COMMUNICATION AND COMMUNITY IN A CITY UNDER SIEGE - THE AIDS EPIDEMICIN SAN-FRANCISCO

The history of urban life has been shaped and directed by the impact o f disaster and disease, variables that have not disappeared in the pos tmodern age. Certainly, a deadly epidemic destroys and alters communic ation relationships while at the same time creating new communication needs and possibilities. The structure, social institutions, and polic ies of cities in part determine the impact and response to affliction. The authors analyze how the city of Salt Francisco was disrupted by t he AIDS epidemic and how HIV/AIDS prevention campaigns sought to slow the epidemic. Both the epidemic and the communication response to it a ltered socially constructed notions about community through changes in personal behavior; interpersonal behavior and organizational activiti es in San Francisco.