Research Blog 4

 Interview 1

Outside Sources: https://dscout.com/people-nerds/interview-balancing 

Over spring break, I conducted my first interview with a past participant of the Shakespeare Behind Bars program. This was a great resource for me to learn appropriate questions to ask when I visit Luther Luckett, but also how to best navigate speaking about topics that might be triggering or hard to revisit.

Some of the questions I asked included...

1. What character did you play? Why did you choose them?

2. We learn a lot about how choosing characters and working through them makes you think a lot about your past actions, is that true? How did that look for you? Was there a particular moment that was challenging?

3.  Biggest misconceptions you feel people have about incarcerated people?

4. If you had 3 words to describe prison, what would they be?

A few things I took away from the interview was:

- a person's crime still affects them in the present, despite how long ago it was

- prison is not all bad, but there is a genuine community aspect to it that is enjoyable and fun

- finding and doing anything to pass the time in prison is a huge thing

After conducting my first interview, I learned that it is important to let the person decide on how much they want to share. I also found that it was extremely important to establish trust and rapport within the person I'm interviewing. One of the ways I did this was discussing the goals of my project, why I chose the topic, and emphasize the fact that my goal is to not judge them or their past. I made sure to inform them that my focus is not their crime, but rather how the program allowed them to grow from their past decisions.

Informing them about my expectations for the conversation and that they have all the power to share what they choose to was crucial in establishing rapport. Going into the interview, it knew that there were probably a lot of things that may be very personal and possibly even things that the person wants to keep private.  Thankfully, my interviewee was very open and wanted answer any questions I had, even if it had to do with his crime.