Informed by interviews with queer women, nonbinary persons, and a trans man, this article aims to fill a major gap in the Southeastern European sexuality studies. It does that by depicting and ...analyzing several microhistories from communism (1947–1989) and from the early 1990s Romania. The 1990s were also marked by the communist legacy and same-sex relationships continued to be criminalized until 2001. Since gay men’s accounts are much more represented in the public space and in the incipient literature on queerness in Romania, the article offers an alternative view beyond this tendency, by bringing forth the particularities and experiences of cisgender women and trans persons and their day-to-day lives within the patriarchal and homophobic society. The article argues that during communism matters of queerness were known, although rarely discussed, and that the accounts of queer women and trans persons were not absent but neglected. Another objective is to offer explanations for the lack of these marginal (ized) accounts in the incipient gender and queer studies literature on Romania.
Promoting decolonial educational practices assumes the determination to step outside of unique, stereotyped and majority narratives and constantly deconstruct patterns, cultural hierarchies, and ...relations of domination in which we are involved. In this perspective, the contribution discusses some issues emerged from the narratives collected within the research path Women’s voices, plural perspectives. Professional life stories in educational and intercultural contexts, recognising the contribution of women with a migration background as active constructors of generative actions and relationships in Italian socio-educational contexts. Through a series of meetings, dialogues and in-depth interviews, the project collected narratives and innovative and intercultural postures of twenty women activists and professionals. Listening to their stories challenges our educational contexts towards greater equity, denounces the persistence of intersectional discrimination and questions the ways of doing pedagogical research to develop a plural, shared and decolonial approach.
Cultural life scripts are shared knowledge about personal events expected to be experienced by individuals within a society and used as a framework for life story narration. Differences in cultural ...life scripts for individuals with depression and trauma, and their relations to anxiety, stress, and well-being, have not been investigated. Malaysian participants (N = 120) described and rated seven significant events most likely to be experienced by a prototypical infant from their culture, and seven significant events they had experienced or expected to experience in their own life. Participants then answered questionnaires about depression and trauma symptoms and about anxiety, stress, and well-being. The subclinical depression group listed less typical cultural life scripts events, whereas the subclinical post-traumatic stress disorder group listed less positive individual life story events. The findings indicate that, although individuals with depression and trauma possess knowledge of the cultural life scripts, there may be small differences in the cognitive processing of cultural life scripts and individual life story events.
Researchers' reflections on narrative inquiry is a growing area of interest for the qualitative researchers' community (Beuthin 2014; Bruce et al 2016; O'Grady, Clandinin and O'Toole 2018). ...Furthermore, the relationship between the insider and outsider, researcher and participant, in narrative research conducted in social sciences, including nursing, health sciences, and education, has been extensively explored (Berger 2015; Darwin Holmes 2020). This paper reports on a project in which life story interviews with former prisoners were conducted in Ireland and Greece. The aim is to contribute to our understanding and knowledge of narrative inquiry by providing insights into the methodology employed, along with the challenges faced and steps taken to address those challenges during the project. The paper begins with a reflective account of the author's experience as a researcher engaging in narrative inquiry, focusing on the rationale behind choosing this method and issues of design, positionality, ethics and access. Then the focus shifts to how the fieldwork in two European countries allowed the author to explore the cross-cultural boundaries of narrative inquiry. Finally, the paper concludes with a persuasive argument on the value of narrative inquiry, drawing upon the insights and findings from the research project.
This paper deals with the unaccompanied minor migrants' journey to Italy. In particular, it takes into account the minors arrived in Italy during the so-called summer of the refugee crisis. It aims ...to analyses the interrelation between the journey, the reasons to leave and how they affect the migration process. The present proposal illustrates the results of analysis of 21 interviews collected during a field survey carried out in 2016 by the author for the Institute for Research on Population and Social Policies of National Research Council (CNR-IRPPS), on behalf of the Italian Committee of Unicef - United Nation Children Found. The key objective of research was of detecting the minor's experience in relation to their migratory experience and to reconstruct their journey towards Italy which can be considered as true turning point for their biography.
In this paper, we examined relationships and differences between personal and vicarious life stories, i.e., the life stories one knows of others. Personal and vicarious life stories of both members ...of 51 young couples (102 participants), based on McAdams' Life Story Interview (2008), were collected. We found significant positive relationships between participants' personal and vicarious life stories on agency and communion themes and redemption sequences. We also found significant positive relationships between participants' vicarious life stories about their partners and those partners' personal life stories on agency and communion, but not redemption. Furthermore, these relationships were not explained by similarity between couples' two personal life stories, as no associations were found between couples' personal stories on agency, communion and redemption. These results suggest that the way we construct the vicarious life stories of close others may reflect how we construct our personal life stories.
Subir na vida DE LOURDES LIMA SANTOS, MARIA
Análise social,
09/2022, Volume:
57, Issue:
3 (244)
Journal Article
Open access
Depois da vitória dos liberais em 1834, as trajectórias de muitos intelectuais de origens sociais modestas são marcadas por uma promoção que os conduz não raramente a importantes cargos e a um ...considerável renome. Neste artigo, são analisadas essas trajectórias, tendo como ponto de partida um conjunto-base de intelectuais dos quais se estudaram as histórias de vida. Concorrem para aquela posição as experiências e aprendizagens iniciais dos intelectuais em causa e as suas posteriores intervenções políticas com vista a reformar Portugal bem como a promover a intelligentsia a que pertencem. A síntese final visa identificar as constantes que configuram este processo de mobilidade ascendente em casos de origem social desfavorecida.
In Portugal, after the liberal victory in 1834, many intellectuals of humble extraction proceed along a successful life course that pushes them often on important functions and makes them win a considerable reputation. Using a corpus of life stories of the concerned intellectuals, this article examines how certain factors contribute to their promotion, namely their initial experiences and learnings, as well as their later political interventions to change Portugal and to assure the position of the intelligentsia to which they belong. The final synthesis puts forward a set of constants as a contribution to explain this process of rising mobility in cases of low social origins.
This paper reflects on the use of life-stories as a way to get a better understanding of the multiple identity constructions of Female Entrepreneurs of Moroccan and Turkish Origin. Since life-stories ...are co-constructions of the researcher and researched, the paper argues that the relationship between these two parties and their different social locations should be explicated in the analysis and writing of the material, as these might reproduce certain power structures. Accounting for such social implications requires a thorough analysis of partiality, issues of inequality, as well as emotions that may direct researchers' interpretations.
Patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) display disturbances in self and other understanding, which is also evident when they narrate events from their own and significant others' lives. ...In a recent study, we found that patients described both their own and their parents' life stories as more negative and with fewer themes of agency and communion fulfillment. Hence, we examined whether 12 months of psychotherapy would change how patients described their own and their parents' life stories. At baseline, 30 BPD patients and 30 matched control participants described and answered questions about their personal and their parents' life stories. At follow-up, 23 patients and 23 control participants repeated the same procedure after patients had completed 12 months of psychotherapy. At both baseline and follow-up, the life stories were coded for complexity and themes of agency, communion, communion fulfillment, and self−other confusion. BPD patients' personal life stories increased significantly in agency from baseline to follow-up compared with the control group, whereas other aspects of personal and parents' life stories did not change significantly after therapy. Development of agency through the reconstruction of personal life stories may be a crucial mechanism in psychotherapy with BPD patients.
Clinical Impact Statement
Patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) improve their understanding of self and others in therapy but no study has examined whether these improvements extend to life stories. Question: This study examined whether 12 months of psychotherapy would change how patients with BPD describe their own and their parents' life stories. Findings: Patients' personal life stories increased significantly in agency after therapy, while other aspects of personal and parents' life stories did not change significantly after therapy. Meaning: Increasing agency through the reconstruction of personal life stories might be important for therapeutic change. Next Steps: Agency should be taken into account as an important factor for therapeutic change in patients with BPD.
The ability to tell one's past life story and to imagine one's personal future serves important social and life defining functions like maintaining identity. In the present study, 34 adolescents ...diagnosed with anxiety disorders (age 9-17) and 34 community based controls wrote stories about their weekend, their past and future life stories and generated cultural life scripts. Cultural life scripts are culturally shared assumptions as to the order and timing of important life events. Adolescents in the anxiety group had less coherent past and future life stories compared to controls. Anxious adolescents also remembered their pasts as emotionally more negative than community controls, despite the fact that both groups described equally many negative experiences from their pasts. Anxious adolescents imagined their futures to consist mainly of positive events, however, they still expected their futures to be less positive than the control group, and their future life stories were more abstract and included fewer cultural life script events than the control group. Weekend stories did not differ in emotional tone and coherence between groups, suggesting that differences in past and future life stories are not due to differences in general narrative ability.
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