Accidental Ethnography

Christopher N. Poulos is Associate Professor of Communication Studies at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro. An ethnographer and philosopher of communication, he teaches courses in family and relational communication, dialogue, ethnography, film studies, and rhetoric. His work has appeared in Qualitative Inquiry, American Communication Journal, Southern Communication Journal, Cultural Studies: A Research Volume, and in the books 9/11 in American Culture, Spirituality, Action, & Pedagogy: Teaching from the Heart, and Spirituality, Action, and Teaching: Stories from Within.

• chapterOne Family Secrets; chapterTwo Accidental Ethnography; chapterThree Dreaming Autoethnography; chapterFour Out of the Shadows; chapterFive Evoking Archetypal Themes in an Ethnographic Life; chapterSix The Storied Life and the Courage to Connect; epi Epilogue;

"What makes this book's applications unique is their ability to make students, including those of us who think of ourselves as lifelong learners, to think on a higher level of reflective engagement. . . . What you have in your hands a truly remarkable story that will engage, I have no doubt, your most creative and intellectual energies." -H. L. Goodall, Jr., Arizona State University"...Poulos constantly reminds us that what he is writing about is as much about the reader as it is about the author. He encourages us to engage in the journey he has undertaken, to write our stories as he writes his. In fact, many times I had to pause in my reading of his book to write my own accounts, something that I think would make Poulos feel as if his project is fulfilled. And in that writing, in that story-telling, often spurred by some accidental trigger I found in his book, we both begin to find some place of healing. Poulos ends his book by finding peace through writing; by allowing the moments to flow into his writing, he finds that writing gave him the home he was looking for."...--Southern Communication Journal