'And what are you reading,Miss? Oh,it is only a website': The New Media and the Pedagogical Possibilities of Digital Culture as a South African 'Teen Guide' to HIV/AIDS and STDs

Abstract

This article comes out of a recognition that access to information on sexuality and HIV and AIDS is all part of a survival strategy for young people. This is particularly an issue in South Africa where in some parts of the country the HIV infection rate for girls and young women is between 20 and 30 per cent, and where they are 3 or 4 more times likely than young men of the same age to be infected with AIDS. While the internet is clearly not the only channel to pursue within AIDS prevention programming, the idea of the new media as social intervention, as we outline here in our analysis of the lovelife website and the Seventeen website, opens up the possibilities for private information within public spaces.