The Department of Communication will host Dr. Mike Alvarez on Wednesday, April 16 at noon in the Communication Hub. Alvarez will discuss his award-winning book “Unraveling: An Autoethnography of Suicide and Renewal,” an autoethnographic story that examines the intricate relationship among trauma, marginality, and mental health, and in doing so, critiques pathologizing discourses on social and relational being.
Through evocative storytelling and in-the-moment narration, Unraveling provides a candid account of descending into madness, the myriad traumas leading to despair, and possibilities for reconstitution and renewal. The book also considers the role of narrative in cultivating empathy for the mentally ill, the psychiatric-industrial complex’s obstruction of that empathy, and the ethical challenges that may arise when writing about self, other, and the social world. Ultimately, the author advocates for ‘unraveling’ as an orientation to the study of madness and suicidality – an invitation to decipher the structures and conditions in which people come apart at the seams, and come together anew.
Alvarez is an Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of New Hampshire. He is the author of several works, including The Paradox of Suicide and Creativity (Rowman & Littlefield, 2020) and Unraveling: An Autoethnography of Suicide and Renewal (Routledge, 2023). He is also the lead author of Pandemic Death Discourse (McFarland, 2025) and lead editor of Suicide in Popular Media and Culture (Bristol University Press, 2026).
This talk is co-sponsored by the Research and Intellectual Life Committee of the Department of Communication and the UMass Ethnography Collective.
Department of Communication to host Mike Alvarez
