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Abstract
This paper seeks to examine how female subjectivities are privileged by Canadian human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination discourse and, in turn, how homosexual male subjectivities are displaced. Employing a Critical Discourse Analysis approach, I analyze selected HPV vaccination (HPVV) promotional materials, and depict the discursive strategies which privilege and exclude gendered subjectivities. My critical analysis is influenced by feminist linguistic works that seek to uncover the discursive constructions around sexuality, gender and identity, and the discursive strategies used to communicate ideas about sexual health risks and responsible citizenship. In addition, I adopt feminist theories of knowledge and power to rethink the discursive representations of some bodies and subjectivities as normal, and Others as unintelligible within HPVV discourse in today's neoliberal time.
Notes
1. Medical Sociologist Steven Epstein has published on the erasure of the link between the HPV vaccine and gay men's health within public debate around the vaccine. In his book chapter, “The Great Undiscussable: Anal Cancer, HPV, and Gay Men's Health” (Citation2010), Epstein notes that the desexualization of the vaccine within public health and pharmaceutical marketing has fostered a silence around gay men and gay sex, and steered the conversation away from gay men's risks of HPV diseases such as anal and penile cancer. Epstein's contributions are noteworthy, yet primarily descriptive rather than theoretical in nature, and do not utilize a critical discourse analysis approach.
2. Health Canada is the Federal department responsible for the national public health of Canadians.
3. Gardasil® was initially approved for use in females aged between nine and twenty-six years. As of April 2011, Gardasil® is authorized for use in females between nine and forty-five years of age (PHAC, Citation2012).
4. Since this paper was written, the provinces of Prince Edward Island and Alberta have announced their intention to extend their HPV vaccination programs to school-age boys (SOGC Citation2013).
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Nicole Charles
Nicole Charles is a PhD candidate in the Women and Gender Studies Institute at the University of Toronto. Her interdisciplinary research interests include transnational feminism, medical anthropology, biomedical technologies, and claims to citizenship. E-mail: [email protected]