CFP: Mediated Autoethnography: Connecting the Personal and the Popular
Call for Papers – Mediated Autoethnography: Connecting the
Personal and the Popular
A special issue of The Popular Culture Studies Journal, co-edited by
Jimmie Manning and Tony Adams.
The Popular Culture Studies Journal invites submissions for a 2015 theme
issue that will explore connections between autoethnography and popular
culture. In addition to full-length manuscripts, the editors are also
open to receiving shorter commentaries on method, practice, and/or theory.
Drawing from Carolyn Ellis’s articulation, autoethnography is
scholarship involving “research, writing, story” and a method that
connects “the autobiographical and personal to the cultural, social, and
political” (The Ethnographic I, xix). The personal, cultural, social,
and political elements of autoethnography certainly link to popular
culture. As Herrmann astutely notes, “Popular culture helps us define
who we are, what we believe, and influences whom we befriend” (“Daniel
Amos and Me,” 7). Indeed, people not only connect with popular culture
entities, but they even see themselves in popular culture texts
(Manning, “Finding Yourself in Mad Men”; Stern, “My So-Called Felicity
and the City”).
Ideal manuscripts will make a strong contribution to understanding
social life as it interacts with popular culture; offer meaningful,
complex, and evocative texts that reflexively articulate the author’s
engagement with the writing process; and express an emotional, embodied
sense of personal experience and popular culture. We especially welcome
submissions that contribute to what we hope will be a tapestry of voices
from diverse cultural backgrounds. Possible topics or approaches could
include the following:
-Articulations of how popular culture influenced or was/is an integral
part of meaningful lived experience
-Essays exploring the way identities can be seen or not seen in popular
culture
-Critical inquiries about race, class, gender, or sexuality in popular
culture
-The development or redevelopment of autoethnographic methods for use
with popular culture studies
-Connections between popular culture representations and personal
experiences, especially as they inform theoretical understandings of
identity and/or relationships
Manuscripts should be sent to both special issue editors as a Microsoft
Word document. In line with the journal’s regular submission criteria,
two files should be included. The first file should include a single
title page containing complete contact information (address, phone
number, e-mail address). The second file should also include a title
page with only the article’s title and no author information. The
journal employs a “double blind review” process.
Full-length essays should be less than 25 pages of double-spaced text in
12 pt. Times New Roman font, including all images, endnotes, and Works
Cited pages. Shorter think pieces of 7-12 pages will be accepted for
this special issue only. Research and documentation must adhere to The
MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers which requires a Works Cited
list and parenthetical author/page references in the text.
Please send all essays by May 15, 2015 to the editors of this special
issue, Jimmie Manning (jman@niu.edu <mailto:jman@niu.edu>) and Tony
Adams (aeadams3@neiu.edu <mailto:aeadams3@neiu.edu>). Questions may also
be directed to those email addresses. ===== General list info and FAQ:
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