An Autoethnography of Fitting In: On Spinsterhood, Fatness, and Backpacker Tourism

Description

An Autoethnography of Fitting In: On Spinsterhood, Fatness, and Backpacker Tourism is a feminist narrative about the social rules of obedience and acquiescence to the norm – embodiment, heteronormativity, partnering – and about fitting in, or not, with those narratives. Phiona Stanley explores a period through her twenties and thirties, living and travelling alone, foreign to herself and the countries of her travel in all regards: white, cisgender, sometimes thin, sometimes fat, sometimes partnered. This fascinating volume uses these lived experiences, depicted through first-person narrative storytelling, as a prism through which to understand the subtle, social rules of gendered normative expectations. It draws on contemporary journals, letters, and photos, and features process-oriented sections that focus on the methodological possibilities these offer, and on questions of verisimilitude and subjectivity. Set in the context of transnational work in Qatar, China, and elsewhere, and "road status" as negotiated and performed among long-term backpacker tourists, this book serves as an exemplar of how autoethnography can illuminate socio-cultural normativities and their effects – which are rarely explicit, but which nevertheless have great potential to harm – while problematizing and rethinking the meanings and semantic boundaries of weight, queerness, and (hetero)normativity. Framed through reflexive autoethnography, with a strong focus on ethics and feminist theories, this book will appeal to students and researchers in autoethnography, qualitative methods, and gender and women's studies. Cover Half Title Series Page Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Table of Contents List of Illustrations Acknowledgements 1 INTRODUCTION Prologue: Dragons On Writing this Book 2 APPEARANCES Disappearing Swirling (Not) Knowing Backpacker: Part 1 Peru Poland 3 FATNESS Mexico Backpacker: Part 2 Losing It Oxford Moving On Sliding Doors On Fatness 4 FITTING IN Qatar Kane Backpacker: Part 3 Desert Driving Connecting Love Couples 5 PRIVILEGE The Golden Cage Nepal Himalayas Flying India The Pigs’ Tale On Privilege 6 NORMATIVITY Rushing Breaking Leaving Gas-Station Boys Backpacker: Part 4 Shanghai On Witches 7 (NOT QUITE) FITTING IN London Schools Franchising Coping Bicycles Interesting Times The White Stork On Being Child-Free 8 SAVING FACE Rabbits Backpacker: Part 5 Lockdown (Not) Missing Kane Keeping Up Appearances On Face 9 SPINSTERHOOD Dream and Reality Enough The End/The Beginning The Couplenorm 10 IN/TER/DEPENDENCE Nature Borders Purpose Going Alone Dust Appearances 11 CHASING APPROVAL CAN SAVE YOUR LIFE Lightness Danger Blame Kicking And Then Backpacker: Reinvented Some Endings 12 THEORIZING STORY/STORYING THEORY And Now A Queer Queerness? Pride? Shame? On Selfhood The Ethics of Storying Fatness, Reconsidered On Ants Solo Roads References Index