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This reflection on the experience of AIDS in Britain in the 1990s draws on social science literature to make an argument for the ways in which AIDS has constituted a significant moment in the expression of contemporary identities, particularly of gay men. It explores the identity-forming processes of a range of people whose lives have been affected by HIV and AIDs, from individual experience of illness to social, community and political dynamics of the epidemic. It situates detailed empirical research on experiences of living with HIV and AIDs in the wider literature of social theory and argues for the methodological relevance of qualitative research which draws on the traditions of anthropology and interpretive sociology. AIDS as monolithic is challenged in comparisons between the experiences of HIV/AIDS of different social categories of person: gay men, women, ethnic minority members. The implications of these different experiences are drawn out in discussing the future policy agenda for AIDS in Britain in the 21st century.