Entrevistas mediadas en sociolingüística cualitativa. La aplicación en la etnografía en línea

Abstract

This article focuses on the collection of sociolinguistic data through mediated interviews, i.e. those using New Information and Communication Technologies (NICTs) artefacts, such as the Smartphone and its instant messaging services. It proposes a critical reflection on the face-to-face notion that has traditionally defined the interview, while exposing the positive aspects and methodological challenges of the mediated interview. The study is divided into two main parts. The first, more general part explains how the interview is understood as a heuristic tool in qualitative studies and situates it historically and methodologically within the framework of sociolinguistics. In the second part, it is explained and exemplified in a practical way how the mediated interview can be used in online ethnographic sociolinguistic studies. In this afore-mentioned strand of sociolinguistic research, the interview is primarily used to examine linguistic attitudes and ideologies. The results of this study show that technological mediation was not a communicative constraint and that it made it possible to collect the expected data. At the same time, however, it is clear that in order for mediated interviews to work and be productive, it is necessary to carry out preliminary work between participants and researchers in order to promote a feeling of trust. It is therefore recommended to invest the necessary time in the online presentation by the researcher. Furthermore, this study has shown the importance of flexibility in fieldwork, which needs to be adapted to the requirements of the participants, as long as these do not undermine the fundamental objectives of the research. On an ethical level, this study draws attention to the fact that online data are not freely available to researchers: declaring their presence and working with the agreement of the people involved whenever and wherever possible is essential. Each methodological step must be planned with the need to protect the people involved and to respect their wishes.