**3. Autoethnographical contributions**

I began my research work without thinking of autoethnography as a methodology or interpretative frame of reference. I was in the first months of my doctoral studies and I was not sure how to talk about my experience. Nor did I know how my story could contribute "scientifically valid" knowledge to science. What was clear to me was the need to interpret my experience and the life stories of the women interns I had met, stories to which I was also a witness. I wanted the thesis to be a dialog, a conversation with the women inmates to unveil how sorority relationships are built inside ([4], cit. Bénard 20-25). Thus, while planning and designing the methodology and data collection methods, I began to feel an uneasiness and uncertainty about the role I played in this research as part of the social phenomenon I was analyzing. In analytical terms, an important element that gives important nuance to the thesis is my participation in the phenomeno, which brought me closer to a different epistemological perspective to understand this lived experience, and the way in which we can make sense of the experience from introspection and writing as qualitative research tools ([5], pp. 3-4).

The thesis starts off with my own testimony, narrating my own experience. This translates, in the words of Elizabeth Aguirre - Armendariz [6] to "telling the thesis". In turn, the becomes the starting point to make a first approach to the field of study from the own introspection. The incorporation of autoethnography as a methodology has also allowed me to position myself as an "active agent with narrative authority" within the research:

Performing autoethnography has allowed me to position myself as active agent with narrative authority over many hegemonizing dominant cultural myths that

<sup>1</sup> PPL is the acronym in spanish for Person Deprived of Liberty, and it is the way in which the inmates are named in this penitentiary

*Autoethnographical Contributions in the Construction of Feminist Knowledge since the Lockdown DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.105162*

restricted my social freedom and personal development, also causing me to realize how my White- ness and class membership can restrict the social freedom and personal development of others [7].

As Tami Spry puts it, sharing an experience from one's position as a researcher inspires readers to reflect critically on their own life experience. Under this assumption, throughout the thesis I describe some of my personal experiences in the CERESO of San Miguel as an intern, to produce an autoethnographic work that consists of the construction of the narrative between the lived, thoughts and feelings. Tami Spry says: "Autoethnographic performance makes us acutely aware of how we "I-witness" our own reality constructions." ([7], p. 707). In this sense, the autoethnographic work, from my position as an inmate, helps me to develop a reconstruction of some practices that are generated in the CERESO that serves as a bridge and encounter between those who read us and the women who speak here about part of our life and daily life in this context of confinement.

Between the experiences and the theoretical plane that was presented to me, it was complicated for me, not only to establish a starting point, but also to define the position from which I was going to develop the research work ([8], pp. 115-119). As I progressed with my fieldwork, the review of information I had collected and its sources allowed me to find the path to follow. It was evident that I was not only elaborating an academic work; at this point I was already telling my own life story. In this way, I began to outline a multi-positionality in the development of the research.

This multiple position is presented throughout the work from three different perspectives: as a researcher, as a leader of a social management project and as an intern. This multipositionality in which I find myself is distinguished throughout my research. Is not just reflected in the stories and descriptions, but at different times it is presented as a distinct writing. It has not been easy. The writing exercise required a mental and emotional effort to allow me to find the balance between academics and my own passions.

In the role of researcher, I elaborated qualitative research of an inductive nature. This approach does not intend to develop concepts and understandings from the collection of data as a way to evaluate models or test hypotheses. On the contrary, the purpose is to understand the lived experience and at the same time to understand how other people live it, which allows flexibility both in data collection and in data analysis ([9], pp. 217-238). Thus, the questions about what is happening in the women's section, what subjectivities "know" in order to transform their relationships into sorority strategies? It was not possible to remain only in the descriptive part of the interviews, it was necessary to ask questions from a different position, to ask much more concrete and direct questions. That is, to go deeper with additional questions about the meaning of their experiences for inmates, through a prolonged group study in which, in addition to participant observation, inmates had other sources of information. This is why I designed, as part of the procedure to obtain qualitative data, four sessions of group memory workshops where interns participated as part of my focus group.

Additionally, another source of data collection that enriches the research and data collection was my interaction in the penitentiary center as a social manager. Since 2005, together with my sister Ana, we founded a civil association with the purpose of promoting projects based on playful methodologies as a tool to develop socioemotional skills. This contributed in the formation of a positive personality that providees children with maximum development potential in health, growth and learning capacities to transform not only the lives of these children, but also of the community, our state and the country. This program has given me access to the female section of San Miguel CERESO on a permanent basis. The actions and activities that we have carried out allow me to have a much more intimate approach with the inmates and their children. My constant presence in the female section has facilitated the elements to carry out a participant observation. This interaction and participation undoubtedly links me to the situation I am observing. It can be said that as a researcher I have become a member of the group to be studied. From this positionality, the challenge has been to set aside my own beliefs, perspectives and predispositions so that I do not try to take some circumstances for granted. At the same time, the information gathered through participant observation and interaction with inmates, custodial staff, family members and volunteers, is part of the corpus that is being analyzed in the doctoral research.

Unfortunately, this entire work plan was interrupted in 2020. The first work session with the focus group had barely been carried out, when the governor of the state of Puebla decreed that, starting in April, visits to prisons would be suspended as a control measure to prevent the spread of COVID-19 among inmates. As a society, we were facing a pandemic of unimaginable dimensions that would obviously have implications in my research and fieldwork.

While I was organizing my ideas and rethinking my thesis work in the face of the control measures adopted by the pandemic, I discovered that I was part of the experience, and that, if my interest was to contribute new perspectives to feminist knowledge, the multiposiotional nature in which I found myself was already a source of knowledge. In addition, although I could not enter the prison as a researcher, I was allowed to enter as a social manager. In this way, the methodology of the thesis started to shape up more towards an autoethnography, but the thread of the narrative itself was still missing. The question at this point was: what was part of my story and experience that I had yet to narrate? It is here where my position as an inmate at CERESO appeared as the missing piece to complete the narrative I was elaborating. This provided me with the opportunity to transcend from the individual to the social.

Autoethnography has been a methodological tool and the method of analysis of social practices and dynamics within CERESO because "autoethnographies are highly personalized, revealing texts in which authors tell stories about their own lived experience, relating the personal to the cultural" [10], then the story of my life as an autoethnographic narration becomes a revealing text that tells us this:

In March 2015, I was arrested for an alleged crime of extortion committed by a public servant. I was detained and consigned to a prison as a precautionary measure. I was deprived of my liberty in the female section of CERESO San Miguel during 3 months an d 3 weeks There, I lived the prison experience as an inmate. The situation was in the midst of a political scenario. I was accused and imprisoned for a crime I did not commit. My stay transgressed each of the spheres of my life: professional, family, labor, social and economic. It disturbed my economic and emotional stability and, why deny it, even my mental health. In this context, talking about my experiences in confinement was not only painful and confusing, but it also seemed a bit selfcentered and narcissistic because I felt that in this place there were other life stories to tell. On the other hand, perhaps another reason for not writing about it was not wanting to acknowledge my own history as an inmate. Avoiding it and not writing about it was in one way or another the way to run away from my memories. When I finally decided to speak about my experience and use it as a thread of conversation with the interns, I found not only meaning, but the richness of lived experience and a way to tell our stories.

*Autoethnographical Contributions in the Construction of Feminist Knowledge since the Lockdown DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.105162*

The pandemic and the suspension of my fieldwork were important events because I realized that my research did not depend entirely on ethnographic sessions. Instead, I understood that it was work, which had started the day I entered the CERESO as an intern. It continued constantly until today, encouraged by the social projects that I had managed recently. I have always been doing fieldwork, and I was also part of the social phenomenon that I was exploring. Thus, all personal experiences are valuable data that helped me to write the following chapters.
