In this video episode of Let Women Talk, HIV community advocate Sarah Feagan speaks with Dr. Allison (Allie) Carter, a Lecturer in Sexual Health at the Kirby Institute, UNSW Sydney, from the 2019 Australasian HIV&AIDS Conference held in Perth on 17-19 September about. Allie has been engaged in research at the intersection of sexuality, health, and human rights for nearly a decade, with a focus on the lives of women. She is the founding co-editor of Life and Love with HIV, a blog and online community for women and couples around the world to share stories of sexuality, romance, and love.
About Life and Love with HIV
Life and Love with HIV is a blog and online community dedicated to de-stigmatising sexuality and relationships among women, partners, and couples living with HIV by shifting the focus from risk to pleasure. In creating our own stories, in our own voices, with our own words, our goal is to reclaim our sexual rights around the world.
But Beyoncé wasn’t built in a day! Turning this idea into action happened over the course of three years. We hosted several sex-positive workshops with women. We also scoured the web, collecting what little resources we could find. And we started community building, eventually recruiting a diverse team of writers from around the world with the help of social media. What began as a small grassroots, volunteer-run effort in British Columbia, Canada, slowly transformed into the global platform it is today.
Find out about Let Women Talk
Let Women Talk is a NAPWHA community-led health literacy initiative where HIV community advocates incorporate their rich perspectives and diverse lived HIV experiences back into strengthening community health responses — where women design and develop the health content and interventions that they want to see and hear. The initiative is one of many activities forming part of the HIV Health Literacy Framework Project, a NAPWHA project supported through the funding of ViiV Healthcare Australia.
Hear other video episodes
In this series, Sarah Feagan reports back from the 2019 Australasian HIV&AIDS Conference aiming to translate research back into community practice.
- Let Women Talk — Episode 01 — Sarah Feagan & Deborah Bateson
- Let Women Talk — Episode 02 — Sarah Feagan & Mina John
- Let Women Talk — Episode 03 — Sarah Feagan & Janet Sangopa
- Let Women Talk — Episode 04 — Sarah Feagan & Jenny Hoy
- Let Women Talk — Episode 05 — Sarah Feagan & Diane Lloyd
- Let Women Talk — Episode 07 — Sarah Feagan & Kirsty Machon
- Let Women Talk — Episode 08 — Sarah Feagan & Carole Khaw
- Let Women Talk — Episode 09 — Sarah Feagan & Rebecca Houghton
- Let Women Talk — Episode 10 — Sarah Feagan & Melinda Hassall
- Let Women Talk — Episode 11 — Sarah Feagan & Shoshana Rosenberg
- Let Women Talk — Episode 12 — Sarah Feagan & Liz Duck-Chong
- Let Women Talk — Episode 13 — Sarah Feagan & Moira Wilson
Who’s in this interview?
Allie Carter is a feminist author, speaker, activist, and researcher — engaged in research to advance women’s sexual health and rights for nearly a decade, with a particular focus on hidden and under-served communities. She received her MPH and PhD at Simon Fraser University in Canada and worked previously at the British Columbia Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS. She is presently a Lecturer in Sexual Health at the Kirby Institute at the University of New South Wales. Allie has published over 30 scientific articles and her work has appeared in CBC, CTV, The Star, Ravishly, and much more. She has a deep passion for communicating science through narrative and is currently writing her first book.
Sarah Feagan is a queer women who has been living with HIV since 2008. She is the previous chair of Positive Women Victoria and has recently joined the team at Living Positive Victoria as a Peer Navigator. She also the Vice President of NAPWHA. Sarah is a co-facilitator of Phoenix for Women and the Positive Leadership Development Institute (PLDi) . Sarah has unique approach to her advocacy and is inspired by the lived experience of the body positive to inform her practice. Sarah’s advocacy spans the from the grass roots all the way up to high level governance. She has a global outlook with a local focus to bringing the community along with her.
