Ma(r)king Themes: Annotating as Thematic Analysis (Poster 6)

• In Event: Themes Without Coding: Expanding Approaches to Thematic Analysis

Abstract

Annotating, a set of related analytical practices involving careful reading and marking of texts, is common in literature classrooms. While some iterations of annotation are used in qualitative research—e.g., for writing literature reviews—we explore possibilities annotation provides as a methodological practice. Drawing on New Criticism literary theory (Gorlewski, 2018) and our own practices, we argue for annotation’s potential in reflective and/or reflexive analysis.

There are numerous purposes for annotating and, correspondingly, many ways to annotate. Generally, however, annotating involves a reader making notes as they consider and interact with a text, usually by highlighting or underlining key pieces of text and/or making marginal notes. As a discipline-specific-practice, annotation-as-literary-analysis is closely associated with New Criticism—a framework emphasizing “close reading” for attending to “how the text works” (Gorlewski, 2018, pp. 63-64). Such annotations often focus on textual features and patterns—including specific techniques, arguments, or narratives. Doing so supports establishing ‘patterns’ and providing text-based “arguments for little-noticed dimensions and subtexts” (Hickman & McIntyre, 2012, p. 3), including how texts function. As a broader strategy, annotation is a common pedagogical strategy, regularly supporting reading comprehension, pre-writing, and detailed bibliographies. Across these various purposes, annotation can be descriptive, evaluative/critical, and/or informative (Campus Library, 2021).

Annotating as analysis aligns well with more conventional data coding, but we would emphasize that annotation is not coding. Coding is predominately categorical in nature; the primary function of coding is the “identification, or more precisely, labeling [of] things [in order] to define or order them” (Freeman, 2017, p. 19). The result is (re)ordering of data, most often through a consolidative process. While annotation can involve categorization, it is not specifically so. It may also be narrative, dialectical, diagrammatic, or poetic (Freeman, 2017); it can be reflective/reflexive, such as annotations functioning as memos. Furthermore, a ‘single’ annotation can operate across multiple modes simultaneously. This flexibility, however, does not mean that annotations lack consistent characteristics. The full poster will discuss responsivity, reciprocity, and reflectivity/reflexivity –and offer examples from teaching and research.

One of the strengths of annotation is how it affords ‘bifocal’ attention—to micro and macro, to text and the researcher, and to these elements in interaction. Annotation involves attending to “the local elements of a [text] independently of the [text]’s governing idea” (Hines, 2022, p. 46) and engaging with the full text as a cohesive piece. Additionally, annotating centers researcher relationality and demands reflexivity. New Criticism’s refusal to hack texts into disparate pieces, even as analysis might consider individual parts, relies heavily on an individual’s close reading. The researcher’s point-of-view arguably becomes the basis of analysis and encourages qualitative analysis to explicitly include reader/researcher presence as part of analytic processes and products.

Authors

• Carlson Coogler, Baylor University

• Stephanie Anne Shelton, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill