Faculty Publications

Personal Narratives And Self-Transformation In Postindustrial Societies

Document Type

Article

Keywords

computer-mediated communication, institutional discourse, neoliberal subjectivities, storytelling

Journal/Book/Conference Title

Annual Review of Anthropology

Volume

46

First Page

65

Last Page

80

Abstract

This article surveys literature on personal narratives as situated practices in a variety of contexts in primarily Western, postindustrial societies. It begins with an overview of theories that articulate the relationships among narrative, self, and narrating context. I then consider how narratives of the self are shaped in institutional contexts, including those in which narratives are used to evaluate selves or used as a technology for changing selves. The section that follows examines how narrative analysis can be used to examine people's positioning in relation to larger social discourses such as neoliberalism. The final section returns to the relationship between narrative forms and contexts by examining how people narrate themselves across the variety of digital media and online contexts provided by the Internet.

Department

Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology

Original Publication Date

10-23-2017

DOI of published version

10.1146/annurev-anthro-102116-041702

Repository

UNI ScholarWorks, Rod Library, University of Northern Iowa

Language

en

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