Commentary Eight

Avoid the Straightjacket

In the article “Imagining Educational Research? On the Uses of Fiction in Autobiographical Narrative Inquiry,” Allison Pryer makes the point that the use of the “memoir,” as an educational tool, is valid. She gives good reasons to support her claims that a little fiction can be enlightening. Teaching at the university level can be very frustrating claims Pryer:

Whereas once I despaired over my incapacity to force my restless spirit into the straightjacket of academe, now I think it’s a miracle that at least some vestiges of that spirit have survived. (Rockhill, 1986)

My take on the gist of this article is that Pryer finds using the “memoir,” as a means of self-expression, gives the author a way to reflect about past experience. A “memoir” is a memory: a memory of past experiences. So, a memoir is also a record, or observation of what happened; an ethnography. But the memoir is not an expository or non-fictional piece of writing. Pryer states that it is through the use of fiction that the memoir provides the biggest reflective return for the investment.

Ms. Pryer quotes bell hooks, “Fragments of memory are not simply represented as a flat documentary but constructed to give a “new take” on the old, constructed to move us into a different mode of articulation.” (hooks, 1990) This is the “dialogue” that I missed on my first read of this article. We use our memory of the past to recollect what happened in order to get a “new take” or refreshed thought about an experience. Pryer is saying that this is how we learn and evolve as individuals. In this case the “memory” is the remembered experience of the teacher. I consider “memoir” to be the documentation of “reflection”. The memoir may “color” the experience, but it is in the “coloring” that new insights and revelations are realized. I recall the work of John Oller and the “episode hypothesis.” (Oller, 1979) Simply stated, Mr. Oller says that we learn better when what we are reading is organized “episodically”: in other words, if the content is arranged in a “story-type” format. So, through self-reflection the memoir serves this purpose.

The author of this article also says, “Readers therefore must become active co-creators of meaning, participating in the construction of their own knowledge when they read the text” (6). This is what we have been doing this semester: participating in the construction of our own knowledge. I have learned so much about the writing process this semester by becoming an active “co-creator” of meaning. I have also learned that there is no one right way to respond to anything we have read this semester. What is required is thoughtful reading and a reflective attitude in order to respond to any text. For me, at the beginning of the semester, it was difficult to write a commentary about any of the readings. But as the semester progressed it became easier and easier to write about the texts. This may have been a result of just doing a lot of reading, but I think it also could be related to what Pryer is saying about becoming the “active co-creator” of our own knowledge. In a sense all of the commentaries we have created this semester are “memoirs.”

In conclusion, I agree with Ms. Pryer that there are benefits to using a “memoir” research approach to educational research. I also see some similarities mentioned in our text, “Rewriting: How to Do Things with Texts,” by Joseph Harris. Mr. Harris says “you will often see the shape of a dialogue begin to appear in your writing, as you alternate between restating the views of others and responding to and making use of their work.” (73) As reflective teachers we need to reflect on our methods and the methods of others in order to not become trapped in the “straightjacket of academe.” (Rockhill, 1986) I think one of the most important things I have learned so far this semester is that writing is the best way to arrange our thoughts and share them with others.