Blogging towards understanding: rethinking the notion of data

From the standpoint of a novice researcher, the author has examined how blogging as a literacy practice enables one to explore and understand self in relation to analysing data and making meaning. The purpose of this paper is to discuss how blogging can be used as a reflective and critical tool and explore the notion of blogging as transgressive, or stumble data.

The theoretical underpinnings of blogging as a literate critical practice are congruent with the work of Freire. Thinking about research through this paradigm thus becomes transformative because it enables one to do data differently. This paper also considers and interrogates different approaches to the analysis of data, and frames blogging as a way to inquire more subjectively.

In this paper, blogging is represented as uncoded data; a concurrent and seemingly unstructured method of analysis. To this end, the definition of data is questioned in terms of what is legitimate, and what counts. Subjectivity puts blogging into a relevant context, as one’s positioning and experiences become a layered foundation upon which to understand one’s research more closely and meaningfully. Self-representation is deeply entwined with self-documentation, which can enable the identity of the writer/researcher to attain greater definition.

Flirting with data in unconventional ways and inhabiting a space of unknowing enabled original thinking and creative processes to enter the research space. Reading and writing are framed as methods of inquiry and analysis that are separate, or an alternative, to coding data.