Why Autoethnography?

Abstract

Autoethnography addresses the need and desire to make the human sciences more human by writing in ways that are more poignant, touching, vulnerable, and heartfelt. Since social work is a field not only of facts but also of meanings and values, researchers should not be obliged to cling to a narrow range of methodologies and writing genres that may be scientifically acceptable but poorly suited to the broad objectives of the field. Concerned more with evocation than information, autoethnography enables researchers and practitioners to address what it feels like, and what it can mean, to be alive and living in a chaotic and uncertain world, and to show others how they might endure it and move forward. As we developed evocative autoethnography, we not only questioned the boundaries between social sciences and humanities, we tried to stretch and cross them in ways that would create new practitioners and new genres for representing lived experience appealing to the hearts and senses of readers as well as their intellects.