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autoethnographer: one who uses lived experience as evidence with which to explore cultural phenomena.
FROM OUR ARCHIVES
This writing is based on storytelling, common in Mexican culture.
I share the complexity of my frustration about a failed site visit to the British Museum and wonder about the meaning of the experience.
J. Sumerau·
All ContentAutoethnographic Flash NonfictionAutoethnographic Literary FictionVolume 3, Issue 4 (2023)
··19 min readThis short story about a night in a shed is an attempt to encourage any reader to think about the stories that circulate within communities.
Ash Watson·
All ContentAutoethnographic EssaysCelebrating Dr. Patricia Leavy's Social Fiction 2024Special Issues
··13 min readLeavy’s 2019 novel about a week-long all-inclusive Icelandic research seminar wends its way through meetings, planning sessions, excursions, debates and dinners to the heart of the paradigms and epistemological questions that structure and drive scholarly research.
Catholic Boy Fights the Devil in the Mohawk River Valley is a short story that’s set in upstate New York during World War II. At a time when America was fighting fascist devils abroad, many were struggling with the devil’s influence at home.
U. Melissa Anyiwo·
All ContentAutoethnographic EssaysCelebrating Dr. Patricia Leavy's Social Fiction 2024MoreReflections on MethodSpecial Issues
··31 min readThis piece is intended to give you a sense of the ways in which I use Low-Fat Love in the classroom and why just using it makes the world a better place.
In Breaking Free: Reclaiming Authenticity in a Capitalist World, I reveal how I overcame my mental health challenges and reconnected with my true self discovering the benefits of holistic therapies and shamanic healing.
You’re Still Here: Art and Grief in Autoethnographic Textiles Artist’s Memo You’re...
In the autoethnographic "Spinach Lasagna", the narrator joins a family of southern Italians and learns that grieving is cultural.
"My poems are not entirely mine. They belong to the people and events of my passage through life. For once the dam is breached its contents flow unabridged. - Milton Carp, poet at 91"
In this new issue from The AutoEthnographer, we introduce new features such as book reviews and autoethnographic art.
Dilek Isler Hayirli·
All ContentAutoethnographic Art & MultimediaEducationFrom the EditorsMoreReflections on MethodVolume 2, Issue 3 (2022)
··13 min read"I had not been aware that this emotional research was also performing autoethnography, collecting memories from the field"
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
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.
U. Melissa Anyiwo·
All ContentAutoethnographic EssaysCelebrating Dr. Patricia Leavy's Social Fiction 2024MoreReflections on MethodSpecial Issues
··31 min readThis piece is intended to give you a sense of the ways in which I use Low-Fat Love in the classroom and why just using it makes the world a better place.
This work shows that the benefits of reading multiple texts, each from a different perspective provides opportunities for students.
AUTOETHNOGRAPHIC MULTIMEDIA
"In the newest video from The Twerking Academic, I explore how the summer of 2020 slammed me back into an awareness of my own double consciousness as a Black American."
"I'm not exactly sure when I decided to make a performance piece about my sister's traumatic brain injury and death. In fact, I'm not sure there ever was a single moment of decision. Her story had become public in many ways, from online care sites to prayer chains to social media posts from family and friends. Her story was being performed out in the world before I started telling it."
”I share this artistic piece as an invitation to problematise and think further about not only the Autoethnographic “I/We” in what I/we can know about ourselves and our bodies but also to make space for the incoherence that becomes a part of “being” and “knowing” in explorations of fragmentation and loss.”
"Damned," the first publication in The AutoEthnographer's Bodily Autonomy issue, is the product of my confused reflection and internal conversations with the culture that raised me."
When Whistles Melt into Beeps: Four Poems for AutoEthnographer Author’s Memo I approach poetry as a vessel to...
The poems in this collection are a reflection on my zero waste aspirations (and the values behind the movement at large).
"One way to reach broader audiences is to embrace creative nonfiction and use storytelling as academic writing."
"'SEE ME, Windows to the Self of the Performer-Autoethnographer' explores the question, 'What can I learn about myself by making artwork as autoethnography'?
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."
Catherine Berresheim·
All ContentAutoethnographic Literary NonfictionAutoethnographic WritingBodily Autonomy Special Issue, 2022-23Special Issues
··14 min readLEARN MORE “Bodily Autonomy: A Fetus for a Fetus” explores the cultural issues of what it means to...
Alexandra Lasczik·
All ContentAutoethnographic EssaysCelebrating Dr. Patricia Leavy's Social Fiction 2024Special Issues
··20 min readPatricia Leavy is a genuine trailblazer, the real deal, an inspiration.
"This poem is rumination on how the personal experience of volunteering in never-before-seen flood relief efforts in the remote north reinforces the research that 'many of the changes observed in the climate are unprecedented in thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of years.'"
NEWS, INTERVIEWS & REVIEWS
"This journal is the culmination of my life’s work as a writing teacher, writer, and farmer. In the pages of this journal, you will find coverage for everything from raising chickens to jam recipes to poetry about farming and Nature."
"The AutoEthnographer is committed to diversity, equity, & inclusion in its administration; support of emerging authors and artists; & celebration of creative expression as a vehicle for shared understanding & positive change."
Narrating Estrangement is written by those who have decided to distance themselves from, or have been driven out by, their families.
SPECIAL ISSUES
EDUCATION, INTERVIEWS, PODCASTS, & REVIEWS
REFLECTIONS ON METHOD
