Certificate for Approving the Dissertation
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MIAMI UNIVERSITY The Graduate School Certificate for Approving the Dissertation We hereby approve the Dissertation of Jesse Michael Denton Candidate for the Degree: Doctor of Philosophy _________________________________________ Director Elisa S. Abes _________________________________________ Reader Peter M. Magolda _________________________________________ Reader Lisa D. Weems _________________________________________ Graduate School Representative Madelyn M. Detloff ABSTRACT LIVING BEYOND IDENTITY: GAY COLLEGE MEN LIVING WITH HIV by Jesse Michael Denton The lives of college students who are HIV positive in the United States have received little attention. This study addressed this lack by inquiring into the self-cultivation and institutional experiences of gay college men living with HIV. Informed by AIDS activism and queer theory, I used narrative and arts-based methods to explore participants’ self-cultivation I placed particular focus on participants’ discourse given that American sociopolitical discourse associates HIV/AIDS with gay men. I conducted over sixty hours of in-depth interviews with nine gay college men of various ages, races, geographic locations, and institutional settings. Six of the nine participants created artwork to express their relationship to HIV/AIDS. Using poststructural narrative analysis, the major findings of this study include: higher educational silence about HIV/AIDS; an affective structure to participants’ discourse; and an askēsis of shame. Most participants encountered a silence or lack of discourse around HIV/AIDS in their institutions. Institutional silence complicated participants’ ability to discern whether to seek support or to disclose their HIV status on campus. Although participants called upon distinct discourses, they shared a common affective structure. Having an affective structure means that these men represented and discussed HIV/AIDS as driving the way they live, although differently at different times and with various intensities determined by different events, objects and people. Like affect, their relationship with HIV varied, often unpredictably, except for its constant presence. While these men felt differently about having HIV, I describe their common affective structure as an askēsis of shame. Askēsis, or self-cultivation, is a response to social contempt for gay men with HIV/AIDS and homonormative discourses of compulsory happiness. Shame is an affect involving investment in the self and others along with covering discredited aspects of the self. Therefore, an askēsis of shame describes how participants covered the discrediting aspects of HIV while still investing in themselves and others. This study carries implications for using affect theory in conceptualizing college students’ lives and implications for queer social science methodology. I explore the complexities and difficulty of supporting this student population for institutions and faculty. Participants also supply their own recommendations for faculty and students. LIVING BEYOND IDENTITY: GAY COLLEGE MEN LIVING WITH HIV A DISSERTATION Submitted to the Faculty of Miami University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Educational Leadership by Jesse Michael Denton Miami University Oxford, Ohio 2014 Dissertation Director: Elisa S. Abes © Jesse Michael Denton 2014 Table of Contents List of Figures ................................................................................................................................. x Dedication ...................................................................................................................................... xi Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................................... xii Chapter One: Introduction .............................................................................................................. 1 An Overview of HIV in the United States of America ............................................................... 1 HIV Transmission and Prevalence .......................................................................................... 2 Attitudes towards People with HIV/AIDS .............................................................................. 3 Challenging Student Development Identity Theory ................................................................ 5 Theorizing the HIV Positive Self ............................................................................................ 7 An In/queer/y about Collegiate Gay Men Living with HIV .................................................... 8 Summary of Introduction......................................................................................................... 9 Chapter Two: Literature Review .................................................................................................. 10 Literature Review ...................................................................................................................... 10 Stigma .................................................................................................................................... 13 Social and Collegiate Environmental Attitudes ..................................................................... 14 Disclosure and HIV ............................................................................................................... 16 Psychosocial and Psychological Perspectives on Living with HIV ...................................... 18 AIDS as the Incarnation of Gay Male Deviance ................................................................... 20 Collegiate HIV/AIDS Discourse ........................................................................................... 23 Summary of Literature Review ............................................................................................. 26 Chapter Three: Constructing the Study ......................................................................................... 27 Creating a Queer Qualitative Study .......................................................................................... 27 Theoretical Perspective: Queer Theory ................................................................................. 28 Queer Methodology ............................................................................................................... 30 AIDS Activism as Queer Methodology................................................................................. 31 Narrative Inquiry ................................................................................................................... 32 Arts-based Inquiry ................................................................................................................. 34 Sample ................................................................................................................................... 35 Methods ................................................................................................................................. 40 Narrative Sessions ................................................................................................................. 40 iii Art-Based Sessions ................................................................................................................ 42 Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................ 42 Constructing the Narrative ..................................................................................................... 43 Analyzing the Narrative ......................................................................................................... 45 Representation ....................................................................................................................... 45 Goodness Criteria / Validity .................................................................................................. 46 Validity as aesthetic experience. ....................................................................................... 47 Wakefulness and verisimilitude. ....................................................................................... 48 In/coherence as quality. .................................................................................................... 48 Accessing hidden dimensions of life. ............................................................................... 49 Queer science? Queer art? ................................................................................................ 49 The politics of intimacy. ................................................................................................... 50 Summary of goodness criteria. ......................................................................................... 51 Additional Ethical Considerations ......................................................................................... 52 On Reflexivity and Discontent, or “Why Do You Want to Study That?” ................................ 53 The Days of Disenchantment: On Political Desire ................................................................ 56 Chapter Four: Narratives of Gay College Men Living with HIV ................................................. 60 Constructing Participants’ Narratives ....................................................................................... 60 A Few Notes on HIV-Related