How to handle swear words in quote / transcription?

Question

In my research, I interview practitioners/real users. One of them, a native english speaker, used a lot a swear words (basically the f-word).

Question: how to deal with curse words in content you need to quote?

Since I use transcripts for a content (and not formal) analysis, I sometime 'smooth' interviewee wordings (like removing "hum", "well", "you know", and other recurring verbal tics). In some case, I could remove the f-word:

it's just super f*cking slow, and really f *cking annoying

However, in some cases it is less harmless, because it more deeply changes the perceived meaning:

if you don't want to do things, just don't f*cking do it

oh f *ck, we'll just go back to do, as we were doing

and in some other, I simply cannot change interviewee's words:

[...] he really tried and wanted to build up, but he completely f*cked up every single part of every single thing.

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Since I am not a native speaker, I don't know how "bad" would using the f-word be perceived (which is why I tried to be careful here.)

In some cases, I could do a cut quote, e.g. "it's just super [...] slow, and really [...] annoying", but it looks like I'm not accurately depicting the wordings.

I've also seen on the internet people using 'f*ck' standing for the f-word. Could this be a solution? (I personally find this solution a bit prudish.)

Otherwise, could I simply quote them? Should I put a warning somewhere?

Answer 1

If you're quoting someone, quote them as they said it. We're all adults. In the literature world, we quote swear words and other potentially offensive things all the time and no one bats an eye. I've no doubt other fields are the same.

Personally, if I saw an asterisk or similar, I would presume you interviewed them via chat or email, and they actually self-censored. If it were a printed text, I'd think it a part of the edition you used.

Answer 2

In research, you should quote them verbatim. Editing, or censoring, swearing is wrongly representing your research subjects and is thus a form of scientific misconduct. If you need to edit the quote for specific audience you must make it clear that you have done so:

It's just so [obscenity] slow, it really [obscenities] me off.

With a note saying that you have edited the text to remove swear words. Partial censorship such as you used above (e.g. f*ck, c*nt) is both utterly pointless and misleading; either completely remove the word (indicating where you have done so) or quote properly:

It's just so fucking annoying; it really fucks me off.

Answer 3

I'm a history student currently working with oral history. You should not smooth anything on a transcript — when quoting you should do exactly as said or written. There are certain ways to indicate that something is a grammar mistake or a phonetic(?) transcription to clarity that there's no mistake on your part; usually those things are put in foot notes.

I'll edit this later to give you some resources for that, but for now if you put any notes make sure to do it as a footnote. You can use the brackets too, they indicate some comment of the author outside the context of the quote.

Answer 4

If this is for publication, check with the editor.

If this is for a working (non-published) paper that you, and perhaps som collaborators, will be working with, then you get to decide, based on subjective considerations, such as, will it be irritating for you to read the f-word 200 times a day? If so, you are free to choose a euphemism.