Text, Sound and Videotape: The Future of Qualitative Data in the Global Network

We are currently seeing a new culture emerging in the social sciences, of a new form of secondary analysis - that of primary qualitative data. It has come about largely as a result of the moves by British social science funding organisations towards formalising archiving policies of data created in the course of research they fund. Funders want added value from research and believe in sustaining a solid research base for the future, in the form of the preservation of empirical findings. Now, this includes qualitative data in addition to quantitative. However, not only is this is a new methodological approach for traditional qualitative researchers it is also challenging the way qualitative researchers view ownership of ‘their’ raw data. New ideas about sharing and providing access to qualitative data are emerging - and in the UK, this is being championed by the Qualidata Resource Centre at the University of Essex. This paper seeks to address a number of issues. From an archival point of view, how do qualitative data differ from quantitative data? Second, what might the implications be for the acquisition, preservation, dissemination and re-use of qualitative data archives for Data Archives? Thirdly, I want to discuss the kinds of procedures required to document and provide access to qualitative data. Inherent in this are the special problems relating to confidentiality of some qualitative materials, and I will suggest ways of overcoming these. Finally, I want to raise a number of questions relating to how the traditional Data Archives might want to consider acquiring, storing and disseminating qualitative data. Is it in their interest to acquire them? What kind of infrastructure needs to be in place to accomplish this?