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autoethnographer: one who uses lived experience as evidence with which to explore cultural phenomena.
FROM OUR ARCHIVES
"'SEE ME, Windows to the Self of the Performer-Autoethnographer' explores the question, 'What can I learn about myself by making artwork as autoethnography'?
The otherness is not somewhere out there. It’s in me. Still, my search did not stop to this discovery. It took me profoundly even further. It took me to love and poetry.
In this new issue from The AutoEthnographer, we highlight work from authors and artists in the USA, Finland, Bangladesh/Canada, Chile/USA, and India.
Syrian Identity and Academic Self: Emerging Research or Ruthless Methodology seeks to illuminate a personal reflection that sparked a unique line of inquiry, ultimately leading to an innovative exploration within my research project.
Sandra L. Faulkner·
All ContentAutoethnographic EssaysCelebrating Dr. Patricia Leavy's Social Fiction 2024Special Issues
··21 min readAs a feminist poet and (auto)ethnographer, I found Leavy's themes of Film Blue speak to what I want my work to do and be.
"When I was first accepted into the PhD by research program in the UK, I had mixed feelings, mainly because I was about to pursue a career that I didn’t have the heart for, and partially because I would need to explore yet another new culture, country, and environment."
This piece situates me in a set of sour in-laws relationships that also involved the legal system and it is in the form of autoethnography.
"Horse, Therapy is a story of my own experience and is a commentary on trauma, both in animals and humans."
Lina Fe Simoy·
All ContentAutoethnographic EssaysAutoethnographic PoetryFrom the EditorsMoreVolume 3, Issue 2 (2023)
··5 min readThere are multiple approaches to find one's poetic voice depending on the lens one chooses as a part of the author’s creative process.
"My poems for this special issue seek to document a history of my choice, not just personally but humanly, to use autoethnography to weave through the personal and the political."
"Ongoing horrific events painstakingly filled my mind when I submerged into Dante’s Commedia Divina. Our tragedy with nature revealed itself to me in its deepest form."
I worry about survival. Bluntly put, according to the Academy of Sciences almost every person on earth will be affected by climate change.
FROM OUR ARCHIVES
autoethnographer: one who uses lived experience as evidence with which to explore cultural phenomena.
What is autoethnography? The AutoEthnographer's international team of editors offer definitions & suggested readings.
“The AutoEthnographer is an award-winning, non-profit, open-access, peer-reviewed literary and arts magazine dedicated to presenting the creative side of autoethnography, a qualitative research method uniting ethnography and autobiography that utilizes lived experience as evidence with which to explore cultural phenomena." ISSN: 2833-1400
AUTOETHNOGRAPHIC WRITING
AUTOETHNOGRAPHIC POETRY
AUTOETHNOGRAPHIC WRITING
This autoethnographic essay offers a musing on the intricate relationship between language, writing and identity through an autoethnographic account of my reading and writing experience from childhood to present, and from China to the UK via Germany.
"As fragrance, and perfume in particular, has played a major role in the shaping of my writer’s voice, and participation in cultures of fragrance has had a major impact upon my identity, it is impossible to situate myself outside of these cultures. It is because of this privilege of “insider identity” within the global fragrance community and my natural inclination towards narrative research that I turned to autoethnography."
After 34 years of monogamy I entered the dating app world and began writing the first weekend I was single. This is story of my experience.
AUTOETHNOGRAPHIC MULTIMEDIA
Shanita Mitchell and Marlen Harrison·
All ContentAutoethnographic Art & MultimediaMorePodcastsReflections on MethodVolume 3, Issue 2 (2023)
··18 min readToday we're talking with the award-winning author, researcher, and performer, Shanita Mitchell about performance and autoethnography.
Overall, "Little Red" encompasses queerness, womanhood, and the implications of growing into an identity that isn't cherished by society.
“A Seat at the Table” is the autoethnographic manifestation of my vulnerability, anger, and anguish, of my black feminist grit."
I use poetry to describe living with ME/CFS, an illness that is chronic and invisible, thus bringing awareness to this little known diagnosis.
Ulla-Maija Matikainen·
All ContentAutoethnographic Literary FictionAutoethnographic PoetryAutoethnographic WritingVolume 2, Issue 1 (2022)
··12 min read"A woman alone doesn’t belong to any male power or protection sphere. She can be kidnapped into fears and dreams."
Eternal Glow: Black Womanhood’s Story Of Love and Resilience Author’s Memo These three poems are autoethnographic as they...
Shanita Mitchell and Marlen Harrison·
All ContentAutoethnographic Art & MultimediaMorePodcastsReflections on MethodVolume 3, Issue 2 (2023)
··18 min readToday we're talking with the award-winning author, researcher, and performer, Shanita Mitchell about performance and autoethnography.
"I’ve already resisted that scholarship is not creative and poetry is not part of my scholarly self. I think the idea of autoethnography allows for that cultural divide between the creative and academic to be really disrupted."
Diane Riggins·
All ContentAutoethnographic EssaysAutoethnographic WritingReflections on MethodVolume 1, Issue 2 (2021)
··5 min read"My thesis began to unfold after doing some research on my final topic idea about Tolkien’s world, female characters, female gamers, and the stereotype that females are the love interests or damsels in distress. I chose autoethnography because it allowed me to add that personal angle to the paper because I am a female writer, reader, and gamer."
This is a love letter to my people, my family and a version of me trying to overcome the trauma of almost seeing their mother die.
The process of seeking pregnancy alone (by necessity, not choice) showed me how limited reproductive rights in the U.S. truly are—even before the recent loss of Roe vs. Wade, that policy that had so shaped my generation’s belief in our bodily autonomy.
Marlen Harrison·
All ContentAutoethnographic Art & MultimediaClimate Change Special Issue, 2022InterviewsMorePodcastsSpecial Issues
··15 min read"Award-winning artist, Suzanne Hughes, talks about autoethnography and painting. Suzanne is responsible for the cover art for our special issue based on climate change."
NEWS, INTERVIEWS & REVIEWS
"Editor Guillermo Gil reviews Renata Harden Ferdinand's An Autoethnography of African American Motherhood: Things I Tell my Daughter."
"The AutoEthnographer is hiring paid interns! A federally recognized 501(c)(3), we're looking for a Social Media Editor and a Layout and Design Editor."
In The AutoEthnographer’s latest podcast, Marlen Harrison talks with Sandra Faulkner about collage and visual poetry.
SPECIAL ISSUES
EDUCATION, INTERVIEWS, PODCASTS, & REVIEWS
REFLECTIONS ON METHOD
