I am currently researching for my Master's Thesis (the subject is the redefinition of marriage in Korea). At first, I wanted to use detailed interviews as my qualitative research data. But with the covid situation, it's been pretty hard to find interviewees online.
My professor suggested that I use media as my research data. She didn't give me many details so I am not 100% sure what she meant by that.
As I searched on Youtube there are some videos that talk about marriage in Korea (some of them are news, some interviews and some were uploaded by individual people to share their opinions with others). Do you think it's a good idea to use Youtube as qualitative data?
Could you share some tips on this?
It's pretty confusing for me really. How many videos should I choose? Can I choose interviews already done by someone or just individual videos? Do I analyze the comments as well? (especially these are great ways of showing how people agree with the speaker in terms of non-marriage or the redefinition of marriage in Korea; but how do I implement both comments and videos in my research?).
Any tips are welcomed. Thank you very much!
You-tube will give you qualitative data, yes. But you have to treat them as secondary sources.
It sounds like you would be using a version of "netnography," which is a general term for searching existing online sources in qualitative research.
You might also consider searching for forums and discussions that talk about your topic.
You can probably use the Youtube content as secondary data, as a part of data triangulation. But suggest that you use primary data first which will help you to directly address your research objectives. You can use social media to conduct individual interviews (either verbally or through chats). As long as you can capture the input given in text form (transcriptions), you can use it for the analysis.
Following up on David L Morgan 's comment about netnography, you could look at a book with the title "Netnogrpahy: redefined" by Robert Kozinets, along with "Internet Research Methods" a book by Claire Hewson, Carl Vogel and Diana Laurent, and also "A Guide to Conducting Online Research" by Ted Gaiser and Anthony Schreiner. Good luck!
Anne Cohen Miller's recommendations are excellent.
Another suggestion: "Creative research methods in the Social Sciences" (Helen Kara).
A very recent edited book on netnography is the one by Kozinets and Gambetti (2021). It renders insights from different contexts. You could check it out. Here is the reference.
Kozinets, R. V., & Gambetti, R. (Eds.). (2021). Netnography unlimited: Understanding technoculture using qualitative social media research. Routledge. https://www.routledge.com/Netnography-Unlimited-Understanding-Technoculture-using-Qualitative-Social/Kozinets-Gambetti/p/book/9780367425654
Good luck,
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