Gender, HIV and risk: Navigating structural violence
本书系统考察性别对HIV感染的影响，揭示马拉维女性面临的结构性暴力，通过丰富实地数据将抽象概念转化为具体案例，回答HIV持续传播的关键原因。
In this systematic and detailed examination of the impact of gender on HIV infection, Anderson unpacks the contents and implications of structural violence as they apply to women in Malawi. Focusing on an ostensibly peaceful country with high rates of HIV, Anderson highlights everyday structures of gendered violence often overlooked by global prevention policies; she argues that these quotidian practices lead to increased risk of HIV infection. Drawing on rich primary data, this book translates the sometimes abstract concept of structural violence into concrete examples, lived experiences, and cultural and economic practices. In this way Anderson makes a useful contribution to literature on structural violence as well as tackling the critical ‘why’ question of ongoing HIV infection. The book's introduction and first two chapters present key concepts, the global HIV policy context, and methodological issues. A particular strength of this section, and indeed of the book, is an unusually honest, self-reflexive, and thorough account of the research method (Chapter 2), including a detailed and respectful account of the contribution of the author's research assistant. Describing her method as qualitative, social constructivist, and actor-oriented, Anderson details the logic and logistics of extensive fieldwork in 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2011, including language training, 44 key informant interviews, consultations, participant observation, 44 focus group discussions, 110 individual interviews, and informal discussions. The depth of the fieldwork, however, leaves some questions unanswered. Given that Anderson rightly characterizes Malawi's cultures as dynamic, for example, this research timespan invites some longitudinal reflection – something that is largely left unexplored. Chapter 2 also raises some important points of comparison that could be leveraged more systematically throughout the book; she notes, for example, that how gender norms differ between ethnic groups is of ‘particular interest’ (p. 35), with specific reference to matrilineal and patrilineal groups.