I am Privileged

"With narrative ethics, we must consider who is able to tell a story and who has the ability to listen," warns Tony E. Adams in his journal piece, A Review of Narrative Ethics. I have been researching ethical responsibilities and guidelines for writing an autoethnography - a narrative piece. In my opinion, the question of who has narrative privilege is at the core of ethical practices when telling our own stories.

We own our stories, and at the same time those stories are owned by someone else. We are all actors in each other's stories, and it is important that the privilege of telling about someone who plays a role in our story - in essence, creating them for our audience - is a privilege we practice responsibly as narrative writers. Even in everyday conversation we ought to be aware of our narrative privilege when having conversations. Essentially, when telling a story whether verbally or written, we are constructing it based on our experiences and our acceptance or denial of cultural ethics, morals, and beliefs. Our stories are constructed based on our current identity, based on current circumstances, and motivated by our future desires and pursuits. Not only is there a story behind everything and every person, there is a reason and motivation behind every story.

I have narrative privilege. Although I don't have the luxury of writing full time or even being paid (yet) for my work, I am privileged. I have the ability to read, to write, to compose grammatically and well enough for others to understand, absorb, enjoy. I have skills as a scholarly writer as well as a writer for personal pursuits. Because I attend college, know how to use a computer, I have the privilege of reaching others and gaining feedback for my writing.

Although I am privileged, my stories may not be told the way the other actors in them would have remembered them and told them. This is why I carefully meditate on each story, and spend more time thinking about the events I want to record before I actually commit them to paper. Paradoxically, I try not to over think them because I don't want to alter them, as I believe a story changes each time it is remembered or revealed.

Tonight, as I write the personal narrative pieces for my autoethnography and put aside the scholarly research component, I consider my narrative privilege and realize that it's my prerogative to recollect and tell to the best of my ability.