Subverting culture: Promoting HIV/AIDS prevention among Puerto Rican and Dominican women

This article discusses the challenges faced by researchers and intervention ists when attempting to promote change in social norms and normative belief s that promote HIV/AIDS risk-related behaviors among Puerto Rican and Domin ican women. The article focuses on the role of culture in HIV/AIDS preventi on with women by analyzing the sociohistorical context of some cultural bel iefs and by illustrating the tension between risk-related and protective cu ltural beliefs in research conducted by the authors with women in both New York and Puerto Rico. The authors propose that promoting changes in sex-rel ated social norms and normative beliefs might be constructed as a subversiv e act and present the challenge this analysis poses for community psycholog y. They conclude that this conceptualization might be constructed as subver sive because rather than idealizing culture it promotes changes that respec t diversity within the culture and foster participation in the development of new cultural values, beliefs and norms.