Abstract

The popular presumption of a particularly vicious homophobia in the anglophone Caribbean has nearly rendered (especially male) homosexuality implausible for anyone living in the region. However, Caribbean men who have sex with men (MSM) are disturbingly omnipresent in the public health discourses circulating throughout the region. These MSM are nearly always overrepresented by a subgrouping of openly gay Caribbean men. Yet the forbidding absence of Caribbean homosexuality in popular discourses and the dangerously pervasive presence of Caribbean MSM in public health discourses both indicate a failure to recognize not only the existence of decidedly gay Caribbean men but also—and more important—the work these men have been doing for three decades to survive the HIV/ AIDS pandemic. This analysis sits with Friends For Life—one of the only HIV/ AIDS nongovernmental organizations in the Caribbean region run by and for selfidentified gay men—to see how these men have used the erotic to survive.

pdf

Share