In the U.S., at least, academics are highly monitored for so-called breaches of confidentiality even in the most benign of projects. There is a near-paranoia on the part of the Internal Review Boards / Human Subjects Divisions that demands that, regardless of a participant's particular desire to not be anonymous, he or she be. A special case must be made, by the researcher, as to why confidentiality is not just not necessary, but also why it is particularly important to the project. Unfortunately, "because it's more interesting that way" does not suffice. Many of us have had that battle and have lost. Further, a new development in the National Science Foundation research grant application process includes an additional memo called a Data Management Plan - or How the Researcher Will Keep Data Confidential and Safe report. A breach of the HSD guidelines can sideline an academic career for many years.

This does bring up some rather intriguing questions about what it means to "do research" and to "report on findings" with regard to ethnographic work. And even more so, what kinds of institutional traditions and regulations have to be navigated when traveling between academic sites.

Regards
tish

Patricia J Lopez
Graduate Student
University of Washington
Department of Geography
Smith Hall 408, Box 353550
Seattle, WA 98195


On Thu, Dec 1, 2011 at 4:31 PM, Adefemi Kingsley Adekunle <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
I think this is an interesting question but a slightly separate point.
There will be instances when anonymity is required but I,  like Sarah,
don't think it should necessarily be the default option.  It does seem
that new technology will challenge this: if you are playing with other
forms of data like GIS or GPS data, is there a need to anonymise that?

On top of that, to expand on Matej point, I did see one program that was
able to anonymise visual data by making it the look like a saturday
morning kids cartoon.  This might be one way to strip out specific details
of an interview whilst retaining some essence of it.

Very much enjoying the discussion ...

Femi


> On 01/12/11 11:53, Sarah Holloway wrote:
>>
>> Two reasons for transcription:
>>
>> 1.It allows for coding which I find enhances thorough data analysis
>>
>> 2.It allows you to protect informants identity by removing their voice
>> and personal details (names, places they talk about) before archiving.
>>
>> Sarah
>>
>
> I don't understand the second reason in many cases.
>
> Why is it necessary to always anonymize informants?  (And why are they
> "informants" anyhow - are they not "interviewees"?)  Why must interviews
> originate (for example) from Mr. A who works for ABC rather than from Mr.
> John Smith who is a Senior Researcher at Microsoft?
>
> I can understand that some people are speaking "off the record" and some
> people are in sensitive positions where they do need to be anonymised.
> This may be particularly true when dealing with vulnerable people.  It's
> entirely understandable to anonymise every facet of their identity in such
> situations.
>
> But I often see papers where people are quoted saying something anodyne
> yet
> they and their organization are unnecessarily vague.  Surely it is more
> interesting to know where the speaker is based?  How much detail can be
> removed before the quote is meaningless ("Mr A. works for a large
> corporation somewhere in England.")
>
> What is the point of such "censorship"?
>
> --
> Matthew Rippon
> School of Geography
> Queen Mary, University of London
> Mile End Road, London, E1 4NS
>
> [log in to unmask]
> http://www.geog.qmul.ac.uk/staff/ripponm.html
>
>


--
(Ade)femi Adekunle
UCL
Department of Geography
PhD Student



--
Patricia J Lopez
Graduate Student
Geography Department

Mail: Smith Hall-Box 353550, Seattle, WA 98195-3550 [log in to unmask] http://depts.washington.edu/geog/