UNITED IN ANGER: A HISTORY OF ACT UP STUDY GUIDE

PRE-VIEWING EXERCISES

Before You Watch United in Anger… Pre-viewing Exercises

HIV/AIDS Education
Before viewing United in Anger, reflect on your own knowledge about HIV/AIDS.  What do you know about HIV/AIDS?  Where did you learn it?  What questions do you have about the virus, including HIV prevention, transmission, and infection?  What questions do you have about living with HIV, or HIV/AIDS drugs?  What do you know about the history of AIDS and the response to it in the U.S. and globally?

An excellent resource for learning about HIV/AIDS, from basic facts about the virus, prevention, testing, and medication to the most up-to-date scientific research, is the website The Body.  Browse the website, then write down four facts about AIDS that you did not know before you read the website.  Now assess your own HIV/AIDS knowledge.  Did anything surprise you on the site?

HIV/AIDS Activism
United in Anger documents the history of the AIDS activist movement ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power).  Have you ever heard of ACT UP?  If yes, what do you know about it?  If you have not heard of ACT UP, why might that be the case?  What other activist organizations are you familiar with?

Historical Context: An Activist Perspective
In order to understand the history of ACT UP, one must understand the cultural conditions that produced the epidemic and the response to it.  Director Jim Hubbard and producer Sarah Schulman describe those conditions from a queer activist perspective in their opening statement to the film.

The cultural conditions of quietude and oppression that marked the AIDS crisis were encapsulated in ACT UP’s most iconic graphic:  Silence = Death.

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Pause for a moment to analyze this image as a hyper-meaningful symbol of its time.  Consider the graphic in terms of its text, background/foreground, colors, connotations, use of space, shapes and symbols, and overall visual effect.  Then layer in considerations of the cultural context that gave the graphic meaning.  For help analyzing Silence=Death, you can read Avram Finkelstein’s explanation of the origins of the Silence = Death Poster.

Your Expectations:
Finally, what are your expectations for watching United in Anger?  Where do these expectations come from?