1JZGauQ
1JZGauQ
1JZGauQ
You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
1: INTRODUCTION<br />
former Iron Curtain. During my time in Slovenia, Anja brought me to the<br />
Solkan Bridge from where the border as well as the Slovenian road corridor<br />
through Italy can be seen, the group interview conducted in Sofije, Slovenia,<br />
included a visit to the former Morgan line (the Italian-Yugoslavian border<br />
between 1945–1954), and Maria and Antonio drove me to the border near<br />
Trieste, Italy, to show me an old sign that had survived in the landscape.<br />
During these visits the importance of the material as a mnemonic became<br />
obvious but these visits also helped to provide ample time for conversation<br />
to flow a bit more freely than during a more formal interview situation.<br />
There are several different methods and techniques for how to conduct<br />
interviews (see for example: Ehn and Löfgren 1996, O’Reilly 2005, Kaijser<br />
and Öhlander 2011). My interviews were carried out in what can be referred<br />
to as unstructured interviews (O’Reilly 2005:116, Fägerborg 2011:99) in<br />
which I used a general plan of the topics that I wanted to cover with a few<br />
specific questions but generally the conversations were allowed to flow<br />
freely in order not to be tied down. The aim of the interviews was not necessarily<br />
to gain answers to particular questions but rather to understand the<br />
ways different people viewed the border and the Iron Curtain and this was<br />
best reached through allowing the interviewees to speak freely about what<br />
they considered to be of importance. The interviews varied in how many<br />
people were present, usually just one or two, but there was also one group<br />
interview in which seven people participated. How interviews were conducted<br />
also varied somewhat depending on the people being interviewed. It<br />
was clear that an approach that worked with some people, such as those<br />
living near the border in Slovenia and Italy who talked rather freely about<br />
life in the area was not necessarily successful when interviewing others such<br />
as the former military officer of the Czechoslovakian border who preferred<br />
more specific questions. What was most important during interviews was<br />
therefore being flexible and reflexive in the way to proceed. As sociologist<br />
Karen O’Reilly writes “…qualitative research is as often art as science, it is<br />
not easy to set out what should be done and how in a given set of circumstances”<br />
(O’Reilly 2005:4) but she also points out that in order to be<br />
confident in making those choices the researcher has to be aware of the<br />
options available and be able to adjust according to the situation.<br />
In this thesis I do not use the word informant which is often the chosen<br />
term within ethnographical studies. This is mostly due to the thesis’ Cold<br />
War context where the word informant often brings to mind the word<br />
informer and as such has connotations and meanings connected with<br />
spying (Gerber 2011:28). Instead I use the word interviewee to try and steer<br />
23