Print-friendly page

Teaching activities

Activity 1

Arrange students into pairs or small groups (maximum four) and give each group a semi-structured interview extract and topic guide to work with.

1. Compare the topic guide to the questions actually asked in the interview.
2. What deviations can you identify?
3. Why do you think the interviewer has deviated at that point of the interview?
4. Discuss the ways in which these deviations might have impacted on the direction of the remaining part of the interview.

Activity 2

Students should work individually or in pairs. Give each student a transcript.

1. What interviewing style/s can you identify in this transcript?
2. If more than one, which would you say was the most dominant technique?
3. Provide justification and evidence for your answers.

Print out the following extracts to use for this exercise - they will not contain the interview type in the heading.

Feminist interviews - interview schedule
Feminist interviews - interview extract one
Life story interviews - interview extract one

Page numbers can be added by adjusting the footer section in a browser's page setup section. If using Internet Explorer type '&p' into the footer section to add page numbers.

Activity 3

Students should work individually on this task.

1. What is your personal research topic?
2. If you were to conduct interviews on this topic, which interviewing style would you consider to be the most appropriate for your research?
3. Why? Justify your answer.

Activity 4 (a multi-session activity)

1. Read the account of the methodology given in the official publication or user guide. (The ESDS catalogue record includes a listing of publications associated with each study.)
2. Does this account reflect how the research was conducted in the interview? Explain your answer.

Suggested comparison: Hollway and Jefferson (2000) and transcripts from SN 4581 Gender difference, anxiety and the fear of crime.