What does a body on PrEP do? Emergent figurations of Tenofovir-Emtricitabine (non)use in communities of men who have sex with men. (360G-Wellcome-212621_Z_18_Z)

Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is heralded as a game-changer in HIV prevention. Despite clinical evidence that PrEP makes a highly effective HIV-prevention method for at-risk men who have sex with men (MSM), both health agencies and potential users appear resistant to PrEP. This project aims to address how PrEP use is made intelligible and conflicts with the habits of the everyday lives of MSM. I argue bodies on PrEP emerge in multiple counterintuitive forms through PrEP non(use). Though framed as an HIV prevention strategy, bodies on PrEP are apt to emerge in ways that are not conceivable through the lens of HIV-prevention alone. How PrEP is used, who accesses PrEP and which events it privileges speaks to how MSM organise themselves in relation to HIV-prevention. I engage with accounts of MSM PrEP users and non-users to understand how PrEP conflicts with its definition as an HIV technology, how it is (re)interpreted by MSM and how those interpretations change what PrEP can do. Using the ‘listening guide’ narrative analysis strategy, I aim to chart the way PrEP is made similar across disparate events. Findings offer insight into how PrEP changes understandings of sexuality and HIV-transmission, informing HIV and health policy.