Papen, Uta (2008) Pregnancy starts with a literacy event : pregnancy and ante-natal care as texctually mediated social experiences. Ethnography, 9 (3). pp. 377-403. ISSN 1466-1381
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
As a literacy researcher my academic attention is usually focussed on how other people use reading and writing in their everyday lives. In this article, for the first time I turn my researcher’s gaze onto myself. I present a portion of my autoethnogaphy which aimed to document my becoming a mother as a ‘textually-mediated’ experience. I discuss three aspects of this experience: (1) the role of the ‘Green Notes’, a personal maternity record, as an example of how the literacy practices of pregnancy and ante-natal care are shaped by institutional norms and procedures; (2) the significance of my own reading and writing activities in the process of ‘making sense’; and (3) the role of reading and writing in what I have called ‘difficult moments’. The paper concludes with a reflection on the potential of autoethnography for social sciences generally and literacy studies more particularly.