During the course of ASTU 100A we have analyzed the genre of auto/biographies to identify their capacity to influence the audience’s perspective of the author, and in turn the group they are a part of. Auto/biographies are able to do important work in giving agency to marginalized groups by allowing members to write back to the “hegemonic scripts” which are imposed when discussing marginalized groups by dominate groups in society (Couser 33). This dominate way of discussing marginalized groups perpetuates and reinforces prominent stereotypes, resulting in a “framed view” of the group (Jawani and Young 902). Framing, according to Jawani and Young selects and highlights specifics from a group in order to foster a certain interpretation (Jawani and Young 902). Using writing as a tool, marginalized groups can share “counter-frames” which resist dominant representations (Jawani and Young 903). Therefore the technique of counter framing, using auto/biographies as the medium to transmit these ideas, has been an important way for marginalized groups gaining their autonomy and agency.

This important work of marginalized groups creating an identity for themselves through writing can be seen in many of the primary texts we have studied this year. For example, in Cockeyed Ryan Knighton used his memoir as a way to address the misconceptions about the disabled in our society. Cockeyed tells the story of Ryan Knighton’s epiphanies after learning that his sense of sight is rapidly detreating, as he attempts to find his place within the disabled community as a blind man. His memoir outlines his journey as he must learn to live in a society that stigmatizes the disabled. The stigmas that are present in our society are a result of the exposure to frames that portray a certain appearance; however, Knighton writes a counter narrative. It is through writing of his experience that Knighton is able to influence his reader’s perception of disabled people. His autobiography is able to do this work of “counter stigmatizing” against the preconceived incapability of disability because while writing Knighton has a “high degree of control over [his] own image” (Couser 31).

The concept of hegemonic scripts is challenged not only by the counter framing that is done through auto/biographies but also by the sharing of stories that do not fit solely in any one group. Within each of the primary text we have read this year there has there has been the struggle to know where one belongs and the resistance being labeled as a certain group by the dominate group in society. Fred Wah expresses this in his memoir Diamond Grill as he writes about his life “living on the hyphen” as a Chinese-Canadian. Wah tells of how he never felt like he fit into the Chinese or White group of society. Furthermore, in Danny Laferriere’s memoir The World is Moving Around Me he also discusses not feeling like he fit into Haitian culture or Canadian culture completely. By writing about these experiences of being “on the hyphen”, caught between two groups in society, these authors are using their auto/biographies as a way to show that the hegemonic scripts that dominate groups apply to label others cannot exist in society because there are so many people who do not fit into any category. Instead the auto/biography tells a different story in which stereotypes are hard to justify because each individuals experience is so unique.

Auto/biographies can help combat the stereotypes which are so prominent in our society by telling counter-narratives and expressing the incomplete nature of grouping people as many people belong to multiple groups. This can have an important impact in the way that we view others in society. Instead of automatically categorizing them into groups to comply with the hegemonic scripts we can recognize that everyone is an individual who the frames don’t necessarily apply to. This is an important revelation that can make a big difference to how we view marginalized groups. For this reason, auto/biographies have political capacities as they can change perspectives resulting in a society which acknowledges individuals instead of groups.

 

 

Works Cited

Couser, G. Thomas. “Rhetoric and Self-Representation in Disability Memoir.” Signifying Bodies: Disability in Contemporary Life Writing. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan UP, 2009. 31-48.

Jiwani, Yasmin and Mary Lynn Young. “Missing and Murdered Women: Reproducing Marginality in News Discourse.” Canadian Journal of Communication 31.4 (2006): 895-917

Knighton, Ryan. Cockeyed. Penguin Canada, 2006.

Laferriere, Dany. The World Is Moving around Me: A Memoir of the Haiti Earthquake. Trans. David Homel. Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp, 2012.

Wah, Fred. Diamond Grill: 10th Anniversary Ed. Edmonton: NeWest, 2006.