Russel-Research-Method-in-Anthropology

Field Notes: How to Take Them, Code Them, Manage Them 405
Coding across the top
412 MA XOR 101290 MIG WOM ECO
This note is number 412. It's about an informant named MA in these notes,
and she is from a village you label XOR. The date is October 12, 1990, and
the note is about MA's migration from her village to the city in search of
work. The note is coded using abbreviations as being about migration
(MIG), about women (WOM), and about economics (ECO).
Coding down the edge
412, MA
XOR
101290
MIG
WOM
ECO
This note is number 412. It's about an informant named
MA in these notes, and she is from a village you label
XOR. The date is October 12, 1990, and the note is
about MA's migration from her village to the city in
search of work. The note is coded in abbreviations as
being about migration (MIG), about women (WOM), and
about economics (ECO).
Figure 14.5. Coding field notes.
Coding vs. Indexing
I want to make clear the three different uses of the word ‘‘code.’’ When I
say: ‘‘Use codes for places and informant names,’’ the word ‘‘code’’ means an
encryption device. The object is to hide information, not dispense it. When I
say: ‘‘After the informant name and place, leave room for topical codes,’’ the
word ‘‘code’’ means an indexing device. The object is to identify the existence
of a variable. The third meaning of the word ‘‘code’’ is a measurement device.
Suppose you do 100 interviews with women about their birthing experience.
If you stick the code PAIN into the text whenever a woman mentions
anything about pain or about feeling hurt, you’d be using the code PAIN as
an indexing device—that is, as a way to find your way back to all the places
in the text where anything about pain is mentioned. It’s just like the subject
index to this book. It says that ‘‘quota sampling’’ is on page 187 and sure
enough, when you go to page 187, you find you’re reading about sampling.
Suppose, though, that you make judgments about the amount of pain—by
counting words like ‘‘agony’’ as indicating more pain than words like ‘‘distress’’
or by looking at the content and meaning of the text and counting ‘‘It
was painful, but I got through it’’ as indicating less pain than ‘‘I prayed I would
die.’’ You might use codes like LO-PAIN, MID-PAIN, or HI-PAIN and in this
case, you’d be using codes for actual measurement. We’ll talk more about this
in chapter 17 on text analysis.