Gannon / (RE)PRESENTING THE COLLECTIVE GIRL (Re)presenting the Collective Girl: A Poetic Approach to a Methodological Dilemma

This article identifies the salient characteristics of collective memory work and collective biography research. Methodological dilemmas that can arise in the course of the research are identified and an argument is made in favor of imagination and creativity as essential elements of any effective response. Particular reference is made to a collective biography project completed by the author where she (re)presented the collective texts in the form of poetry. In recent years, feminist researchers in diverse locations and disciplines1 have worked with methodologies based on the original collective memory work presented as Female Sexualisation by Frigga Haug and her colleagues (1987). In this article, I begin by locating my own work within a strand of col-lective memory work that is also called collective biography by its practitioners. My own use of the methodology has been within a larger study of feminist writing practices and thus has entailed an acute sensitivity to issues of power and authority. To a degree, power disparities are inherent in all academic con-texts and therefore always impact on the work of the collective memor