My research on health communication has focused on public health initiatives in Tanzania which are meant to reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS. As a researcher affiliated with several non-governmental organizations since 2005, I have been interested in the ways knowledge about HIV, sexuality, risk, and responsibility are discursively constructed and contested in community-based education events. I have also been interested in examining how health literacies are presented and transmitted to high risk populations, and how these populations respond to messages of international organizations such as the World Health Organization. Most recently, I have researched innovative practices by local Tanzanian NGOs such as the Tanga AIDS Working Group (TAWG), which actively recruits indigenous healers to collaborate with biomedical doctors on public health initiatives in rural areas of northern Tanzania.
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• ​Higgins, C. (2016). Authorization and and illegitimation among biomedical doctors and indigenous healers in Tanzania. Applied Linguistics Review 7(4), 385–407. 
• Higgins, C. (2014). Constructing identities through literacy events in HIV/AIDS education. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 35 (7), 709-723. 
• Higgins, C. & Norton, B. (Eds.) (2010). Language and HIV/AIDS. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
• Higgins, C. (2010). Discursive constructions of responsibility in HIV/AIDS prevention: Re-entextualization practices in Tanzania. In C. Higgins & B. Norton (eds.) Language and HIV/AIDS. (pp. 133-154). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
• Higgins, C. & Norton, B. (2010). Applied linguistics, local knowledge, and HIV/AIDS. In C. Higgins & B. Norton (eds.) Language and HIV/AIDS. (pp. 1-19). Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
• Higgins, C. (2010). Discursive enactments of the World Health Organization’s policies: Competing world views in Tanzanian HIV/AIDS prevention. Language Policy, 9(1) 65-85.