Moral Selves and Moral Scenes: Narrative Experiments in Everyday Life

Through what kind of inaugural scenes is the moral self born? And what are the practices, within that scene, through which one tries to become a moral person, or a different sort of moral self, a person one is not but wishes to be? These questions are at the heart of the recent ethical turn in anthropology and sociocultural studies more broadly. In this paper, I explore three moral imaginaries: the trial, the artisan workshop and the moral laboratory. Turning to ethnographic material, I compare how these social imaginaries illuminate the moral work of people engaged in trying to create good lives for themselves and those they care about. Drawing upon a long-term study of a group of African-American families caring for children with significant illnesses and disabilities, I examine people's attempts to transform not only themselves but also the social and material spaces in which they live.