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Running head: AUTO-ETHNOGRAPHIC DIARY 1

AUTO-ETHNOGRAPHIC DIARY 9

Auto-ethnographic diary

Haoyu Huang

WRIT-1133

07/01/2022

Abstract

Social media has various apps that are essential in allowing people to interact, communicate and share their ideas. TikTok is one of the social media apps that gained many followers during the COVID-19 pandemic, where people used it for social interactions and sharing content. In this diary, we highlight the experiences with the TikTok app on a three-day use and the opportunities that the app can offer if fully adopted in different sectors.

Auto-ethnographic diary

July 1

Social media is a 21st-century technology that changed communications and interactions around the globe, and everyone is eager to get the experience. TikTok app is a social media platform that became popular in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world, and that is the moment I got the experience with the app. I started using the app mainly during the period when the pandemic restrictions were adopted, and I had more free time at home and needed an entertainment platform to keep my mind occupied. During this period, I had a friend who had already installed the TikTok app on his phone. I found it entertaining and engaging, leading to my interest in having it and having fun (Lisdawati, 2021). Immediately after the installation, I consistently used the app for more than an hour non-stop since the content was in excess and only needed me to scroll upwards. It was a fantastic experience using the app at first because of the easy usability and short and interesting video clips that maintained my attention, developing my interest in the following content. I started using the app purposely to serve the entertainment and engagement moment that was best for the time when I spent most of the time at home, and it was not my norm. I missed many outdoor activities, especially playing tennis with friends, but TikTok helped minimize the boredom created by the pandemic. The app played a significant role in my life, especially for entertainment and engagement purposes, where I would watch content from all over the globe, experiencing diverse cultures and traditions. I had limited knowledge about using the app, but the presence of a friend that had used it for a more extended period assisted in getting used to additional icons and features that made it possible even to create an account and access the accounts of family and friends.

However, accessing family accounts made it possible for we interacted with family through their accounts where some were engaging in content creation, especially the lip-sinking was particularly a straightforward exercise. Through the platform, I learned that family members and friends were doing well despite the pandemic and were happy and healthy. It was the best experience since the posts that I viewed of family and friends were full of fun and entertainment, and this is where the app is more significant compared to the other social media platform. I also had the opportunity to send direct messages to them, communicate about the family's progress, and get instant feedback through the platform, which was quite encouraging. There are scenarios where we participate in live sessions with the family that helps in building relationships and bonds with one another, making it possible to have better interactions even without physical meetings. It was memorable the moment when all the family members were in live online interaction, something that had never happened for a long time since we were used to physical family meetings, but the pandemic gave us an experience that unique and worth remembering it.

TikTok is a platform that has led to a better understanding of how social media is a crucial technology today, and it has made the world a global village since our interactions and communications were the best. Our interactions made me feel we were in an actual physical meeting since we achieved our family gathering objectives and related well beyond the expectations. I have gained knowledge about the roles that TikTok offers to the users and felt that there are many gaps in leveraging the platform, especially for academic purposes. Limited educational content is shared on the forum, and this showcases that what the scholars mentioned about the significance of the tool is literally true, primarily because it works best for interactions and information sharing. Scholars have stated that TikTok is an app that can be adopted for different purposes, including creating awareness about sensitive issues like vaccination messages and political activities (Li et al., 2021). TikTok also has been described as a tool that can play a significant role in the business industry, especially for marketing purposes, and this is evident that the tool can help in having direct social interaction with customers.

July 2

Entry 1, July 2, 2022. The interaction with the TikTok technology was all about entertainment, learning, and getting awareness information from various users and content creators. Today, the first video clip I interacted with was about cooking tips shared in Chinese culture. It was an exciting experience that led to my developing curiosity about learning more about their cooking cultures. I just looked into the content creator's account and viewed more video clips about cooking, and the most common ingredient used in their food is the chili pepper. I used the technology as a learning session to acquire the knowledge and skills about cooking since I am passionate about it. There were various recipes for cooking chicken meat, and chili pepper was a common ingredient in all of them. Since the platform is more of an interactive session, I had to enquire about the reason why the Chinese value the Chili pepper ingredient in various foods, and the response was about flavor and medicinal reasons. In the comments section, there was positive feedback from the viewers about the food recipe videos, and some requesting for more content delivered about cooking. I also had the opportunity to ask to cook pizza the Chinese way, and the content creator promised to do so. It did not materialize within the day, but the content there was valuable for my time spent watching them. There is always no boredom or regrets visiting TikTok looking for content since it is plenty and readily available.

I felt good that the session visiting the social media app was productive, and I learned more about cooking and developed a broader perspective about diverse cultures when it comes to food. My thinking about food was much limited where I was only aware of the essential chicken cooking recipes but using the TikTok platform changed my whole perception and made to understand that there are multiple ways chicken is cooked based on different cultures. I reacted to the experience by trying out what I learned in the video clips sourced from TikTok, and surprisingly, the recipe backfired, and the food failed to meet the standards demonstrated. It indicated that there is much that I need to learn about the topic, and this is possible by sending the feedback to the account asking for assistance which I did. I found that the social media platform is worth using on a daily basis since some new concepts and ideas are shared or generated there and is valuable to everyone. Since content creators are continuously sharing content, it is an interactive session where they respond to the information by giving cooking tutorials that are of assistance to interested people on the cooking topic. For me, it did not look that the platform could be used for teaching but looking at it from a broader perspective showed the strength and opportunities that the platform has that can be leveraged for the better. The response to the inquiry about the recipe assisted me in having a chicken cooked using the Chinese recipe, and it was the best experience ever. It was an additional knowledge and skills in cooking, meaning that people benefited from getting other information on different topics.

In addition, getting into details about the information I learned showed strengths and possibilities that can be achieved using a social media platform, uniquely the TikTok app. The short clip app has an opportunity to be applied in different sectors, including the education field, which I confirmed through the cooking recipes. There is a significant connection between the information written in the annotated bibliography on the importance and value that the application of TikTok brings to an organization. There is much that TikTok can get when adopted and leveraged well, and this includes developing the best marketing content, awareness, education information, and also educational content (Li et al., 2021). Learning about cooking using the platform has supported the research question about how TikTok can be used in the process of learning science content and experiments. The thought that came to me was how the tool could be used in making science teaching successful by adopting the popular social platform. There is also the issue of turning the misinformation that is shared to the forum for positive awareness reasons like educating the public about vaccines.

July 3

Entry 2, July 3, 2022. A Sunday is always a day of relaxing and having fun for me, and using the TikTok platform was more of looking for entertainment content, and luckily, I interacted with a popular and fancy dance style that I admired. I felt terrible that I was not a good dancer but decided to try it this time and have fun. I decided to record the dancing session and ensure I became close to the dancers on the platform. Luckily, I found a dance tutorial in the content creator's account and learned it before recording the actual video. It took me about 45 minutes to learn the dancing styles based on the tutorial though the video was relatively short. It was a fantastic experience that I successfully recorded, and on looking at it severally when I admired the progress in learning to dance, and this is the point I decided to give it a try posting in my account for the first time. It was a good interaction, especially when the followers and friends shared their responses to the dance video based on the challenge done through the platform.

I felt good that there was a positive response after doing the dance video and sharing it on the TikTok app. A positive reaction about something you did not accept results in a feeling of satisfaction that doing it was right, which motivated me to do more (Gapp, 2022). The experience led to gaining more followers and also receiving more viewership that was my source of happiness looking forward to earning from the platform. I reacted to the experience by thanking the fans who responded positively, promising more dance content since they appreciated the effort.

I thought the experience was enough to confirm that the social media platform can serve a bigger purpose than entertainment and educate the viewers about what is happening in society and around the globe. Much resemblance between my experience with the dance video on the social media platform and the information shared in the annotated bibliography shows that TikTok is an interactive and engagement platform that brings people together. The experience led to the appreciation that TikTok experienced a spike in the number of followers during the pandemic because they felt that they needed to interact and communicate between friends and family (Gapp, 2022). In the research question, the issue of using TikTok for scientific teachings for students and the general public significantly relates to my experience using TikTok for dance learning through tutorials and getting feedback from friends for improvement purposes.

References

Gapp, D. (2022). Using TikTok as an Active Learning Strategy. Nurse Educator, Publish Ahead of Print. https://doi.org/10.1097/nne.0000000000001260

Li, Y., Guan, M., Hammond, P., & Berrey, L. (2021). Communicating COVID-19 information on TikTok: a content analysis of TikTok videos from official accounts featured in the COVID-19 information hub. Health Education Research, 36(3), 261-271. https://doi.org/10.1093/her/cyab010

Lisdawati, I. (2021). Language Style and Register Used by Famous Content Creators in TikTok Application. IDEAS: Journal on English Language Teaching and Learning, Linguistics and Literature, 9(2), 187-198. https://doi.org/10.24256/ideas.v9i2.2192