Guidance
This assessment requires you to choose any published written autobiography of someone who has experienced victimisation, harm or survival of some sort and expose it to evaluation and further insight.
You will be asked to critically assess your chosen text with regards to the most relevant theoretical, policy-related, and/or methodological debates discussed throughout the module.
Autobiography – Yousafzai, M. and Lamb, C. (2013). I am Malala: The Girl who stood up for Education and shot by the Taliban. London: Wiedenfeild and Nicolson.
In making your critical assessment of this form of textual data, you may wish to consider and include the following:
a summary of your chosen autobiography; – 10% 300 words
the theoretical perspective within victimology that would help make best sense of this lived experience;
uses of relevant concepts to help provide further insight into the account given within the chosen autobiography;
an assessment of the author’s own perception as a ‘victim’, survivor or otherwise;
an evaluation of any structural issues that may have impacted upon the experience being recounted;
the value of using autobiography as a form of data within sociology, criminology and victimology to provide insight into the lived experience of victimisation, harm and/or survival.
Q. Do I need to fully reference the autobiography we are using in-text, or just put page number (e.g. p. 6)?
A. As this is textual data produced in the form of a published book you will need to make same value-judgements on how to refer to the work you are citing. As a general set of principles, consider the following:
if quoting directly or paraphrasing from the autobiography, please ensure you use the Harvard Style of referencing (noted below), for e.g. Girl A and Bunyon (2013: 66) or (Girl A and Bunyon, 2013) respectively;
if cross-referencing the experience being recounted then you may wish to refer to the author in the third person, for e.g.: as illustrated from the experiences recounted by ‘Girl A’, these events are complex and require further critical consideration using victimological insights.
