Cultural Interview Paper

Introduction I originally was going to interview a girl from Singapore for this paper, but I had to go back home and I was not able to talk with her after all. So while I was back in my home town I interviewed a girl I went to school with, and for the sake of the paper I am going to refer to her as Sally. Before interviewing Sally I knew how our physical appearances differed, but I didn’t realize how culturally different we were.

Understanding Others
Sally is different from me in number of ways, but some of our differences are she is a mother, she refers to herself as a Christian, she still lives in the town she grew up in, and she has a job. Although I did have a job I had to quit it when school started because it interfered with classes, but Sally doesn’t have that luxury. She can’t quit her job like I did because she has a child to support and care for. I also moved from my home town to continue going to school, she couldn’t move so she had to find a school that was close to her home. …show more content…
I think the most helpful guidelines were to approach the interviewee with respect, acknowledging the limitation of my knowledge of the interviewee’s culture, and to display an attitude that not one culture is better than another, but rather equal. I think using these skills in my interview with Sally helped me establish a comfortable environment, where Sally didn’t feel like I was going to judge her or criticize her for her culture. One thing I learned about myself during the interview is that I tend to get distracted while the other person is talking, and this is something I will have to approve upon other than that I think the interview went well. I would like to think that my social identities are rather average and hopefully the people I work with in the future won’t feel intimidated by me. Maybe people will find it easier to relate to me and feel comfortable with