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Abstract
Taking an ekphrastic approach, this essay responds to and reflects on my reading of Assessing Autoethnography: Notes on Analysis, Evaluation, and Craft by Andrew F. Herrmann and Tony E. Adams. It has three parts. First, I summarize the book’s central chapters and discuss their practical uses, especially as prompts for in-progress autoethnographies. Second, using clarity as a point of entry, I explore a tension I felt while reading the book—between the comforting utility of specific criteria and the marginalizing power of criteria themselves. Finally, I share a found poem composed in response to the book and reflect on the impermanent meanings it surfaced for me, highlighting how autoethnography makes space for uncertainty.
Keywords
autoethnography, assessment/evaluation, evaluation criteria, poetic inquiry
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank Margaret Berg, Caitlin Callahan, Hannah Radcliff-Hoy, Adam McClain, and Kirby Wycoff for their feedback on previous drafts of this manuscript: it was thoughtful and heartful, and the kind of assessment for which even I can be grateful!
Publication Date
9-27-2025
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.
DOI
10.46743/2160-3715/2025.8330
Recommended APA Citation
Hoy, A. (2025). A not-quite-assessment of assessing autoethnography: Ekphrastic compositions on quality, clarity, and (un)certainty in autoethnography. The Qualitative Report, 30(9), 4289-4304. https://doi.org/10.46743/2160-3715/2025.8330
ORCID ID
0000-0003-1837-8311
Included in
Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Ethnicity in Communication Commons, Poetry Commons, Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies Commons, Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies Commons
