week1

In this week’s blog, I’ll explore some of these issues.

  • To what extent do artists engage with this story telling format?

After reading relevant materials, I feel that the participation of artists in auto-ethnography is about 50%. I am not sure whether this degree is correct. This can be seen in the definition of ego ethnography. “Auto ethnography is research, writing, stories, and methods, and it acts as a bridge between the font and the individual and the cultural, social, and political. Its form includes dialogue, scene, characterization and so on.” (Patricia Lina Leavy and Press, 2015) Like Jonathan Wyatt’s self-ethnographic short story about death, the story is not only about death, family, time, but also about connection with the audience. This makes me feel that self-ethnography is a good way for artists to connect with audiences, and the degree of participation of artists depends on the artists themselves. However, there is no denying that the works of ego ethnography are created by people and not just recorded.

  • Are artists more likely to write using autobiographical or fictional narrators?

Although different research perspectives have their own advantages, I guess artists are more likely to use fictional narrators. This is because Leavy (2015) points out that ethnographers (and self-ethnographers) may turn to fiction for a variety of reasons, and the practice of engaging in fictional ethnography differs from traditional ethnography and fiction. And the fictional form can make the reader think. Jessica Smart Gullion, for example, has turned her research into a novel. Taking the novel as a means, the content of the novel not only combines its own research results but also stimulates people’s reflection on a certain issue to some extent. As Primo Levi said, fictional characters are never entirely real or entirely fictional.  (Franklin, 2010)  As a result, it seems to me that artists are perhaps more inclined to fictional narrators.

 

Reference

Franklin, R. (2010). A Thousand Darknesses: Lies and Truth in Holocaust Fiction. [online] Google Books. Oxford University Press. Available at: https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=zh-CN&lr=&id=B5RoAgAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&dq=Franklin [Accessed 22 Jan. 2023].

Leavy, P 2015, Method Meets Art, Second Edition : Arts-Based Research Practice, Guilford Publications, New York. Available from: ProQuest Ebook Central. [22 January 2023].

 

 

 

 

 

 

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