Exploding the strictures of patriarchal myths: representations of self and collective identities in the context of HIV and AIDS in Tendayi Westerhof's Unlucky in Love

Abstract

The HIV/AIDS scourge has, over the decades, affected women physiologically, emotionally and socially more than it has affected men. This is because patriarchal and sexist attitudes tend ensure that the woman, particularly the African woman, is viewed as the source and vector of the HIV/AIDS virus. This paper seeks to argue that the emergence of the female authored HIV/ AIDS life narrative in general, and Westerhof's Unlucky in Love in particular, is an engagement with the cultural politics that has denied women a meaningful cultural participation in their societies in the context of HIV/AIDS. The paper argues that Westerhof's narrative complexly ushers in a representational practice that privileges both the HIV/AIDS infected/affected woman's voice and possibilities for positive identities of the self and the nation.