and anxious about the future.

This volume presents original and high quality contributions on women’s migration from several different perspectives. Because of its complex nature, this topic has been examined in order to bring into dialogue a variety of theoretical perspectives, within an interdisciplinary context which includes not only sociology, anthropology, psychology and political geography, but also linguistics and literature. As the papers present the results of research projects which refer to specific geographical contexts, the collection is structured around the diverse destinations of the migrations here considered: namely, the Italian city of Palermo, Italy and Europe. All the papers were presented during the sixth edition of the “Migration, Human Rights and Democracy” Summer School, organized by the University of Palermo, Italy, in September 2012, which every year focuses on specific topics concerning questions of migration and human motilities in the contemporary world.

This book reflects cutting-edge science that has only recently become available. It is a comprehensive assortment of new approaches to HIV prevention. It describes a set of prevention strategies that do not solely rely on male condoms, including: the use of HIV antibody testing and `negotiated safety', abstinence, control of sexually transmitted diseases, treatment advances as prevention, and psychopharmacology to assist with behavior change. It is of interest to HIV prevention scientists, health psychologists, health educators, and public health workers in the communities at risk.

This text compares the effectiveness of approaches in aiding poverty reduction. The provision of credit and other financial services has become seen as the answer to the problem facing poor people. It emphasizes the importance of studying the local context, and then considering macro-economic factors which may be operating upon the economy.