1 / 14

Roles, relationships and identity in qualitative interviews Steve Mann (University of Warwick)

Roles, relationships and identity in qualitative interviews Steve Mann (University of Warwick) February 2011. Aims of talk. Share views from related disciplines concerning analysis and representation of roles and identity in qualitative interviews

chester-lott
Download Presentation

Roles, relationships and identity in qualitative interviews Steve Mann (University of Warwick)

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Roles, relationships and identity in qualitative interviews Steve Mann (University of Warwick) February 2011

  2. Aims of talk • Share views from related disciplines concerning analysis and representation of roles and identity in qualitative interviews • Outline four ‘discourse dilemmas’ (Mann 2011) • Show how prior relationships are invoked and made relevant by both interviewer and interviewee during educational research interviews and how these prior relationships contribute to the ‘generation’ (Baker, 2004: 163) of data.

  3. Growing presence but undertheorised • The qualitative interview has a growing presence in applied linguistics. • Despite this increase, the qualitative interview has, for the most part,been undertheorized in relation to roles, relationships and identity.

  4. Worrying tendencies: • Selected voices arranged in journalistic tableau • Bereft of context and methodological detail • Critical reflective dimension often missing.

  5. The ‘active’ interview • Holstein and Gubrium’s (1995) contribution to this theorization of the ‘inter-view’ (interviews as unavoidably ‘active’) • ‘no matter how formalized, restricted, or standardized’ thenature of the interview, there is ‘interaction between the interview participants’. (Holstein and Gubrium 1995: 18)

  6. Discursive psychology • Antaki et al. (2003) present the concerns of discursive psychology inreference to the interview. • Concern with the linguisticfeatures of positioning, footing, stake management, and identitywork.

  7. Contingent problems • Potter andHepburn (2005) draw attention to avoidable ‘contingent problems with interviewing: • the deletion of the interviewer • problems with the representation ofinteraction • the unavailability of the interview set-up • the failure to considerinterviews as interaction.

  8. Co-construction • More researchneeds to recognize that the interviewer and interviewee jointly construct theinterview talk (Sarangi 2003). • a ‘growingliterature on the importance of treating interviews as interactionallyco-constructed events in which participant identity and positioning have significant analytical implications’ Richards (2009: 159).

  9. Interactional Context • Pavlenko (2007) - too muchemphasis on content and little attention to form and contexts of construction,ignoring the ‘interactional influences on the presentation of self’ (2007: 178). • Interviewee contributions arealways produced in negotiation with the interviewer (Rapley 2001: 317)

  10. A greater focus on the interviewer Research studies need to be more open in their accounting of how membership, roles and relationship can affect the way talk develops (e.g. Roulston, 2001; Rapley, 2001, 2004; Garton and Copland 2010).

  11. Extract 1 Sue umm I just wanted to pick up start off by picking up one point from last time = Linda = are you supposed to do that pre chat ((jointlaughter)) Sue I don’t know Linda go on Extract 2 Fiona: um () this is the same question really Ned: is it Fiona but I’m going to ask it anyway because I’m very inexperienced at this ((laughs)) I’m not sure what you’re supposed to do at this point ((joint laughter))

  12. Extract 3 Fiona yes if you could change oh sorry ((phone starts ringing)) anything about your feedback style what would you change May well I think you know the answer to that ((laughs)) Fiona okay ((laughs)) May I’m sorry I think that’s my phone and nobody ever rings me I do apologise Fiona no no that’s fine that’s fine I’ll have another cake I like this interview I get cakes cakes and cats. ((May answers phone)) May sorry ((May sits down)) what was the () oh yes what would I change about my erm feedback style erm () well as I said I’d like to be able to be a little bit more circumspect about some issues I think erm

  13. Responding to the analytic challenges • How can we make relevant the co-construction of interviews in our research papers and chapters? Is ‘contextual detail’ enough? • Is there a danger of paying too much attention to the roles and relationships of interviewer and interviewee at the expense of the content of what they say?

  14. Reference List Garton, S. and Copland, F. 2010. ‘I like this interview: I get cakes and cats!’; the effect of prior relationships on interview talk. Qualitative Research Vol. 10 (5), 533-551

More Related