ABSTRACT
While transcription might seem like a simple act, many difficulties may arise while typing an interview. This chapter deals with tough choices the transcriptionist and the project manager must make. Recordings may include unidentified speakers or groups of people who talk simultaneously, obscuring words. Sometimes sound files are missing, mislabeled or don’t play correctly. There may be foreign language passages that the transcriptionist can’t transcribe. Dialects present a tricky problem for some oral history projects—is it authentic or insulting to try to phonetically spell a spoken dialect? Sometimes the terminology is unfamiliar to the transcriptionist, such as with a subculture or profession. Projects have to decide whether to include profanity.
