Premise
The
indications below presuppose that you have made a questionnaire
that really helps you understand an Anglo culture –
specifically, In the case of Trinity College students, the
culture of a generally White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant (WASP)
American . If your questionnaire does not do this, you
cannot write your Report.
Your questionnaire does
not do this if it asks banal questions (“Do
you like music?”
“What's
your favorite food?”)
or questions about habits (“Do
you and your friends 'help each other' during exams?”,
“At
what age do young people leave home in your country?”)
but not about the WHY of those habits. Of course, the “why”
is impossible to know directly, so you must use indirect
questioning and make guesses. But at least your questions
should focus on your interlocutor's culture. (Remember: his/her
psychology is personal; his/her culture is what makes him/her
similar to the other American students in the room, and
dissimilar to the Italian students in the room.)
So if
your questionnaire does not have the right focus, what should you
do?
Change your questions during the evening and do
another interview. Do this as many times as necessary,
until you find questions that give you the answers you need to
write your Report.
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How
to write your report in 5 paragraphs
First
paragraph. Start with the conclusion. Say immediately what your
interviews of an Anglo speaker showed you about Anglo culture.
Say whether this insight is new to you or whether you already
realized this particularity with respect to Anglo culture.
Second
paragraph.
Explain how you got your data. It is not necessary
to list your questions since you will attach the questionnaire
(in English) that you used. But it IS
necessary to explain what your questionnaire tried to show, who
you interviewed (where is s/he from, what background does s/he
have, etc.), what particular reactions s/he had (if any). If you
have made not an audio recording but a video recording, much of
this information will appear in the video – but say it
anyway, because there are a lot of things to see in the video
and in your Report you have to decide what is essential.
Third
paragraph.
Explain what are you trying to discover, why is an
interview a good (or not-so-good) instrument for discovering it,
why your questions are effective. Hypothesize the answers
to your questions.
Fourth
paragraph.
Then explain --
if your hypotheses were verified; --
if the answers you got reveal a particular cultural mind-set. If
so, say what that mind-set is. Then say if you think it is
typical of most of the people in your interviewees' country, or
if it is just a stereotype or even just a myth.
Fifth
paragraph.
Repeat briefly the conclusion you already gave at
the beginning. Then say what this experience is worth and if the
knowledge you got is knowledge that will help you in life. DO
NOT say that you interviewed too few people to make a
valid statistic – this is obvious since the task serves to
learn a method, not to produce scientific evidence.
GIVE
YOUR REPORT TO YOUR GROUP LEADER, WITH YOUR TRANSLATED
QUESTIONNAIRE AND THE AUDIO OR VIDEO RECORDING OF AT
LEAST ONE
INTERVIEW.
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