2007/05/01 by Michael Graydon · 5 citations
Social Sciences · Psychology · #Social Media and Politics #Gender, Feminism, and Media #Media Studies and Communication #Carnivalesque #Narrative #Realm #Normative #Sociology #Storytelling #Social psychology #Psychology #Aesthetics #Political science #Literature #Art #Law
paper · doi:10.1080/13691050601124649
openalex publication_date 2007/05/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
At online internet newsgroups, members who self-identify as Giftgivers and Bugchasers post messages describing exchanging HIV as a gift, as the Gift. Using the literature on the social function of gift exchanges, this paper considers how Giftgiver and Bugchaser messages mobilize the language of gifts. In doing so, newsgroup members generate an ontological narrative wherein HIV, as the Gift, promotes social bonds, the creation and maintenance of self identity and social roles, and the meeting of particular goals. Thus the Gift appears to fulfill (at least discursively) many of the social functions of gift exchanges as described in the literature. Online newsgroups function as fora for the expression of a contrarian, transgressive HIV/AIDS narrative and act as 'carnivalesque' spaces in which normative social roles and meaning are inverted in the establishment of a realm whereby HIV becomes a gift.