Description
Book SynopsisGrief and loss are fundamental aspects of the human experience. This book explores the desire to make sense out of the nonsensical by exploring specific loss and grief experiences. The autoethnographic essays reflect on the unique and individual experiences of each contributor’s story. Simultaneously, these experiences reveal that although their grief experience is unique, it is also cultural and collective, evoking broader cultural themes related to loss and grief. The chapters in this book represent a wide range of loss experiences ranging from the loss of a parent, child, or partner, loss within larger family systems, ambiguous and anticipatory loss to broader cultural aspects of grief. Scholars of communication, sociology, and family studies will find this book of particular interest.
Trade Review“Narrative and Grief: Autoethnographies of Loss, edited by Deleasa Randall-Griffiths and Patricia English-Schneider, is thoughtful, provocative and vulnerable. The editors and authors capture the chaos of grief in various moments. This monograph has much to offer both lay and academic audiences dealing with grief. Through poignant autoethnographies, it addresses many thoughts and emotions that surface during grieving, but one never gives voice while providing insights into how we can heal in the grieving process.”
-- Margaret M. Quinlan, University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Table of ContentsTable of Contents
Introduction
Deleasa Randall-Griffiths and Patricia English-Schneider
Section I: Perspectives on Family Loss
Chapter 1: A Puzzle of Love and Loss
Nathan P. Stucky
Chapter 2: Losing Mama Lola: An Autoethnographic Story of Caregiving and Remorse
Olga Zatepilina-Monacell
Chapter 3: Surviving Our Aging: A Love Letter for My Mom
Lesa Lockford
Chapter 4: Honoring Mom: Layers of a Daughter’s Grief
Sharon L. Russell
Chapter 5: The Things That Knew Her: “Holding On” as a Way of “Letting Go”
Deleasa Randall-Griffiths
Chapter 6: “I Have a Son Named Jake…”: An Autoethnographic Application of the Continuing Bonds Theory
Nancy J. Brule
Chapter 7: Mother, Scholar, & Co-Victim: My Son’s Death by Police Homicide
Elizabeth Stephens
Chapter 8: Ripple Effect
Faith Griffiths
Chapter 9: Living Through Hell and Back: How Autoethnographic Performance Functions as a Means of Moving Through and Beyond the Grieving Process
Lori L. Montalbano
Section II: Broader Perspectives of Loss
Chapter 10: Living with Loss: A Poetic Autoethnography
Ronald J. Pelias
Chapter 11: Linework
Jonathan M. Gray
Chapter 12: Stones on the Beach, Ashes in the Woods: Locating Grief in Place and Time
Stephanie L. Young
Chapter 13: Anticipatory Grief and Dementia: Mourning The Lady Who Sings
Jacqueline Owens
Chapter 14. “She’s Not Doing it Right”: An Autoethnographic Exploration of One Woman’s Response to Loss
Kristi P. Treinan
Chapter 15: The Gift of Grief
Kimberly J. Stanislo
Chapter 16: Private Losses Made Public: Managing Boundaries to (Re)construct the Classroom
Leah E. Bryant and Joann Martyn
Chapter 17: Feminist Grief as Narrative Inquiry
Meggie Mapes, Savaughn Williams, and Myleah Brewer
Chapter 18: What Happens Between Support and Communal Coping?
Dena M. Huisman and Wendi Bellar
About the Contributors
