Steve Mann

The research interview

This book brings into focus the decisions that the interviewer faces at all stages of the interview process. Taking a data-led approach, the book makes evident choices and decisions in planning for, managing, analysing and representing interviews. The chapters concentrate on the real-time, moment-by-moment nature of interview management and interaction. A key feature of the book is the inclusion of reflexive vignettes that foreground the voices and experience of qualitative researchers (both novices and more expert practitioners). The vignettes demonstrate the importance of reflecting on and learning from interactional experience. In addition, the book provides an overview of different types of interviews, commenting on the orientation and make-up of each type. Overall, this book encourages reflective thinking about the use of research interviews. It distinguishes between reflection, reflective practice and reflexivity. All the chapters focus on recurring choices, dilemmas and puzzles; offering advice in opening out and engaging with these aspects of the research interview.

Promoting teacher–learner autonomy through and beyond initial language teacher education

With the growing international market for pre-experience MA in ELT/TESOL programmes, a key curriculum design issue is how to help students develop as learners of teaching through and beyond their formal academic studies. We report here on our attempts at the University of Warwick to address this issue, and consider wider implications for research and practice in initial language teacher education. At the Centre for Applied Linguistics at the University of Warwick, we run a suite of MA programmes for English language teaching professionals from around the world. Most of these courses are for students with prior teaching experience, but our MA in English Language Studies and Methods (ELSM) programme is designed for students with less than two years’ experience and, in fact, the majority enrol straight after completing their undergraduate studies in their home countries.

Research Interviews: Modes and Types

Chapter 4 considers different interview modes and types. It is a wideranging chapter, as it aims to introduce important choices that face the qualitative interviewer. The chapter begins with a discussion of ‘mode’ (Halliday 1978: 138). For example, we think about whether an interview is face-to-face or conducted on the telephone or through Skype. This deliberation furthers some of the discussion around the importance of context that was developed in Chapter 3, as whether you are interviewing face-to-face or using some form of CMC (computer mediated communication) can be seen as an important dimension of interview context.

Interviews as Reflective Practice

I have been working with researchers in education and applied linguistics for over 20 years and I would say that interviews are the most frequently used method in qualitative research. This is a view endorsed by others. Dornyei, for example, sees the reason for the frequency being that interviews are the most ‘natural and socially acceptable way of collecting information’ (2007: 134). The common use of qualitative interviews is also undoubtedly due to their potential to provide in-depth information related to ‘participants’ experiences and viewpoints of a particular topic’ (Turner 2010: 754). In addition, interviews are widely held to be a fundamentally useful way to understand informants’ beliefs, experiences, and worlds. As Kvale (2008: 9) tells us, they provide ‘a unique access to the lived world of the subjects, who in their own words describe their activities, experiences and opinions.’ However, the fact that qualitative interviews are common can lead to a ‘taken-for-grantedness’ and a lack of critical attention to their use and management. As Kvale and Brinkman say, it ‘seems so simple to interview, but it is hard to do well’ (2009: 1). There are many aspects of qualitative interviews that might be taken for granted. This is one of the reasons why ongoing commitment to reflection is important. Any professional activity can be better understood through attempts to reflect on practice and this is no different in the case of qualitative interviewing.

Qualitative Interviews Overview

This chapter takes a wide-angle view of the interview, recognising that interviews take place in many forms and are very much part of our everyday experience. Through providing an overview of different perspectives of interview and research interviews, we can contemplate the ways in which we experience interviews in everyday life. Even if we have not conducted a research interview, we are likely to have been interviewed and certainly to have watched/listened to a range of interviews on television/radio. Interviews are both mundane and memorable, both ubiquitous and unique, and it is worth considering their range in terms of genre. This chapter assembles a collection of texts and perspectives on interviews that I hope will stimulate thinking about the nature and purpose of research interviews.

Transcripts and Analysis

Riach maintains that the challenge for the qualitative researcher is ‘conducting analysis or presenting findings in a way that sensitively captures the multiple levels of a research encounter’ (2009: 356). The next two chapters outline the nature of this challenge, both in terms of transcription and analysis (Chapter 8) and representing data and findings (Chapter 9). Working with interviews creates a number of different challenges: making contact with interviewees and arranging interviews can be demanding; organising and securing permissions with ethical approval can be frustrating; however, it is often grappling with data analysis that causes the most angst. Generally speaking there is more advice available on how to conduct interviews than on how to analyse the interview interaction (Wilkinson 2004). This is partly because analysis varies so much across different paradigms and research traditions.

Training and Development

Potter and Hepburn claim (2005: 300) that students ‘often perform open-ended interviews with almost no training’. Richards (2011) has pointed out the lack of attention given to interviewer training generally. Uhrenfeldt et al. (2007: 47) also express the concern that ‘strategies to assist novice researchers in developing their interviewing skills have been limited to date’. Novice researchers are sometimes given general guidelines and checklists but rarely engage in training which focuses on interview interaction, strategies, and dilemmas. This chapter offers ideas for working with transcripts, either researchers’ own data or secondhand data. It also features tasks designed to raise awareness of interview choices and interaction. The last part of the chapter offers guidance on suitable reading for novice researchers.

Dilemmas and Parameters

In the English language teaching industry, professionals are categorised as native speakers (NS) or non-native speakers (NNS). This study critically explores the identity of a sub-category of English language teachers: visible ethnic minority native English speaking teachers (VEM-NEST). I am an English language teacher who is also a visible ethnic minority and so this topic is one that affects me on a personal and professional level. The aims of this study were to explore the experiences of VEM-NESTs and whether this specific category further problematises the native speaker model in English language teaching.

Beyond the Individual

Extract 7.1 below is from a participatory group interview with children of ten to 12 years of age. This interview was part of my PhD research project, which explored how students educated at primary level in Iran make sense of intercultural relationships. Through understanding their current levels of awareness I am also investigating the potential for creating opportunities for intercultural learning. The interview participants in this school were mainly Iranians with dual nationalities who spent parts of their lives in another country. The interview took place in a private international school where the medium of education was English (for most students in this school, English was their strong second language). Most of my other interviews were conducted in Persian but this one was conducted in English.

Managing Interview Interaction

Chapters 5 and 6 form a pair. Chapter 5 provides a practical guide to managing the interview while Chapter 6 provides a deeper reflexive treatment of important areas of sensitivity. This chapter concentrates on an introduction to the nuts and bolts of interviewing; the importance of recording the interview, listening, eliciting information through questions, using probes, and developing and maintaining rapport. While it is possible to consider interviewing from each of these perspectives (on one-at-a-time basis), it is also important to remember that all these elements have a reflexive relationship. For example, Spradley, talking about eliciting information and rapport says: nEthnographic interviewing involves two distinct, but complementary processes developing rapport and eliciting information. Rapport encourages informants to talk about their culture. Eliciting information fosters the development of rapport. (1979: 78)