Hi all,
My PhD is all about interviews - and I've been through a variety of
approaches. I initially
intended to have the interviews professionally transcribed - then I found
out how much it was going to cost. I then moved, for my pilot interviews
- to taping and using a dictation program to transcribe. This was better
than typing the whole thing in myself, but not much. I am now using a
combination of tapes and notes. As I transcribe I am editing out the junk
(bearing in mind then one persons 'junk' is another persons vital data).
But I think it very important to have a verbatim record of the interview -
notes are too subjective for my kind of semi-structured interview. The tape
also enables me to give my complete attention to the interviewee if the
situation demands it, and not to have to worry about whether I will remember
what was said. It is also very interesting to contrast my notes and
recollections of the interview with the tape ;-) .
On a practical level - I got a sony machine which fits in a pocket, uses
normal cassettes, has a built in speaker, but can record at half speed -
meaning a c-90 tape will run twice as long as normal - 90 mins on each side.
It came from Argos for about £30. Details below
I got the dictation software from Dabs.com IBMs package Via voice. It works
better than I expected - but not perfectly! It came with a purpose designed
headset - which you need for this kind of work - it plugged in the USB
socket on my PC. You may be able to get thew version I got - vn9 around.
Else go for the version 10 from dabs with the headset for £70.
Hope this helps
Neil
TCM20DV
Features:
Compact tape recorder with double time recording
Double recording time (Double/Normal)
Front speaker
Voice Operated Recording
Clear Voice
Speed controller
Microphone Jack
Built-in microphone
L/R monaural out
Silver
-----Original Message-----
From: Matej Cepl [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 22 April 2003 17:22
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Software
On Tue, Apr 22, 2003 at 02:27:39PM +0100, E.S.Housby wrote:
>What I would like to know is: while these whizzy packages for
>analysing interview transcripts sound great, is it really
>necessary to transcribe interviews in full at all? I have also
>transcribed interview tapes for a living and I know how much
>work it is. I have a little cynical voice at the back of my mind
>saying that spending a year transcribing fifty odd interviews is
>make-work activity which justifies taking three/four years to
>complete. Can't you just listen to the tapes, pick out the
>interesting bits and transcribe those? Or am I over-simplifying?
>I am about to start interviewing and have to make a decision
>soon on whether to record them, so this is a question of fairly
>urgent interest to me. My gut instinct is not to tape record at
>all but to rely on notes and then submit a typed up version of
>the notes for the subject's approval.
I had very interesting debate with my tutor on this theme. The
problem is that transcription of taped interviews costs some
money (American way) or it takes huge amount of time and moreover
in his opinion the analysis which is supposed by software like
NUD*IST tend to be totall overkill for the one-man show
dissertation research I am doing here (moreover, I would have to
install Windows on my computer, but that's my own issue).
Therefore, I have decided that I will not use tape recorder
but just write down field reports after returning to my
office/home and then analyse them.
Any thoughts on this?
Matej
--
Matej Cepl,
GPG Finger: 89EF 4BC6 288A BF43 1BAB 25C3 E09F EF25 D964 84AC
138 Highland Ave. #10, Somerville, Ma 02143, (617) 623-1488
[W]hat country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not
warned from time to time that [the] people preserve the spirit of
resistance? Let them take arms...The tree of liberty must be
refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and
tyrants.
-- Thomas Jefferson, letter to Col. William S. Smith, 1787
SOCREL-PG is the Postgraduate e-mail list of the BSA Sociology of Religion
Study Group.
To join SOCREL-PG, send the following one-line message:
join socrel-pg YOURFIRSTNAME YOURLASTNAME
to: <[log in to unmask]>
Send contributions to the list by
sending messages to: [log in to unmask]
To leave SOCREL-PG, send the following one-line message:
leave socrel-pg YOURFIRSTNAME YOURLASTNAME
to: <[log in to unmask]>
SOCREL-PG is the Postgraduate e-mail list of the BSA Sociology of Religion Study Group.
To join SOCREL-PG, send the following one-line message:
join socrel-pg YOURFIRSTNAME YOURLASTNAME
to: <[log in to unmask]>
Send contributions to the list by
sending messages to: [log in to unmask]
To leave SOCREL-PG, send the following one-line message:
leave socrel-pg YOURFIRSTNAME YOURLASTNAME
to: <[log in to unmask]>
|
