Transcription Resources

Training resources

• E.A. Schegloff has a Transcription Module on his website: “The transcription module is designed to provide practice in transcribing talk-in-interaction using conversation analytic conventions”.
• An introductory online tutorial on CA transcription and analysis, by Charles Antaki
• See some notes on transcription software here: CASE advisory on equipment for recording and analysing in CA
• Video introduction on Jefferson Transcription by Em does CA
• How to use CLAN and ELAN together by SaulAlbert (talk)
• lots of videos by Brian MacWhinney (creator of CLAN)
• lots of great CLAN video tutorials

Specialised Transcription Software

Free / Open Source transcription tools

• CLAN - download here: https://dali.talkbank.org/clan/ - a large array of transcript analysis tools including an editor for CA transcriptions.
  • A CLAN User's blog post on CLAN for CA
• https://tla.mpi.nl/tools/tla-tools/elan/ - a widely used tool for the creation of complex annotations on video and audio resources.
  • ELAN manuals and how-tos
• http://transag.sourceforge.net/ - a multi-platform general transcription tool for segmenting, labeling and transcribing speech
• http://agd.ids-mannheim.de/folker.shtml - a transcription tool designed to support transcription in the FOLK corpus.
• http://www.exmaralda.org/ - a large suite of tools including a partiture editor usable for transcription

Commercial transcription software

• Transana: software for the transcription of video data; download here: http://transana.org/
• http://www.audiotranskription.de/english/f4.htm - user-friendly transcription and annotation tool.
• http://www.inqscribe.com/ - a user friendly video transcription tool. highlight: automatic subtitle exports.
• DOTE: Bespoke EMCA software that has tools for Jefferson and Mondada transcription systems, as well as note taking

Comparison of Transcription Software

Name	Creator	Software license	Platform(s)	Cost	Open source?	Last updated	Multilingual	Partition editing	Line-by-line editing	Syncs transcript with data	Jeffersonian symbols	Machine-readable transcripts	Formats	Export Formats
Standard word processor	N/A	N/A	All	Free	Some	N/A	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	No	Word, RTF, ODT, Text etc.	Word, RTF, ODT, Text etc.
ELAN	Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, The Language Archive	GPL3	Mac, Windows, Unix	Free	Yes	Nov 6, 2023: Release 6.7	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	EAF (ELAN's native format) Toolbox, FLEx, CHAT, Transcriber, CSV, Subtitle Text, Audacity Label, Praat TextGrid, recognizer Tiers, Shoebox	Toolbox, FLEx, CHAT, Tab-delimited text, Tiger XML, Interlinear text, HTML, Traditional transcript, Time-aligned Interlinear text, Praat TextGrid, WebAnnotation JSON, Alphabetical list of words, SMIL, QuickTime text, Subtitle text, Tiers for recognizers, Media clip using script, Image from ELAN window, Filmstrip Image, Annotation Density Plot, Shoebox,
CLAN	TalkBank	BSD 3-Clause License (Unix tools) & Proprietary (Mac/Win editor)	Mac, Windows, Unix	Free	No	Feb-2024	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	CHAT (CLAN's native format) Anvil, CoNLL, EAF, WaveSurfer or LABB, LENA, LIPP, PraatTextGrid, RTF, SALT, SRT (subtitle), Text	Anvil, CA (approximate Jeffersonian), CoNLL, ELAN, WaveSurfer or LABB, LENA, LIPP, PraatTextGrid, RTF, SALT, SRT (subtitle), Text
Folker
Partitur-Editor
DOTE	Paul McIlvenny, Jacob Davidsen and programmers at Aalborg University	[Proprietary	Mac, Windows	Freemium (750 DKK for 'Pro'/paid, needed for anything over 200 lines)	No	7-Dec-2023	Not user interface, but supports multilingual transcripts	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	DOTE (Native format), JSON, Text	RTF, SRT (subtitle), CA (Jeffersonian, Mondadaian), Text
Transcriber JS	Ortolang	Public Domain	Mac, Windows, Unix	Free	Yes	November 2020 v. 0.7.8	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	TEIML (TJRS' native format) , CHAT, Transcriber, Praat TextGrid	TEIML, CHAT, Transcriber, Praat TextGrid
Transana	Transana]	Proprietary (used to be GPL)	Mac, Windows	$150-$750	No	November 2, 2021 v. 4.01	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	XML, QDC (Qualitative Data Exchange), QDPX (NVivo), Transana XML (Transana's native file format)	Transana XML, REFI-QDA
TranscriberAG
Inqscribe
f4transrkipt
Anvil	Michael Kipp	Freeware	Windows (95/98/2000/NT/XP/8/10), Linux, Mac OS X and Solaris.	Free	No	August 20, 2017 v. 6.0	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	Anvil XML	EAF, Praat, DiAML
Praat
Transcribe!

Other useful transcription-related software

• http://www.anvil-software.org/ - free video annotation / coding software
• http://www.seventhstring.com/ - commercial audio playback software for transcription
• http://www.fon.hum.uva.nl/praat/ - free phonetics analysis and representation software

File formats / tips

• Advice on setting up a WORD document for transcription, by John Heritage (UCLA)
• Transcription in HTML
• Typing transcription in various word processing programs - Paul ten Have
• Typesetting EM/CA Transcripts in Markdown

Professional Transcription Services

• 1) Christianne Pollock & Hannah Wheat
• 2) Type. For researchers.

Literature on Transcription

There are a number of transcription-related resources in the EM/CA bibliography:

See also

• see also: Website: "Transcription in Action: Resources for the Representation of Linguistic Interaction", mainained by Mary Bucholtz
• Ashmore, Malcom., Darren Reed (2000) ‘Innocence and nostalgia in conversation analysis: The dynamic relations of tape and transcript.’ Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 1 (3). Available at:
  http://qualitative-research.net/fqs-texte/3-00/3-00ashmorereed-e.htm
• Bonu, Bruno, coord. (2002) Transcrire l’interaction. cahiers de praxématique 39: 1-159
• Bucholtz, Mary (2007) ‘Variation in transcription’, Discourse Studies 9: 784-808
• Couper-Kuhlen, Elizabeth; Dagmar Barth-Weingarten (2011) ‘A system for transcribing talk-in-interaction: GAT 2’, Gesprächsforschung - Online-Zeitschrift zur verbalen Interaktion 12: 1-51 [1]
• Duranti, Alessandro (2007) ‘Transcripts, like shadows on a wall’, Mind, Culture, and Activity13(4): 301–10.
• Goodwin, Charles (1994) ‘Recording human interaction in natural settings’, Pragmatics 3: 181-209
• Duranti, Alessandro (1997) ‘Transcription: from writing to digitized images’. in his: Linguistic anthropology Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 122-61
• Edwards, J.A., & M.D. Lampert, eds (1993) Talking data: transcription and coding in discourse research. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum
• Have, Paul ten (2002) ‘Reflections on transcription’ cahiers de praxématique 39: 21-43 [text in PDF]
• Hepburn, Alexa (2004) ‘Crying: Notes on Description, Transcription, and Interaction’, Research on Language & Social Interaction 37:251-91
• Hepburn, Alexa; Galina B. Bolden (2012) ‘The conversation analytic approach to transcription’. In: Jack Sidnell, Tanya Stivers, eds. The Handbook of Conversation Analysis. Wiley-Blackwell: 57-76
• Jefferson, Gail (1985) ‘An exercise in the transcription and analysis of laughter’. In: Dijk, T.A. van, Handbook of discourse analysis. London: Academic Press, Vol. 3: 25-34
• Jefferson, Gail (1989) ‘Preliminary notes on a possible metric which provides for a ’standard maximum’ silence of approximately one second in conversation’. In: Roger, D., P. Bull, eds., Conversation: an interdisciplinary perspective. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters: 166-96
• Jefferson, Gail (1996) ‘A case of transcriptional stereotyping’, Journal of Pragmatics 26: 159-70
• Jefferson, Gail (2004) ‘Glossary of transcript symbols with an introduction’. In: Gene H. Lerner, ed. Conversation Analysis: Studies from the first generation. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins: 13-31
• Laurier, Eric. (2014)  The Graphic Transcript: Poaching comic book grammar for inscribing the visual, spatial and temporal aspects of action. Geography Compass, 8/4: 235-248
• MacWhinney, Brian; Johannes Wagner (2010) ‘Transcribing, searching and data sharing: The CLAN software and the TalkBank data repository’, Gesprächsforschung - Online-Zeitschrift zur verbalen Interaktion 11: 154-173 (www.gespraechsforschung-ozs.de)
• Mondada, Lorenza (2007) ‘Commentary: transcript variations and the indexicality of transcribing practices’, Discourse Studies 9: 809-821
• Ochs, Elinor (1979) ‘Transcription as theory’. In: E. Ochs and B.B. Schiefelin, eds. Developmental Pragmatics. New York: Academic Press: 43-72
• O’Connell, D.C., & S. Kowal (1994) ‘Some current transcription systems for spoken discourse: a critical analysis’, Pragmatics 4: 81–107
• Psathas, George, Tim Anderson (1990) ‘The “practices” of transcription in conversation analysis’, Semiotica 78 (1990): 75-99
• Traverso, Véronique (2002) ‘Transcription et traduction des interactions en langue étrangère’  cahiers de praxématique 39: 77-99