Transcriptionist

I met with a new transcriptionist yesterday, the person referred to me during my "good lunchage" last week. It wasn't easy to physically let go of those tapes, but now it's done and hopefully her work will be as "good" and as "fast" as everyone else says it is. I'm confident it will be. Can't wait to see those completed...by someone else!

I left two interviews for me to work on alone. One is with a tape that unfortunately broke, and if I can fix it myself or get it fixed, then I'll be able to transcribe most if it on my own. Yes, I'm using microcassettes instead of doing these digitally. I still don't know how one would transcribe something digital...I have to keep rewinding the tape recorder with my foot pedal...were it not for the trust pedal, I think it would take me twice as long as if I had to remove my keys from the keyboard and use the mouse to click the rewind button on for a digital recording. I'm probably missing something re: the technology on this.

Anyhow, the other interview I'll transcribe myself is of a participant about whom I'm really rather worried. The subject matter of our interview was pretty sensitive, and I suspect this person's mental state may not be very stable. I will need to consider whether or not this person's contribution to the study will be skewed by this instability, or if it's part of the analysis in general. Not sure. I'm certainly not a pscyhologist, so I'm probably not qualified to assess this person's mental state. However, it's pretty clear there's something different going on. Anyhow, I didn't think it was appropriate to share this person's interview tape with a transcriptionist I've only just met.

In a future post, I will probably outline the process I'm taking for this analysis. I'm dropping in terms here like "open coding" that may not make a lot of sense if you don't work in this field every day. Besides, the act of writing it out here may help me in the long run with writing up the results chapter(s).

My next tasks for the short term will be to a) finish the transcribing of these two tapes I still have, and b) finish up the initial open coding of the six interviews that have already been transcribed (I've already completed two...or three?). Oh yeah, and I need to c) finish purging the home office/prison.

Am finally getting some focus! I suppose I'm still on a bit of a high from the feedback I've been getting about how close I am to finishing up.