God's curse and hysteria: women's narratives of AIDS in Manokwari, West Papua.

This article describes the ways in which women in the coastal Papuan (Indonesian) town of Manokwari understand and represent HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) and AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome). Having employed focus group interviewing and other qualitative research methods during long-term fieldwork conducted in Manokwari, I argue that my subjects frame ideas about disease aetiology less in biomedical terms and more through a Christian worldview. AIDS is understood to be a fatal 'disease' (not disease syndrome) that is sent ultimately from God but that was recently brought to Papua by outsiders to the west. It is thought that people most likely to become afflicted with AIDS are those who breach Christian codes of conduct. In particular, women who sell sex, not homosexuals, not men who buy sex from women and not intravenous drug users, are attributed with having the greatest chance of suffering from and transmitting HIV. Even though Manokwari women discussed HIV and the aetiology of AIDS in moral terms, and even though they do not regard themselves as sinful, they nevertheless fear 'catching' AIDS, even though this is physically impossible. This fear motivates the scape-goating of female sex workers and the exhibition by community members of distancing behaviours toward people who display clinical symptoms of AIDS.