PSY 351 Fall 2020 Reading and Writing Notes for Autoethnography

This is going to be your bi-weekly diary. You will save your notes/writing each week under
PSY351(YOURNAME)day_month_year and upload those to Box 24 hours before our meeting.
Type in Times New Roman 12-font and single-space.
This is your template, type into this and just save this each week with a new date
Provide this information for each article assigned (in APA FORMAT)

Wiesner, A. (2020). Contemplating reflexivity as a practice of authenticity in autoethnographic

research. The Qualitative Report, 25(3), 662–670.
https://nsuworks.nova.edu/tqr/vol25/iss3/7

What are the 3 BIG IDEAS you got from this reading?
Three big ideas that I got from this article, is that autoethnographies take on a holistic
perspective, it must be vulnerable, and it is an act of self-love.
How does this author (s) define autoethnography?
Wiesner (2020) defines autoethnography as an act of self-love, something that gives the author
permission to let out the thoughts that they kept bottled up out of fear, criticism, or oppression.
He also, says that reflexivity is when “the author consistently questions themselves as both a
participant and a researcher” (Wiesner, 663).
How does this author(s) use their personal culture/experience to explain their experiences?
I like that Wiesner is a part of the LGBTQ+ community, that identity is definitely shown
throughout the autoethnography. Also, astrology is the spiritual belief of The Gays TM, so I was
able to relate to this article.
How could you apply this article to your own topic?
I think that this article has helped me understand how to use reflexivity in regard to my topic
because while Wiesner openly identified himself as part of the community, he did not use that
as his focus. It was more like a facet of his experiences.
What are your two major questions or clarifications about this reading?
My only question is why did he “out” himself, if that part of his identity wasn’t really what he
was going to focus on in the article?

Gergen, K. J., & Gergen, M. M. (1988). Narrative and the Self as Relationship. Advances in
Experimental Social Psychology Advances in Experimental Social Psychology Volume 21,
17–56. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0065-2601(08)60223-3

What are the 3 BIG IDEAS you got from this reading?
Three ideas that I got from this reading are how to organize my paper (establish end point,
select events relevant to the story, the ordering of events, and demarcation signs), the self-
narrative is the relationship among self-relevant events across time, and that human
consciousness is fluid and my paper should be as well.
How does this author (s) define autoethnography?
The authors, Gergen and Gergen (1988) define autoethnography as a self-narrative, or
individual accounts of the relationship among self-relevant events across time.
How does this author(s) use their personal culture/experience to explain their experiences?
The authors seem to have experience writing autoethnographies and a lot of what they were
talking about seems to be relevant to writing an autoethnography.
How could you apply this article to your own topic?
I will definitely apply the authors’ outline for writing my topic.
What are your two major questions or clarifications about this reading?
I feel like I need to re-read this article. My questions are how does an author get a paper to be
fluid like human consciousness without loosing academic stance? How do we know which
events or experiences will be relevant to our narratives?

Gergen, K. J. (2012). From reflecting to making: Psychology in a world of change. PsycEXTRA

Dataset. https://doi.org/10.1037/e528342013-002

What are the 3 BIG IDEAS you got from this reading?
Three big ideas that I got from this reading are being reflexive in methodology, shaping
activities that help our future, and shifting our framework and thinking from traditional to
modern and futuristic.
How does this author (s) define autoethnography?
To be honest, I don’t think that Gergen defines autoethnography that well, but shifting “from
an emphasis on reflecting the past to making the future” seems to be a close definition
(Gergen, 515).
How does this author(s) use their personal culture/experience to explain their experiences?
The author seems to reflect a lot on conversations that he has had with other people and relates
that back to updating how psychology, as a study, does its methodology to match with the
times.
How could you apply this article to your own topic?
I think the way that I can apply this to my topic is by trying to not dwell too much into my past
experiences because my focus should be applying my experiences to society and the
community.
What are your two major questions or clarifications about this reading?
Why this reading? I had a hard time connecting this to the other readings. I’m not really sure
Gergen gives the readers a lot to go on, just like three pages and most of it was really
confusing to read.