AIDS has grown in just two decades from a rare disease to one that has already killed millions of men, women, and children worldwide. To help high school and college students understand the history and current status of AIDS as a social, political, psychological, public health, and cultural phenomenon, this documentary history provides 228 short and highly readable selections from primary and secondary sources of information about AIDS and HIV. Its scope covers the entire history of the epidemic from its beginnings to early 1997. The documents, many of which cannot easily be found elsewhere, will help the reader to understand and debate the many perspectives and points of view on this controversial topic. Douglas A. Feldman, one of the country's leading specialists in international and domestic AIDS social research, and Julia Wang Miller, a research consultant, have selected documents and provided explanatory introductions to them to help readers gain a deeper understanding of the sociocultural ramifications of AIDS. Following a narrative historical overview of the AIDS crisis, the work is organized into nine topical chapters: the history of HIV/AIDS; the impact of the epidemic in the United States and globally; HIV/AIDS within communities and populations; AIDS in the developing world; the human side of AIDS; the politics of AIDS; education and behavioral change; legal and ethical issues; and the future of AIDS. Each chapter contains an introductory narrative overview of the topic, brief explanatory introduction to each document, and list of suggested readings. A glossary of terms and an AIDS resource directory of organizations to contact for further information complete the work. This important documentary history belongs on the shelves of every public school and college and university library.
Dr. Feldman received his Ph.D. in Anthropology from Stony Brook University in 1981. He is currently a Professor of Anthropology and former Chair of the Anthropology Department at The College at Brockport, State University of New York, located near Rochester, NY, where he works with undergraduate students on medical and applied anthropology research projects, and teaches courses on global issues, culture and AIDS, medical anthropology, cultural anthropology, the anthropology of sex, and applied anthropology. He was a Visiting Professor at the University of Debrecen in Hungary in 2009. He consulted for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on international reproductive health projects; for the University of Rochester, School of Medicine's HIV vaccine trials research; and as an expert witness on several AIDS immigration cases for African clients.
Previously, Dr. Feldman served as Director of Research for The Village, a large drug rehabilitation agency in Miami; as Research Associate Professor at the University of Miami School of Medicine; as Professor, Academic Director and Institute Director at Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale; and as founding Executive Director of the AIDS Center of Queens County in New York City. He conducted extensive social, behavioral and epidemiologic research on HIV/AIDS in the United States and Africa (Zambia, Rwanda, Senegal, and Uganda), with grants from the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, and elsewhere, since 1982 - one of the first anthropologists to do so. He wrote one book (Ethnicity and Health Care Delivery: Sexually Transmitted Diseases [2009]), and edited several books on AIDS: The Social Dimensions of AIDS: Method and Theory (1986), Culture and AIDS (1990), Global AIDS Policy (1994), The AIDS Crisis: A Documentary History (1998), AIDS, Culture and Africa (2008), and AIDS, Culture and Gay Men (2010). He is currently interested in research on international affairs, HIV and men who have sex with men, HIV global policy and on AIDS-related stigma.
Dr. Feldman founded and was the first Chair of the Society for Medical Anthropology's AIDS and Anthropology Research Group, the American Anthropological Association (AAA) Task Force on AIDS, and the Society for Applied Anthropology Advisory Committee on AIDS. He helped significantly redirect HIV policy for Bangladesh in 1988. He served on committees of the Institute of Medicine, and on the boards of several AIDS service organizations in New York City, Miami, and Rochester. He also served on the AAA Nominations Committee (2001-04), as Treasurer of the National Association for the Practice of Anthropology (NAPA) (2002-04), and on the board of the Society for Medical Anthropology (SMA) (2004-07). He is currently a candidate for the President-Elect position at the SMA, an organization of over 1300 members. He is the 1996 recipient of the Solon T. Kimball Award for Public and Applied Anthropology, and the 2008 recipient of the AIDS and Anthropology Research Group Distinguished Service Award.
