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Positive Men: searching for relational dignity through health activism in a South African township

This paper explores how men from a South African township appropriate health and rights discourses in times of existential needs and uncertainties, in order to construct isidima, or what the author calls a relational model of dignity. The activists’ efforts were tied to gendered moral practices of granting respect to others and expecting to be respected as “positive” men who struggle against gender-based violence and HIV/AIDS. Their involvement in situations of moral breakdown, however, forged a situated transfiguration of gendered social relationships that went beyond both “traditional” notions of masculinity and “modern” ideals of liberal citizenship. The findings are based on life histories of 15 Xhosa-speaking men who were involved in the group Positive Men (PM). Furthermore, they are the result of direct and participant observation of key events that took place between 2007 and 2010.