LET’S (NOT) TALK ABOUT SEX: PUBLIC HIV/AIDS DISCOURSES IN SINGAPORE, 1985-2015

Abstract

As the “defining disease of the 1980s,” Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) is an incurable, lifelong condition caused by the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) which allows lethal, opportunistic infections and cancers to thrive.¹ Once thought of as an imminent death sentence, public perceptions of HIV/AIDS have changed significantly across over thirty years since its first emergence. This thesis seeks to understand how HIV/AIDS was talked about in Singapore. Using local newspapers and forum letters as its main primary sources, this study seeks to provide a general outline of how public HIV/AIDS discourses in Singapore have evolved across thirty years since the first locally reported case in 1985. The thesis thereby argues that public discourses surrounding the disease from 1985 to 2015 can be demarcated into three distinct stages - the containment (1985-1988), ‘heterosexualization’ (1988-2004), and ‘re-gaying’ (2004-2015) of HIV/AIDS. Additionally, given the disease’s close association with issues relating to sexual behaviour and sexuality, such discursive shifts were also accompanied by the politicization of issues concerning sexual morality through discussions involving HIV/AIDS over time, such as that of condoms or LGBT rights. This thesis ultimately explores how public HIV/AIDS discourses became increasingly intertwined with broader discourses relating to public morality. ¹ Paul Pradeep, ed., Caring for our People: 50 Years of Healthcare in Singapore (Singapore: MOH Holdings, 2015), 129.