Annotations for Speaker: Interviewer

This is [[]]. Today is [[]]. I am here in [[]] for an interview with one of our community members. Before we begin, I'd like to get verbal consent for the form we just went over. Could you please say, I consent to being interviewed in audio recorded for this study?

Perfect. Thank you so much. So, first off, can you tell me how you came to live here in [[]]?

That's awesome. So we go way back then here with this town. Oh, yeah. Perfect. And can you tell me a little bit more about this community? Like, if you met someone new and wanted to describe this town, how would you

Absolutely. That's great. And I've heard very similar sentiments from a lot of people. So being here for a while and even comparing it to some other places you lived, like, how would you say the community has changed? You spoke a little bit about that, how much it's changed recently, especially?

Yeah. A lot of change recently. I've seen so much myself in my short time here. So, despite all this change, what would you say are still some of the greatest strengths here in this community?

Excellent. That's very nice. Now that we've talked about some of the positives, you wanna talk about some of the things that you think are negative about this community?

Absolutely. Yeah. It, it can be hard for all this change. Thank you. Yeah. And you, uh, you spoke about working as a carpenter, right? Is that

How would you say, uh, your connection to this community influenced your work as a carpenter?

Oh, that's no problem at all. Like, how would some of the connections you've made with other people in this community, how does that affect your work as a carpenter?

Absolutely. Like what you're saying with the neighbors, it's such a common thing. Yeah. Especially in like cities where I'm living now. Yeah. I clearly relate. That's a big

That's alright.

That's between you two. Yeah. How bad you are.

Back to your work as a, uh, carpenter a little bit. How long have you been doing that here with Ian?

Yeah. No, that's all right. And, um, so I guess as a carpenter, what does your typical workday look like?

And you touched on this, uh, already a lot. So, uh, just like briefly, what do you think, what does it mean to you to be a carpenter in community and what brings you satisfaction?

That's great. I can definitely see how I would like, bring you joy. Like, it's like doing art. I feel the same thing when I'm like, yeah, I, I made something really cool. Yeah, it's great. But what would you say are some of the challenges? 'cause I'm sure there's plenty of challenges that come with this work too,

Yeah, absolutely. I'm sure that's a struggle. I get a little tired running upstairs, so . Yeah,

Okay. So now, if you don't mind, we're gonna move on from the work. Sure. Related discussion. I'm just gonna ask you a few sets of questions. Okay. And I'll read a statement to you, and you're gonna indicate what the extent of your agreement with each question is. Okay. On a scale of one to four. So if you say one that's, you completely disagree with the statement I read, two, you somewhat disagree. Three, you somewhat agree with my statement, or four. You completely agree. Okay. So one bad, four. Completely agree. Absolutely. So my first statement is, I consider myself to be an American. Would you say that?

Excellent. Do you wanna tell me why?

Excellent. So on a similar tone, would you, using that same scale, would you agree with the statement I consider myself to be a Texan?

That's great. And just to clarify, where would you say you are on that scale in one to four?

. I, I figured . Perfect. And I'll have to check out that museum

Ranger. That's awesome. I I really like my history, so. That sounds great. And for our next question, I'm gonna read out three different statements and tell me which one you agree with the most. So first off, I'm American first and Texan second. Two, I'm Texan first and American second, or three being Texan and American is equally important to you.

Excellent. And then for our next question, would you say to be a true Texan, you must know how to speak Spanish on that one to four scale, or Yeah, sorry. That's right.

Yeah, I agree. It feels funny not being able to speak more than just English, especially being so close to the border.

And once again, just to clarify, where would you put yourself on that one to four scale?

Four. Completely agree.

And then, um, on a similar note, would you say to be a true Texan, you also need to know how to speak English? One to

And then kind of going off of that, if you don't know how to speak English, would you say you can do everything you want and get everything you need? If you can't speak English?

And, sorry, I phrase that question a little funny. Like, uh, one to four. Do you think you can get everything you want done?

Perfect. And then for our last number rating question, please answer on a one to four. In my community life has been pretty stable over the past 40 years. Things haven't changed much

Yes. That's,

.

Excellent. So, uh, now we can talk, let's talk a little bit more about the community. So, um, what are, you've talked a little bit about this in the last question, but what do you think are some of the change things that have changed this in this community over the past few decades?

Yeah. So, going back to like your childhood, what do you think were the best parts about growing up here as a kid?

That's great. And do you think some of this, like traditional life you've been talking about has gone away in this community since you've

Yeah. That's a great story. Thanks for sharing. It's really interesting hearing about just how much

And thanks for sharing. Don't worry about rambling. That's act, that's actually great. It's really interesting to hear. Um, but just to, I'm wrap up with a few fun questions I have for you. Okay. What's your favorite sports team out there?

How about them? Cowboys, .

That's great. It's a little bit of a disappointing year though. Yeah. . Yeah, unfortunately. Well,

Absolutely. And the next fun question. Some people think it's hard for boys and girls to be friends. What do you think

,

Are some great stories. Thanks for sharing. I'm really sorry to hear you lost your mom

I'm really close with my mom too, so I can only imagine how

Hilarious. Damn,

Yeah, that's amazing. Still plenty of time to write a book,

Why not?

Yeah, two. And just for one last fun question before we have like a little optional thing we can do. A lot of people think the [[]]90s was the golden decade of pop music. Do you think so

Also. Pretty good one then. Uh, thank you for your answers and if you have a little bit of time, I'd uh, I have one last request. One of the overarching research questions through this Home to Texas program is about linguistic changes in Texas. As a part of this project, a linguistic research is asking that interview participants read a brief passage about life in Texas. It's a short made up story that was created in the [[]]80s and since then, linguistic researchers have recorded a couple hundred Texans reading it over the past few decades. They use these recordings as samples of people's standard way of speaking and they try to track how speech and change has varied and changed over time. Would you be willing to just read this brief passage out loud? Sure. Perfect. Thank you. Uh, the passage is right here. Just please read it out.

Alright, perfect. Thank you so much and thank you again for your time. Oh, welcome. I'm gonna stop the recording right now.

Uh, this is [[...]] . Today is [[...]] , and I am in [[...]] , Texas for an interview, uh, with one of our community members for the language and history interview. Before we begin, I just want to get, uh, verbal consent. Could you please say I consent to being interviewed and audio recorded for this study?

Alright. To get started, can you tell me about how you came to live in this community

Can you tell me a bit more about your community here? How would you describe it to someone who doesn't live here?

Urban stuff. I've, I have some family in [[...]] and they're always thinking there's a, the rivalry between [[...]] and a [[...]] is so, I the whole, rather, I'd live rather die than live in [[...]] thing. Do you think that's a thing here in [[...]] ?

Of the rivalry between, uh, [[...]] and [[...]] , so to speak? Do you think there's an element of that here?

Publish or parish

Anyway, our friends go to UT [[...]] . They like it a lot, so Yeah.

Yeah. No, campus has been, I know you're, you're a UT Lum, but campus has been a pretty crazy with all the, uh, the sports teams as of late. So I'd say the mood at UT is pretty high right now.

But just endless stream of construction, so.

How do you think that your community has changed throughout your time living here?

The, the World Series Champion Texas Rangers

What do you think the, uh, strengths of your community are?

You know, our our mayor recently switched. He was a, got elected as a Democrat, but switched to a Republican while in

Can you tell me about the roles and sort of the relationships that you have within this community?

Cold calls are hard.

Lawyers are in everything. They seem that they're fingering every pie.

I kind of wanna talk a little bit more about your career. I know you've touched on it, but, uh, just for the record, what do you do for work and how do you think your connections in this community have sort of, uh, influenced your work?

. Yeah. It's pretty crazy. My dad's always on me to read the, uh, the LBJ biographies by, uh, Robert Carroll. Yeah,

Um, and then, uh, I'm a big fan of Larry Wright. He's probably my favorite Texas, um, writer. But he does a lot of odd stuff. He does a lot of, like the Scientologists and stuff. Hmm.

I'm a, I'm a government major at ut so I talk a lot about politics with my, uh, friends. And I'm also in Plan two, so it's a common topic of conversation, and I don't think people understand the labor influence really at all. Like, um, the [[...]] were just at the R and c, or at least the, uh, president of the [[...]] were. Um, and, uh, like a lot of my friends who were pretty politically involved in know anything about that or why that mattered. And I, I, so I think it's really, really cool that you worked on that.

. So I wanna talk a little bit more about your role as a professor in politics. How did you really get involved in that?

So, uh, I'm a big fan of the PCL at UT in the [[...]] Center. 'cause you're allowed to just go in there and look at whatever you want. Mm-hmm. So I'd be curious to see if they have labor records, if that's just

I might, I'll take a look at that when I go back in the fall. That actually sounds very interesting. I like historical topics. Yeah, I'm sure. So, I know you mentioned that you're writing a book right now. So what is your typical sort of workday or writing schedule look like?

Oh, you're standing

Again, my dad has one of those. He really likes it.

You can put 'em, uh, on top. It's like a platform.

, I junk up my cork board. I have, I always pin stuff and then never get back to it.

What does it, uh, what does it mean to you to be a professor or sort of a political, um, activist in your community?

Sort of an open-ended, odd question, but answer it how you like.

What aspects of your job brought you the most satisfaction?

Makes lectures a little more interesting.

What were the biggest challenges that you say you had faced in your career?

Knit wit's. A good insult. I like that.

Years. Nature of the job, sort

Management and stuff.

Alright. Well, we're started moving to a different segment of the interview. Now. I want to talk about your experiences as a resident of your community. For these questions. I'm going to read a statement and then I'd like you to indicate the extent of your agreement. I'll give you an answer. Uh, you'll have to give an answer on a scale from one to four, where one is completely disagree, two is somewhat disagree, three is somewhat agree, and then four is a complete agreement. If you'd like to comment on any of the statements, uh, feel free to do that too. Mm-hmm

Alright. So the first phrase is, I consider myself to be an American. Would you say that you completely disagree with that? Somewhat disagree, somewhat agree or completely agree?

Me too. Now, using the same scale, I'd like you to rate the following statement of, I consider myself to be a Texan.

Which of the following three statements do you agree with, with most strongly? I am an American first and a Texan second. I am a Texan first and an American second. Or being a Texan and American are equally important to me.

The next phrase is to be a true Texan. You must know how to speak English. What would you rate this one given the scale we started with?

How about to be a true Texan? You must know how to speak Spanish. Sort of the flip side.

Alright. The next phrase is, in my community, you can do everything you want and get everything you need. Even when you don't speak English

Ear. Alright. Finally. In my community life has been pretty stable over the last 40 years. Things haven't changed much. Mm-hmm.

No, I agree with that. I'm, I'm 19 and I think there's been a lot of change in Yeah. In my lifetime. A lot less blue bonnet fields. A lot more development around. Oh

All right. Just a few more questions. What are some of the things that have changed in this community during the last few decades?

The last few decades? I know we've sort of gone over that already a lot, so if you just wanna give bullet points, that's good too.

Few decades.

I find the population stuff to be just really interesting. Um, that's something I've read a lot about, you know, sort of everything from Thomas mouth is to Yeah. The modern thinkers on that. I think the current estimates of the population will stabilize around 10 billion, and then we'll just learn to live with that. So I'm gonna be a little curious

Yeah, I'm, I'm gonna be serious, curious to see how it carries out, especially if, uh, you know, considering how many resources it takes for the, uh, you know, the average

Yeah. Like, uh, we're always talking about running out of resources or become independent on a sort of a hostile foreign state for resources. But, uh, it seems that, like we always find a, like some American farmer finds a random store in the middle of nowhere,

That's interest. That's one take on the Fermi paradox. .

And the aliens are actively avoiding us. Maybe

So overall, do you think this is a good community to live in?

Geography and

That's the one thing. Uh, I feel like North Texas is lacking. It would be good to have a, you know, some national parks or something around here.

I suppose prairie's pretty in its own way, but not, yeah. Not everybody's cup of tea, you know.

Yeah. No, I, uh, I've spent some time in West Texas. We usually go out there for spring break or something. We like Big Bend a lot. It's very pretty

A little bit lonely, but you know, it's so dark. You can see any stars you want class

So you can answer this next question for either yourself or for your own grandchildren, but what do you think is, or was the best part about being a young person or a kid in this community, or just Texas in general for you, since you grew up in Austin?

Or what was the best part?

Austin's very pretty, um,

Yeah. They've dammed up their, it used to be called Town Lake, the part of the Colorado that's dammed up there, but it's, uh, they've renamed it Lady Bird Lake recently. And I, I spent a, they renamed it, uh, to Lady Bird Lake.

It was kind of a boring name, but, um, no, I, I spent a lot of time out there my, uh, my first semester and second semester at ut, so I enjoy it. So, uh, do you feel that traditional way of life sort of in your community, or Texas in general, if you like, is going away?

It sort of evolved, I think, too. Yeah.

Alright. So it's a little, few little miscellaneous questions at the end here, but, uh, what is your favorite sports team?

Yep. And the next question is, how have they been doing lately? pretty good, I would say.

My, uh, my roommate was from Houston [[...]] , and she was a big Astros fan. Had a poster on the wall, huge Astros fan. She did not speak to me for three days.

Yeah. But it's okay. You know what, they've, they, they've had enough success. It's

Yeah. We just need one thing. And they had to cheat to get it too.

All right. Another sort of random question here, but, uh, what chores did you have to do when you were younger and what chores do you sort of do today?

My parents do that with me too, so, yeah. That has not changed.

Alright.

Yeah. So these ones are truly just random questions, but have you ever told a story about another person, thinking the other person was not near you, and then sort of had like a, almost a cinematic turned around and saw that person was near you or had overheard

The dreaded reply All . Yeah.

That must have been awkward.

I, I'll make sure not to do that. That'll be, I, I will keep this in mind when I'm using email 'cause I feel like I don't understand it sometimes.

Alright. What do you think was the, uh, golden decade at least, in your opinion, of a pop music,

Wow. Okay. So that's, that's serious.

There's a, there's a mural of Willie Nelson that was by my dorm. Oh,

That's pretty cool. Yeah,

Did you, uh, do you live on campus when you went to ut?

Commuter student. Yeah. That's probably

Yeah. Probably a better, better living experience in the dorms.

Speaking from my experiences, I liked it. But the, the air conditioning was a little,

That's it. It builds character.

Yeah.

Alright. Well that concludes the, uh, questions that I have. There's one more part of the interview that's optional if you want to do it. It's just reading a, a brief passage that was created in the 1980s, um, about growing up in Texas. It's completely fictional, but it's again, just part of the sort of linguistic element. If you'd like to do it, I'd be, uh, happy to have you read here on my computer, but if not, that's

Alright. Lemme just get that it's not too long. I will,

Just start whenever you're ready.

Alright. That's the conclusion of that passage. Alright. So that's the conclusion of our interview. If you have any other questions, please just let me know and, uh, if you'd like a ut t-shirt or anything I can send as a thank you for this. I really appreciate it. I found this very interesting. I've done a lot of these and this has been my, my favorite interview so far. Definitely

So I, I I really liked hearing about uh, Austin because uh, I feel like people are, my professors are always griping about how the old Austin was so much cooler. And so I told my, my parents went to ut so I told my parents about that and they were like, well our professors were also always griping about how the old Austin was cooler. I think the, uh, so I think the old Austin is just however Austin is, whenever you're like 20, you know, doing That's probably right. Young, young people things. Yeah. Yeah. That is probably right. Alright, well I'm gonna stop the recording now.