Thematic Analysis

Braun and Clarke are extremely engaging, interesting, accessible writers, and would you believe, fun to read. I can't recommend Thematic Analysis: a Practical Guide enough!



I feel like you’ve passed me a head torch and a shovel when I was previously just in the bottom of a mine not sure how to get out!

Evaluation Journal of Australasia Braun and Clarke write in an invitational style, welcoming and accommodating a wide readership including those who are neurodivergent (...) I believe their highly accessible style of writing and their ability to unpack complex ideas and communicate them clearly and succinctly has played a large role in building their notable profiles within qualitative research circles.



Thematic Analysis: A Practical Guide is set to become a classic within qualitative research and is an essential addition to the evaluator’s toolkit.

Whether you are just departing, circling back, or well into your thematic analysis journey, you will find this textbook a rich resource. [...] With the use of numerous examples, you see reflexive thematic analysis come to life, bringing the practical application of the method to the forefront. This book provides the scaffolding to guide and support you on your journey, while also provoking further questions and reflection on reflexive thematic analysis. 

This book is a must-have for anyone thinking about or undertaking thematic analysis of data, more specifically, reflexive thematic analysis! A thoroughly useful and accessible practical guide. It contains clear definitions of terminology and explanations and makes good use of helpful boxes in each chapter to explain concepts or alert you to mistakes easily made in the process of analysing data using this method. 

We have about 60 students per year undertaking the Dissertation module and this text is high priority reading to help them plan out their research proposal in relation to data analysis. We also recommend the text to our researchers and higher research students. The text brings thematic analysis up to date and step by step explains the analytical process with extensive explanations ...

Virginia Braun is a Professor in the School of Psychology at The University of Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand. She is a feminist and critical (health) psychologist and teaches around gender and psychology and critical health psychology at undergraduate and graduate levels. When she gets time for it, her research (sometimes in collaboration with Victoria Clarke) explores the intersecting areas of gender, bodies, sex/sexuality, health, and (now) food. She is on Twitter @ginnybraun, where sometimes her tweets about qualitative research, usually in that case a retweet of an awesome thread by Victoria. Victoria Clarke is an Associate Professor in Qualitative and Critical Psychology in the Department of Health and Social Sciences at the University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol, where she teaches about qualitative methods, and gender and sexuality, and supervises student research, on a variety of undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. When she's not busy collaborating with Virginia Braun, she has conducted research in the intersecting areas of gender and sexuality, family and relationships, and appearance and embodiment. She is also active on Twitter mainly tweeting about thematic analysis and qualitative research @drvicclarke.

Section One: Venturing forth! Doing reflexive thematic analysis Chapter One: It's almost time to depart: Getting ready for your thematic analysis adventure Before analysis: A brief design interlude Chapter Two: Taking an initial lay of the land: Introducing our worked example dataset and doing familiarisation Chapter Three: Exploring this world in detail: Doing coding Chapter Four: Finding, losing, then finding your way again: Developing your themes Chapter Five: Arriving home and telling a story about your adventure: Writing your thematic analysis report Section Two: Going deeper for tip-top reflexive thematic analysis: Theory, interpretation, and quality matters Chapter Six: A not-so-scary theory chapter: Conceptually locating reflexive thematic analysis Chapter Seven: So what? The importance of interpretation in reflexive thematic analysis Chapter Eight: One big happy family? Understanding similarities and differences between reflexive TA and its methodological siblings and cousins Chapter Nine: Getting your own house in order: Understanding what makes good reflexive thematic analysis to ensure quality