- Welcome
- Important notice
- About the author
- About this site
- Site guide + Search box
- Dedications
- Acknowledgments
- My personal pantheon (of the great and the good in survey research)
- Recent and planned activities
- Textbooks for Research Methods and Data Analysis
- 1: Survey Analysis Workshop (SPSS)
- 1a: Statistical concepts and methods
- 1b: Teaching with Survey Data
- 1c: Developing research projects using survey data
- 1d: Workshop and presentations for ASSESS (SPSS users in Europe)
- 2: Survey Research Practice
- 2a: Survey Research Methodology, Practice and Training
- 2b: Major survey series
- 3: Subjective Social Indicators (Quality of Life)
- 4: Survey Unit, Social Science Research Council (UK)
- 5a: Polytechnic of North London (1976-1992)
- 5b: Survey Research Unit (1978-1992)
- Village life in Normandy
- Contact
- Origins of the British Crime Survey
- British Crime Survey
An interview with Mark Abrams (transcripts)
[Page first published 6 March 2012: last updated 9 September 2017]
Transcripts
The full original transcript (25 mb) is in Word 1997-2003 *.doc format and has 102 pages: it includes photographs and images. It's far too big to go on this site or send by e-mail. I've done the workaround by producing pdf files, one for the full version (minus the Appendix) and 19 others by splitting the transcript into smaller sections (which users will find easier to scroll through on-screen) following the original contents list as below: photographs and other images are retained, but the original pagination is lost.
Recorded: September 19th 1984
Place: Flat 6, 48 St Martins Lane, London
Interviewer: Dominic Abrams (grandson, then aged 26 and with fresh PhD from LSE)
[All files are in *.pdf format with 11pt Arial text and 9pt Arial footnotes]
Full transcript (3.6 mb):
An interview with Mark Abrams (minus the Appendix in section 20 below)
Transcript sections
0. Introduction
1. Family Origins
2. Latymer School, Edmonton
3. London School of Economics
4. First Academic Position – Lecturer in Agricultural Economics
5. America (Brookings Institution)
6. Back in England: Market Research and London Press Exchange
7. Philip Abrams
8. Wartime at the BBC
9. After the War
10. Philip at school
11. Back to Research Services Limited
12. Philip Abrams going to Cambridge
13. Research Services Limited (Part 2)
14. The Labour Party
15. Social Science Research Council
16. SSRC Survey Unit
17. Research on Old Age
18. Academic Relationship Between Mark and Philip
Appendices
19. The "Invasion of Britain" in German Propaganda [Marked Secret]
(Studies in broadcast propaganda No 16, BBC, 3 June 1940)
20. Analysis of Hitler's Speech on 26th April 1942 [Marked Secret]
(Report by JTW, dated 10 June 1942)
Audio files
The original five audio tapes were in *.mp3 format and ran to around four hours in total. I converted them to *.wav format, extracted separate audio files for each section (to match the transcript list above) and uploaded them to servers in Florida (courtesy of my son Richard Hall) so that (with some streaming delas) they could at least be heard. The audio files have now been converted back to *.mp3 format and will play from the links on this site.
An interview with Mark Abrams (audio files)