When someone I know stumbles upon my blog I’m really embarrassed. I don’t claim to be a good writer, in fact, I don’t think I am. One of my research interests lies in metacognition, which Seth Godin (2009) describes as “thinking about what you are going to say”. I’ve written about the value I see in blogs before, and I promise you, I will write about it again. Blogs are raw and unrefined.
This week I was doing some research and found the following academic article:
Lennon, S., & Barnes, N. (2020). A New Materialist take on the possibilities and impossibilities of becoming a scholarly blogger. The International Journal for Academic Development, 25(3), 247–258. https://doi.org/10.1080/1360144X.2019.1704411
I thought Lennon describes my feeling towards blogs perfectly.
This is where I must expose my writing ‘in the raw’. Unshielded, undrafted, unprotected and unsure. This is where I get to sink or swim- and I think I might just be drowning.
Sherilyn Lennon, on blogging, p. 248.
Blogs are absolutely raw, they are unfinished, undrafted, unprotected, and unsure. I use this space to question, prod and explore ideas that I find interesting. It’s a public diary that maps out my research interests and my growths as a librarian. To “publish” it in this form, is absolutely terrifying.
It’s absolutely horrifying to share! I believe it is scary because of everything mentioned above. The writing is not academic and it’s not purely train of thought. I loosely structure things and guess what? I make mistakes (grammar, etc.) That isn’t what this space is for, it’s not for perfection.
Look at the header image of this post. It’s a geode. On the outside, it looks like a normal rock. But if you crack it open, it’s beautiful. That’s how I think about my blog. It’s not about the package, it’s about the ideas inside.
That is why I love blogging. It’s raw!
Header image by ChatGTP 4