Mead), ethnomethodology (Harold Garfinkel), and sociology of knowledge (Karl Mannheim). The development and improvement of the method are closely connected to German sociologist Fritz Schütze, part of the Bielefeld Sociologist's Working Group, which maintained close academic cooperation with American sociolinguists and social scientists such as Erving Goffman, Harvey Sacks, John Gumpertz, and Anselm Strauss. The analysis of life histories was further developed by the biographical case reconstruction method of German sociologist Gabriele Rosenthal for the analysis of life history and life story. Rosenthal differentiates between the level of analysis of the narrated life story (erzählte Lebensgeshichte) and the experienced life history (erlebte Lebensgeschichte). Technique In this method, the interviewer allows the subject to tell the story of their life on their own terms, as opposed to those of the researcher. It is common practice to begin the interview with the subject's early childhood and to proceed chronologically to the present. Another approach, dating from the Polish Peasant, is to ask participants to write their own life stories. This can be done either through competitions (as in Poland, Finland or Italy) or by collecting written life stories written spontaneously. In these countries, there are already large collections of life stories, which can be used by researchers. References Footnotes Bibliography Further reading Human development