English
中文Within this essay I aim to explore a number of issues central to writing autobiographical or biographical narratives in relation to the self and society, and the relationship between the two. In order for this essay to explore these issues it is important to firstly outline what is meant by autobiography and biography. I will then briefly outline what is meant by ‘the personal’ and ‘the social’ and then the relationship between the two is going to be explored throughout this essay. I will then outline which type of narrative (autobiography or biography) I have chosen and outline the case study I have chosen to explore. This essay will then go on to briefly outline the methods chosen for gathering this data. Finally, before concluding this essay, I am going to critically engage with three types of social categories: gender, sexuality and class, in relation to the dialogues I will outline. Within this critical engagement it is important to note that I have decided to use the interweaving method of auto/biographical writing (A+B+A+B+A+B) where primary data and secondary data will develop a thesis and antithesis of knowledge and exploration.
The primary, and essentialist, difference between an autobiography and a biography is that the former is about yourself (narrated and written by you) and the latter is about someone else (narrated by this other person but not written by them).
‘They [both] tend to begin with the characteristics of the person (biological attributes, aspects of information processing, or features of consciousness) and work outwards from that point’ (Wetherall and Maybin, 1996: 220).
I have decided to carryout a biography of my friend Dina (her name has been changed for confidentiality purposes). I have chosen to do this for a number of reasons. Firstly, I felt that an autobiography would be much more problematic than a biography due to the subjective position of the researcher and writer, as well as the gaining and telling of these narratives (Plummer, 1995: 19). Secondly, I feel that my friend, Dina, is a very interesting person, therefore allowing me to be selective over an abundant amount of information that she has narrated to me. Thirdly, when carrying out any primary research it is essential to gain the participants consent, of which Dina was willing to give (Bryman, 2004: 511 – 513; May, 2001).
Before this essay develops it is important to outline a few basic facts about the participant. Dina is 24 years old, female and a lesbian. She works as a researcher for a local voluntary group. In her spare time she is very active, social and enjoys reading. Dina grew up in the care system and as such does not have any family members, other than close friends (this issue will be explored later on in this essay).
In relation to Dina’s narrative and the social categories which she has chosen to use: gender, sexuality and class, I am now going to explore the role of the personal and the social within this context. The personal relates to the personal narrative or account, as outlined by the participant, of their sense of self and of their identity. The social, however, relates to the social categories and discourses that are placed upon the participant’s identity through institutionalization and socialization (or within which we choose to define). A good example of this is the way that the holding of hands has been explored within Goffman’s (1969: 228 – 229) work.
I decided to use basic interview techniques to engage with the participant about their life story. Within this I decided not to use a structured interview (where there are set questions and there is no deviation from those questions) nor an unstructured interview (where there is an overall issue that you want to discuss but no more guidance or structure than this), but a semi-structured interview (where there were five or so set questions but I was not tied to them and allowed other issues to be explored) (Bryman, 2004: Chapter 15). I carried out this interview in a small room that was neutral (neither her house nor mine) and gained consent for the interview to be recorded on tape. I also felt that it was ethically important to inform the participant of my project (aims, objectives, position and what I would be using the data for), as well as reassure them that their identity would be anonymous and their information confidential (Bryman, 2004: 329). We also discussed the fact that she would be allowed to read the essay before I submitted it to ensure that she was happy with everything that I had written.
Within the next sections of this essay I am going to explore Dina’s biography by using sentences, paragraphs and dialogue that I have transcribed from the tape, then explore these using literature and critical engagement. It is worth noting here, however, that I am not critically engaging with Dina’s narrative, as her sense of truth should not be questioned, but instead I am going to engage with the discourses and social constructs she has used to identify with (and those she has not) (Rabinow, 1991).
ME: “Now you have told me a bit about yourself can you explain why you identify as a female, as opposed to any other category?”
DINA: “My gender… that’s an interesting one. Having read a lot of literature about the feminist movement I feel that I know a lot about this subject and I ask myself the same question you have just asked me all the time. [Silence] Well I think I kind of believe that I should say I am female because I look female. But I also know that looking doesn’t automatically make you what you are or acceptable to how others want to categorize you.”
ME: “So what does being female mean to you? Why do you use the term ‘female’?”
DINA: “Being female is about how I feel and how I choose to identify. It all comes down to choice. If I wanted to say I was a man then I could even though a lot of people would disagree with me.”
This is Dina’s personal account of her gendered identity. The social issues covered in this account relate to both language and discourse. Discourses are what Michel Foucault (1926 – 1984) called issues, topics or subjects that have gained depth and validity over history. We use discourses as a way of identifying our self within the social world and in relation to others (see the example of the snooker ball given by Wetherall and Maybin, 1996: 221). Ascribing to social categories (or being placed in social categories by others) such as gender, age and sexuality are ways of doing this. We also use language to represent our interactions with each other and understand the world we are in. Thus meaning that the language of ‘male’ and ‘female’ is predetermined and we are socialized into using these categories as reference points and markers of identity. The relationship between the personal and social within this biography therefore relate to how the participant has used discourses and certain language to describe her personal identity (a female gender). Within this discussion, however, there are two further issues that Dina has raised: aesthetic gender and socialized gender. The first relates to gender that is assigned to someone (or claimed by someone) because of the way that they look. Alsop, Fitzsimons and Lennon (2002) explore within their book Theorizing Gender that there are many ways that people are gendered – through biology, through social constructionism and through the psyche. People are socially constructed (socialized) into visually seeing gender. Symbolic pointers include long hair, make up and skirts for women and trousers, a beard and a deep voice for men. As Burr (1995) points out, however,
‘There is no single description, which would be adequate for all the different kinds of writers who I shall refer to as social constructionist… [However] social constructionism insists that we take a critical stance toward our taken-for-granted ways of looking at the world, including ourselves. It invites us to be critical of the idea that our observations of the world unproblematically yield its nature to us, to challenge the view that conventional knowledge is based upon objective, unbiased observation of the world’ (Burr, 1995: 2 – 3).
Wetherall and Maybin (1996: 220) would also state that
‘… the social constructionist view of the self [is] continually shaped and reshaped through interactions with others and their involvement in social and cultural activities.’
These quotes bring in this essays next point about socialized gender. The way our world is constructed is based on what some scientists would call objective truths – things we take for granted and don’t question. For example, objective truths might include: that humans are more intelligent that animals, that the sun will always shine and that men are men and women are women. All these ‘truths’ are questionable and need to be questioned within the social sciences (as well as other ‘sciences’ but also by society as a whole). Within autobiographies and biographies, however, these discourses and uses of language need to be used in order for people to be able to interact with them and relate to them in relation to the social (society) and the personal as a representation of the social (Goffman, 1969: 238).
The next issue that this essay is going to explore is that of sexuality. First, this essay is going to relate the interview conversation we had about this issue then critically engage with what was relayed using relevant literature.
ME: “At the beginning of these discussions you stated that you identified as a lesbian. Can we explore that in more depth?”
DINA: “Sure. What do you want to know?”
ME: “I don’t really want to know anything in particular. Just tell me about your sexuality. What does it mean to you to identify as a lesbian? Have you got any stories or encounters you would like to discuss?”
DINA: “OK. Being a lesbian for me simply means being sexually attracted to other women. I do, however, feel pressurized by some members of the heterosexual community to not have this sexual attraction towards women but to be sexually attracted towards men. This makes me angry on some levels but I know that it’s just because of their ignorance or the fear of something different than how they choose to define.”
ME: “How else does this make you feel?”
DINA: “I just ignore it now. I don’t think they often think about what they are saying like it is ingrained in them not to like gay people. I also feel pressure from the lesbian community though.”
ME: “How?”
DINA: “I feel that I should not have heterosexuals as friends and that I should be more political otherwise they might think I’m not a real lesbian. I think, from the literature that I have read, that this stems from the political lesbianism from the 1960’s when lesbianism meant that you were against men and against patriarchy.”
The two main issues that have been raised in this section of Dina’s biography are: firstly, how we are all socialized into heterosexuality (or homosexuality) and, secondly, the simplification of what lesbianism means. The personal issue of sexuality, as relayed by Dina, also has social implications. To explore the first issue it is important to acknowledge that within current (and historical) literature, heterosexuals have long been stereotyped as being socialized into a discourse of homophobia and heterosexism, as well as patriarchy (Alsop et al, 2002: Introduction). This means that the personal and social implications of Dina’s identity have been developed and defined in relation to the experiences of homophobia and heterosexism that she has encountered (either personally or through the media/literature etc). To embrace the second issue, however, it must be stated that the lesbian community, also have their own discourses of which they ascribe to (see the reference to the closet in Plummer, 1995: 27; Rabinow, 1991). We can see some of these issues outlined in the section of narrative relayed above. Dina feels ‘pressure’ from both the straight and gay community to ascribe to certain discourses and the ‘playing out’ (Goffman’s (1969: 238) notion of a front stage and a back stage) of these identities. The language used: lesbian, community and sexual attraction, all have meanings within which we are socialized into understanding and therefore enable us to interact with each other (see discussion outlined above relating to gender). The relationship between the personal and the social is implicitly complex due to the nature of subjectivity, socialization, language and discourse.
The final issue to be explored is that of class (it must be noted , however, that although Dina does not believe in a class system I have placed the issues that she has raised into this context as I feel they are central to both historical and contemporary debates about class). Class is an important issue within contemporary society due to the fluidity and social mobility of ourselves as social actors, but also of literature that explores the concepts and the ever-changing notion of class (as well as the disbelief that class still exists) (within the postmodern world and within the media. See Denzin, 1991: viii).
ME: “Now we have explored the two main issues, you talked about being in care can we talk about that?”
DINA: “Yes but it’s so big and there are quite personal things I don’t want to talk about.”
ME: “Yes. I understand that. Can we talk about it in relation to class? I mean in relation to what class you felt you belonged to then and what class you feel you belong to now. If it’s changed.”
DINA: “Well I don’t believe we have a class system anymore and even though I did sociology at university I don’t know enough literature about it.”
ME: “It doesn’t matter what literature you know. I’m only interested in how you feel about it and your own personal story”
DINA: “OK. I felt that at school the students and the teachers saw me as an underclass either not worthy of their time because I was “bound to make trouble” or as a poor orphan who didn’t have a mummy and daddy. Now I think I would be stereotyped as upper working class as I have been to university but I have a very working class job working in the voluntary and community sector. Which I love doing.”
The two main issues raised in Dina’s narrative are: (1) the doubt over whether we can possibly talk about identifying within one class or another when there are numerous questions about whether we have a class system or not, and, (2) how other people may view you and put you into one class or another. This personal account of class discussed through Dina’s narrative allows us to view a perspective of class that is personal and subjective but nevertheless real. Dina, as outlined previously, grew up in the care system which she states placed her as an ‘underclass’. This situation may place her into an ‘underclass’ category for a number of reasons: (1) lack of economic power, (2) a perceived lack of appropriate adult or moral guidance and (3) the possible lack of any schooling. Dina then states, however, that within her profession as a researcher for a local voluntary group this enables her to be placed within the ‘upper working class’ segment of the class system (allowing for social mobility). Therefore, the shift from the ‘underclass’ to the ‘upper working class’ is of great importance, as this acknowledges one of the ways that identity, the person and their biography changes throughout their life course. Although we may not consciously do so, society socially stratifies people into one ‘class’ or another. This may nor relate to Marx’s view of class (simply stratified into those that have money and property and those that do not) but a much more complex one possibly based on a Weberian view of class. Class, according to Weber, was about status and related to the activities you undertook, the people you mixed with and the job that you had (along with many other things) but not just about your economic status. The social aspect of this issue is important as this discussion supports one of the ways in which our identity is developed through class systems (Denzin, 1991: 14).
In conclusion, this essay has considered the relationship between the personal and the social through a biographical account (of my friend Dina) and has been explored and analysed with reference to appropriate theories and literature from the social sciences. In doing this I feel that this essay has been successful in producing a thesis and antithesis approach to primary knowledge and secondary data. The primary success of this dialogue was due to the research method used (semi-structured interview), as well as engagement with the literature.
This essay has also explored three main issues, gender, sexuality and class, within a biography from a personal and social perspective. This essay has successfully narrated segments of a biography (from carrying out an appropriate methodology and data collection techniques) and intertwined them with relevant literature and critical engagement. From a personal view, however, I feel that I have benefited greatly from carrying out primary research then being able to synthesise the results with literature and critical engagement. If I had have engaged with this research from a different perspective and carried out an autobiography I feel that the results would have been a lot different due to the problems of objectifying the subject, especially when that subject is yourself. The benefits of biographical writing are numerous but I shall outline two of the most important ones below. Firstly, being able to engage with primary research and relate theory and practice is important within all areas of academic disciplines. Secondly, engaging with someone else’s biography allows you to be objective (to a certain extent) and therefore much more able to write about the narration. The limitations of biographical writing are that as you are not that person it is difficult to truly understand their meanings and usage of the social discourses they ascribe to or the personal self they view. Secondly, it is also impossible.
