so what I've been up to

I've gone slightly AWOL for the past week and a bit. I say slightly because I'm still working but I'm just not working at the OU or in the UK or at a normal work pace. It's been a good break and something I needed to help take my mind off the fact that I'm having serious withdrawal symptoms from being in Cape Town. But that is an on-going saga that needs a whole entry devoted to it.

The island of Fejan in the Stockholm archipelago

According to my more detailed week-by-week workplan, I was meant to be tackling transcription over these last two week in July. I'm feeling the pressure of my Plan A workplan that only gives me 1 month to organise and prepare my data for analysis. I have about 70 interviews and interactional recordings, and even with some strategic selection of specific recordings and events, there is no way, unless of course all I do over this two week period is sit in front of my PC and transcribe, can I possibly complete all this work. Then as I started to work on my fieldnotes I realise a major gap in the entries for my first research site. In retrospect I can kick myself that I didn't pick this up while in the field and sort it out then. But to be kind to myself these gaps are more a reflection on how my fieldnote collection changed over the fieldwork period, than an indication that I was lazy or inattentive during fieldwork. When I started my fieldwork I had a particular approach to collecting/recording fieldnotes. I recorded hand written descriptive notes in a fieldwork journal and electronic analytical memo on my laptop. For the first week or so all I used was the journal, and I never copied these notes electronically. So as I worked at authenticating my fieldnotes using both the electronic and journal notes I started to see major gaps in the descriptive quality of the notes. Also by the time I went to the second research site I decided to combine the process of description and analytical insights into one fieldnote for each day in the field. I thus needed to ensure come continuity in the fieldnotes over the entire fieldwork period.

Confused? Complicated? Yes of course, I certainly was for most of last week as I worked to align my journal entries with the electronic ones, a process that took me the better part of last week and which I only completed yesterday. I remember while in the field how demanding it was to write the fieldnotes in first place, then doubting my ability to accurately and insightfully capture events, people and practices. I really needed so much energy and time to write my notes and as fieldwork progressed I worked out various strategies that either didn't work (as the method used above illustrates) or only worked for a short while. It was only in the final 6 weeks of fieldwork that I eventful developed a suitable method that suited my work patterns and energy levels. I would hand write in my journal, fairly detailed descriptions of what was happening in the field on a particular day. Then either later that day or evening, if I managed to put aside some time, or more commonly when I took a half-day or day off , I would sit and electronically capture both descriptive and analytical insights of my participant observation activities. Usually I would write up to three or four fieldwork days in one sitting. I think practice resulted in a good mixture of descriptive, analytical and reflective elements in my fieldnotes. However, my attempts to fill the gaps created by my developing fieldnote writing approach means I'm about a week behind with my transcription. I'll have to see how helpful my brand new foot pedal, courtesy of CREET at the OU, is in reducing the transcription time. Somehow I think I need more than a swanky foot pedal to help me play catch-up.