(Re)Using Qualitative Data? [1]

Recent interest by social scientists in the questions posed by reusingqualitative data has been prompted by two related events. The first is theestablishment of the Qualitative Data Archival Resource Centre (QUALIDATA, and,since 2003, ESDS Qualidata) at the University of Essex in 1994. The second isthe publication of the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) DatasetsPolicy (1996) which asks that those in receipt of ESRC grants offer copies oftheir data for deposit to QUALIDATA. This perceived injunction to archive datahas been met with resistance by recalcitrant researchers who are wary of theimplications of depositing data, and the possibilities of reusing data. Thedebate risks becoming polarised between those advocating the archiving and reuseof qualitative data, and those more sceptical of these possibilities. This paperaims to open up this debate and to seek a more fruitful path between thesepositions. I begin by calling into question the supposed ‘newness’ of reusingqualitative data, through turning to examine some of the assumptions embedded inthe key terms and premises of the debate thus far, including the reliance ondistinctions between primary and secondary data and primary and secondaryanalysis. I examine some common tropes in accounts of reusing data: comparisonswith secondary analysis of quantitative data; efforts to distinguish betweenreusing qualitative data in a sociological context and other disciplinary andmethodological traditions; and reliance on particular interpretations of keyprinciples of qualitative research, context and reflexivity, in establishing thechallenges of the reusing of qualitative data. I suggest that reuse may be moreproductively understood as a process of recontextualising data, and thatattending to the reflexive production of data in the contemporary researchproject may offer more hopeful possibilities for reuse. I conclude by offeringsome reflections on why discussions of reusing qualitative data appear to havebecome so fraught.