His Story takes the form of a fictive but autobiographically based investigation into the child and young adult I used to be, and follows that protagonist into early adulthood. It tries to show the damage done to that character and the way in which he damaged others in turn. As Hemingway said, We are all bitched from the start and you especially have to hurt like hell before you can write seriously. More importantly, the main protagonist is somebody who became concerned with, and cognizant of the main political and social events of his day. His life is set in its social context, and reaches out to the larger issues. That is to say, the personal events of the protagonist's life are recorded alongside and set in the context of the major events taking place on the world stage. The manuscript is some sort of hybrid of novel, autobiography, and historical and social document. As Isaac Bashevis Singer said, The serious writer of our time must be deeply concerned about the problems of his generation. In order to make His Story effective in sharing my ideas and beliefs, and, of course, in order to protect the innocent and more particularly, the guilty, it is created in the colourful area that is the overlap between memory and fiction. When we tell the stories of our lives to others, and indeed, to ourselves, we prise them out of memory's fingers and transform them into fiction. To write autobiography well, as E.L. Doctorow said, you have to invent everything, even memory.

ABSTRACT Music and differences in knowledge – a study of music teachers experiences with differences in musical knowledge. The purpose of this paper is to, out of a music teacher’s perspective, see if the differences in music abilities between 7th grade students are at all, or in some ways connected to the previous schools they’ve attended. I will also research in what areas, in the subject of music, students are differing more, as well as less, in their knowledge.  The analysis is based on interviews with six 7th grade music teachers working in the Swedish nine-year compulsory school system. According to the teachers, the result of these interviews show that students do come from different music teaching backgrounds that can affect their skills in the subject. These teachers argue that students own music interest along with practicing in their free time, the pedagogues and access to material are all important components to why students differ in their music skills. According to the teachers, there is more of a difference in knowledge among the students when it comes to digital tools and ensemble playing and less of a difference when it comes to singing.

Recent studies have found that large numbers of consumers innovate. In our study, we provide a re-estimation of the figures provided in the extant literature. We do so by conducting a study in which we apply two different methods of data collection: (1) telephone interviews, the method considered most valid in previous research, and (2) personal interviews, which involve much higher effort but induce better individual recollection. Using telephone interviews, we measured a user-innovator frequency of 10.8% in our sample. In stark contrast, personal follow-up interviews resulted in a frequency of 39.7%, indicating a considerable underestimation in extant research. We then used the correction factor generated to re-estimate findings on user innovation frequency in Finland, Japan, Korea, Sweden, the UK, and the USA. It appears that user innovation is indeed a mass phenomenon that should not be overlooked by policymakers or firms. (authors' abstract)

Video games and the social effects that they inflict upon society and the individual have been a highly debated subject. While studies have been made in regards to several social issues and their connection to video games, there was little research in regards to physical game gatherings like LAN-parties, as well as larger game gatherings like Dreamhack, and what the social effects of having physical contact with other people are at these gatherings. The goal with this study was to answer the question: “What are the social effects for the individual when participating in physical video game gatherings?”. This was done through a qualitative study by conducting five semi-structured interviews at the physical game gathering called Umeå Game Night that was located in the Umeå cultural center Klossen at Ålidhems Centrum. Four of the participants were male and one female. “Snowball-sampling” was used to gather the participants for the study through Game Night’s Facebook group. However, this sampling was unsuccessful when no participants were gained from it. Instead I had to take direct contact with people at the game gathering. The interviews were all done during the game gathering in their facility and were then transcribed for analysis with two types of methods; an inductive analysis that was backed up by a deductive analysis in the form of Activity Theory using Engeström’s model of Activity Theory. The results of this study showed that physical game gatherings helped to overcome some negative social effects that the participants thought surrounded online game as well as other social problems that they brought up during the interviews, like toxic behaviour, discrimination, and the feeling of not being welcome. There was an overwhelmingly positive reaction from the participants when being at the game gathering. Being able to socialize with other people proved to be the main motivation. However, even though physical game gatherings showed to improve negative social effects surrounding game, the learning process was still difficult to overcome for new players, and participating in these game gathering may even have negative results in keeping the new players interested in wanting to play as well as participate at the physical game gatherings. This was mainly because of the skill disparity between the experienced players, who were the majority at the game gathering, and the new players, who would feel potentially frustrated from seeing the experienced players being much better than themselves. However, the less experienced female participant in the study indicated that this issue may still be overcome, but more research needs to be done to see how big the issue surrounding the learning process when playing games at game gatherings actually is, and if there are ways to solve it.

This qualitative study aims to look at how the knowledge and awareness regarding source criticism is seen amongst media students attending their first year at Linnaeus University. Our theoretical base includes to explain what source criticism is, about media literacy, the power media has in the Swedish society, the effects that media can create, and the effects of internet. This study consists of eleven interviews where knowledge and awareness regarding source criticism are in focus. Our interviewees have contributed with diverse reasoning and thoughts, which will be presented closer in this study. A central part of this study also contains questions about the reasoning of the eleven media students regarding source criticism in relation to their career choice and position in society.Our result shows that the knowledge and awareness regarding source criticism amongst the eleven students are high, however they also express that this might not be the case amongst the population in general. All interviewees testify that source criticism is a subject that affects and that it is a high possibility it does not get the attention it deserves.

The interview is an important component of the selection process for employment and is one of the initial presentations of self by the applicant to the interviewer. As an extension of a study by Wilson, Aleman, and Leatham (1998), this study used politeness theory to investigate perception of face threat in the context of a job interview, specifically, when making requests and giving advice. This study predicted that jobseekers perceive an act as a greater threat to an interviewer’s negative face (appealing to interviewer’s autonomy) when making a request than when giving advice. Secondly, the study predicted that job seekers would perceive an act as greater threat to the interviewer’s positive face (appealing to the interviewer’s desire for approval) when giving advice or recommendations than when making a request. Both hypotheses were supported and other related interests such as acceptability of the act and likelihood of getting the job were also investigated. / text

<p>During my time as a student of education I have learnt that it is my responsibility, as a teacher, to adjust the ways in which I teach to the needs, abilities, experiences, and thoughts of each individual child. What I have not yet gained much knowledge on is how to go about finding the children’s thoughts.</p><p>In this thesis I investigate the interview as a method of finding out how sixth graders think about their mathematics education. Four children were interviewed. In addition to these inter-views, as a means of giving a broader perspective to and a greater understanding of the chil-dren’s answers, one math lesson was filmed and the math teacher was interview on two sepa-rate occasions.</p><p>What I found was that a number of factors seemed to influence the children’s thoughts and answers, and that their answers were most likely not always a mirror of their thoughts. From this follows that we, as teachers, must be careful and not assume that we know about a child’s thoughts when, in fact, what we know is what the child chooses to communicate about his or her thoughts. I also found that the children seemed unaccustomed to speaking about mathe-matics in the way that I wanted them to. One reason for this seemed to be the way in which their teacher organized the lessons.</p>

This project is for Rinker Center for International Programs at Ball State University to provide useful information to international and American students. The project consists of ten video interviews with the director of Rinker Center for International Programs and nine international students presenting Ghana, France, Germany, Mexico, Brazil, Japan, China, Taiwan, and Turkey. Each interviewee provides cultural differences between American culture and their cultures. In addition, the interviewees tell their personal solutions for coping with cultural difficulties based on their experiences in the United States or different cultures. The director was given three questions and the nine international students were asked ten questions.Each video interview is categorized under country menus and question menus designed with Adobe Macromedia Flash 8 to be navigated by clicking each menu button on a computer. / Department of Telecommunications

This study aims to investigate the determinants of capital structure in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia and their effect on firms’ performance. The study addresses the following primary question: What are the factors that influence the capital structure of SMEs in Malaysia? The sample of this research is SMEs in the east coast region of Malaysia. Adopting a positivist paradigm, the research design includes a preliminary study comprising 25 interviews with the owner-managers of SMEs, which is analysed using thematic analysis. The results are used to finalise the conceptual framework for the main study, which takes the form of a self-completion questionnaire survey. Usable responses were received from 384 firms, giving a response rate of 75.3%. The survey data is analysed using a series of binomial logistic regression models. Results reveal that there was no indication for the impact of owner’s education and experience on capital structure decisions. Other owner-related factors, firm characteristics, management performance and environment were found to relate to all types of capital structure. Both complete and partial mediating effects are also discovered in this study. The results provide evidence to support the pecking order hypothesis (Myers, 1984; Myers and Majluf, 1984), agency theory (Jensen and Meckling, 1976) and culture model of Schwartz (1994). It appeared that owner-managers in Malaysia do not strive to adjust their capital structure towards some optimal debt ratio, which is contrary to the static trade-off theory (DeAngelo and Masulis, 1980) of capital structure. This study makes several important contributions to the existing studies of capital structure. This research led to the development of a model of capital structure determinants by integrating factors related to owner-managers, firms, culture, and environment. This study incorporates methodological triangulation that may mitigate the problem of the difficulties in accessing financial data of SMEs in Malaysia. This study also provides meaningful insight into the financing preferences of the owner-managers with relevant implementations to academics, business practitioners, financial providers and policymakers. The research findings should assist owner-managers in making optimal capital structure decisions as well as help the policymaker in making an appropriate policy on the financing.

Este trabalho de investigação tem como objetivo compreender e analisar o desenvolvimento do Curso de Formação dos Professores Indígenas do Estado de São Paulo - MagIND, uma parceria entre a Secretaria de Estado da Educação e a Faculdade de Educação da Universidade de São Paulo, FE-USP, realizado em 2002 e 2003. Os indígenas que concluiram o curso estão aptos a serem professores de Educação Infantil e das quatro séries iniciais do Ensino Fundamental I. Para a pesquisa, foram considerados os pontos de vista dos professores indígenas e dos professores/formadores não-indígenas, partindo do pressuposto de que a escola é um espaço de diálogo e conflito entre os conhecimentos indígenas e aqueles da escola não-indígena. O recurso de entrevista foi o procedimento básico da pesquisa cujas categorias de análise que emergiram das respostas às entrevistas são: (a) duração do curso, ritmos docentes e discentes; (b) oralidade, leitura e escrita; (c) o preconceito vivido e o poder alcançado pelos professores indígenas, (d) a matemática escolar e os professores indígenas. No âmbito dos fundamentos, procurei contribuições na Antropologia Social e na Etnomatemática para entender os limites e as possibilidades da educação escolar indígena e, de modo especial, para compreender as contradições e os progressos que ocorrem no processo ensino-aprendizagem quando são tomadas como objetivos e valores a interculturalidade e a Etnomatemática. / This work of inquiry intends to understand and to analyze the development of the São Paulo State indigenous teachers\' formation program - MagIND, a program developed through a partnership between the São Paulo State Secretary of Education and the College of Education at the University of São Paulo, FE-USP, Brazil, carried in 2002 and 2003. The indigenous people that have concluded the course have been qualified to be k - 4/ kindergarten and elementary education teachers. This research has been devised according to the point of view of the indigenous teachers and non-indigenous teachers and teacher educators, starting from the assumption that the school is a space of dialogue and conflict between the indigenous people knowledge and the non-indigenous school one. The resource of interviewing was the basic research procedure whose categories of analysis that emerged from the answers to the interviews are: (a) duration of the course, teacher and student rhythms; (b) speaking, reading and writing; (c) the living prejudice and the power achieved by the indigenous teachers (d) the school mathematics and the indigenous teachers. In regards to the background theory I have looked for contributions in the Social Anthropology and Ethnomathematics to understand the limits and the possibilities of indigenous school education and, more specifically to understand the contradictions and the progress in the teaching-learning process when interculturality and Ethnomathematics are considered as objective and values.