Article by Ellis, Adams and Bochner

Autoethnography: An Overview¹⁾

Carolyn Ellis, Tony E. Adams & Arthur P. Bochner

http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/1589/3095

This summarises well what auto ethnography is all about.

“Autoethnography is an approach to research and writing that seeks to describe and systematically analyze (graphy) personal experience (auto) in order to understand cultural experience (ethno) (ELLIS, 2004; HOLMAN JONES, 2005).”

What makes it special?

“Autoethnographers must not only use their methodological tools and research literature to analyze experience, but also must consider ways others may experience similar epiphanies; they must use personal experience to illustrate facets of cultural experience, and, in so doing, make characteristics of a culture familiar for insiders and outsiders.”

…

“When researchers write autoethnographies, they seek to produce aesthetic and evocative thick descriptions of personal and interpersonal experience. They accomplish this by first discerning patterns of cultural experience evidenced by field notes, interviews, and/or artifacts, and then describing these patterns using facets of storytelling (e.g., character and plot development), showing and telling, and alterations of authorial voice.”

Generalizability

“In autoethnography, the focus of generalizability moves from respondents to readers, and is always being tested by readers as they determine if a story speaks to them about their experience or about the lives of others they know; it is determined by whether the (specific) autoethnographer is able to illuminate (general) unfamiliar cultural processes (ELLIS & BOCHNER, 2000; ELLIS & ELLINGSON, 2000).”

Unique story

The Sage Handbook of Visual Research Methods

The Photo Diary as autoethnographic method p.245

By Eric Margolis & Luc Pauwels

“An autoethnographic account tells a ‘unique’ story (to a unique reader), whereas social science theory has had generalization as its end goal.”

Helpful youtube videos

Making the case for Autoethnography

Interesting lecture of auto ethnography. I admit I skipped to 50 mins to get to the actual auto ethnography content.

This makes me wonder if you actually cannot use the traditional format of introduction, discussion and results. Would it be bad auto ethnography if you applied a bit of structure to it? Though I have no objections of resigning from that format. I just have to hope the conference review board understand auto ethnography.

Autoethnography: Possibility and Controversy

At 25:53 mins the video talks about Evocative and analytic auto ethnography. I have been more interested in the evocative auto ethnography but I am not sure how well it fits my purposes.

Notes: The Ethnographic I, Carolyn Ellis

Autoethnographic writing starts with personal life and pays attention to the researcher’s physical feelings, thoughts and emotions.

Autoethnography uses systematic sociological introspection and emotional recall to understand the experience.

Then the experience is written as a story.

-preface XVII

“These writers want readers to be able to put themselves in the place of others, within a culture of experience that enlarges their social awareness and empathy. Their goals include:

• one, evoking emotional experience in readers;
• two, giving voice to stories and groups of people traditionally left out of social science inquiry;
• three, producing writing of high literary/artstic quality;
• and four, improving readers’, participants’ and authors’ lives.” (bullet points added for clarity)

-page 30

“The goal is to practise an artful, poetic and empathic social science in which readers can keep in their minds and feel in their bodies the complexities of concrete moments of lived experience.”

-page 30

“The author usually writes in the first person, making herself or himself the object of research.”

-page 31

“The story often discloses hidden details of private life and highlights emotional experience.”

-page 31

Narrative truth = experiences depicted become believable, lifelike and possible.

-page 31

As a form of ethnography, auto ethnography overlaps art and science.

-page 31

Stories are the way people make sense of the world.

-page 32

Autoethnography refers to writing about the personal and its relationship to culture. It is an autobiographical genre of writing and research that displays multiple layers of consciousness. (Ellis after Dumon 1978, 3, 200)

-page 32

“First they look trough an ethnographic wide angle lens, focusing on social and cultural aspects of their personal experience; then they look inward, exposing a vulnerable self that is moved by and may move trough, refract, and resist cultural interpretations.”

-page 32

How to take retrospective field notes:

• Write  notes on what you remember
• put the notes down and fill in more memories later

-page 117

In field notes you try to fill in as much information as possible. When you start writing the story you limit the information.

-page 117

“Events in the past are interpreted from our current position.”

-page 117

VALIDITY in autoethnographic work = the work evokes in readers a feeling that the experience described is life like, believable and possible.

-page 124

“You can also judge validity by wether it helps communicate with others different themselves or offers a way to improve the lives of participants and readers -or even your own.”

instead of the factual truth, the truth of experience

“What matters is the way in which the story enables the reader to enter the subjective world of the teller -to see the world from her or his point of view, even if this world does not mach reality.”

-page 125-126

Think about re-creating emotions and dialogue rather than remembering it. Just sit down and create a scene that could have happened and see what flashes back. Use everything you do remember, the bits and pieces of words, and fill in the emotions until they feel authentic.

-page 161

“Story’s generalizability is always being tested…by readers as they determine if a story speaks to them about their experience or about the lives of others they know.

-page 195

 

AutoethnoGRAPHIC novel?

I have been reading The Ethnographic I: A Methodological Novel about Autoethnography (Ethnographic Alternatives) by Carolyn Ellis. I’m sold. I love this research method! 

It crossed my mind that if the purpose of this kind of research is to tell stories to bring the emotions and personal experiences tangible ,then what would be a better form than a comic?

I would be so interested in making this thesis in comic form. There is a risk that the form would draw attention from the content though. Still, I am tossing this idea. I’m not at all sure however wether this topic translates well to a graphical form. I mean it’s pretty boring thing in the end when someone is drawing. But if I’d draw a bit of my experiences in Ghana it might be a bit more interesting.

Here is what I’m gonna do: I will continue as if I’m just doing a regular form thesis, but I will also keep in mind the comic. At the point where I am to form the story I will try if I can use the comic format. If it appears boring or distracting, I will leave it there.

Examples of the format:

http://www.utpteachingculture.com/announcing-ethnographic-a-new-series/

https://anthrocomics.wordpress.com/comics-anthropology/

From anthrocomics.wordpress.com

https://comicsforum.org/2012/02/03/anthropology-goes-comics-by-hannah-wadle/

Linked to the topic is visual autoethnography:

https://books.google.fi/books?id=AcBsjtkmPWkC&pg=PA244&lpg=PA244&dq=visual+autoethnography&source=bl&ots=rO4Qh9PQYE&sig=4nbDyDhxyn8ZqsHkNm9AEahP5mk&hl=fi&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiQ-YTuh-rQAhXGWCwKHei9BlYQ6AEILzAC#v=onepage&q=visual%20autoethnography&f=false

Methods

I am going to do a literary review to find out more about stereotypes of Africans.

Then I’m going to analyze illustration samples from the micro stocks to find out what kind of imagery they provide about Africans.

I would then reach out for new kind of ways to represent Africanism by using innovation methods. I will produce cultural probes to gather inspiring returns. I would then use different material approaches (thumbnails, sketches, mood boards etc.) as I see appropriate. My goal is to create designs that are thought provoking, and not necessarily ready commercially suitable products.

In the end I would go back to my findings from the data comparing it to my designs to see whether I have managed to create anything new and different.

Cultural Probes

I came trought this method in our course book Design Research Through Practice, From the Lab, Field, and Showroom, Koskinen   &    Zimmerman   &    Binder   &   Redstrom   &    Wensveen, 2011.

Cultural probes or Design Probes (Im not very sure what is the difference) are materials sent to a target group to bring inspirational information about themselves to the researchers. Common probes are disposable cameras and journals.

Here is a nice little summary of what it is all about:

http://www.doctordisruption.com/design/design-methods-36-cultural-probes/

Sounds like a very interesting method. I don’t think I would be able to apply it to this study though. Or maybe hmm… Say I would give some people of african origin a note book to portray themselves, their dream me and how they would hate to be seen portrayed. This could then act as a source of inspiration.

This is actually so interesting I could easily go over the board and plan my study subject to fit the method instead of planning the method to fit my subject.Well I come back to this later if I find this beneficial. Im surely going to use this in another project, if not for my thesis.

On the other hand this could be a very good thing. If I would attempt  base my designs to solely the data I get from my research of existing illustrations, I would have to use methods of RATIONAL design, which I detest. I don’t find rational design really helpful for real world problems. The cultural probes method could add creativity to my practical work while still binding it somewhat to the world around me and not just my personal likes and dislikes. Hmm… I think I have to let this one brew a bit. Not bad not bad at all…

When I have time I will read these studies:

• Design probes – Muotoiluluotaimet, Mattelmäki, Tuuli, 2006, Aalto University, Dedartment of Design
  • https://aaltodoc.aalto.fi/bitstream/handle/123456789/11829/isbn9515582121.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
• Design probes for happiness, Borole, Rashmi, 2014, Aalto University, Dedartment of Design
  
  • https://aaltodoc.aalto.fi/handle/123456789/14471
    

• Elizabeth B.-N. Sanders & Pieter Jan Stappers (2014) Probes, toolkits and prototypes: three approaches to making in codesigning, CoDesign, 10:1, 5-14, DOI: 10.1080/15710882.2014.888183
  • http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15710882.2014.888183