Exploration of My Aboriginal Heritage: An Autoethnography

Abstract

This autoethnography tells the story of myself, a blonde haired blue-eyed Aboriginal woman exploring identity and belonging. It begins with a brief overview of the dark history that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have experienced as a result of colonisation and policy makers. An autoethnographic journal was kept over the course of several months, documenting affective responses to questions concerning the aboriginal identity of the author. These subjective responses informed a written personal narrative as well as creating the foundation for retrospective reflections on the journal that appears later in the autoethnography. A number of theories are then explored in an effort to explain the phenomena behind finding and belonging to two cultures, white Australian and Aboriginal.