Abstract
This thesis is an ethnography of the research interview. It presents an analysis of interviewer-interviewee interaction unencumbered by the methodological and practical concerns of research interviewers, for collecting reliable or valid data. The thesis argues that positivist and interactionist descriptions of the research interview, that are tied to interactional procedures for saving the referential quality of interview talk - by maximising or minimising respondent interviewer interaction - under-theorise the interaction they describe. Thus this thesis suspends any concern with the referential quality of interview data and draws upon a particular reading of the work of Goffman to analyse how participants accomplish a research interview as an intelligible interactional reality organised from within and how participants honour and accommodate each other as ritual selves in the primary roles of interviewee and interviewer. The thesis reviews positivist and interactionist descriptions of the research interview; makes the case for a Goffman style ritual analysis and presents an empirical analysis of qualitative interview talk.