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pturnbull's review
3.0
AIDS SUTRA is a series of essays that describe how AIDS is being transmitted in India and how that relates to culture. Sex work is common and the book presented it as having a kind of blue collar dignity to it--working with the body, just as others do (athletes, farmworkers, haulers). Sacred prostitution has become corrupt. There are prostitutes who are proud their lineage goes back to royal courtesans, etc. Sad stories of girls kidnapped, sold by their parents, all sorts of examples of how devalued women are. Stories about positive men marrying young girls and, though the man's family knows, no one tells the girl, who contracts it and passes it onto her child at birth. Homosexuality is despised, leading to denial, secrecy, and the spread of the virus. What a challenge to do AIDS education there, but it proceeds and things are changing, one person at a time.
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