Past Experiences with Content Analysis

I think of all the methods that we have covered so far in the course, I have the most experience with content analysis. This week’s readings reminded me of some of the assignment that I have done in the past. The section on image-based research in the Knight reading reminded me of the American civil war photograph assignment that I once did. I remember the lecture where the professor talked about how the photographers would move around the bodies of soldiers or objects in order to create a scene that will send a particular message to their audience. In a way, she was telling us to not take our chosen photographs literally and to think about the message that they want people at the time to receive. That was why we needed to contextualize the photographs through research.

Another assignment that I remembered from this week’s readings is the document study that I did in my first year of university. I chose a book that was written around 1136 on the early histories of Britain. The advice that my TA gave me when doing the assignment was to think beyond the fantastical events, and to think about what the texts reveal about the author’s time period and not the time period in which he is writing about. Looking back on this assignment, I can see how it was used to train students how to interpret and contextualize primary text for historical research. Even though I was able to relate some of my experience to this week’s readings, I feel that I saw some differences in how content analysis is conducted for social science research and it was interesting to get a new perspective on a method in which I am somewhat familiar.