Engaging Anthropology: An Auto-Ethnographic Approach

  • Shahram Khosravi
Chapter
First Online:
Part of the Approaches to Social Inequality and Difference book series (ATSIAD)

Abstract

Auto-ethnography is a writing style with personal experiences interjected into ethnographic writing. As a form of self-narrative, auto-ethnography places the self within a social context. An interesting aspect of this genre is that the distinction between ethnographer and others becomes blurred. Auto-ethnography links the world of the author with the world of others. The main aim of my auto-ethnographies has been to link, to connect, human experiences. My stories gain their narrative power from the spaces in between these experiences. This linking and communicability of experiences is the core strength of auto-ethnography. Based on my own experiences as migrant, anthropologist and public intellectual, in this chapter I will explore what emerges from the space in between.

Keywords

Auto-ethnography Public intellectual Migration Street academia 
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Notes

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Synnøve Bendixsen and Tone Bringa for the insightful feedbacks.

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Copyright information

© The Author(s) 2016

Authors and Affiliations

  • Shahram Khosravi
    • 1
  1. 1.Department of Social AnthropologyStockholm UniversityStockholmSweden

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