Blog #2

After these academic readings in class, I have changed my view on autobiography. At first, like most people, I thought the autobiography was a tool used by famous or powerful people to show the world the great things that had accomplished. For instance, it would make sense for Winston Churchill, Oprah, or John Lennon to have an autobiography but I always wondered why Susanna Keysen, Sandra Cisneros, or Harriet Jacobs would write one.

With these new, lesser known, authors writing autobiographies, readers who normally would not read autobiographies, may now consider it. For example, if a person normally reads historical fiction about slaves, they may be interested in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. On the other hand, people who normally read autobiographies may be put off by the vignettes of House on Mango Street by Cisneros. All in all, the new notion of autobiography could encourage or hinder readers.

Considering these autobiographies, I believe feminists have more opportunities than challenges. For instance, if all feminist autobiographies could become “politically engaged, they tend to frame consciousness less as contemplative than as involved with social conditions, community affiliations, and historical circumstances.” (Goldman 288) Therefore, all feminist autobiographies would have a distinguishing factor that would set them apart from the autobiographies of others.

However, there is a challenge for this new style of autobiography. Since the recounting of memory could discredit an autobiography, feminists could have problems with people not believing their story. As Segal says, “There is, obviously, a difference between memory and history, even though this distinction has been increasingly probed and problematised of late. Despite the current fascination, even obsession, with memory over the last two decades, it is seen, correctly, as a fragile thing, vulnerable to all the illusions and self-deceptions, conscious and unconscious, that constitutes our mental life, as well as our inherently unstable, selective, always imperfect, conscious cognitive processes of recall: no memory without forgetfulness, no forgetfulness without memory, could be today’s mantra.” (Segal 121). The greatest challenge these autobiographies will face is proving their creditability. However, could feminists show that memory isn’t the most important aspect of an autobiography? Only time will tell.