2.2 Research methodology
2.2.1 Autoethnography: a self-study?
In the early stages of the conceptualisation of my study, I was very keen to pursue the research tradition referred to as self-study, which is a look at the self. Hamilton and Pinnegar (1998) define it as “the study of one’s self, one’s actions, one’s ideas as well as the ‘not self”’” (p. 236). Self- study is related to the idea of studying the self in a specific activity, usually in an educational practice (Khau & Pithouse, 2008; Loughran & Russell, 2002; Pithouse, Mitchell & Moletsane, 2009).
Autoethnography, on the other hand, is an emerging genre, with evocative or emotional autoethnography being in the mainstream. Scholars argue for the need to change the world by writing from the heart. Autoethnography is described as a highly personalised account in which the author draws on his or her own experience to extend understanding of a particular discipline or culture (Chang, 2008; Ellis, 2003; Holt, 2003). Evocative autoethnography, in particular, involves considerable narrative skills that may be expressed in prose, poetry and performances.
Ellis and Bochner (2000) assert that autoethnography is a rather personal style of research characterised by ‘confessional tales’ that do not figure in more conventional styles of academic writing. Ellis’s (2000, p. xix) description of autoethnography provides a clear summing up when she explains that it is
research, writing, story and method that connect the autobiographical and personal to the cultural, social and political. Its forms feature concrete action, emotion, embodiment, self-consciousness and introspection that is portrayed in dialogue, scenes, characterization and plot. Thus it claims the conventions of literary writing.
It is argued that autoethnography can, however, have different meanings for different people (Ellis, 2003; Ellis, Adams & Bochner, 2011).Some describe it as personalised research; others describe it as a study of the self within a larger socio-cultural context and emphasise that when researchers do autoethnography, they retrospectively and selectively write about epiphanies that stem from, or are made possible by, being part of a culture or by possessing a particular cultural identity.
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Duarte (2007) explains further that autoethnographic writing begins with a descriptive narrative of events and activities that unfold within a particular culture. It then develops into a reflective analysis of these events and activities to generate new insights and to enhance the researcher’s sensitivity towards the knowledge that he or she gained in the process. Hence, autoethnography allows a researcher to return to a story that has already happened and to rearrange elements of the story in order for them to make sense. It is contended that the autoethnographic method enables the researcher to journey back in time to recollect lived past experiences that shaped his or her life and destiny, and to share these experiences with an audience (Autrey, 2003; Eisner, 1997).
In a South African study, Grossi (2006) used autoethnography very effectively to examine her life as a teacher in a career that spanned a period of 41 years. Her study is a reflective analysis of her life and the multiple intersecting paths on which she journeyed. Through her successful use of this methodology she argues that more teachers should tell their stories, especially teachers with different cultural identities. She recommends that autoethnography as a method be incorporated into pre-service training for educators. Hendry (2008) used autoethnography effectively to chronicle his own experiences as a principal in the United States of America. He provides a highly personalised account of the complexities, interpretations and reflections of a principal who moved from one elementary school to another elementary school. This illustrates to me that autoethnography has the potential to research the shifting aspects of self, and creates ways to write about experiences in a broader social context.
At some stage early in my research, I was confronted with the pertinent question of whether autoethnography was indeed a self-study. Hamilton, Smith & Worthington (2008) describe self- study as a look at the self in action and outline three specific characteristics: self; practice and context. They further point out five essential elements that must be prevalent: autoethnography must be self-initiated, focus on the self, be reflexive, be improvement-based and be qualitative in nature.
These characteristics are prevalent in autoethnography primarily because there is a focus on ‘I’, there is a ‘context’, it is ‘reflexive’ and it is a ‘qualitative study’. However, I was inclined to agree with scholars who argue that the most clearly distinguishable characteristic of autoethnography is that it has an easily identifiable cultural component. It is this essential cultural component that distinguishes self-study and autoethnography (Chang 2008; Ellis, 2003; Hamilton et al., 2008).
Proponents of autoethnography emphasise that autoethnography can be used effectively to write about the personal and its relationship to culture. They postulate that autoethnography refers to
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stories that feature the self or include the researcher as a character, but the distinguishing characteristic is that it must have an easily identifiable cultural component. In addition, autoethnography must combine cultural analysis and interpretation with narrative details (Ellis, 2003; Ellis & Bochner, 2000). Chang (2008) advocates that the “stories of autoethnographers be reflected upon, analysed and interpreted within the broader sociocultural context” (p. 4).
My interaction with literature has led me to understand that in a self-study the ‘I’ is an ‘actioned’
one, but in autoethnography it is a cultural ‘I’. Hence, in self-study one studies the self in action, and in autoethnography one studies the self within a larger sociocultural context. A study will not be classified as autoethnography if there is no cultural component.
It is against these arguments that autoethnography became my preferred methodological choice because I viewed autoethnography as a self-study with a strong sociocultural component. Ellis et al., (2011) propose that an autoethnographer must use personal experience to illustrate facets of cultural experience, and in so doing make the characteristics of a culture familiar for insiders and outsiders. I therefore chose to use autoethnography to examine my lived experience as a principal within the unique socio-cultural context of Hilltop School for the Deaf. Furthermore, I was drawn to this method as it not only situates the self within the context of a culture, sub- culture or group, but it also enables one to study one’s experiences and the experiences of others within the group.
Most crucial to my research interest is the fact that this method has enabled me to write reflexively, and be explicit about my social position and its location in time and space (Richardson, 2000). Duarte (2007) and Ellis (2003) argue that writing reflexively requires that the researcher’s whole being (intellectual, emotional and spiritual) be present in the research process and that reflexive ethnographers use all their senses, use the ‘self’ to learn about the other, and “use their experiences in the world of others to reflect critically on their own” (Ellis, 2003, p. 48). McIlveen (2008) emphasises that autoethnography is a method that enables the researcher and practitioner to operationalise the notion of critical consciousness. It is this reflexivity that entails an awareness of reciprocal influences between the researchers, their settings and research participants. More importantly, it involves self-conscious introspection with the objective of gaining an understanding of both self and others through examining actions, beliefs and perceptions (Anderson, 2006).
It is also emphasised that autoethnography is a reflexive means by which the researcher- practitioner consciously embeds himself or herself amidst theory and practice and by giving an
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explicit autobiographic account, exposes a phenomenon under investigation or intervention (McIlveen, 2008). Toney (2011) argues that an important issue is that “unlike ethnography where the researcher becomes a disembodied, sometimes omniscient, overseer of the experiences of the researched, autoethnography is first-person and researcher embodied” (p. 2).
My reading of literature points out that there are other emerging visions of what autoethnography can be. Atkinson, Coffey & Delamont (2003) and Anderson (2006) critically examine new forms of inquiry and practice to assess their potential value for improving and expanding the analytic ethnographic craft. A point of contestation within autoethnography is the fact that it embraces subjectivity and has an emotional dimension. In order to counter this criticism, scholars place emphasis on the analytical dimension (Anderson 2006; Atkinson et al., 2003). Anderson (2006) introduces a new version of autoethnography, which he calls analytic autoethnography. From the analytical perspective Anderson maintains that subjectivity and the emotional dimension can be counteracted. This analytical goal can enable the theorisation of experiences that will subsequently eliminate subjectivity. Anderson (2006) proposes strategies in support of analytical autoethnography. These include inter alia, analysing data reflexively, the researcher declaring the ‘self’ in the research, and extending conversation with others beyond the self.
The literature suggests that performative and political autoethnography are part of the emerging ideas in this genre (Spry, 2001; Denzin, 2006). Performance autoethnography is a form of moral discourse and a defining feature of autoethnographic performance is interpreting culture through self-reflections and cultural refractions of identity. Scholars argue that autoethnography is not an innocent research practice but is performative, pedagogical and political. Analytical autoethnography, however, has the advantage of making one acutely conscious of how one witnesses one’s own reality constructions (Spry, 2001; Denzin, 2006).
I therefore embraced all these emerging variations so that I could use academic rigour to engage in a thorough self-examination in my cultural context, by combining cultural analysis and interpretation with narrative details (Chang, 2008). Through my autoethnographic study I relived and traversed my journey as a school principal from the day I took on the role. Autoethnography has thus enabled me to theorise my life.
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