10 - Life writing

Summary

The last quarter of the twentieth century has been a profoundly autobiographical age with the personal narrative providing an important lens both on to history and on to the contemporary world. Narratives, productions, and performances of identity have begun to permeate and transform Canadian culture in every medium. Furthermore, personal narratives no longer depend on speakers belonging to dominant social groups but emerge with pride from minority positions, cultivate the value of undervalued experiences, and risk distinctly intimate subject matter. Because the personal is also expressed as political, recent life writing contributes explicitly to changing cultures and to changing understanding of personal, communal, even national identities. In short, quite apart from the range and quality of life-writing production in Canada since the 1970s, and the rich archives that contribute to Canadian history, life writing is now recognized as preeminent among the genres in which the evolving character and concerns of the nation have been and continue to be written.