Collaborative Autobiography

Pretty Self-Explanatory here. It's an autobiography in which some sort of collaboration is present. It could be written by more than one person, an "as-told-to" story, a ghost-written story or an interviewer, transcriber, or editor may have been heavily involved in the creation of the narrative. 

The Narrative of Cabeza de Vaca is by Álvar Núñez Cabeza De Vaca, however it is edited, translated and textually introduced by Rolena Adorno and Patrick Charles Pautz. Additionally, it should be noted that all parodies and renditions of The Narrative of Cabeza de Vaca can also be considered "collaborate autobiographies" according to the definition put forth by Smith and Watson. 

Personal Take:

 One writing project that I would love to do one day would be to take the massive memoir written by my great grandmother as well as the autobiography written by my father's estranged biological father and use pieces of each in a story about my family. Thinking of the project now, that would have been an incredible project to do for my 20% project for the class that has inspired this blog, however, it would have been even more work and with lots of liabilities-- my great grandmother's memoir is fragile and there's only one copy. However, maybe I could have done a portion of that larger project as a 20% Project. Regardless, I intend to put it all together one day, and if Vander Zee continues to teach this class, maybe he can use it as an example when I'm super duper famous. Furthermore, OUR blog is an example of collaborative autobiography in that we are working on a common project while using examples from our personal lives. 

- Mary Alice Miller