Karen Howells

“What’s the Story?” Autobiographies and Narrative Analysis

Since the earliest of times, human beings have conveyed their socially constructed experiences through the act of storytelling.  Researchers have come to understand that personal, social, and cultural experiences are constructed through the sharing of stories and that accessing these stories provides us insight into people’s experiences.  In our role as researchers we can access these stories through conversations with interview participants, through the diaries that participants may write, or through autobiographies. This workshop will draw on research in elite sport involving the narrative analysis of sporting autobiographies (Howells & Fletcher, 2015; Newman, Howells & Fletcher, 2016).  The workshop will explore “doing” narrative analysis, address the advantages of using autobiographies as a source of information, and focus on some of the pitfalls.

What's the story