The Autobiographical IOU: Elizabeth Warren’s Debtor-Citizen and the Reliably Liable Life Narrative

In light of the cultural politics following the 2008 global financial crisis, this essay analyzes the autobiographical acts of US Senator Elizabeth Warren, and her advocacy for the “debtor-citizen,” in order to outline a new hybrid narrative that draws from scholarship, memoirs, and self-help literature. The controversy over Warren’s unverified Native American ancestry constructs the political candidate as an autobiographical debtor to her constituents, exposing the autobiographical “I” as an autobiographical “IOU.”