The role of autoethnography in higher degree research supervision

In all higher degree research, it is imperative that candidates have interrogated their role as the Researcher in the Research. I supervise a large number of doctoral candidates and have come to use autoethnography underpinned by phenomenology as a way to explore assumptions and biases based on past experiences and understandings. By knowing who they are in the research, doctoral candidates find the tensions inherent in the emic/etic positions they inhabit easier to articulate. This forms a strong basis for bracketing which is essential in research. There is the added benefit, that the autoethnographic writing allows me (as supervisor) to come to know my students well. Often I am surprised which indicates that I too hold assumptions that I must question. In my presentation I will address autoethnography per se and offer examples of how my students’ autoethnographic writings have unfolded. This will be followed by a discussion of strategies to foster autoethnographic thinking and the role of questioning in prompting self-investigation and self-reflection. I will conclude with a discussion of crafting autoethnographic writing and possible strategies for publication