6: What to do with the journal entries?

Author:
Nicole Brown
Publication Date:
19 Oct 2021
Pages:
77–94
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.51952/9781447360063.ch006
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Maintaining an effective research journal consistently and efficiently is hard enough and often not talked about or taught. Within the traditions and conventions of ethnography, fieldnotes are a substantive element of the process, and are genuinely used purposefully to create a particular end product. In most other disciplines, however, journalling and journal entries are not shared. Somehow and somewhere in the process of being advised or made to keep a journal it is just assumed that we all know what we are supposed to do with our entries. Academic writing guidance and workshops focus on getting people to write regularly to become more proficient at formulating arguments. In an effort to improve practical writing skills and knowledge, it seems the practicality of dealing with the entries from journalling is neglected or ignored. Yet, if we spend so much time and energy on journalling and recording details, then surely we ought to do something purposeful and meaningful with those entries.

Let me remind you of two journalling principles mentioned elsewhere in this book: (1) anything and everything goes, and (2) tools and contexts need to fit the purpose. These principles also apply in relation to what to do with the journal and its entries. There are no limits, other than perhaps our lack of imagination, sense of adventure or flexibility. Naturally, within the context of academic careers and publishing, there may be conventions that we do need to adhere to, and where particular kinds of output are perhaps not considered as scholarly enough, or as too innovative or too risky (see Chapter 6 in Leigh and Brown, 2021).

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