Auto/biographical Strategies of Women’s Basketball Coaches as Educators

• In Event: Virtual Poster Session
  In Virtual iPresentation Only: SIG-Biographical and Documentary Research Virtual Poster Session

Abstract

Biography and autobiographical genres have expanded to include various forms of innovative life writing. Recently a group of university educators have created autobiographies worthy of examination from a critical theory perspective. Auto/biography projects have the potential to contribute to deeper understandings of sub-cultures--in this case the history of women’s athletics. This case-study examines the ways in which university and professional women's basketball coaches created and used their autobiographies as cultural critiques of education, sports, gender, race, and social class. A close examination of autobiographies, created by these educators, from a critical auto/biography case-study perspective, provides researchers with new methodological tools for creating and analyzing biographical data about women coaches as educators.

Author

• Thalia Mulvihill, Ball State University