Re-Assembling "Risky" Subjects: African Migrant Youth in Winnipeg, Canada

• Published in: Medical anthropology Vol. 38; no. 4; pp. 311 - 326
• Main Authors: Odger, Allison, Frohlick, Susan, Lorway, Robert
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Routledge 19.05.2019; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Acquired immune deficiency syndrome; Adolescent; Adolescent girls; Adult; Africa - ethnology; African youth; AIDS; Canada; Children & youth; Discourses; Emigrants and Immigrants - psychology; Ethnographic research; Ethnography; Female; HIV; HIV Infections - prevention & control; HIV/AIDS; Human immunodeficiency virus; Humans; Manitoba; Noncitizens; risk; Risk behavior; Sexual behavior; Sexual Behavior - ethnology; Sexual Behavior - psychology; Sexual health; Sexual Health - ethnology; Women - psychology; Young Adult; Young women; Manitoba; Africa; Canada; Winnipeg Manitoba Canada; HIV/AIDS; Canada; sexual health; risk; African youth; ethnography
• ISSN: 0145-9740; 1545-5882; 1545-5882
• DOI: 10.1080/01459740.2018.1551390

Drawing upon ethnographic research in Winnipeg, Manitoba, we complicate simplistic epidemiological and sexual health discourses that position African newcomer teen girls and young women as "at-risk" for HIV/AIDS and other consequences of being sexually active. By tracing the trajectories of sexual health messages and utilizing the concept of assemblage, we seek to account for the ways in which risk is actively made and negotiated in practice by African newcomer youth. By highlighting the perspectives and experiences of participants in relationship to Canadian literature on the subject of sexual risk, culture, and education, we work to counter essentializing, racializing, and pathologizing discourses.