Stories shape our culture, creating narratives that become familiar blueprints guiding how we write and tell our own tales.
However, our stories do evolve. Through science, different worldviews, increased compassion, and critical questioning of our assumptions, we build richer understandings of ourselves and others by layering new meaning onto older understandings without erasing their past significance.
For this essay, we were asked to explore the evolution of a cultural narrative that speaks to us, identifying a specific aspect of our culture and tracing its development through different versions over time in order to analyze why the narrative has changed—or why it hasn’t.
The Drafting Process: Invention
We started the writing process first by assessing what we wanted to write about and why.
I knew I wanted to focus on Indian culture and mental health disorders, two concepts I hold near and dear to me.
Originally, I wanted to discuss how Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) could be classified as a “culture-bound” illness, so I based my initial works on that concept.
Part 1: My perspective on and understanding of ASD in India
Annotated Bibliography
Next, we were asked to find and analyze our sources: 1 text from the Narrative Medicine topic seminar, at least 2 scholarly articles, and 3 “artifacts,” or non-research sources.
However, I quickly realized that I did not like my original topic as much as I thought I would. It felt like the paper had no true basis. So, I shifted my topic slightly.
Part 2: “How Cultural Awareness Across Socioeconomic Strata Impacts Autism Spectrum Disorder in India“
First Draft:
Final Draft:
