Remaking the Technosubject: Kenyan Men Contextualizing HIV Self-Testing Technologies

ABSTRACT

The Kenyan government offers free HIV self-testing kits to men who have sex with men. The value of self-testing is based on the imaginary of an autonomous technosubject empowered to independently control testing services, thereby “freed,” through technology, from the social conditions that might inhibit health services utilization. Following a community-centered collaborative approach, community researchers interviewed their peers who examined and reacted to the technology. Participants reframed the technosubject as intertwined with the social world and the testing kit itself as an object that exerts agency and possesses affective potential. Attending to these socio-material relationalities offers insights into program planning.

KEYWORDS:

• HIV self-testing
• Kenya
• men who have sex with men
• science and technology studies
• community-based research
• sex work

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Key populations are groups assumed to be the most vulnerable to HIV infection such as sex workers, people who inject substances, and men who have sex with men.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation [OPP-11191068].

Notes on contributors

Matthew Thomann

Matthew Thomann is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at The University of Maryland, College Park.

Bernadette Kombo

Bernadette Kombo is a qualitative research manager with Partners for Health and Development in Africa, a Kenyan NGO based in Nairobi and a PhD candidate at The University of Manitoba.

Helgar Musyoki

Helgar Musyoki holds an MPH and leads the HIV prevention unit within the division of National AIDS and STIs Control Programme (NASCOP) at the Kenyan Ministry of Health.

Kennedy Masinya

Kennedy Masinya is an activist who leads the organization, Men Against AIDS Youth Group (MAAYGO), an MSM-led organization based in Kenya.

Samuel Kuria

Samuel Kuria is the Founder and Director of Minority Person’s Empowerment Program (MPEG), an MSM-led organization based in Kenya.

Martin Kyana

Martin Kyana is the Founder and Director of HIV & AIDS People’s Alliance of Kenya (HAPA), an MSM led-organization based in Kenya.

Janet Musimbi

Janet Musimbi has an MPH and works as the Technical Manager with Partners for Health and Development in Africa.

Lisa Lazarus

Lisa Lazarus is Research Associate at the University of Manitoba, where she completed a PhD in Community Health Sciences.

James Blanchard

James Blanchard is a medical epidemiologist who leads the University of Manitoba Institute of Global Public Health.

Parinita Bhattacharjee

Parinita Bhattacharjee is a social scientist and leads program delivery in the University of Manitoba Institute of Global Public Health and Senior Technical Advisor with Partners for Health and Development in Africa.

Robert Lorway

Robert Lorway is Professor of Community Health Sciences in the University of Manitoba Institute for Global Public Health where he holds the Canada Research Chair in Global Intervention Politics and Social Transformation.