Chapter 6: Community-Based Adult Education to Promote Human Rights and Health Equity in a Stigmatized Community in Canada

This chapter evokes community-based participatory research and a critical theoretical approach to examine how individual, organizational, social, institutional, political, economic, and environmental factors and underlying assumptions influence health, health equity, human rights, and the well-being of a diverse vulnerable group: racialized women living with human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV). Herein is a historical analysis of the community-driven response to the HIV epidemic, with a focus on a stigmatized community in Ontario, Canada: racialized women living with HIV particularly from the South Asian community.

This chapter describes historical community-based education initiatives from the 1980s onward as documented in a variety of sources especially materials and communications from community-based organizations and academic sources covering the spread and community-based response to the HIV epidemic. The extent and impact of these education efforts will be analyzed within a social determinants of health lens and an intersectional analysis within an adult education framework. The impact of both (a) external and internal HIV stigma and (b) racism and homophobia will also be considered as factors influencing community response. Finally, government funding initiatives and the changing political and social climate in Ontario will be considered while honoring the integral role of adult educators in (a) working with the community (formally and informally) and (b) shaping policies and practices.