Autoethnographers as Freedom-Writers?

Abstract

In this reaction to the attack on Sir Salman Rushdie in August 2022 I suggest that he and several other writers represent powerful role-models for autoethnographers who also aspire to be freedom-writers. Some of those I reference include Nobel prize-winners such as Orhan Pamuk and Annie Ernaux as well as other literary and political figures such as Maya Angelou, Elena Ferrante, James Joyce, and George Orwell. I then turn to Norman Denzin, recently honored in a warm festschrift, as a prime exemplar of an academic autoethnographer whose work has encouraged others to become their own kind of freedom-writer.