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Introduction. Palliative care embraces the plight of patients and caregivers. Cognitive and emotional empathy, empathetic care and the information environment at a time of dying influence caregivers' experiences of information interactions and emotional well-being. Understanding empathetic care, and the need for empathy in caregiver information interaction experiences in both palliative care and information behaviour, is still too limited. Visceral autoethnographic sharing combined with other qualitative research methods may help. Method. This paper intends to push the boundaries of research on the complexities of information interactions experienced by caregivers in empathetic care for the dying. Themes for further research are deducted from the subject literature, recorded experiences of caregivers, and our own experiences and insight gained from dual sharing experiences as information behaviour researchers and caregivers (i.e. collaborative autoethnography). We allow for etic (outsider) and emic (insider) perspectives. Information behaviour, collaborative autoethnography, and the philosophy of palliative care served as research lenses. Analysis. A cursory thematic content analysis was applied to the literature on caregiver experiences, caregiver 'voices' on information interaction, the value of collaborative autoethnography and our own shared experiences. Results. Key research themes include: caregiver sense-making in individual situated contexts; conceptualisation of empathy and empathetic care; cross disciplinary collaborative autoethnographic research. Conclusion. Since conventional research designs alone cannot address the complexities of information interactions, and there has been a failure to meet with the expectations of caregivers at the time of dying, alternative designs such as inter-disciplinary collaborative autoethnography supplemented by qualitative mixed methods research must be considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If you are troubled with the way we know the world, with the "traditional" academic sets, with the way certain bodies (maybe your body too) are treated, and with the way certain things are hidden and excluded in academia, so this text is (maybe) for you!... if you think "science" is the way to know the world, "valid" knowledges are made in academic sets, and papers represent the "scientific product," this text is also (maybe) for you too! Playing with our personal/political stories, we do a co-performance autoethnography to honor different way of knowledge. We invite you to think with us about science, resources, and possibilities embodied in our texts, in our lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background This paper focuses on the Creation of a Personality Garden as a development tool. The original concept of the Garden was born from an autoethnographical study on the effects of self-concept on the teaching and learning experience. Objectives To explore the effects of self-concept on the teaching and learning experience. Design An autoethnographical study. Setting The study was undertaken in London, UK. Participants The researcher was also the sole participant in line with the autoethnographical approach. Methods Data was collected through the means of a reflective diary, personal memory data, interview and other creative genres. A thematic analysis approach was then used to code and group core concepts. Results Three key areas were identified: emotional connection, growth, and resilience, with a fourth as an over-arching driver for the study; the audience and act of teaching. These elements appeared to underpin a teaching philosophy which recognises the benefits of self-awareness in teachers and an ability and willingness to connect with learners and respond to individual needs. The Garden was one element of self-reflective data which was later re-designed to embrace the personal transformation of the researcher throughout the study. Conclusions Educationalists must have a willingness to explore self-perception as it can facilitate a sense of transparency and connection between the teacher and the learner. The Garden works as a dynamic tool and a sustainable model for confronting the on-going challenges of embracing risk-taking and emotionally connecting with learners within the educational context. It allows exploration of the nuances of personality and how the uniqueness of self interacts with the role of the teacher; a sometimes uncomfortable, yet safe, place to sit and experience a virtual reality check questioning assumptions and the theories that the individual espouses to use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This article is an autoethnography that describes an emotional journey of writing and; presenting a conference paper. While it is a personal story being told, it is a story that speaks to many other minorities in academia who continuously need to legitimize their voices in the midst of the dominant colonialist perspective. The intention of writing this autoethnography is to speak to the feelings of otherness experienced, to disrupt the traditional academic voice (Pathak, 2010), and to allow for the expression of a reality that is often hidden to those with a colonialist frame (Mohanty, 2003). Design/methodology/approach: This article uses autoethnography as a methodology to reveal a personal story. Since autoethnographies help us make sense of our fragmented lives, the journey is told in chronological segments, detailing the emotions leading up to the conference presentation and its aftermath. Findings: The findings of the article expose some of the colonialist frameworks that are still embedded in academia. They also lie in the revelation of the "spectacle of otherness" endured in the process. Drawing the reader into the author's mind and heart with the intention of understanding the other is an important part of this paper. Originality/value: The first contribution of this paper lies in its decolonizing project, where Western knowledge systems and their epistemologies are the object of inquiry. The second contribution of the paper lies in its attempt to write intersectional research that does not impose predetermined categories of analysis but writes beyond specific classifications of identity. Finally, it also lies in celebrating the subjective self as a place that is worth exploring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to explore the praxis of creative social entrepreneuring as a vehicle for creative emancipation. The main research question asks how the knowledge and practice of entrepreneuring intersects with creative practice, process, and production in the development of a creative social enterprise. This study contributes to entrepreneurship and creative industries literature highlighting the actions of entrepreneurship in connection with concepts of emancipation and empowerment. Additionally, this paper contributes knowledge about the impact of entrepreneurial activities within the context of the creative economy. The study takes a deep-context autoethnographic approach towards the praxis of entrepreneuring by a creative social entrepreneur. Research using an autoethnographic approach of an individual creative social entrepreneur contributes to creative and cultural entrepreneurship research by illuminating the unique challenges and opportunities they face as they navigate entrepreneurship dynamics within the creative economy and uncover the factors that contribute to social innovation. This study aims to illuminate the practices of entrepreneuring that create sustainable opportunities for creative emancipation. This paper addresses calls for contextually embedded studies on entrepreneurship in the creative economy. Ultimately, this paper serves as a catalyst for transdisciplinary studies in the areas of entrepreneurship and the creative economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This autoethnographic (AE) paper draws directly from a national collaborative project called the New Academics Transitioning into Higher Education Project (NATHEP), which is funded by the University Capacity Development Grant (UCDG). We adopted evocative and narrative AE methodology to confront, interrogate, and uncover our own biases, assumptions, and preconceptions of induction before NATHEP, how it is now, and how it should be understood and conducted after being part of the NATHEP project. Our AE showcases our critical and reflective thoughts on the learning acquired throughout the journey, consciously and intentionally asking ourselves whether the NATHEP journey was worth it and how it benefitted the induction programme we conceptualised and implemented. Through a combined autoethnography study design and technique, we were able to gather qualitative data from the two of us and present it as written reflective narratives. Together, we developed an openended questionnaire in which we asked questions that sought to elicit our experiences throughout the journey as a way of reflecting on the overall learning acquired by being part of the NATHEP project. Our responses and narratives are reflectively and thematically analysed to make sense of how we interpret our eventful NATHEP journey thus far. We conclude and submit that this paper has implications for academic development practice and academic developers who aspire to be reflective practitioners, constantly reflecting on their practices to dismantle and disrupt cultural tendencies in their quest to transform their context of work and induction practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are two aims in writing this paper. Firstly, I reflect on several incidents that highlighted for me what it meant to be a widow in the eyes of others. The intention is to bring to light how becoming a widow reinforces how people define you relative to a man, more poignant because that man is absent. Providing personal insights sifted through theory is a form of feminist autoethnography that functions here as an intervention into more common views of widowhood. The second aim is to consider my experience of having the original version of this paper rejected by a journal. The reviewers' comments made me understand that my execution of feminist autoethnography was seen as problematic. This experience has spurned me to explore the need for methodological risk-taking, particularly when the topic being discussed, in this case widowhood, requires personal resilience to bring out of the shadows. Discussing issues that are "heartfelt" can contribute to debates about the construction of knowledge because they invite consideration of what is taken to be rational and what is taken to be emotional. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]