Critical Autoethnography in multicultural psychology
The critical autoethnography assignment asks you to reflect on personal experience(s) and how these experience(s) reflect broader cultural ideas. This autoethnography will also give you the opportunity to discuss privilege and disadvantages based on social identities. There are two pre-requisite activities to be completed prior to the final written assignment. These two assignments will contribute ideas that feed into your final written submission:
Social identity wheel – due Sept.
The culture cycle activity – due Oct.
Your final submission (due Oct. 18th by 11:55pm) will be a 1250-1500 words paper, which will weave together the follow components:
Using what you completed in the culture cycle activity and the social identity wheel activity, consider a big cultural idea (norm) that relates to one of your social identities and has affected your life in some way. Describe the big cultural idea and connect it a cultural/social identity you hold – for example, your race, gender, or social class background.
Discuss a specific example (an experience, event, moment, memory etc.) that is related to your cultural/social identity and the broader cultural idea. Describe this example. What happened? How did you feel? Why do you remember this? How has this example shaped your thinking?
You should state the significance of your experiences and tie it into examples related to prejudice and discrimination OR privilege – see the Social identity wheel activity. You are not simply telling a story; rather, you need to explain why this story about yourself is meaningful. Why should others care about it? How is it linked to social and cultural issues?
Overall, you should provide a discussion of how your personal cultural background and perspective shapes this event or social interaction, and how that reflects the larger cultural system in institutions or societal factors and ideas.
Your final submission will be a 1250-1500 words paper, which will weave together the follow components:
Drawing on the culture cycle activity and the social identity wheel activity, consider a big cultural idea (norm) that relates to one of your social identities and has affected your life in some way. Describe the big cultural idea and connect it a cultural/social identity hold – for example, your race, gender, or social class background.
Discuss a specific example (an experience, event, moment, memory etc.) that is related to your cultural/social identity and the broader cultural idea. Describe this example. What happened? How did you feel? Why do you remember this? How has this example shaped your thinking?
You should state the significance of your experiences and tie it into examples related to prejudice and discrimination OR privilege – see the Social Identity wheel activity. You are not simply telling a story; rather, you need to explain why this story about yourself is meaningful. Why should others care about it? How is it linked to social and cultural issues?
Overall, you should provide a discussion of how your personal cultural background and perspective shapes this event or social interaction, and how that reflects the larger cultural system in institutions or societal factors and ideas.
See next page for further instructions.
Here is an example of how your paper might flow logically (you are not obligated to follow this structure, so long as you can integrate the 4 points above coherently):
Introduction: a cultural idea (example: men are expected to ask women out in relationships) you will be discussing; your cultural identity (example: I am a male/female), an experience tied into that cultural identity (example: one time, I had to ask a guy/girl out).
Body: Why are these two connected, what does cultural psychology tell me about this…how does my cultural identity affect what my experiences are like, how does it reflect institutions, how do these institutions feed into the broader cultural idea?
Privilege disadvantage paragraphs.
Conclusion; thoughts about privilege/power, discussions related to social justice.
In this paper, I will be looking for:
Unified and coherent paragraphs
Thoughtful reflection and analysis of your personal values, understandings, and skills regarding your experiences (considering power dynamics);
Critical reflection on the cultural and social influences (such as social norms, identity, and status locations) that shape your views and understanding; and
Connections to, and insights from, course discussions, exercises and assigned readings, aiming for depth.
Formatting, references, and citations should follow APA format
