Virginity Discourse in the AIDS Era: A Case Analysis of Sexual Initiation Aftershock

Women's experiences of sexual initiation are explored in this article from a socio-cultural and gender perspective that examines the impact of popular discourse about virginity, romance, and marriage on female adolescent sexuality. It is argued that economic and cultural factors weigh heavily on a young women's ability to "be" a virgin, and that virginity discourse is laden with middle-class assumptions about self-empowerment and achievement. Drawing, in part, on focus group self-reports of young, low-income women in Alabama, it was found that the women's experiences of sexual initiation included feelings of rape, betrayal, and distrust of men. The discrepancy between popular ideals and personal reality particularly contributed to a sense of victimhood. In this complex rite of passage, female adolescents' notions of harm appeared to diverge from those of AIDS researchers. The findings suggest that feeling-states play a powerful role in disease vulnerability, and that HIV prevention may be enhanced by "listening to" as well as "assessing" adolescents at risk.