WHAT IS INTERVIEW CODING?
Coding is the process of organizing data in preparation for analysis. Through coding we identify common themes that allow us to compare and contrast experiences, perspectives, and descriptions from our data. Fundamentally, coding helps us figure out what is salient across stories and most important to the narrators.
It’s a fairly straightforward process! Coding involves identifying, creating, and updating themes, as well as sorting data into those themes. Among the Pussy Palace oral histories, common themes can be as simple as descriptions of the carpet or more complex like individuals’ experience of care at the bathhouse. For the Pussy Palace Oral History Project (PPOHP) we created our themes with the narrators in mind, trying to honour their contributions by utilizing a bottom-up process. This means that we reviewed the interviews first, then compiled the themes that appeared most prevalent and effective to sort the interview content.
We created definitions for each theme that included descriptions of what should and shouldn’t qualify for each theme. We combined these definitions to create a “codebook.”
The specific definitions in the codebook help us keep the themes consistent throughout the project and make it easy for each member of our team to navigate the data set. As we move through the interviews and sort the content into our themes, we keep testing the themes to make sure that they match the narrators’ contributions, adding to or updating our list as new themes arise.
Our codebook currently consists of over 50 themes that span identity development, community creation, activism, aesthetics, and affect. In future we hope to make this publicly available so others can navigate our archival data effectively. In the spirit of qualitative research, this extended use best honours our narrators by maximizing the value of their contribution and decreasing the burden on marginalized groups to retell their story for each new project.
NVivo AS A TOOL FOR THE DIGITAL HUMANITIES
Historically, coding in qualitative research has occurred through physical means, with researchers reading printed transcripts of interviews and using highlighters, sticky-notes, or scissors to sort their data into different categories. For the PPOHP we are doing something different. We are coding with a qualitative data management software called NVivo. With NVivo we can sort our data digitally, consistently update themes, and organize the large data set as our understanding of the project evolves. Through this, NVivo’s auto-coding contributes to spot checking so that our work is consistent. As our themes grow, NVivo visualizes our data to give us a better sense of the salience of themes and contributions of the narrators.
NVivo has further allowed us to incorporate the audio and video of the interviews in coding. As we code, each portion of the transcript is synchronized with the audio and video of the interview. So, as we move through the interviews, we can select portions of the video or transcript and label it as belonging to a certain theme. With that, each instance of coded text is just two clicks away from hearing and seeing the narrator speak it!
Everyone who uses the data set will be able to hear the narrators describe their Pussy Palace experience in their own words, with their own intonations, inflections, and body language, preserving as many modes of communication as possible and providing authentic representations of the narrators. Through the coding process and with the integration of data analysis software, we hope to create a rich, immersive data set that provokes curiosity and promotes community knowledge-building and knowledge exchange.