About

The contemporary moment is one in which Generation Z (those born between the mid-1990s and mid 2010s) are experiencing a coming of age defined by global crisis; our transition to adulthood is shaped by post-pandemic workplaces and relationships, and unprecedented rates of depression and anxiety. We are dealing with twenty-first century illnesses, ecological peril, financial instability, and complex new systems of social interaction.

Through interrelated elements, this creative writing PhD aims to examine how autofiction is uniquely positioned to investigate these challenges. Exploring the intensified experience of coming of age in a space of crisis, I look at how autofiction can both capture the Gen Z experience and connect readers to large scale societal themes through personal narrative. The research consists of formally experimental autofiction, ‘Party Girl Gets Sick’, which is the story of my mental and physical health journey, beginning from March 2020 and ending in September of 2021, a period in which I was debilitated by a Small Intestinal Bacterial and Fungal Overgrowth infection, which forced me to stop my life and reconsider everything I knew about health. Through autofiction, I examine how physical and mental illness is entwined with the degradation of the environment and the food system. I also investigate how these issues intersect with questions of sexual politics and youth culture. Alongside the creative component, I will critically examine how autofiction – in particular strategies such as non-linear form and the use of non-fiction reference points – serve to construct empathy between the individual’s experience and wider social and political imperatives, addressing what Ghosh has called the ‘derangement of scale’ of contemporary experience. Building on ideas of evocative autoethnography and new sincerity in fiction, I position my work as an intervention into issues such as apathy, polarization, and ‘Apocalypse fatigue’ that are shaping youth experience.