Leaving the chasm behind? Autoethnography, creativity and the search for identity in academia

Atherton, P (2022) Leaving the chasm behind? Autoethnography, creativity and the search for identity in academia. PRISM. ISSN 2514-5347

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Abstract

This paper examines visual narratology as a way of presenting qualitative primary data. The paper is an autoethnographic study with the overall goal of helping teacher educators understand their digital literacies in a time of uncertainty and flux. The researcher deployed thematic analysis as the organising methodological framework. This performative autoethnographic method provided creative freedom and the satisfaction of a renewed perspective for the author (Jay and Johnson 2002). This primary qualitative data was given legitimacy and structure by the use of thematic analysis as a methodology. The findings support Bochner’s (1994) idea that social science research can benefit from deliberately value-laden stories alongside empirical data and theories. The findings also developed the author’s previous autoethnographic paper, which drew on his own social media posts as qualitative and quantitative data Author (2020). The paper also built on the notion of digital literacy as an interaction between skills, practices and identity (Clark 2020). The study helped the author understand his own subject position. The most likely contribution of this study could be in amplifying the individual voices of those telling their stories with creative freedom, in order to enrich our collective body of academic knowledge (Fuchs, 2017). In terms of limitations, reflexive thematic analysis could risk an unfocused set of generalisations and an ‘interpretive understanding’ (Denzin and Lincoln, 2011. pp366).

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	autoethnography; higher education; teacher education; thematic analysis
Subjects:	L Education > L Education (General)
Divisions:	Education
Publisher:	Liverpool John Moores University
Date of acceptance:	14 February 2022
Date of first compliant Open Access:	12 July 2022
Date Deposited:	26 Jan 2022 12:02
Last Modified:	18 Nov 2022 11:36
DOI or ID number:	10.24377/prism.ljmu.0402212
URI:	https://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/id/eprint/16158

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