Re: PLWHAs,PLHAs,PWHAs,PLA's ????

June 3, 2004

Hi all,

I think Dr Lal raises an important question.

Personally, I think its time to stop using acronyms to refer to people. of the

many problems wiht HIV/AIDS lingo, I would like to highlight two here in order

to suggest that we say and write 'people living wiht HIV/AIDS', 'men who have

sex wiht men' etc. instead of acronyms.

First, there is a difference between saying 'there are people living with

HIV/AIDS' and 'there are PLWHA' and between 'i am living wiht HIV/AIDS' and 'i

am a PLWHA'.

The first describes a person's context and experience while the second refers to

a 'type' of person. This implies that everytime we are refering to people who

are living wiht HIV/AIDS as 'PLWHA' we are refering to some sort of universality

amongst people so grouped. The different contexts wihtin which people are living

with HIV/AIDS, for example, get negated when we use such acronyms. it is

de-humanising and de-contextualising.

second, the use of acronyms in the AIDS sector is extremely alienating to all

people outside the sector. PLWHA, MSM, CSW, IDU, PMTCT (or is taht PPTCT now?),

VCTC (or is taht now VCCTC?), ART, MTV, MSMPLHA. A conversation between two AIDS

activists is mere gibberish to a thrid person.

In this way, we exclude the possbility of people engaging with the issues we

feel require attention. it is a way in which participation in discourse relating

to HIV/AIDS is limited, and thus controlled by a few people.

It doesnt take much more effort to state the entirity fo what one is refering

to. for those who find it 'tedious', welcome to the 'autocorrect' option in your

wordprocessing software.

best,

Akshay

E-mail: <133789@...>

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