Interviewer's conflicting interactional tasks

The interviewer in research interviews on ethnic and racial relations faces potentially conflicting interactional tasks with regard to the interviewees and the topics of the interview. The interviewer aims to have the interviewees express themselves on issues where disagreement and conflict are around the corner, even between interviewer and interviewee. On the one hand, the interviewer may want to create an atmosphere of confidence in which the interviewee feels free to express possibly controversial views, while on the other hand the interviewer as a person holds views on the interview topics that may not be in agreement with those expressed by the interviewee. The potential interactional conflict that arises from this is that the interviewer may want to establish an interpersonal rapport with the interviewee without identifying at the same time with the views the interviewee expresses. In this paper I will argue that this interviewer problem is particularly precarious since one of the discursive means to establish interpersonal rapport is precisely a content-oriented affiliation with the other's prior contributions.

I will discuss three open interviews on ethnic identity and ethnic relations in New Zealand and be concerned with one aspect of the interview as a reciprocal activity; namely, the ways in which the interviewer responds to the answers given by the interviewee.