1. Life stories the biographic method The Biographical Interpretive Method Life History Interviews Life Story Interviews

2. Life History - Life Story biographic interviews unfocused, open-ended In-depth broad area of experiences detailed accounting in its own right - as background for life events psychoanalytic - user-focused empowerment politics

3. different approaches to biography as method Chamberlain (2002) Hollway & Jefferson (2000) Rosenthal (1983, 2003) Wengraf (2001) Hermans (1992) Holstein & Gubrium (2000) McAdams (1985) Miller (2000) Mishler (1986, 1999)

4. Rosenthal (2003) the narrative-conversation-guide ---usually TWO interviews ---first interview: several hours Opening question: “ Please tell me your family story and your personal life story; I am interested in your whole life. Anything that occurs to you. You have as much time as you like to tell it. I won’t ask you any questions for now. I just will make some notes on the things that we would like to ask you more about later; if we haven’t got enough time today, perhaps in a secvond interview ”

5. Rosenthal (2003) PHASE I: MAIN Narration –Attentive and supportive – no interruptions, no questions except supportive questions when stuck (“ and then what happened ”?) [using the ‘active listener guide ] PHASE II: INTERNAL Narrative Questions –“Could you tell me more about time X”? or ”Could you recall a situation when your father behaved in an authoritative way”? PHASE III: EXTERNAL Narrative Questions: –Regarding topics that have not been mentioned in the interview

6. Rosenthal (2003) GOALS of the interview –‘to come close to an integral reproduction of what at that time happened or the past experience’s gestalt’ (p. 922) –maintaining the gestalt of the interviewee’s story Analysis of the interview –reconstructing sequences of actions –‘abducting’ the ‘gestalt’ –theoretical generalization Relevancies –For the interviewee, the interviewer + the public