Thread by @raulpacheco

In response to Dr. Donnelly's request, and her specific challenges, here's a thread with links to posts of mine to be read in a specific sequence to guide you through the process of a large literature review (I assume new topic?).

I, too, need to read not-on-computer.

https://twitter.com/PhoebsG86/status/1393199736698687491

.@PhoebsG86 indicates 3 specific challenges (when you ask me for tips, THIS IS VERY HELPFUL - what exactly do you need help with? This is the very first thing I teach my students and research assistants).

1) hard to read at computer
2) how to organize notes/sources
3) returning

3)... returning meaning = saving electronic notes, documents, and coming back to them.

I have two blog posts that walk people through an entire literature review process.

1) for a new topic (to map a new field) raulpacheco.org/2018/01/mappin…

This post gives a step-by-step process.

2) this post walks you through how *I* am learning about hospital ethnography (I'm an ethnographer who does mixed methods, but never have done HE)

raulpacheco.org/2021/03/delvin…

Personally, I print and read and highlight and scribble and annotate on paper raulpacheco.org/2019/02/readin…

What a number of folks who follow me do on a regular basis is Batch Processing and #AICCSED-ing sources. This means printing a bunch of papers,

*doing a quick AIC skim raulpacheco.org/2017/12/carvin…

*then dumping their notes/annotations into an Excel Dump raulpacheco.org/2016/06/synthe…

I call this process #AICCSED Processing raulpacheco.org/2017/12/carvin…

My post on Batch Processing: raulpacheco.org/2021/02/batch-…

On the topic of notes vs. sources: I store my PDFs in Mendeley (you can use Zotero, Citavi, RefWorks, Endnote).

I need redundancies, so I do digital+analog.

The "notes vs. sources" and "saving documents and coming back to them/using them" comes back to physical and digital workflow.

Personally, when I am writing, I need ALL forms of printed and digital output near me. This means, I keep open Mendeley, Evernote, Word and Excel.

This is what my desk looks like this morning. It’s hard to see because of lighting but I have my Conceptual Synthesis Excel Dump (CSED) for “Ethnography of Illicit Activity” open in my laptop. On my desk I have the reading I’m annotating, my Everything Notebook, a few index cards

As you can see, I pre-filled a few rows of my Excel Dump with citations of stuff I’m going to Batch Process. The index cards you see on my window sill offer verbatim quotations from this Boeri and Schuckla book chapter I’m reading carefully.

To my right you’ll find my Everything Notebook open right in the “Ethnography” section. I should note that I’m writing clean notes here, and that I recognize that I’ll need to write in a different section issues that are specific to the ethnography of illicit activity.

To finalize this thread, which connects all the dots: I often make the assessment of whether I need to print an article or a book chapter based on a quick AIC scan of the digital piece. My suspicion is usually confirmed by how much color/how many notes I take on the margins.

Have I highlighted a lot of text in the reading?

Have I written many index cards with plenty of quotable sentences?

Have I written A LOT of notes on the margins?

This reading MUST be very important and is one worth engaging with very deeply.

(This is Boeri & Shukla 2019)

People often ask me about searchability. I keep all citations and PDFs in Mendeley, digital copies of PDFs organized by topic and by paper in Dropbox, and physical copies in magazine holders with a rigid plastic label with Author (Date). Also add citation to each printed piece.

For my reading-highlighting-annotating-systematizing process: raulpacheco.org/2019/02/readin…

How I organize digital files: raulpacheco.org/2020/07/organi…

How I organize PDFs: raulpacheco.org/2015/09/organi…

How I organize physical documents and books: raulpacheco.org/2015/09/organi…

And here's how I maintain searchability in digital and analog files:

raulpacheco.org/2020/02/on-the…

Anyway, @PhoebsG86 I hope this LONG thread is helpful (to you and to anyone undertaking a literature review that appears daunting).

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