‘Thanks for the memory’: memory books as a methodological resource in biographical research

Abstract

The article describes the evolution of the ‘memory book’, an innovative method for biographical research. In the first part of the article, we explain the origins of the method, tracing our own journey from conducting memory work as a research group to the creation of memory books as a method to be used alongside interviews in a longitudinal qualitative study of young people’s transitions to adulthood. In the second part of the article, we map the form and content of memory books generated in the study, commenting on issues of audience and privacy. In the final part of the article, we discuss how we used the memory book data, distinguishing between their function as sources of documentation, resources for elaboration and critical tools for the understanding of identity. The article draws attention to the potential for the method to bring embodiment and the visual dimensions into a method dominated by text and discourse, as well as facilitating the expression of a range of ‘voices’ and time frames which complicate cohesive narrative presentations of self.

A Literature Review to Evaluate the Choice and Use of Visual Methods

“…What she did not indicate, other than stating the interviews were on average longer, is whether having photographs as prompts in the second interview helped the less communicative to say more. In a study of transitions to adulthood, Thomson and Holland (2005) found no marked benefit of having memory books (a record of events made by the participant) as a prompt in the ensuing interview, and they even noted that some data from the interviews with the books were "less codable" (p. 215); their contents did contain data additional to those raised in the interview however, which demonstrated that memory books can elicit different data from interviews. Thomson and Holland (2005) reported that only 50% of the teenage participants compiled memory books, which underlined the fact that some people will find a visual method more helpful than others.…”

Rethinking the Politics of Social Capital: Challenging Tocquevillian Perspectives

“…In the second, Inventing Adulthoods, we selected 120 young people across the samples and sites, using a range of methods over two and a half years to investigate their understandings of and strategies for transitions towards adulthood. These included repeat biographical interviews, memory books and lifelines (Thomson andHolland 2002, Thomson andHolland 2005). The third component, Youth Transitions, continued the biographical interviews with a focus on families, communities and social capital.…”

The email-diary: a promising research tool for the 21st century?

“…Recording people's feelings, thoughts, attitudes or reactions makes them interesting to researchers who are trying to explore the complexity of the experience and the behaviour of a distinct or representative group. Solicited diaries range from being totally structured, with specific guidelines limiting responses (Corti, 1993), to free-form, where content is decided by the diarist themselves (Thomson and Holland, 2005). The benefit of structure in diaries is that it allows the researcher to specify the area of information they are interested in and what they want recorded.…”