Embracing the Suck*

During my time at IU I’ve transcribed for my advisor and for a few of my own projects and by the end of each recording I’m relatively numb both physically and mentally. So I approached this week’s readings with a mix of excitement and trepidation. Would the secrets to painless transcription be revealed, would I learn the magic trick to transform my participants’ words into text on the page ready for my analysis and coding? Or would my deepest fears be confirmed. There is no trick, you just have to embrace the suck* and get through it, wrist cramps, blurred vision, and all. My conclusion after finishing this week’s readings? It’s a bit of both. Transcription is a necessary evil, but one, that when viewed as an initial component of the analysis is essential to the research process.

Some thoughts on the readings:

I’ve never thought deliberately about transcription. I simply attempted to place my participants’ words on paper – I didn’t include infliction or reference facial expressions. I did include laughter but, after about my 1,000^th “um” and 250^th “like” I omitted all backchannel utterances for my sanity! So, without thought I’d been conducting gist transcription, more particularly condensed transcription (Paulus, Lester, & Dempster, 2013). For my next round of transcriptions I will likely enhance my transcriptions to include hyperlinks to the actual audio and video as a way to increase the transparency of my findings and to hopefully enhance my data analysis (Markle, West & Rich, 2011; Paulus, et al. 2013). I’m thinking about a lot of other things with my transcriptions, but this is at the surface now.

Another aspect of transcription I’ve never truly thought about is the interpretive process of taking another’s words and placing them on paper. Hammersley (2010) describes this beautifully when he says, “What is meant by the constructional character of transcription is that a whole variety of decisions are involved, and that none of these is open to a single rational solution, so that there cannot be one correct transcription of any stretch of audio- or video-recording” (p. 556). So it is up to the transcriber to make some pretty serious decisions about the text produced. This is complicated if the transcriber is different from the person who conducted the interview who might be different from the researcher or research team as several layers of interpretation are applied to one moment in space and time. (Yup, Doctor Who reference dropped right there.)

Also, I found Johnson's study and ultimate conclusion on the use of voice recognition software troubling. He set out to determine which was more lucrative in terms of time spent and accuracy in transcription – voice recognition software or traditional listen/type methods. Johnson found that the traditional listen/type method was 14% quicker with greater accuracy. However, I was bothered by his methods. The experiment only included a comparison of ONE 17 minute recording which I feel is too small of a sample to support such a claim! In addition Johnson first transcribed the interview using the voice recognition software and then used the listen/type method. It is possible that the additional exposure to the data – hearing, speaking, reading for errors and then re-listening to correct errors increased his familiarity with the transcript which might have increased his typing time when conducting the second part of the experiment. The fact that these relatively obvious concerns were not mentioned is a glaring omission which makes me question the validity of his findings. While Johnson does find both methods equally dull (which I don’t question), his ultimate conclusion that his preferred transcription method would be to have a graduate student do it for him using a mix of voice recognition and listening/typing is relatively trite and contradicts statements made in his introduction related to the significance of conducting your own transcriptions as being a key component in ensuring the proper tone and intent of the participants is captured.  

Finally, it was nice to see some discussion of the different resources available. I'm curious to experiment with some of the different methods mentioned.  I’ve used Express Scribe before, but didn’t find it that much different from simply playing back a recording at reduced speed and typing. Playing recordings at reduced speeds takes a little getting used to. I always feel like I’m listening to drunks talk about history which, if you’ve seen Drunk History, is relatively amusing and far more interesting than transcribing. (Viewer discretion is advised!) 

*Embrace the suck: A military term that refers to a bad, seemingly pointless situation that you have no choice but to deal with. Often you are advised to just get on with it and are even encouraged to make the most of the situation. For more on this term check out this NPR Morning Edition interview with Austin Bay. 

Me embracing this weekend's suck - to the best of my abilities.

How to embrace the suck. First, acknowledge the negatives. This is the easy part. Negatives - Reading and writing this in a hotel room knowing that I'm losing an hour of sleep tonight and have to sit through a full day of briefings tomorrow followed by a three hour drive home, oh and I missed a friends birthday celebration. Next identify the positives and try really hard to convince yourself it all evens out. This is the not so easy part. Positives - They pay me, no tax on alcohol, Yuengling Lager, I'm in Ohio now, not New Jersey and I'll be home in time for Walking Dead. The briefings are a one time thing and next month I'll start in my new position - which is super exciting. Oh and I'm in a hotel room...with wifi.