Female and child ‘husbands’: Rituals as HIV escape routes

Introduction

As HIV and AIDS continue to ravage African societies, scholars have come to realise the importance of African traditional religio-cultural practices in confronting the scourge. In light of this, Chitando and Klagba (2013) point out that:

disease and illness do not occur in a religio-cultural vacuum. Although there have been information campaigns on HIV across sub-Saharan Africa, these count for very little if they do not contend with the African worldview. (p. 10)

This observation is particularly true in remote and resource-constrained rural areas where a traditional worldview remains strong. In one such area, the Manyika-Gandanzara community of rural Zimbabwe, biomedical, behavioural and structural approaches to HIV and AIDS proffered from the top are not fully appreciated particularly by the middle-aged and elderly population groups because, more often than not, these contradict their traditional worldview. This, however, does not mean that the middle-aged population group in the Manyika-Gandanzara community totally abhor conventional approaches to HIV and AIDS. While they have adopted some of these approaches, they have largely renegotiated some existing rituals in their endeavour to avoid HIV infection or re-infection. One ritual that has been widely renegotiated is widow inheritance. While in some instances this ritual has been abandoned, in other contexts, its sexual orientation has been suppressed. As a result, asexual unions that include female and child ‘husbands’ have been revived and renegotiated in an attempt to escape the HIV virus. Despite these developments, the attention given to widowhood rituals by scholars has maintained a fairly narrow focus. This is clear in Duffy (2005), Chirawu (2006), Kambarami (2006) and Shoko (2007, 2012, 2013) whose researches on Shona traditional beliefs and practices portray sex-oriented widow inheritance as an enduring harmful custom in the context of HIV and AIDS. In addition, while Gundani (2004) and Chitando (2013) have noted how widow inheritance among the Shona has been replaced by the sarapawana (guardianship) ritual, they fail to recognise the continued existence of widow inheritance, albeit in an asexualised form, a gap this study explores.

This lack of scholarly attention to the renegotiation and transformation of HIV risky practices probably explains why the reduction in the prevalence rate of HIV and AIDS in Zimbabwe from 27% in 1997 to 15% in 2015 is largely attributed to the behavioural change agenda spearheaded by the Government and non-governmental organisations (Halperin et al., 2011: 1–6). Discourses on the reduction of HIV and AIDS are silent on endogenously motivated behavioural changes. This silence stems from the erroneous notion that African religio-cultural practices are antithetical to the struggle against the pandemic (Chirawu, 2006; Kambarami, 2006). Consequently, the official approach to HIV and AIDS does not recognise views and experiences of those from ‘below’, unless they can be translated into categories defined by those from the ‘top’. This, according to Kippax (2012), has resulted in the dismissal of health-defining African religio-cultural practices as ‘non-efficacious technologies in HIV prevention’ (p. 2).

Conventional HIV and AIDS intervention strategies being provided in resource-constrained rural areas, to use Paulo Freire’s (1972) words, seem to be informed by the ‘banking concept’. This concept denotes a situation whereby those from below are considered empty vessels in which relevant HIV and AIDS information and response mechanisms must be deposited. HIV and AIDS interventions, for example, abstinence, faithfulness and condom use, are perceived as new knowledge being deposited into passive and clueless rural recipients. In this unidirectional process, pre-existing knowledge and experiences of those from below are ignored since views from the top are conceived as epistemologically authoritative. The top-down approach tends to treat rural sufferers of HIV and AIDS as people without agency, thereby failing to appreciate HIV and AIDS discourses and coping mechanisms circulating in these communities. Furthermore, the approach does not emphasise abstinence and fidelity because African populations are believed to valorise sexual pleasure and casual sex. This presupposition is clearly spelt out in Ateka (2001) and Marindo et al.’s (2003) submissions that fidelity is not a virtue among Africans, particularly African men.

Against this backdrop, this study explores the extent to which the Manyika-Gandanzara community has harnessed traditional rituals which promote secondary abstinence and faithfulness among widows as a way to escape the disease. Interest in widows stems from Duri et al.’s (2013) observation that widowhood accounts for between 8% and 17% of HIV transmissions. This means that widowhood is risky in the transmission of HIV and AIDS. How rural communities and in particular widows are utilising rituals as HIV avoidance mechanism need to be explored because population segments are confronted with different HIV risk situations. It is hoped that this study will help in the interpretation of traditional practices that superficially appear unproductive to HIV and AIDS experts. Before analysing the extent to which widowhood rituals have been renegotiated in response to HIV and AIDS, it is important to clarify how data were collected.

Methods and methodology

This qualitative research relied on data gathered from participants in order to answer the question: What localised responses has the Manyika-Gandanzara community developed in order to ‘escape’ HIV? This means, apart from being inductive, the study is epistemological in that it seeks to understand and interpret the meaning and relevance of widowhood rituals from the point of view of the Manyika-Gandanzara people. Conducted within the framework of phenomenology of religion, the study relies on principles such as epoche and empathetic interpolation which stress the centrality of believers’ perspectives. I briefly explain epoche and empathetic interpolation.

According to Sharpe (1986), the term epoche is derived from the Greek word epecho, which means ‘I hold back’ (p. 224). Epoche is translated to mean suspension or ‘bracketing out’ of preconceived ideas in order to allow the phenomena to speak for themselves (Erricker, 1999: 77). For Kristensen, quoted in Cox (2010), epoche enables the scholar to view religious reality from the perspective of the believer. This is important because according to Kristensen, ‘there is no religious reality other than the faith of the believer’ (Cox, 1992: 25). In a field-based study of this nature, epoche helped me to ‘bracket’ preconceived ideas on whether widowhood rituals have any role in mitigating HIV- and AIDS-related problems such as their transmission and infectiousness. By ‘bracketing’, I mean being alert to preconceived ideas that researchers unwittingly carry into the field, which serve to contaminate and distort one’s findings. Similarly, empathetic interpolation is a technique that equips the researcher with the skills and attitudes that help him or her to enter into the life experiences of the believers and approach reality from their point of view (Chitando, 2005: 301). The thrust of this principle is aptly captured in Cox’s (1992) contention that

the phenomenologist of religion must get inside the religion he is studying and view the world, as far as possible, as a believer does. (p. 26)

Empathy is, however, not play acting. Instead, it is for the scholar to participate in the religious (ritual) proceedings. Smart (1973: 54) argues that while empathy enables the scholar to access the meaning of religious life and practices from the believers’ point of view, interpolation helps the scholar to make sense of the beliefs and practices expressed by the believers. Empathetic interpolation, therefore, describes the way in which the observer is able to recognise ‘a framework of intentions’ among the believers (Smart, 1973: 54).

Although epoche and empathetic interpolation were invaluable in approaching participants and in handling views regarding widowhood rituals with minimum biases, let me hasten to add that while these techniques helped me to empathise with the Manyika-Gandanzara people and to view reality from their perspective, I did not simply rubber stamping the Manyika-Gandanzara’s views and their interpretation of widowhood rituals. I interpreted widowhood ritual data dynamically in light of the spread of HIV. Data obtained from participants were also historically interpreted, because rituals are dynamic practices themselves influenced by scientific innovations and ‘external’ cultural forms. In this regard, I agree with Allan’s (2005) assertion that, ‘the Phenomenologist must be aware of the specific historical, cultural, and socio-economic contexts within which religious phenomena appear’ (p. 196).

In line with phenomenological principles, data were collected through semi-structured interviews with key informants, focus group discussions (FGDs) and observations. A total of 24 key informants were sampled, some on the basis of having undergone widowhood rituals and others because they were the sources of the Manyika-Gandanzara religio-cultural beliefs and practices. Semi-structured interviews were preferred because they allowed for flexibility in terms of the precise wording of questions (Bryman, 2012). In addition, semi-structured interviews enabled me to probe interviewees for more details, and were done in a private setting (participants’ homes) where confidentiality was ascertained.

Three FGDs, each between six and ten participants, were held. FGD participants were drawn from willing and voluntary community members. This promoted the collection of heterogeneous data (Braun and Clarke, 2013). In other words, FGDs helped to elicit a wide range of views regarding the functions of widowhood rituals in the context of HIV and AIDS. Two widow inheritance rituals were observed in order to gain a more naturalistic understanding of the rituals. Furthermore, given that observations were of real-life situations, with participants conversing among themselves rather than with the researcher, the study availed itself to their immediate conversations. In order to check whether data analysis and interpretation were in tandem with the participants’ views, a strategy known as member reflections was employed which ‘entails sharing and dialoguing with participants about the study findings’ (Tracy quoted in Braun and Clarke (2013: 285). The strategy involves participant validation and provides an opportunity for reflexive elaboration. This process was done with six purposively sampled participants. ¹

Female and child ‘husbands’: Conjugalities renegotiated

In the Manyika-Gandanzara community, brothers of a woman’s husband are regarded as potential or symbolic husbands. Moreover, the relationship between the wife and her husband’s siblings can be jocular and is cemented by privileged familiarity and disrespect. The wife looks up to her husband’s brothers for assistance and indulgence. In this latent husband–wife relationship, verbal flirtations and limited or controlled physical contact are tolerated. However, with the death of the husband, it is the norm for the relationship between the bereaved wife and one of her late husband’s brothers to be ritually activated and elevated to the status of husband–wife with full conjugal rights. Such inheritance rites signal the end of post-funeral ritual called chenura (cleansing and bringing back the spirit of the dead), usually performed at least a year after the passing on of the deceased. According to Gundani (2004: 91–92), levirate marriage served to inter alia protect the estate of the deceased, ensure that the bereaved wife remains loyal to the late husband’s family and perpetuate the natural father–children bond between the bereaved children and their late father’s brother. However, community’s realisation that levirate marriage was exacerbating the prevalence of HIV- and AIDS-related deaths seems to have necessitated a re-thinking of this custom. Thus, Gundani (2004) and Chitando (2013) argue that in the context of HIV and AIDS, levirate marriage is largely viewed as a ‘passport to death’. As such, the practice has largely vanished from the ritual terrain of Zimbabwe’s indigenous population.

Although it was a norm for the widow to be inherited, she was not forced. Instead, her consent and the approval of the significant others were sought. In the rare case that a widow was not willing to be inherited, she would elect her eldest son as the ‘husband’. Data gathered through observations, FGDs and interviews with key informants at three locations show that among the Manyika-Gandanzara community, this kind of levirate marriage has become the norm and has suppressed the traditional conjugality-based wife inheritance. Participants largely attributed this adaptation to the HIV and AIDS scourge. The ritual transformation of the eldest son into a mother’s ‘husband’ is in tandem with the Manyika cultural traditions. Culturally, it is considered a blessing to be the eldest son. The eldest son is granted privileges that include the right to inheritance, and is given the title newanji meaning heir. He is perceived as the father’s vice regent at the level of the family and community. Irrespective of his age, he represents the father in various rituals. In vernacular, he is referred to as baba meaning father. The resulting husband–wife relationship between the mother and her son is symbolic and asexual in that mother–son coitus is culturally prohibited.

A similar ritual observed at one of the villages is the female ‘husband’ inheritance practice. From this observation, it was discerned that a female husband phenomenon emerges when the widow ritually elects to be inherited by the late husband’s sister instead of the brother. The resulting union is asexual because same-sex relationship is taboo and unimaginable in the Manyika-Gandanzara community. The phenomenon does not conflict with cultural traditions because, as noted by key informants, one’s sister is traditionally considered murume (husband) and babakadzi (female father figure) by the brother’s wife and children, respectively.

The above explanations demonstrate that rituals, as potential avenues for creative expression, have resulted in the renegotiation of widowhood rituals from sex-oriented rites to non-conjugal female–female and mother–son symbolic unions. This means that in the context of HIV and AIDS, rituals function as existential enablers. According to Airhihenbuwa and Webster (2012), existential enablers facilitate the ‘availability, accessibility, acceptability and affordability of resources that are traditionally extant in the community or society for support of preventive health decisions and actions’ (p. 11). The popularity of female and child ‘husbands’ phenomena in the Manyika-Gandanzara community resonates with Csordas’ (1983) observation that as ritual innovations become more accepted and standardised, they are slowly adapted to become a norm.

After these ritual appointments, a caretaker father commonly referred to as sarapawana, who would have been nominated at the close of the funeral proceedings, is installed to continue with his guardianship roles. His duties, according to Gundani (2004: 93), include providing the widow and the orphaned children a compassionate ear and assisting in the management of the trauma of death and bereavement, providing a link between the widow and the orphans and the rest of the family in order to maintain their sense of belonging and identity, and giving moral as well as socio-economic support to the widow and the orphaned children. These responsibilities mean that being a sarapawana is not an easy task. As such, the office is bestowed upon a person who can best serve the interests of the widow and her children. This explains why the appointment of a sarapawana is preceded by careful deliberation among family elders and sealed with ritual enactments. Given the increased number of orphans and widows due to HIV and AIDS (Chitiyo et al., 2016; Mpofu, 2010; Muchacha et al., 2016), it can be argued that the phenomenon of sarapawana has become a viable pathway for supporting orphans and widows. These ritual innovations are a clear demonstration of how communities in resource-constrained areas compensate for limitations associated with the conventional approaches to HIV- and AIDS-related problems, which emanate from top-down directives. In this regard, the following section gives a cursory view of the top-down approach and its limitations within the Manyika-Gandanzara community.

Top-down approach and the struggle against HIV and AIDS in the Manyika-Gandanzara community

The bureaucratic approach entails the adoption of conventional or official strategies in the fight against HIV and AIDS. However, for the sake of brevity, this study focuses on the commonly observed strategies in the Manyika-Gandanzara community. These strategies include HIV counselling and testing (HCT) also known as voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) and the ABC method which stands for Abstain, Be faithful and Condomise. These strategies are explored in terms of their accessibility, acceptability and availability to the middle-aged populations, particularly widows within the Manyika-Gandanzara community.

HCT is a government-initiated programme that has become a dominant form of promoting HIV prevention in Zimbabwe and other countries all over the world. The underlying assumption to this procedure is that biomedical HCT services are important entry points for prevention and care. Through this procedure, individuals are encouraged to get tested for HIV. Pretesting and post-testing counselling services are provided to individuals irrespective of the outcome of the test results. Those who test positive are counselled to accept and live positively with the infection. If still sexually active, they are encouraged to have protected sex in order to avoid re-infection and spreading the virus. If negative, they are counselled to avoid risky behaviours. According to Bekker et al. (2012), HCT is premised on the assumption that individuals are more likely to take precautions to protect themselves and their partners once they know that they are HIV-positive. In view of these findings, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends annual HCT to sexually active individuals in high HIV prevalence settings. In Zimbabwe as a whole, strategies to increase testing include national campaigns, provider-initiated counselling and testing as well as mandatory HCT for pregnant women. However, in the Manyika-Gandanzara area, the provision of HCT services is profoundly hampered by the lack of infrastructure. Key informants revealed that apart from mobile HCT service providers who sporadically visit the area, there are only two health service centres that provide this service. Data gathered show that the majority of people in this community are averse to HCT and very few are aware of their HIV status. Key informants emphasised that most men are averse to HCT. A 31-year-old female key informant attributed low male involvement to patriarchal ideology when she said:

warume wazhinji wanoti ‘ndiri murume pachangu, handingaudzwi zvekuita’ (most men say ‘I am a man in my own right, I can’t be told what to do’). (Interview at School Y)

Participants noted that women and in particular expectant mothers are more amenable to HCT through the provider-initiated and mandatory HCT services upon visiting the two health service centres for maternity health care. A male informant aged 44 aptly put this across:

zvekutestwa zvinongoitwa kuwakadzi wane pamwiri (testing is only done to pregnant women). (Interview at village A)

Most widows who confessed to have undergone HCT claimed that they were moved by the kind of illnesses that befell their husbands. A widow aged 39 aptly expressed this idea:

murume wangu akange apera serutsanga. Ruwara rwachinja. Achingofa ndabva ndandotestiwa (my husband had become thin like a reed. The skin texture had changed. Soon after he died I went for testing). (Interview at village A)

Within the Manyika-Gandanzara community, HCT is further hampered by a lengthy lag-time between testing and antiretroviral initiation. Furthermore, despite its benefits, enrolling on antiretroviral therapy (ART) is highly stigmatised. Key informants and FGD participants noted that ART patients are referred to as wanhu wanorarama nekujusa (people who live by juicing – meaning taking tablets frequently), wana tiriparwendo (those who are on a journey – implying moving to the grave), wana Jehova ndouyako (God I am coming – implying death) and wanhu wepasi pemumango (people who sit under the mango tree – a description of HIV-positive people gathered under the tree waiting to be saved by the clinic/hospital officials). This name-calling points to some degree of stigma and discrimination.

Controversies surrounding the issues of voluntariness/willingness to get tested, confidentiality of results, informed consent, and stigma are not peculiar to this community as shown by studies carried out by Chirawu (2006) and Mangena (2009). Closely related to the HCT is the ABC strategy. According to Bekker et al. (2012), the slogan ‘ABC’ was first coined as part of prevention campaigns in Botswana in the late 1990s. The trio argues that this method was necessitated by the realisation that approximately 85% of HIV transmissions occur heterosexually. Abstinence means refraining from any sexual activity. It occurs at two levels, that is, primary abstinence which refers to zero premarital sexual activity and secondary abstinence which refers to the avoidance of sex for a period of at least 12 months by an individual who had sex before. Fear of losing respect and being excommunicated, religious commitment, the risks of HIV infection, and respect for the deceased partner account for secondary abstinence.

Where people cannot abstain, they are encouraged to be faithful to one uninfected partner. This strategy proceeds from the premise that having multiple concurrent partners increases one’s exposure to the possibility of HIV infection. Studies by Morris and Kretzschmar (1997) show that HIV spreads more rapidly where partnerships are con-current than where partnerships occur sequentially. Thus, the rate of change of sexual partners, particularly concurrent partners, is an important determinant in the spread of HIV. In addition, HIV viral load, and therefore infectiousness, is much higher during the early (acute) stage of HIV infection, hence transmission would be aggravated by partner change among newly infected people. Recent scientific research has shown that even infected partners need to be faithful to each other in order to avoid the cross-breeding of the virus and the development of a drug-resistant HIV strain. However, this tactic requires the commitment of both partners. It is important to note that abstinence and fidelity can only be efficacious in reducing HIV incidence in societies that uphold religio-cultural and moral values that promote virginity and fidelity. The biomedical experts are sceptical about the effectiveness of abstinence and faithfulness. According to Igo (2009), this stems from the generalised assumption that sexual licentiousness has become the ‘in-thing’ in the 21st century.

Contrary to the aforesaid assumption, information gathered from the Gandanzara community shows that since people started to recognise the dangers of HIV and AIDS, they have increasingly used rituals to promote abstinence and fidelity in lieu of condoms. This is particularly true among widows. Reasons given for the low uptake of condoms include the perception that condom use is synonymous with high-risk sexual partnerships/infidelity, the conceptions or misconceptions that condoms are smeared with infections, and the idea that condoms make sex less pleasurable. These findings resonate with Zimbabwean-based studies by Rodlach (2005), Igo (2009), Shoko (2012), as well as South African-based studies by Dickinson (2014).

The fact that condom use is associated with high-risk sexual partnership and infidelity was echoed by a 46-year-old widow who said:

kana uri shirikadzi ukada kusuggester kushandisa kondomu unonzwa umwe wako akuti ‘asi une edzi kana kuti urikuhura’ (as a widow if you suggest condom use you hear your partner asking ‘do you have AIDS or you are promiscuous). (Interview at village A)

Participants further noted that kinship ties sometimes make condoms inaccessible because rural folks are generally ashamed to be seen buying sex- and promiscuity-defining items by their kinsfolk. The extent to which kin group membership serves as a barrier to condom use by widows was succinctly put across by a 37-year-old female informant who said:

wanhu wakagarisana hama nehama. Wamwe wanyarikani saka kuonekwa uchitenga kana kukumbira makondomu kunoti netsei. Sesu shirikadzi zvinoswera zvazara raini rese kuti akutora warume wewanhu (people live in kin groups. Some are related in ways that make it impossible to be seen buying or requesting condoms. Particularly for us widows, the news that she wants to take other people’s husbands will spread throughout the village in a short space of time). (Interview at village B)

In addition, condom use is hampered by intermittent supplies. This was confirmed through a survey and interviews with shop and bar attendants as well as village health workers. From the survey, I discovered that condoms were virtually absent in all the grocery shops and were available in three of the eight sparsely located beer halls. Interviews with the shop and bar attendants as well as village health workers revealed that condom uptake was very low, hence they find it unprofitable to sell or distribute them. A 30-year-old male bar attendant aptly put this across:

tikahoarder makondomu anoita gore aripapo. Haatengwi. Anotosvika pakuexpire ari musherefu (if we hoard condoms they take a year there. They don’t sell. They come to expire in the shelves). (Interview at X business centre)

The uptake of condoms among widows and widowers is further aggravated by being accustomed to unprotected sex. A 46-year-old widower explained:

usati wafirwa unenge wakajaira nyoro. Kuzoda kushandisa kondomu inogona kubva yarara. (you are used to unprotected sex before you become a widow/widower. Erection might be lost in wanting to use a condom). (Interview at village C)

In addition, the gap between supply and demand of condoms, particularly in resource-constrained rural areas, was confirmed by Bekker et al. (2012). According to Bekker et al. (2012), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) 2007 report estimated that at least 13.1 billion condoms were required to reduce the spread of HIV, yet in 2008, less than 15% of this target was distributed globally. Similarly, the National AIDS Council (NAC) 2012 report highlighted that in Zimbabwe, 88,368,501 male condoms were distributed, a figure far below an estimated market of approximately three million consumers (Kavhu (2014), Sunday Mail, 6 April). While participants have heard about the female condoms, they claimed not to have ever seen them. In addition, they confessed never to have heard about the dapivirine ring which is thought to prevent women from acquiring HIV virus by approximately 27%–31% (Chipunza (2016), Herald 24 February). This informational blackout also applies to pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) mechanisms.

These findings demonstrate that in spite of the success stories associated with the conventional approach to HIV and AIDS, peripheral communities still rely on rituals in order to avoid the virus. This means that apart from depending solely on official strategies, communities have not been passive victims, as alluded to in the prevailing literature. Instead, they have resuscitated some traditional religio-cultural rituals, such as female and child ‘husbands’, in order to simultaneously curtail the spread of HIV and salvage the family and community’s social fabric.

Ritually motivated self-restraint: Emic perspectives

Data suggest that ritually motivated self-restraint and/or secondary abstinence is one factor governing sexual behaviour and in turn HIV infection and re-infection in resource-constrained settings such as the Manyika-Gandanzara area. The trauma of HIV- and AIDS-related illness, suffering and death has over the years triggered a revival, renegotiation and tightening of ritual restrictions as part of HIV avoidance strategies. HIV and AIDS is a scourge that has struck the central nerve of traditional religio-cultural practices, and local communities need not to be made aware of this by outsiders. The stress, fear, misery, illnesses and funerals caused by the disease have created what may be called an AIDS-induced sense of crisis. This crisis seemed to rationalise endogenous behavioural adjustments. An elderly male saliently summarised this crisis-driven change, stating that:

wanhu warikufa nechakauya ichi. Hazvichadi kupinda pese pese (people are dying due to HIV and AIDS. It’s no longer advisable to sleep around). (Interview at Village A)

Ritually embedded HIV-avoidance strategies result from the fact that traditional religion seeks to promote health and well-being at the expense of suffering. Once the community realised that conjugality-oriented wife inheritance had become a death trap, they tapped into the positive and feasible aspects of this rite, transforming and redirecting the sexualities it originally assumed. A 50-year-old married woman stressed this by saying:

nekuda kweedzi, nhaka haichisiri yebonde (because of AIDS, widow inheritance no longer involves sex. (Interview at Village C)

Abstinence and fidelity are moral virtues that are rooted in traditional practices and ritually enforced to promote health and well-being. Even a widow who opts to marry her deceased husband’s sister or heir is expected to adhere to the family and societal moral virtues. A 58-year-old widow FGD participant explained:

kusarudza kuroorwa natete kana mukorori zvinorewa kuti hauchadi bonde. Nyakuenda anogona kumuka kana shirikadzi ikaite gumbo mumba gumbo panze mumusha make (opting to be married to the aunt or the eldest son is a public declaration that you no longer want sex. The deceased may seek revenge if the widow flirts within his homestead). (FGD at Village B)

These sentiments demonstrate that the ‘moral burden’ that married women carry follow them into widowhood. According to participants, the ritually imposed ‘moral burden’ is important because it helps to reduce the spread of HIV and AIDS.

Reducing HIV prevalence the ritual way

In resource-constrained Manyika-Gandanzara community, inheritance rituals have yielded female and child ‘husbands’. These symbolic unions have reversed normative masculinities that previously compelled widows to be involved in levirate marital relationships. The community’s consciousness and trepidation of the HIV and AIDS pandemic has provided a fertile ground for the renegotiation and transformation of sexually oriented widow inheritance into asexual female-to-female and mother–son symbolic marital unions. Given that between 80% and 90% of HIV infection in Africa is attributed to heterosexual acts (The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) Report 2007, 2008, 2010; K4 Health Report, 2014; Kippax, 2012), in these ritually asexualised unions, the virus can hardly be transmitted. Choosing to be symbolically married to the late husband’s sister or eldest son demonstrates that the widow still wishes to remain a member of the late husband’s family. In the event that the widow is HIV-positive, the recreated levirate marriage ensures that she is given due care by her children and the late husband’s family members. Sovran (2013) supports this by positing that levirate marriage ‘helps to maintain the social and economic welfare of widows and orphans’ (p. 35). Furthermore, if the widow remains in the custody of the late husband’s family, she is culturally considered married and enjoys all the sociocultural benefits associated with being a daughter-in-law and a married woman. Because she is considered married, it is taboo for any other man to propose to her. The late husband’s family has a cultural right to sue for damages and compensation in the event that the widow romantically transgresses. This resonates with findings by Wojcicki et al. (2010: 4) that women whose brideprice had been paid have a reduced number of lifetime sexual partners, a key factor associated with reduced infectiousness and risk of infection.

It is, however, an oversimplification to claim that the phenomena of female and child ‘husbands’ completely deter the widow from seeking sexual pleasure and, therefore, the risk of getting infected or infecting others. In fact, the resulting symbolic marital unions might drive the widow into clandestine relationship(s). Clandestine relationships are characterised by fear and shame as they often lead to irregular sexual encounters. However, according to Marindo et al. (2003), Leclerc-Madlala et al. (2009) and Airhihenbuwa and Webster (2012), such relationships are less risky in that they are amenable to condom use. In addition, studies show that irregular sexual acts restrict infectiousness to 1.6% at four coital acts a month and 6.2% at 16 acts per month during the acute stage of infection (K4 Health Report, 2014). This implies that the frequency of sex is one single factor that promotes HIV infection. In addition, the 1-year mandatory sex sabbatical imposed on the Manyika-Gandanzara widows and widowers through kupisa guwa (burning the grave) tradition minimises chances of HIV transmission. Kupisa guwa is a tradition that forbids a widow or widower from having sexual intercourse until the spirit of the late partner has been ritually brought home, at least a year after death. Breaching this taboo is believed to cause supernatural vengeance. This secondary abstinence, therefore, reduces infectiousness. Furthermore, it can be argued that a symbolically married widow is more likely to use condoms in order to avoid the embarrassment of having illegitimate children. A 42-year-old widow who was purposively sampled as a key informant states:

kana uri shirikadzi, zvinonyadzisa kuuya netsuro isinambwa mumusha memushakabvu, saka unototamba wakangwarira (if you are a widow, it is disgraceful to bring an illegitimate child into the family of the deceased husband, so you play it safe). (Interview at village C)

This means traditional religio-cultural rituals function as the Manyika-Gandanzara people’s positive and existential perceptions in the fight against HIV and AIDS. Positive perceptions are the knowledge, attitudes and beliefs that influence beneficial decisions about HIV and AIDS prevention, care and support. While existential perceptions refer to specific cultural traits that promote decisions which help to keep HIV at bay (Airhihenbuwa and Webster, 2012).

One may argue that inheritance rituals, in this case the female and child ‘husband’ levirate rites, provide a platform for controlled ‘rebellion’. Female and child ‘husband’ rituals are rites and sites of rebellion insofar as the accepted social order of a widow ritually married to a husband with full conjugal rights is symbolically overturned. Cultural traditions of female and child ‘husband’ have provided widows, who are generally thought to be on the receiving end of patriarchy (Chikombero, 2007; Kambarami, 2006), with an opportunity to rebel against marital unions that enhance the spread of HIV. In this regard, it can be argued that HIV prevention existential enablers subsist in the form of rituals among the Manyika-Gandanzara people.

Electing to be symbolically married to the aunt or son is a widow’s declaration about her sexual life. The female and child ‘husband’ customs are traditions through which the Manyika-Gandanzara widows are redefining themselves as an HIV and AIDS aware group that is not confrontationally opposed to traditional customs and male dominance. Working through these very rituals, widows appear to have created a new sense of womanhood in which the widow is single though married, independent yet deeply engaged in social relations of dependence. Such rituals have also created a situation whereby abstinence and faithfulness to the late husband and symbolic husband (female or child) means that widows gain control over their own sexuality. Widowhood rituals have become scenes for oblique social protests in the era of HIV and AIDS. Such responses are endogenous and not exotic prescriptions. It is, however, important to note that the renegotiation of inheritance rituals is not strictly a female domain. Due to HIV and AIDS, several men were also reluctant to inherit widows as wives and, therefore, were instrumental in the ritual transformation of sex-oriented widow inheritance to non-sexual marital arrangements.

In light of these observations, this study contends that in the context of HIV and AIDS, widowhood rituals serve to promote self-restraint. As such, interventionists who may want to assist such resource-constrained communities ought to be sensitive to the productive aspects of their culture instead of adopting predetermined ethnocentrically biased values. The official and bureaucratic approaches deployed in dealing with HIV in resource-constrained areas are steeped in the Newtonian-Cartesian rationality. According to Goduka (2000), this rationality presents a narrow, static and instrumental view of reason that excludes other ways of knowing and making judgements. It disdains other truths based on indigenous knowledge and spirituality. The paradigm considers itself as the only legitimate avenue for the invariant construction, transmission and attainment of valid knowledge. To this end, Hardt and Negri quoted in Schirato and Webb (2003) posit that the first task of the grid of official approaches is not just to produce consensus among the subjects but to ensure that all thought systems, every notion of morality and ethics, and the dispositions and values of the subjects are produced within and are commensurable with the framework of the dominant cultural group.

Conclusion

The discussion demonstrates that the conventional HIV prevention strategies being imposed on resource-constrained rural communities are not widely accepted and accessible to middle-aged population groups, particularly widows. This can be attributed mainly to socio-economic circumstances prevailing in these communities. Furthermore, the strategies are, to a very large extent, out of sync with sociocultural traditions. In this regard, the study posits that the reduction in HIV and AIDS prevalence rate in resource-constrained areas in Zimbabwe ought to be explained, not only in terms of the conventional interventions but also in terms of ritually motivated endogenous behavioural changes. Rituals, particularly those enforcing secondary abstinence, tied to the phenomena of female and child ‘husbands’, play an indispensable role in HIV prevention in resource-constrained rural areas such as the Manyika-Gandanzara community.