Browsing by Author "Morrell, Robert"

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    Carework and caring: A path to gender equitable practices among men in South Africa?
    (BioMed Central Ltd, 2011) Morrell, Robert; Jewkes, Rachel
    BACKGROUND: The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between men who engage in carework and commitment to gender equity. The context of the study was that gender inequitable masculinities create vulnerability for men and women to HIV and other health concerns. Interventions are being developed to work with masculinity and to 'change men'. Researchers now face a challenge of identifying change in men, especially in domains of their lives beyond relations with women. Engagement in carework is one suggested indicator of more gender equitable practice. METHODS: A qualitative approach was used. 20 men in three South African locations (Durban, Pretoria/Johannesburg, Mthatha) who were identified as engaging in carework were interviewed. The men came from different backgrounds and varied in terms of age, race and socio-economic status. A semi-structured approach was used in the interviews. RESULTS: Men were engaged in different forms of carework and their motivations to be involved differed. Some men did carework out of necessity. Poverty, associated with illness in the family and a lack of resources propelled some men into carework. Other men saw carework as part of a commitment to making a better world. 'Care' interpreted as a functional activity was not enough to either create or signify support for gender equity. Only when care had an emotional resonance did it relate to gender equity commitment. CONCLUSIONS: Engagement in carework precipitated a process of identity and value transformation in some men suggesting that support for carework still deserves to be a goal of interventions to 'change men'. Changing the gender of carework contributes to a more equitable gender division of labour and challenges gender stereotypes. Interventions that promote caring also advance gender equity.
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    The Emergence of Gender Scholarship in South Africa – reflections on Southern Theory
    (2016-06) Morrell, Robert; Clowes, Lindsay
    The late 20th century saw a steep rise in published works on gender in South Africa. This article analyses the production of gender research against a backdrop of current interest in southern theory, theory that is produced to analyse and challenge existing global knowledge inequalities. As a domain of research, South African gender writings draw both on global feminist impulses as well as national and local ones. We discuss what this means for understanding the particularity of South Africa’s gender scholarship which we trace back to the writings of Olive Schreiner at the beginning of the 20th century. In this paper we quantitatively identify the trajectory of gender research in South Africa and consider the genealogy of South African feminist writing. We show how the focus of gender research evolved noting that it sometimes was divided on grounds of race, but often was united by opposition to patriarchy which took forms of activist scholarship. We focus on a number of themes to show how feminist scholarship developed out of engagements with questions of inequality, race, class and gender. While gender research featured a strong, almost obsessive, engagement with local, South African issues which serve to give this body of work its cohesion, it also manifested divisions that reflected the very inequalities being researched.
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    Gender and sexuality: emerging perspectives from the heterosexual epidemic in South Africa and implications for HIV risk and prevention
    (BioMed Central Ltd, 2010) Jewkes, Rachel; Morrell, Robert
    Research shows that gender power inequity in relationships and intimate partner violence places women at enhanced risk of HIV infection. Men who have been violent towards their partners are more likely to have HIV. Men's behaviours show a clustering of violent and risky sexual practices, suggesting important connections. This paper draws on Raewyn Connell's notion of hegemonic masculinity and reflections on emphasized femininities to argue that these sexual, and male violent, practices are rooted in and flow from cultural ideals of gender identities. The latter enables us to understand why men and women behave as they do, and the emotional and material context within which sexual behaviours are enacted.In South Africa, while gender identities show diversity, the dominant ideal of black African manhood emphasizes toughness, strength and expression of prodigious sexual success. It is a masculinity women desire; yet it is sexually risky and a barrier to men engaging with HIV treatment. Hegemonically masculine men are expected to be in control of women, and violence may be used to establish this control. Instead of resisting this, the dominant ideal of femininity embraces compliance and tolerance of violent and hurtful behaviour, including infidelity.The women partners of hegemonically masculine men are at risk of HIV because they lack control of the circumstances of sex during particularly risky encounters. They often present their acquiescence to their partners' behaviour as a trade off made to secure social or material rewards, for this ideal of femininity is upheld, not by violence per se, by a cultural system of sanctions and rewards. Thus, men and women who adopt these gender identities are following ideals with deep roots in social and cultural processes, and thus, they are models of behaviour that may be hard for individuals to critique and in which to exercise choice. Women who are materially and emotionally vulnerable are least able to risk experiencing sanctions or foregoing these rewards and thus are most vulnerable to their men folk.We argue that the goals of HIV prevention and optimizing of care can best be achieved through change in gender identities, rather than through a focus on individual sexual behaviours.
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    Gender inequitable masculinity and sexual entitlement in rape perpetration South Africa: findings of a cross-sectional study
    (Public Library of Science, 2011) Jewkes, Rachel; Sikweyiya, Yandisa; Morrell, Robert; Dunkle, Kristin
    Objective To describe the prevalence and patterns of rape perpetration in a randomly selected sample of men from the general adult population, to explore factors associated with rape and to describe how men explained their acts of rape. Design Cross-sectional household study with a two- stage randomly selected sample of men. METHODS: 1737 South African men aged 18-49 completed a questionnaire administered using an Audio-enhanced Personal Digital Assistant. Multivariable logistic regression models were built to identify factors associated with rape perpetration. RESULTS: In all 27.6% (466/1686) of men had raped a woman, whether an intimate partner, stranger or acquaintance, and whether perpetrated alone or with accomplices, and 4.7% had raped in the last 12 months. First rapes for 75% were perpetrated before age 20, and 53.9% (251) of those raping, did so on multiple occasions. The logistic regression model showed that having raped was associated with greater adversity in childhood, having been raped by a man and higher maternal education. It was associated with less equitable views on gender relations, having had more partners, and many more gender inequitable practices including transactional sex and physical partner violence. Also drug use, gang membership and a higher score on the dimensions of psychopathic personality, namely blame externalisation and Machiavellian egocentricity. Asked about why they did it, the most common motivations stemmed from ideas of sexual entitlement. CONCLUSIONS: Perpetration of rape is so prevalent that population-based measures of prevention are essential to complement criminal justice system responses. Our findings show the importance of measures to build gender equity and change dominant ideas of masculinity and gender relations as part of rape prevention. Reducing men's exposure to trauma in childhood is also critically important.
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    Men, prostitution and the provider role: understanding the intersections of economic exchange, sex, crime and violence in South Africa
    (Public Library of Science, 2012) Jewkes, Rachel; Morrell, Robert; Sikweyiya, Yandisa; Dunkle, Kristin; Penn-Kekana, Loveday
    BACKGROUND: South African policy makers are reviewing legislation of prostitution, concerned that criminalisation hampers HIV prevention. They seek to understand the relationship between transactional sex, prostitution, and the nature of the involved men. METHODS: 1645 randomly-selected adult South African men participated in a household study, disclosing whether they had sex with a woman in prostitution or had had a provider relationship (or sex), participation in crime and violence and completing psychological measures. These became outcomes in multivariable regression models, where the former were exposure variables. RESULTS: 51% of men had had a provider relationship and expected sex in return, 3% had had sex with a woman in prostitution, 15% men had done both of these and 31% neither. Provider role men, and those who had just had sex with a woman in prostitution, were socially conservative and quite violent. Yet the men who had done both (75% of those having sex with a woman in prostitution) were significantly more misogynist, highly scoring on dimensions of psychopathy, more sexually and physically violent to women, and extensively engaged in crime. They had often bullied at school, suggesting that this instrumental, self-seeking masculinity was manifest in childhood. The men who had not engaged in sex for economic exchange expressed a much less violent, more law abiding and gender equitable masculinity; challenging assumptions about the inevitability of intersections of age, poverty, crime and misogyny. CONCLUSIONS: Provider role relationships (or sex) are normative for low income men, but not having sex with a woman in prostitution. Men who do the latter operate extensively outside the law and their violence poses a substantial threat to women. Those drafting legislation and policy on the sex industry in South Africa need to distinguish between these two groups to avoid criminalising the normal, and consider measures to protect women.
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    Prevalence of consensual male–male sex and sexual violence, and associations with HIV in South Africa: A population-based cross-sectional study
    (Public Library of Science, 2013) Dunkle, Kristin L; Jewkes, Rachel K; Murdock, Daniel W; Sikweyiya, Yandisa; Morrell, Robert
    Background: In sub-Saharan Africa the population prevalence of men who have sex with men (MSM) is unknown, as is the population prevalence of male-on-male sexual violence, and whether male-on-male sexual violence may relate to HIV risk. This paper describes lifetime prevalence of consensual male–male sexual behavior and male-on-male sexual violence (victimization and perpetration) in two South African provinces, socio-demographic factors associated with these experiences, and associations with HIV serostatus. Methods and Findings: In a cross-sectional study conducted in 2008, men aged 18–49 y from randomly selected households in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal provinces provided anonymous survey data and dried blood spots for HIV serostatus assessment. Interviews were completed in 1,737 of 2,298 (75.6%) of enumerated and eligible households. From these households, 1,705 men (97.1%) provided data on lifetime history of same-sex experiences, and 1,220 (70.2%) also provided dried blood spots for HIV testing. 5.4% (n = 92) of participants reported a lifetime history of any consensual sexual activity with another man; 9.6% (n = 164) reported any sexual victimization by a man, and 3.0% (n = 51) reported perpetrating sexual violence against another man. 85.0% (n = 79) of men with a history of consensual sex with men reported having a current female partner, and 27.7% (n = 26) reported having a current male partner. Of the latter, 80.6% (n = 21/26) also reported having a female partner. Men reporting a history of consensual male–male sexual behavior are more likely to have been a victim of male-on-male sexual violence (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 7.24; 95% CI 4.26–12.3), and to have perpetrated sexual violence against another man (aOR = 3.10; 95% CI 1.22–7.90). Men reporting consensual oral/anal sex with a man were more likely to be HIV+ than men with no such history (aOR = 3.11; 95% CI 1.24–7.80). Men who had raped a man were more likely to be HIV+ than non-perpetrators (aOR = 3.58; 95% CI 1.17–10.9). Conclusions: In this sample, one in 20 men (5.4%) reported lifetime consensual sexual contact with a man, while about one in ten (9.6%) reported experience of male-on-male sexual violence victimization. Men who reported having had sex with men were more likely to be HIV+, as were men who reported perpetrating sexual violence towards other men. Whilst there was no direct measure of male–female concurrency (having overlapping sexual relationships with men and women), the data suggest that this may have been common. These findings suggest that HIV prevention messages regarding male–male sex in South Africa should be mainstreamed with prevention messages for the general population, and sexual health interventions and HIV prevention interventions for South African men should explicitly address male-on-male sexual violence.
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    The relationship between intimate partner violence, rape and HIV amongst South African men: a cross-sectional study
    (Public Library of Science, 2011) Jewkes, Rachel; Sikweyiya, Yandisa; Morrell, Robert; Dunkle, Kristin
    Objective: To investigate the associations between intimate partner violence, rape and HIV among South African men. Design Cross-sectional study involving a randomly-selected sample of men. METHODS: We tested hypotheses that perpetration of physical intimate partner violence and rape were associated with prevalent HIV infections in a cross-sectional household study of 1229 South African men aged 18-49. Violence perpetration was elicited in response to a questionnaire administered using an Audio-enhanced Personal Digital Assistant and blood samples were tested for HIV. A multivariable logistic regression model was built to identify factors associated with HIV. RESULTS: 18.3% of men had HIV. 29.6% (358/1211) of men disclosed rape perpetration, 5.2% (63/1208) rape in the past year and 30.7% (362/1180) of had been physically violent towards an intimate partner more than once. Overall rape perpetration was not associated with HIV. The model of factors associated with having HIV showed men under 25 years who had been physically violent towards partners were more likely to have HIV than men under 25 who had not (aOR 2.08 95% CI 1.07-4.06, p = 0.03). We failed to detect any association in older men. CONCLUSIONS: Perpetration of physical IPV is associated with HIV sero-prevalence in young men, after adjusting for other risk factors. This contributes to our understanding of why women who experience violence have a higher HIV prevalence. Rape perpetration was not associated, but the HIV prevalence among men who had raped was very high. HIV prevention in young men must seek to change ideals of masculinity in which male partner violence is rooted.
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    Relationship between single and multiple perpetrator rape perpetration in South Africa: A comparison of risk factors in a population-based sample
    (BioMed Central Ltd, 2015) Jewkes, Rachel; Sikweyiya, Yandisa; Dunkle, Kristin; Morrell, Robert
    BACKGROUND:Studies of rape of women seldom distinguish between men's participation in acts of single and multiple perpetrator rape. Multiple perpetrator rape (MPR) occurs globally with serious consequences for women. In South Africa it is a cultural practice with defined circumstances in which it commonly occurs. Prevention requires an understanding of whether it is a context specific intensification of single perpetrator rape, or a distinctly different practice of different men. This paper aims to address this question. METHODS: We conducted a cross-sectional household study with a multi-stage, randomly selected sample of 1686 men aged 18-49 who completed a questionnaire administered using an Audio-enhanced Personal Digital Assistant. We attempted to fit an ordered logistic regression model for factors associated with rape perpetration. RESULTS: 27.6% of men had raped and 8.8% had perpetrated multiple perpetrator rape (MPR). Thus 31.9% of men who had ever raped had done so with other perpetrators. An ordered regression model was fitted, showing that the same associated factors, albeit at higher prevalence, are associated with SPR and MPR. CONCLUSIONS: Multiple perpetrator rape appears as an intensified form of single perpetrator rape, rather than a different form of rape. Prevention approaches need to be mainstreamed among young men.
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    South African Social Science in the Global HIV/AIDS Knowledge Domain
    (2016-07) Hodes, Rebecca; Morrell, Robert
    Research about HIV constitutes a global domain of academic knowledge. This domain is dominated by biomedicine, and by institutions and funders based in the ‘global North’. However, from the earliest years of the epidemic, African investigators have produced and disseminated knowledge about HIV. Using a ‘Northern’ standard for determining research impact - bibliometrical measures of citation count - we demonstrate how metrics for capturing the impact of knowledge may be repurposed. We explore how the research in this archive may be interpreted as ‘Southern Theory’. Our argument is not based on the geographical location, but instead on epistemological significance. With a focus on South Africa, we situate HIV social science within changing historical contexts, connecting research findings to developments in medicine, health sciences and politics. We focus on two key themes in the evolution of HIV knowledge: (1) The significance of context and locality - the ‘setting’ of HIV research; and (2) sex, race and risk – changing ideas about the social determinants of HIV transmission.
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    Southern knowledge online? Climate change research discoverability and communication practices
    (Information, Communication & Society, 2016-01-01) Czerniewicz, Laura; Goodier, Sarah; Morrell, Robert
    The networked age promises global digital cultures with flattened power relations, given the affordances of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to collapse distance, enable easier cross-country collaborations and create new opportunities for knowledge production and sharing. In the academic domains, indications are that knowledge patterns continue to reflect physically-based geopolitical realities – where knowledge from the South is still peripheral while knowledge from the North still dominates in terms of all the conventional metrics. This study explores the potential role of digital affordances to challenge structural Northern bias and generates questions about knowledge production and dissemination in the climate change knowledge domain. It is framed by the field of scholarly communication within an African setting and by the emergent field of climate change which is fraught with debates and contestations, particularly regarding mitigation and adaptation. It draws on Southern theory which interrogates the global dynamics of knowledge production and dissemination; It explores the intersection of the discoverability and visibility of local climate change research methodologically from the outside in, through an experiment of searches for “climate change / South Africa” and from the inside-out by reviewing the online presence of one climate change group in a top ranked African university
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    Steroids in the gym: the law, strong bodies and masculinity in South Africa
    (2021) Mashasha, Tamsanqa Munyaradzi; Morrell, Robert
    We know little about the use of steroids in the fitness industry in South Africa although the media frequently features stories about sportsmen who are charged with illegally taking steroids and subsequently issued with bans against continuing to participate in competitive, professional sport. In this study I examine the status of steroids in terms of pharmacology and the law. Steroids is a shorthand for Anabolic-Androgenic Steroids (hereafter AAS). As I show, these substances are evolving compounds with important medical utility but also with the capacity to rapidly build muscle and strength. It is for this reason that they are used in competitive sport but also in the fitness industry where strength and bodily appearance tempt people, mostly men, to take AAS. AAS are defined as a drug and thus cannot legally be bought without a prescription or overthe-counter. But for a number of reasons the control of AAS by regulatory authorities is weak. There are many laws that refer to AAS but these laws overlap and produce inefficiency and consumer confusion. In this grey area, AAS operate as an element of the country's gym culture. The gym as a space for fitness activities has become exceptionally popular in the last few decades. Gyms are primarily a middle class institution, attracting men and women of all races. The desire to get fit and strong and look good is strongly supported by media campaigns. For many men, particularly those that attended sports-focused, single-sex schools, the connection between a fit, strong and good-looking body is an extension of sports participation. For some young men, the habit of taking supplements as part of a fitness regime starts during the school-going years. The line between supplements and AAS is not always clear. This study included a survey of male gym-goers in East London and Cape Town. The survey asked questions about a knowledge and use of AAS and linked these questions to issues of masculinity. The survey was augmented with one-on-one interviews with gym-goers. This primary research is used in a chapter to investigate AAS use amongst gym goers. This thesis compiles and analyses pharmacological and legal material that defines and regulates AAS. To our knowledge this is the first academic work to attempt to understand AAS, their regulation and therefore their accessibility to the public. It shows that because the development of AAS is ongoing in the drug industry, definition is not easy and this, together with the absence of a coordinated set of laws which bear on the production, sale and use of AAS, results in grey areas of uncertainty. The final part of the study is based on a survey of 150 gym users and interviews with a select group of gym users known to the author. Using insider knowledge (the author is himself a gym-user) 30 interviews were conducted. The interviews explore the path along which young men travel as they develop their bodies. This path involves ideas of fitness and strength and these are bound up with the construction of masculine identity. The interviews help to explain why young men seek strong bodies and fitness and why some of these men take or have taken AAS. The thesis argues that the allure of AAS is that it allows young men quickly to build muscle and strength and thus to realize bodily aspirations that are built by the popular media and supported by peer groups. Sport participation is often, but not always, a feature of the bodyfocussed approach to performing a masculine identity. The lack of clarity regarding AAS is a contributing factor to gym-goers using steroids. Steroids can easily be purchased, are widely used and prosecutions for leisure use are unheard of giving the impression that they are not illegal.
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    Transactional relationships and sex with a woman in prostitution: prevalence and patterns in a representative sample of South African men
    (BioMed Central Ltd, 2012) Jewkes, Rachel; Morrell, Robert; Sikweyiya, Yandisa; Dunkle, Kristin; Penn-Kekana, Loveday
    BACKGROUND: Sex motivated by economic exchange is a public health concern as a driver of the Sub-Saharan African HIV epidemic. We describe patterns of engagement in transactional sexual relationships and sex with women in prostitution of South African men, and suggest interpretations that advance our understanding of the phenomenon. METHODS: Cross-sectional study with a randomly-selected sample of 1645 sexually active men aged 18-49years who completed interviews in a household study and were asked whether they had had sex with a woman in prostitution, or had had a relationship or sex they took to be motivated by the expectation of material gain (transactional sex). RESULTS: 18% of men had ever had sex with a woman in prostitution, 66% at least one type of transactional sexual relationship, only 30% of men had done neither. Most men had had a transactional relationship/sex with a main partner (58% of all men), 42% with a concurrent partner (or makhwapheni) and 44% with a once off partner, and there was almost no difference in reports of what was provided to women of different partner types. The majority of men distinguished the two types of sexual relationships and even among men who had once-off transactional sex and gave cash (n=314), few (34%) reported that they had had sex with a 'prostitute'. Transactional sex was more common among men aged 25-34years, less educated men and low income earners rather than those with none or higher income. Having had sex with a woman in prostitution varied little between social and demographic categories, but was less common among the unwaged or very low earners. CONCLUSIONS: The notion of 'transactional sex' developed through research with women does not translate easily to men. Many perceive expectations that they fulfil a provider role, with quid pro quo entitlement to sex. Men distinguished these circumstances of sex from having sex with a woman in prostitution. Whilst there may be similarities, when viewed relationally, these are quite distinct practices. Conflating them is sociologically inappropriate. Efforts to work with men to reduce transactional sex should focus on addressing sexual entitlement and promoting gender inequity.