A Life in Motion: Exploring Auto/Biographical Exchanges by ‘Walking With’ Nelson Sullivan

Abstract

In this article, we combine a number of related elements – YouTube films, autobiographical methods, diaries, letters, and walking – to explore the sociological value of the films of Nelson Sullivan (1948–1989). Sullivan was a film maker who documented New York, and elsewhere, in the mid-late 1980s; however, the films are ‘vlogger style’ and offer richly detailed, relational, and dialogical accounts of the ever-changing figurations between Nelson and a cast of other characters. Here we aim to walk sociologically with Nelson. We explain of how we analysed Nelson’s films before considering the implications of repositioning ‘vlogs’ as something of a hybrid between letters and diaries. We then explore walking as an autobiographical act a little further. Finally, we conclude by considering the implications of Nelson’s work for past, present, and future sociological practice which uses YouTube videos and vlogs, by emphasising the importance of the ‘dialogic exchange’.