Reflexivity and research

Is reflexivity like recursion?

You have to go in on yourself to find what the assumptions are, but that assumes an understanding of what assumptions are.

We had a speaker, Ann Cunliffe, from Hull, give a lunch time seminar on the topic. It's a social constructionist approach that questions our notions of reality.

"an unsettling of the basic assumptions, discourse and practices used in describing reality"
{Pollner, 1991}

But, questioning reality means that I question the tools that I have to question with. So let alone not write authoritative accounts, the idea of reflexivity meaning that theories and explanations must be tentative undermines any confidence I have left in my research and analysis.

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Pollner, M. (1991) 'LEFT OF ETHNOMETHODOLOGY: THE RISE AND DECLINE OF RADICAL REFLEXIVITY', American Sociological Review, 56 (3), pp. 370-380. 845