As Nick Caddick explains in Chapter 14, the two transcripts that he was asked to analyse related to interviews that were not ideal for narrative analysis. He says, ‘the interview data were more structured and the interviewer was more actively involved than would normally be the case in data generated specifically for narrative analysis. Typically, narrative analysis relies on data generated from sources where participants are given the opportunity to develop lengthy stories about their experiences with minimal interruption. These include interviews but also visual narratives, diaries, internet blogs and particularly autobiographical work. Nevertheless, I found it useful to think of the transcripts themselves as stories with a beginning, middle and end.’ By doing that, Nick was able to apply dialogical narrative analysis to the two interview transcripts from that project which concerned ex-soldiers’ accounts of renegotiating identity after leaving the army.

You are invited to extend that analysis by subjecting some or all of the additional transcripts of interviews with ex-soldiers to dialogical narrative analysis. (See Appendix 1 for the additional interview transcripts from Arnie Reed’s study with ex-soldiers.) Use the guide that Brett Smith provides for dialogical narrative analysis in Chapter 13 and the strategies and questions that Nick Caddick applies in Chapter 14.

• Does your analysis of the additional data confirm all or parts of Nick’s analysis?
• Does it cause all or parts of his analysis to be revised or to be set aside entirely?