This article provides an autoethnographic account of my personal journey through ‘good time’ sociology. Telling my story involves recounting my experience as a Catholic nun and closeted lesbian in 1970s’ USA; providing a picture of what it was like to do the first PhD on lesbians in the UK; explaining the impact of drugs and alcohol research on my lesbian feminist sociological imagination and reflecting upon the place of ‘deviant bodies’ in the new genetics and generally in society. My stories are framed by the backdrop of being a lesbian feminist sociologist in academia and informed by a small yet, emerging body of work by LGBT scholars who use autoethnography. Autoethnography is introduced as a methodological tool for speaking and writing reflexively about being out in academia. I demonstrate that telling one’s story can become a gift — ‘a telling creating conversations that transcends our traumas’ and a way of healing ourselves and others.
Barker, M. ( 2006) ‘Critical Sexology: Sexual Self-Disclosure and Outness in Academia and the Clinic’, Lesbian and Gay Psychology Review7(3): 292-5.
2.
Berry, K. ( 2006) ‘Implicated Audience Member Seeks Understanding: Re-examining the gift of Autoethnography’, International Journal of Qualitative Methods5(3): 1-7.
3.
Bochner, A. ( 2000) ‘Criteria Against Ourselves’, Qualitative Inquiry6(2): 266-72.
4.
Bourdieu, P. ( 1984) Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
5.
Crawley, S. ( 2002) ‘They Still Don’t Understand Why I Hate Wearing Dresses! An Autoethnographic Rant on Dresses, Boats and Butchness’, Cultural Studies Critical Methodologies2(1) 69-92.
6.
Crawley, S. ( 2008) ‘The Clothes Make the Trans: Region and Geography in the Experiences of the Body’, Journal of Lesbian Studies12(4): 365-79.
7.
Ellis, C. and Bochner, A. ( 2000) ‘Autoethnography, Personal Narrative, Reflexivity: Researcher as Subject’, in N. Denzin and Y. Lincoln (eds) Handbook of Qualitative Research, pp. 733-68. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
8.
Ettorre, E. ( 1980) Lesbians, Women and Society. London and Boston, Routledge & Kegan Paul.
9.
Ettorre, E. ( 1982) ‘The Perks of Male Power: Heterosexuality and the Oppression of Women’, in S. Friedman and E. Sarah (eds) On the Problem of Men, pp. 214-26. London: Women’s Press.
10.
Ettorre, E. ( 1992) Women and Substance Use. New Brunswick, NJRutgers University Press and London: Macmillan.
11.
Ettorre, E. ( 1997) Women and Alcohol: From a Private Pleasure to a Public Problem?London: Women’s Press .
12.
Ettorre, E. (ed.) (2001) Before Birth: Understanding Prenatal Screening. Aldershot: Ashgate Press.
13.
Ettorre, E. ( 2002) Reproductive Genetics, Gender and the Body. London: Routledge.
14.
Ettorre, E. ( 2005a) ‘Gender, Older Female Bodies and Autoethnography: Finding My Feminist Voice by Telling My Illness Story’, Women’s Studies International Forum28(6): 535-46.
15.
Ettorre, E. (ed.) (2005b) Making Lesbians Visible in the Substance Use Field. New York: Harrington Park Press.
16.
Ettorre, E. ( 2006) ‘Autoethnography: Making Sense of My Illness Journey from Thyrotoxicosis to Health’, Auto/Biography14: 1-23.
17.
Ettorre, E. ( 2007) Revisioning Women and Drug use: Gender, Power and the Body. Gordonsville, VA andBasingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
18.
Ettorre, E. (forthcoming) ‘Autoethnography: Making Sense of Personal Illness Journeys’, in I. Bourgeault, R. De Vries and R. Dingwall (eds) Sage Handbook of Qualitative Methods in Health Research. Thousand Oaks, CA SAGE.
19.
Ettorre, E. and Riska, E. ( 1995) Gendered Moods: Psychotropics and Society. London: Routledge.
20.
Foucault, M. ( 1984) The Care of the Self. (The History of Sexuality, Vol. 3). London: Penguin Books.
21.
Frye, M. ( 1983) The Politics of Reality: Essays in Feminist Theory. Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press.
22.
Gibson, M. and Meem, D.T. ( 2005) Lesbian Academic Couples. Binghampton, NY: Haworth Press.
23.
Giorgio, G. ( 2009) ‘Traumatic Truths and the Gift of Telling’ , Qualitative Inquiry15(1): 149-67.
24.
Glassner, B. and Hertz, R. (eds) (2003) Our Studies, Ourselves: Sociologists Lives and Work. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
25.
Gust, S.W. ( 2007) ‘Look Out for the Football Players and Frat Boys: Autoethnographic Reflections of a Gay Teacher in a Gay Curricular Experience’ , Educational Studies41(1): 43-60.
26.
Inness, S.A. ( 1997) The Lesbian Menace. Amherst: University of Massachusetts.
27.
Krieger, S. ( 1996) The Family Silver: Essays on Relationships Among Women . Berkeley: University of California Press.
28.
MacGregor, S., Ettorre, E., Coomber, R. and Crosier, A. ( 1990) Drug Services in England and the Impact of the Central Funding Initiative. London: ISDD .
29.
McNaron, T. ( 1996) Poisoned Ivy: Lesbian and Gay Academics Confronting Homophobia . Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
30.
Morris, T. ( 1957) The Criminal Area: A Study in Social Ecology. London: Routledge.
31.
Munoz, J. ( 1995) ‘The Autoethnographic Performance: Reading Richard Fung’s Queer Hybridity’, Screen36(2): 83-99.
32.
O’Byrne, P. ( 2007) ‘The Advantages and Disadvantages of Mixing Methods: An Analysis Combining Traditional and Autoethnographic Approaches’, Qualitative Health Research17(10): 1381-91.
33.
Philareatou, A. and Allen, K. ( 2006) ‘Researching Sensitive Topics Through Autoethnographic Means’, The Journal of Men’s Studies14(1): 65-78.
34.
Plummer, K. ( 2009) ‘Autoethnography of Sexualities: Introduction’ , Sexualities12(3): 267-69.
35.
Radstone, S. ( 2000) ‘Autobiographical Times’, in T. Cosslett, C. Lury and P. Summerfield (eds) Feminism and Autobiography: Texts, Theories and Methods, pp. 201-19. London : Routledge.
36.
Rambo, C. ( 2005) ‘Sketching Carolyn Ellis, "The Purple Diva" of Autoethnography’ , Studies in Symbolic Interactionism28: 3-13.
Rose, H. and Hanmer, J. ( 1976) ‘Women’s Liberation, Reproduction and the Technological Fix’, in D. Leonard Barker and S. Allen (eds) Sexual Divisions and Society: Process and Change, pp. 199-223. London : Tavistock.
39.
Rutan, G. ( 1995) ‘Catholic and Evangelical Elites in Dialogue and Alliance’, International Journal of Social Economics22(9/10/11): 109-34.
40.
Smart, C. ( 2007) Personal Life. Cambridge: Polity Press.
41.
Steinberg, D. ( 1997) ‘Technologies of Heterosexuality: Eugenic Reproductions Under Glass’, in D.L. Steinberg, D. Epstein and R. Johnson (eds) Border Patrols: Policing the Boundaries of Heterosexuality , pp. 66-97. London: Cassell.
42.
Steinem, G. ( 1979) ‘These are not the Best Years of your Life’ , MS. 8(3): 64-8.
43.
Stoneall, L. ( 1981) ‘Review of Lesbians, Women and Society’, Contemporary Sociology10(4): 572-3.
44.
Taylor, V. and Raeburn, N. ( 1995) ‘Identity Politics as High-Risk Activism: Career Consequences for Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Sociologists, Social Problems’, 42(2): 252-73.
45.
Trotter, J., Brogatki, L., Duggan, L., Foster, E. and Levie, J. ( 2006) ‘Revealing Disagreement and Discomfort Through Autoethnography and Personal Narrative’, Qualitative Social Work5(3): 369-87.
46.
Urla, J. and Terry, J. ( 1995) ‘Introduction: Mapping Embodied Deviance’ , in J. Terry and J. Urla (eds) Deviant Bodies, pp. 1-18. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
47.
Vannini, P. ( 2008) ‘A Queen’s Drowning: Material Culture, Drama, and the Performance of a Technological Accident’, Symbolic Interaction31(2): 155-82.
48.
www.fordham.edu (2005) URL (accessed 5 February 2008): http://www.fordham.edu/images/Whats_New/magazine/winter05/FordhamW_05_main18_19.pdf
