Teaching Autoethnography: Personal Writing in the Classroom, Paperback

Teaching Autoethnography: Personal Writing in the Classroom is dedicated to the practice of immersive ethnographic and autoethnographic writing that encourages authors to participate in the communities about which they write. This book draws not only on critical qualitative inquiry methods such as interview and observation, but also on theories and sensibilities from creative writing and performance studies, which encourage self-reflection and narrative composition. Concepts from qualitative inquiry studies, which examine everyday life, are combined with approaches to the creation of character and scene to help writers develop engaging narratives that examine chosen subcultures and the author's position in relation to her research subjects. The book brings together a brief history of first-person qualitative research and writing from the past forty years, examining the evolution of nonfiction and qualitative approaches in relation to the personal essay. A selection of recent student writing in the genre as well as reflective student essays on the experience of conducting research in the classroom is presented in the context of exercises for coursework and beyond. Also explored in detail are guidelines for interviewing and identifying subjects and techniques for creating informed sketches and images that engage the reader. This book provides approaches anyone can use to explore their communities and write about them first-hand. The methods presented can be used for a single assignment in a larger course or to guide an entire semester through many levels and varieties of informed personal writing.

About the Author:

Dr. Melissa Tombro is an Associate Professor of writing and literature in the English and Communication Studies Department at FIT. She received her PhD in English from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign where her research focused on the use of qualitative inquiry and personal writing in the English classroom. Dr. Tombro is the author of Teaching Autoethnography: Personal Writing in the Classroom published through Open SUNY Textbooks. Her creative writing has appeared in Litro, Eclectica, StepAway Magazine, and Crack the Spine. She is the recipient of the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching for her work at FIT in a wide range of courses from Creative Nonfiction to Theatre Arts. In 2015 she created the Women and Gender Studies minor at FIT and serves as its coordinator. Outside of FIT she runs volunteer writing workshops for at-risk and underserved populations through the New York Writers Coalition. In her writing, teaching and volunteer work, she encourages other writers to use self-reflection and community engagement as a way to create meaningful, informed, and inspiring prose.