Stigmatisation through metaphors borrowed from religious discourse in the early coverage of HIV and AIDS by the Sesotho press

Abstract

This article investigates stigmatisation through metaphors that were borrowed from religious discourse in the early coverage of HIV and AIDS by the Sesotho press. The goal of the study is to provide insights into how stigma against people living with HIV emerged and developed in Lesotho. Employing the tenets of critical discourse analysis (CDA), the study examines the stigma that was encoded by religious metaphors used in the period 1986–2010, and the social agency behind the use of these metaphors. The analysis shows that the newspapers used the religious metaphors to perpetuate the stereotypes of people living with HIV as ‘sinners’. The findings show that one set of metaphors that the newspapers used was that of cleanliness metaphors. These metaphors portrayed both the conduct of people living with HIV and the people living with HIV themselves as ‘unclean’, with the expression ‘clean’ used as a metaphor for ‘being holy’. Another set of metaphors that the newspapers used involved the idea of a journey. These journey metaphors portrayed people living with HIV as sinners who followed ‘a wrong way or path’. The wide distribution of these metaphors from 1986 to 2010 suggests that the perceptions of people living with HIV as sinners were widespread.