PrEPped Intimacies in Berlin: Affective Ambivalences and Embodied Subjects in Biomedical HIV-Prevention

自1980年代初艾滋病毒/艾滋病流行病爆发以来，避孕套以及后来的艾滋病毒治疗一直是预防性传播病毒的唯一手段。生物医学技术现在为预防艾滋病毒引入了一个新时代：每天或“按需”服用，“暴露前预防”（PrEP）被证明在预防艾滋病毒感染方面非常有效。在德国，PrEP自2016年10月起可按处方购买，自2019年9月起，药物费用以及每三个月一次的检查费用已由公共医疗保险支付。引入生物医学预防的特点是情感矛盾：虽然这种药物为结束艾滋病毒/艾滋病流行和艾滋病毒阳性者的耻辱带来了希望，它还引发了关于无安全套性行为和传播其他性传播感染危险的道德辩论。“柏林的PrEPped亲密接触”项目从（亚）医学和酷儿人类学的学科，并调查其多重社会文化影响的男同性恋者在城市谁构成的主要用户群体的PrEP。它概念化PrEP作为一种情感，话语和物质形成的生活，经验和身体的男同性恋者，以及在特定的背景下柏林，这座城市在国际上有很高的吸引力，并以性放纵而闻名。该项目调查人种学如何生物医学预防形状体现的主题和转换亲密接触-连同健康公众，亚文化话语和治疗的情况下，其中PrEP本身位于。因此，它要求的关系，影响和话语，准备在柏林生产，并调查如何亲密，身体和主体性出现在这个过程中。人种学领域的研究将在柏林同性恋社区和艾滋病毒预防领域内进行十个月以上，以照顾到情感的矛盾和体现主题的新型生物医学艾滋病毒预防。为了了解有关PrEP的个人和机构谈判，将通过为各种艾滋病毒预防项目工作进行参与者观察。作为人种学实地工作的一部分，该项目将通过不同的访谈形式（传记叙述和部分后续访谈;焦点小组;半结构化在线访谈）关注男同性恋者的主观经历，并通过艾滋病毒预防领域的专家访谈以及流行病学话语和在线约会概况分析来补充收集的数据。

Since the outbreak of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the early 1980s, the condom and, later on HIV therapy, have been the only means of preventing a sexual transmission of the virus. A biomedical technology now introduces a new era in the prevention of HIV: taken on a daily basis or “on demand”, “Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis” (PrEP) proved to be highly effective in preventing an HIV infection. In Germany, PrEP has been available on prescription since October 2016 and the costs for the drug as well as the three-monthly examinations have been covered by public health insurance since September 2019. The introduction of the biomedical prophylaxis is characterized by affective ambivalences: while the drug has raised hopes for ending the HIV/AIDS epidemic and the stigmatization of HIV-positive people, it has also incited moralizing debates about condom-free sex and the danger of spreading other sexually transmitted infections.The project “PrEPped Intimacies in Berlin” approaches the new HIV prophylaxis from the (sub-)disciplines of medical and queer anthropology and investigates its multiple sociocultural effects among gay men in the city who constitute the main user group of PrEP. It conceptualizes PrEP as an affective, discursive and material formation in the lives, experiences and bodies of gay men as well as in the specific context of Berlin, a city with a high international appeal and a reputation for its sexual permissiveness. The project investigates ethnographically how the biomedical prophylaxis shapes embodied subjects and transforms intimate encounters – together with the health publics, subcultural discourses and therapeutic situations within which PrEP itself is situated. It thus asks for the relations, affects and discourses that PrEP produces in Berlin and investigates how intimacies, corporealities and subjectivities emerge in this process.Ethnographic field research will be conducted over ten months within the Berlin gay community and in the field of HIV prevention to attend to the affective ambivalences and embodied subjects of the novel biomedical HIV prophylaxis. In order to get to an understanding of individual and institutional negotiations regarding PrEP, participant observation will be carried out by working for various HIV prevention projects. As part of ethnographic fieldwork, the project will focus on the subjective experiences of gay men through different interview formats (biographical-narrative, and partially follow-up, interviews; focus groups; semi-structured online interviews) and complement the collected data with expert interviews in the field of HIV prevention as well as the analysis of epidemiological discourses and online dating profiles.