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AIDS: A Matter of Life |
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Audience:
African-American and Hispanic Heterosexual Teens
Year:
1988
Speech Rate:
166 words/min
Large Words
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This video uses dramatizations, interviews and didactic presentations to provide an overview of the AIDS epidemic as it affects the African-American community and, to some extent, the Hispanic community. Interviews with Black and Latino PWAs are featured, along with presentations by Black and Hispanic medical experts and AIDS educators. The message that PWAs deserve compassion and support is stressed by many of the speakers, including an African-American minister preaching from his pulpit. Some messages are likely to increase viewers' fears of AIDS. The video emphasizes abstinence from sex and drug use. Specific discussion of methods for preventing HIV infection is minimal.
This video provides an overview of the AIDS epidemic for heterosexual African American and Hispanic audiences. It touches on many different segments of the African American community and, to a lesser extent, the Hispanic community. HIV-transmission through male homosexual behavior is not discussed. The discussion of HIV-prevention is minimal and does not include specific explanations of safer sex or demonstrations of using condoms or sterilizing needles. Although the video may increase viewers' fears about AIDS, it does not offer extensive information about protecting oneself from infection. One of the video's principal strengths is its presentation of personal narratives and testimonies from African Americans and Latinos with AIDS, many of whom discuss their own experiences with stigma. The video also includes a brief but effective segment in which an African American man discusses the experience of being a parent of a person with AIDS. These sections may give the epidemic a human face for the viewer. Overall, the video makes a strong case against stigmatizing people with AIDS. One segment that may be particularly effective in communicating this message features an African American minister preaching compassion for people with AIDS. Technically, the production quality is uneven. A strength is that some important facts – such as routes of HIV transmission – are presented both orally and visually (through captions). A weakness is that several of the individuals appearing in the video speak in an awkward or stilted way, and many scenes in naturalistic settings (e.g., a classroom AIDS education discussion, a medical interview) have a scripted or "staged" quality. These technical weaknesses may detract from audience reception of the information being presented. |
Go to video listings for:
African Americans
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