In Uganda, I wrote a questionaire that I had my research assistants give; on it, I asked about the embalasassa, a speckled lizard said to be poisonous and to have been sent by Prime minsister Milton Obote to kill Baganda in the late 1960s. It is not poisonous and was no more common in the 1960s than it had been in previous decades, as Makerere University science professors announced on the radio and stated in print… I wrote the question, What is the difference between basimamoto and embalasassa? Anyone who knows anything about the Bantu language—myself included—would know the answer was contained in the question: humans and reptiles are different living things and belong to different noun classes… A few of my informants corrected my ignorance… but many, many more ignored the translation in my question and moved beyond it to address the history of the constructs of firemen and poisonous lizards without the slightest hesitation. They disregarded language to engage in a discussion of events… My point is not about the truth of the embalasassa story… but rather that the labeling of one thing as ‘true’ and the other as ‘fictive’ or ‘metaphorical’—all the usual polite academic terms for false—may eclipse all the intricate ways in which people use social truths to talk about the past. Moreover, chronological contradictions may foreground the fuzziness of certain ideas and policies, and that fuzziness may be more accurate than any exact historical reconstruction… Whether the story of the poisionous embalasassa was real was hardly the issue; there was a real, harmless lizard and there was a real time when people in and around Kampala feared the embalasassa. They feared it in part because of beliefs about lizards, but mainly what frightened people was their fear of their government and the lengths to which it would go to harm them. The confusions and the misunderstandings show what is important; knowledge about the actual lizard would not.

~ Luise White

Luise White Basimamoto Beliefs Constructions Constructs Embalasassa Government Government Power History Interview Interviewing Interviews Knowledge Language Methodology Oral History Social Truth Social Truths Truth Uganda

The cane is just not going to cut it. I shared with some of my colleagues that these brothers live in neighborhoods where they are getting whapped with a piece of stick all night, stabbed with knives, and pegged with screwdrivers that have been sharpened down, and they are leaking blood. When you come to a fella without even interviewing him, without sitting him down to find out why you did what you did, your only interest is caning him, because you are burned out and frustrated yourself. You say to him, ‘Bend over, you are getting six.’ And the boy grits his teeth, skin up his face, takes those six cuts, and he is gone. But have you really been effective? Caning him is no big deal, because he’s probably ducking bullets at night. He has a lot more things on his mind than that. On the other hand, we can further send our delinquent students into damnation by telling them they are no body and all we want to do is punish, punish, punish. Here at R.M. Bailey, we have been trying a lot of different things. But at the end of the day, nothing that we do is better than the voice itself. Nothing is better than talking to the child, listening, developing trust, developing a friendship. Feel free to come to me anytime if something is bothering you, because I was your age once before. Charles chuck Mackey, former vice principal and coach of the R. M. Bailey Pacers school.

~ Drexel Deal

Drexel Deal At Risk Students Building Trust Burn Out Caning Childhood Communication Conversation Corporal Punishment Department Of Education Developing Friendships Down To Earth Educators Gang Communities Gang Members Intelligence Interviewing Juvenile Courts Listening Skills Ministry Of Education Open Door Policy Parenthood Punishment Reaching Trouble Youth Rough Neighborhoods School Officials School Principals School Punishment School Students Senior Pastors Street Gangs Student Gangs Teachers Trouble Youth Young Men Youth Intervention Youth Pastors Youth Reform Youth Retreat

Hanging out is good historical methodology.

~ Jean Pfaelzer

Jean Pfaelzer History Interview Interviewing Interviews Methodology Oral History Writing

I also often ask my guests about what they consider to be their invisible weaknesses and shortcomings. I do this because these are the characteristics that define us no less than our strengths. What we feel sets us apart from other people is often the thing that shapes us as individuals. This may be especially true of writers and actors, many of whom first started to develop their observational skills as a result of being sidelined from typical childhood or adolescent activities because of an infirmity or a feeling of not fitting in. Or so I’ve come to believe from talking to so many writers and actors over the years.

~ Terry Gross

Terry Gross Actors Artists Childhood Trauma Defining Moments Defining Yourself Individuality Interview Interviewing Interviews Introspection Journalism Loneliness Not Fitting In Outcasts Personal Development Self Awareness Shortcomings Weaknesses What Makes Us Who We Are What Shapes Us Writers

Bad boss? Fire him/her. When you're interviewing for a job, You're job is to interview them. You are an equal.

~ Richie Norton

Richie Norton Bad Bad Boss Boss Bossy Choose Yourself Employee Employer Entrepreneurship Equal Equality Fire Hire Hiring Manager Interview Interviewing Job Equality Job Search Management Pick Yourself

Action is the spark that ignites potential.

~ John Long

John Long Career Career Coaching Career Exploration Interviewing Job Search Judo Mbti Resume

Getting an interview with someone is like asking your good-looking cousin to go out with a friend of a friend on a blind date: you must approach the subject Just So.

~ John Brady

John Brady Interviewing Journalism