Resumen

This thesis investigates how the notion of taboo can be understood as the result of discursive formations in relation to graphic designs—including advertisements and posters—produced for Australian HIV/AIDS prevention campaigns. HIV/AIDS campaigns are commonly thought of as being closely associated with a host of taboo subjects. Though much has been written about HIV/AIDS campaigns within various fields of study, no research focuses specifically on the subject of taboo in relation to these campaign graphics, and little has been written about the notion of taboo in general in relation to graphic design. As a result the word taboo is often used superficially to describe controversial images, without further exploration of how the word can be used in a meaningful way within a graphic design context. Consequently, no framework exists for understanding and theorising the absence of particular images and the prevalence of others in HIV/AIDS prevention graphic designs. My original contribution to knowledge is to provide such a framework, which from a graphic design perspective, illustrates how the decisions made during the design of these campaign graphics shapes the visual culture of HIV/AIDS. The thesis centres around the premise that the notion of taboo is best understood as a discursive formation in relation to graphic designs produced for HIV/AIDS campaigns, resulting from discourses within three domains of design culture—namely circulation, practice and value (Julier 2008)—concerned with the design-process, censorship and distribution, and the integration of resources into the everyday lives of audiences. The study focuses on a number of Australian campaigns as case studies, relating them to interviews conducted with the producers of HIV/AIDS prevention resources. The thesis shows how issues such as censorship, favouritism towards specific design-strategies and dismissal of others, and the absence and presence of particular body representations, makes it seem as if specific images are taboo, causing some discrepancy between what producers believe to be effective and appropriate visual strategies, and what audiences are in actuality asking to see.