This is the third in a series of blog posts showcasing Cinema Memory Archive assets relating to the planning and conduct of Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain.[1]<\/sup><\/a> The previous post<\/a> featured a 1995 discussion paper that looked at the potential role of computer applications in the project and explored the features of qualitative data analysis packages that were available at the time.<\/p>\n When the document that follows was drafted (in March 1996),[2]<\/sup><\/a> the decision had been made to work with NUD*IST (now NVivo<\/a>). Training had been undertaken and transcription of interviews was close to completion. All core interviews had been listened to, and\/or transcripts read, by project team members, and it was time to think about how the material was to be systematically analysed. A few months later CCINTB’s initial findings were presented at the Screen<\/em> conference in Glasgow.[3]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n Analysis of Interview Transcripts: <\/strong>A Discussion Paper<\/strong><\/p>\n I have closely read and marked up two sets of transcripts: those of the interviews with Margaret Young and Mollie Stevenson<\/a> (Glasgow) and Fred Curnick and Gwen Curnick<\/a> (Harrow).\u00a0 My comments are based largely on my reading of these transcripts, but also to some extent on my (less close) familiarity with the contents of other interviews, my overall sense of what the interviews as a whole contain, and also of their ‘structure of feeling’.<\/p>\n It seems to me that analysis of the interview material will be guided to some, as yet unspecifiable, degree by the questions we want to ask of the raw data. What sorts of things do we want to \u00a0get from the data, always bearing in mind that with qualitative analysis there is quite properly always some degree of open-ended exploration involved?\u00a0 In some areas at least we will be working in a creatively analytic way with the data, and it would thus be wise to avoid preconceptions and remain open to what the material offers us.<\/p>\n It also seems to me that there are at least three levels at which qualitative data may be explored and analysed. In increasing order of openness and ‘exploratoriness’, these are<\/p>\n 1. Base coding<\/u><\/p>\n This is the area VB [CCINTB Research Fellow Valentina Bold] calls ‘descriptive categories’ in her discussion paper[4]<\/sup><\/a>:\u00a0they are the variables upon which we shall want to make comparisons between responses.\u00a0 On what grounds do we want to explore differences between responses?\u00a0 Do men talk about their cinemagoing in different ways than women?\u00a0 Do people in different areas or with different social backgrounds have different preferences for stars or types of film? These categories are probably best kept simple, with perhaps even fewer \u00a0than those suggested by VB, for example:<\/p>\n We shall need to make coding frames for some of these:, liaising with the questionnaire coder to establish consistency.[5]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n 2. Overt data level<\/u><\/p>\n This is more or less coterminous with the headings VB calls ‘thematic categories’, and refers to conscious, explicit, overt or factual responses:\u00a0 ‘factual’ or descriptive information about cinema buildings and personnel, for example;\u00a0 preferences as to films and stars; types of ‘fannish’ behaviour; other leisure pursuits and so on.\u00a0 Significantly, these are exactly the sorts of areas explored in the questionnaire, and \u00a0all lend themselves to a straightforward content analysis type of reading and coding.\u00a0 There is scope at this level for amalgamating and\/or comparing interview and questionnaire responses, and it would be as well to bear this in mind when making decisions as to the coding both sets of data.<\/p>\n For NUD-*ST, the question of ‘trees’ and ‘nodes’ will immediately arise at this level.[6]<\/sup><\/a> How this is dealt with will depend on what we are likely to ask of the data (though one of the beauties of NUD-IST is that it’s possible to develop your thinking or change your mind about this as you go along). It is likely, for example, that we will be interested in preferences for Hollywood as against British stars, and male against female, and the STARS ‘tree’ can be constructed accordingly.<\/p>\n Areas\/topics for coding at this level could include:<\/p>\n A number of more impressionistic, though still consciously articulated, items also arguably belong at this level. For example:<\/p>\n There is likely to be an area of overlap between this more qualitative end of the overt data level and the beginning of the next, deeper, level of analysis.<\/p>\n 3. Discursive or subtextual level<\/u><\/p>\n This level of analysis calls for a particularly exploratory and open approach to the material, and for sensitivity to clues that go below or beyond the written or indeed the spoken word.\u00a0 Most of my annotations on the transcripts I read relate to this level, at which I see emerging in particular issues relating to space, time and the narrativisation of memory.<\/p>\n There are different levels of analysis also within this category, beginning perhaps with<\/p>\n Moving on from this, analysis might attend to:<\/p>\n Other attributes of the account may also be revealing:<\/p>\n Beyond this, the analyst can move into various forms of ‘symptomatic’ reading, always respecting the data.\u00a0 One might wish, for example, to follow up a ‘hunch’ that emerges from what one knows about the respondents and how they speak.\u00a0 For example, \u00a0there is something that comes up in many interviews about the ways in which people remember their outings to the pictures–the detailed accounts of local topography, for example, or of companions and activities surrounding actual picturegoing.<\/p>\n At another level, and central to the rationale of the project as a whole, is the question of memory, of how people construct memories or turn their memories into stories.\u00a0 For example, I already note a difference between what might be called ‘repetitive’ memory (‘we always…’, ‘we used to…’) and singular memory (the recounting of one-off events, often anecdotes well-polished through many retellings); between memories in which the speaker involves herself in the telling, commonly collectively (‘we used to..’) and more impersonal remembering (‘there used to be…).<\/p>\n Another ‘symptom’\u00a0 relates to the ways in which people talk about time:\u00a0 an important form of memory narrativisation seems to be a ‘then\/now’ motif, which carries across different contents of memory, and varies in value accorded to each term (the Curnicks are more positive about ‘then’, for instance, Young and Stevenson about ‘now’).<\/p>\n Conclusion<\/u><\/p>\n These various levels of analysis would seem to call for differing forms of attention to the data, reading\/analytic skills, and so on.\u00a0 Without having sufficient experience with NUD*IST to assess how feasible this is, it would seem on the face of it sensible to perform each level of analysis separately.<\/p>\n For example, it would seem good sense–and indeed NUD*IST provides for this–to go through and base code all transcripts before beginning analysis proper.\u00a0 Moving then to the overt data level, the researchers can perform relatively straightforward indexing\/coding procedures and at the same time get\u00a0 used to working with the software.\u00a0 It would perhaps make sense to engage with the discursive level later on in the project, and\/or when particular sorts of ‘deep’ questions are being asked of the data,. For example: ‘how do our interviewees talk about the past as against the present, and how does this relate to their memories of going to the pictures?<\/p>\n Annette Kuhn, 1 March 1996<\/p>\n [1]<\/sup><\/a> We are able to to showcase these items here because non-participant materials in the Cinema Memory Archive \u00a0are now fully documented and accessioned.\u00a0 The project’s primary\u00a0focus has hitherto been the participant materials (interviews, letters, questionnaires, memorabilia etc) held in the CMA. While the bulk of these materials are readily accessible via the\u00a0project website<\/a>, non-participant items , including those featured in this series of blog posts, can currently only be accessed via Lancaster University Library Special Collections and Archives.<\/a><\/p>\n [2]<\/sup><\/a> Discussion Paper. ‘Analysis of Interview Transcripts’, 1 March 1995. CC-19-000NA012. Cinema Memory Archive, Lancaster University Library Special Collections.<\/p>\n [3]<\/sup><\/a> Annette Kuhn and Valentina Bold, ‘ Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain: Ethnohistory of a Popular Cultural Practice. Screen <\/em> Studies Conference’, Glasgow, 29 June 1996.<\/em><\/p>\n [4]<\/sup><\/a> Discussion paper. Base coding suggestions for NUD*IST’, 19 February 1996.\u00a0 CC-19-000NA008. Cinema Memory Archive. Lancaster University Library Special Collections.<\/p>\n [5]<\/sup><\/a> University of Glasgow Sociology student Callie Perks was responsible for coding CCINTB questionnaires, using quantitative analysis software SPSS. See Annette Kuhn, ‘Cinemagoing in Britain in the 1930s:\u00a0 report of a questionnaire survey’, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television<\/em>, vol.19, no.4 (1999).<\/p>\n [6]<\/sup><\/a> Workhop Manual for Q.S.R. NUD*IST qualitative data analysis software, 1995. CC-19-000NA020. Cinema Memory Archive, Lancaster University Library Special Collections.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Annette Kuhn This is the third in a series of blog posts showcasing Cinema Memory Archive assets relating to the planning and conduct of Cinema Culture in 1930s Britain.[1] The previous post featured a 1995 discussion paper that looked at the potential role of computer applications in the project and explored the features of qualitative … Continue reading Analysing Interview Transcripts<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","category-uncategorized","without-featured-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12699"}],"version-history":[{"count":30,"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12699\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12730,"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12699\/revisions\/12730"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lancaster.ac.uk\/fass\/projects\/cmda\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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