Ethnographic Interview

Opportunistic chats, questions that arise on the spur of

the moment, one-to-one in-depth interviews, group
interviews, and all sorts of ways of asking questions and
learning about people that fall in between (OReilly,
2012, p.116)
Spradley (1979) calls ethnographic interviews as a series
of friendly conversations (p. 58) in which friendly, easy
going talk is interspersed with ethnographic, information
gathering questions.

My experiences with interviews

Varying degrees of formality

Informal chats
and conversations
Open ended
Unstructured
Individually and
in naturally
occurring
(OReilly, 2012,
p. 137) groups

Semi formal
Opportunistic
interviews
- turning a situation
opportunistically into an
interview (OReilly,
2012, p.124)
Guided conversation

Formal interviews
Semi structured
Interview protocol
No rigid structure
(free to introduce new
ideas)

Preparing the interview protocol

My interviews - Who

Target population - 21 teachers

Informal chats with the majority
Superficial chats with the rest
formal interviews with 14 (13 teachers and the principal)

My interviews - Where
Teachers refreshment room
Canteen
Corridor
Staff room
Library (formal interviews)
Science laboratory (formal interviews)

Before the formal interview

At the formal interview

Challenges faced
Reluctance to be interviewed
Lack of ability to express oneself
Language barriers
Not talking much, short answers
Talking too much, and repeating oneself
Forgetting vital information
Reluctance to reveal some information
Time- consuming
Demands skill to mine information from conversation

Gains from the interview

Filled in missing links and details that could not be observed
Gave information on past experiences
Gave the interviewees feelings, perceptions and opinions
In-depth understanding of issues
Clarified ambiguities in answers
Could record participants own words
Gave spontaneous views in a natural setting (Chats and
conversations)
Informal group discussions often yield multiple view points (chats
and conversations)

References
OReilly, K. (2012). Ethnographic methods. (2nd ed.). Routledge,
New York NY.
Spradley, J.P. (1979). The ethnographic interview. New York: Holt,
Rinehart & Winston.

The End

Thank You

All the best