Methods Practice 1

Method: Interview

Type: very informal/unstructured

Notes: The participant I chose to interview is a Tibetan who has moved to Salt Lake after gaining his primary education in exile in India, and then his secondary education in America. Some notes on the individual's personality throughout the interview are:

• This person needed very little prompting to continue their thoughts
• They also seemed comfortable with large amounts of silence in between thoughts
• They did not appear angry or distressed in their situation (specifically referring to their country's dilemma) but instead took to joking or being light-hearted about it in order to maintain a good attitude in life
• They used humor to relate and connect with me as an interviewer

I have labeled this interview as unstructured because the interviewee led the conversation and was the ultimate decider in which changes and maturations the subjects underwent. I, as the interviewer, had a list of potential questions I would ask, and because the subject of the conversation seemed to change quickly as the interviewee led the interview, I did not commit to many of these questions. The following are the questions that I had in mind, and the ones with an asterisk next to them are the ones that were actually asked. Underneath the asterisked questions are some details on the answer given.

• How old were you when you came to India from Tibet?*
• "My mother said I was 9 because she said I was born in the year of the ____ and we left 9 years later." The interviewee then expounded upon how kids don't know for sure what year they were born because they don't have birth certificates, they just go off of what their parents tell them.
• What were the kinds of things you liked to do as a child?
• Were you close to your parents?
• Where did you go to school?*
• The interviewee then told me about their schooling in detail, including what they were required to learn and recite, the kinds of food they ate, how one is supposed to refer to teachers, how one is supposed to write home to their parents (the format of the letter), etc.
• The interviewee also talked about how they had one free day a month to go to the city and do something fun, such as go to a movie or go out to eat.
• What was your favorite subject to study in school?
• Although you were far away, did you have much communication with your parents?
• Did you attend school with any of your siblings?
• Was your life dramatically different in India than it was in Tibet?*
• The interviewee then talked about how in Tibet, life was still very like the "olden-times" and they didn't have any technology or any vehicles really, they just had bicycles, yak, horses, etc.

These notes are not all-inclusive, but touch on the interview.

What I learned in the exercise is that notes are very important to take during the interview and not after!! It is hard to remember things later on, especially when the interviewee is particularly long winded. Another thing I learned is that different probes work better in different cultures. For example, with this participant, the silent probe was although a little uncomfortable for me, perfectly natural for them. Then again, they didn't need much probing because they were very willing to give a lot of information. All in all, I greatly enjoyed interviewing this individual. I think that when I'm in the field, if I want to find out half of the information I would like to, I might have to be a little more structured in my interviewing style.