The interview between Eric Parry and Christian Frost took place over Skype as Eric is currently lecturing at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. As Christian already knows Eric, who was his tutor at Cambridge, the interview was more like a discussion and as such flowed like a conversation without pause or hesitation. This allowed for a rich and detailed discussion where many interesting ideas were tabled and a comprehensive answer to the questions we researched – which are discussed in a previous blog post.
Having never previously had to transcribe a recorded discussion I found it difficult to begin with, having to stop the recording frequently. However as I continued I found it easier to process both the copying of the text and meaning of what was being discussed. That said throughout the interview there were references to specific buildings and figures which I was unfamiliar with so through a process of internet searching and trial and error I was able to find and read around the topics, making sure I understood the context in which Eric was discussing them.
The first half of the interview explored Eric’s past experiences, using the questions we wrote on his childhood, his education and his developing experience of practice as a base but also ventured into concepts from his book and his understanding of festival.
Conclusion
To hear the questions we had spent time researching was rewarding as they were answered in such a comprehensive way and although the answers weren’t necessarily what I was expecting they were very interesting and have encouraged me to look into some of the ideas further for my own work. As well as this transcribing and interpreting conversations effectively is a key skill for professional practice and is something that can always be improved.
Following the completed transcript of the first half (approx. 32:30) I now have to begin editing and choosing the parts I think are most important to pull out to present separately as part of the submission. This will be a difficult task as I feel the majority of the conversation is important to the overall piece, but I will try to highlight the parts which best explain the themes in the first instance. Alongside this we plan to submit the full transcripts as an appendix for the research group to use and incorporate into the published works as they require.
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