Living in Darkness at the Time of the Great East Japan Earthquake: A Poetic-Narrative Autoethnography

Abstract

This qualitative research employs expressive forms of writing to explore the author’s traumatic life experience in relation to the Great East Japan Earthquake which took place on March 11, 2011. The methodology chosen in the current study was a poetic-narrative autoethnography. The author selected both a collection of his English poems and poetic expressions of his Japanese second language students in English writing. While looking at each writer’s emotional response to this experience, narrative reflections and understandings of the tragedy were added. This study provides insights into a cultural trauma emergent from the disaster and presents the author’s personal experiences of living alone in a foreign country at the time of the dramatic earthquake and tsunami taking place in his home country.