Gender and Sexuality Studies

Abstract

Warner writes that fairy tales reflect “lived experience, with a slant towards the tribulations of women.” (Warner, xix) In this presentation, we detail our collaborative autoethnographic (Chang et al,. 2018) approach and how we reimagine our lived experience with perimenopause and menopause using fairy tales.  In earlier work (Marr and Moriarty, 2023; Marr and Moriarty, 2022; Moriarty and Marr, 2019) we developed stories that - for us - legitimize our experiences as mothers and academics, share ideas, and offer each other solidarity in a way that fits around our busy schedules and produces work (peer-reviewed texts) that is valued by our institution as scholarly activity and research. We argue that this process helps us to avoid the spaces that are synonymous with traditional academic work – white, heteronormative, male, and hierarchical (Moriarty, 2014).  It is from here that we are able to discuss our personal experiences of being peri/menopausal women in academia, to be vulnerable, ask for advice, and critique the existing culture – via our conversations and the writing that emerges in a way that nourishes and enhances our creativity, builds our connection as friends/colleagues/collaborators, and restores our sense of self as academics/mothers/artists. We suggest that our method of writing creatively and autoethnographically can help to entice change in women’s lives.

Storytelling
Menopause
Autoethnography
Creative methods

Biography

Dr Jess Moriarty is a principal lecturer at the University of Brighton where she is course leader on the Creative Writing MA and Co-director for the Centre of Arts and Wellbeing. She has published widely on autoethnography, community engagement and pedagogy in writing practice. Her last book, Walking for Creative Recovery, was published in 2022 and her latest book, Conversations on Creative Process, Methods, Research and Practice, looks at feminist approaches to supporting the creative self.