This assignment is designed to have you become more familiar with the concept of a social norm. A social norm often involves a tacit rule of expected or appropriate behavior that is agreed upon by a group of people, yet is not always clearly verbalized. For this assignment, you will violate a social norm. Remember as per our discussion of this assignment, you are not to violate a law or a regulation, both of which are clearly articulated and are not considered social norms. Also, in choosing the social norm you plan to violate, do not do anything potentially harmful to yourself or to anyone else. For the purposes of this assignment, if you violated a social norm in the past (whether intentionally or accidentally), you may choose to relate that experience.…
I didn’t want to annoy the employee so I just ordered a Big Mac. When I pulled up to the window, I was nervous; I didn’t want the employee to see me because I had just made a fool of myself. But, the employee did see me and noticed that I was a teenager. He immediately assumed that I was part of a prank and asked me, “So where’s the camera?” to which I replied “What camera?” He chuckled, handed me the Big Mac, and I drove off. On the drive home, I laughed the whole time. I kept picturing the man’s face when he asked me where the camera was. But, along with the fun, this experiment was also a great learning experience. I learned that violating a social norm isn’t such a big deal after all. Before, I thought that doing something like this would be embarrassing and that people, like the McDonald’s employees, would make fun of me. But the only response I got from the McDonald’s employees was a little chuckle and life continued. Perhaps I shouldn’t worry about my social mistakes too much because the people around me don’t really care as much as I think they…
#2 Look up all the time – Monday during lunch in my roomates common area, there were five other participants all of which were my friends.…
We see norms in our everyday life but ones stand out more than others. That is exactly what I wanted to do with my experiment, make everyone remember my norm by the humor and awkwardness it brings. To get a better understanding of a norm Simone Isadora Flynn states in her article that “Norms refer to conditions for social relations between groups and individuals, for the structure of society and the difference between societies, and for human behavior in general. Norms are shared rules, customs, and guidelines that govern society and define how people should behave in the company of others.” Although that there are many different types of norms the one I have committed is a folkway “Folkways refer to norms that protect common conventions. Most people in a society follow traditional folkways but failure to conform to them is considered neither illegal nor immoral.”…
Apart of me believes that as a society, we value social norms to the fullest in regards to what behaviors and or actions are considered acceptable; however it been proven that violating social norms in the past have help with the progression of society today. Change did not occur without having people who were opposed to certain traditions. For example, the civil right movements, women suffrage, interracial marriages, and now Sexual Education programs. Sex is an unspoken, uncomfortable topic because society symbolizes virginity. Virginity is a social construction seen as sacred, when in fact it is just a form of oppression and the ability to control women and their bodies. In todays age, teens already know what sex is all about but its completely…
Sarah Shaffer Social Norm Violation Extra Credit A norm present in American society is not verbally communicating with other unknown individuals in public bathroom stalls. A violation of this norm would be attempting to communicate with other individuals in the stalls. Through an ethnomethodological investigation, I discovered certain aspects revolving around this specific violation.…
folkway, the face reactions I received were quite humorous. Some ignored which was pretty acceptable on account of mid-terms, but the majority stared followed by questioning and maybe laughter. Understanding my violation how could you blame them, walking backwards is not only a walking folkway it is also dangerous to myself as well as my fellow class mates. As childern we grew up learning to speak a certain language or dress a certain way. When natural motor skills come in to play such as walking and running heading in the forward motion is a judgment of what ought to be.…
In order to understand our adherence to social norms we must understand what they are and the various ways in which they can be broken and violated. These violations can vary greatly and be anywhere between quirky and frightening. The intensity of discomfort associated with these violations depends not only on the violation itself but on the individual performing, experiencing, or witnessing it making the spectrum of reactions widespread and interesting. There are two ways to truly explore norm violations, to observe others both performing and reacting to violations and to perform them yourself and observe the reactions of others.…
For my norm violation, I decided to go out into a public place and briefly interact with complete strangers. To achieve this, I decided to simply say hi to individuals as they passed by me. In picking my location, I wanted to be somewhere with a lot of foot traffic. Ultimately, I decided to go to Fred Meyer on a Saturday, when I knew it would be busier, and start saying hi to unsuspecting shoppers. Even though this was a minor norm violation, it still made me feel very uncomfortable. Each time I went to speak I became nervous and scared people would respond to me negatively. After pushing through the awkwardness, however, and saying hello to large handful of people, I seemed to be getting a handful of the same reactions. People would either…
When I broke the norms I actually broke two and didn’t even know it until I was done with my acting. The two social norms that I broke were, wearing pajamas to the movie theatre with my boyfriend and being rude to authority such as elders. When my boyfriend picked me up for the movies, he just looked at me strangely. I know he wanted to ask why did I have on pajamas but he just kept quiet. By the way I did bring a extra pair of clothes with me, so I wouldn’t look like an idiot that whole night. Well anyway, on our way to the movies, my boyfriend just kept staring at me, but mind you he never said a word. When we went to get the tickets I received many looks from people and…
For my folkway violation I chose to position myself six inches away from someone during a conversation. I chose to try this particular one because I knew my mom would give me the best, honest reaction. She has always had a small pet peve that was people getting in her personal space. I thought to myself this is the perfect norm violation for me to use. I was able to easily approach my mom at home where she would be completely clueless of the stunt.…
BE NICE – Explain you were doing a social experiment for class and ask if you can ask them some questions.…
Like with most Deaf events, I was nervous about going so I didn’t want to walk in without the friends I was meeting there walking in with me. As we entered I not only saw a lot of signing but I heard a lot of conversation and people casually talking. This comforted me a little as I paid and took the program.…
The audience was respectful, for the most part. Everyone set quietly during the performances, and clapped after each one. Some people did use their cell phones, but that did not bother me as I set in the front row. Between the acts, people around me made small talk about what project they were doing or what professor they had. The stage was set up like a normal small stage would. It was on ground level, and the light eliminated the small but versatile stage. The large piano was the center of the stage, but when someone would play a different set of instruments, they would stand in front of the piano and the piano would almost disappear as your attention was now focused on the performers.…
This week the group’s task was to create a proposal for our performance. During class we decided to create a Google doc, which allowed all us to collaborate using our laptops at the same time on the document. As soon as Olivia made the Google doc, we started to assign each group member with his or her responsibility. My responsibility was to write about the project development ideas. I wrote about how we included the Brechtian technique into our performance along with audience participation. Since we were required to perform a scene during our proposal, each group member played a role. Josh was the drunken frat guy, Luke was an oblivious, dumfounded teenage girl, Stan was the narrator, and Olivia, Kim, and I were portrayed the audience for this particular scene. Since my responsibility was to write about the project development idea, I elaborated on how we used various techniques. The audience participation comes into effect when Stan asks the audience to tell us what is wrong with the picture and what the characters are doing. This also ties into the technique known as breaking the fourth wall, where the barrier between the actors and the audience is broken when Stan directly address to the audience.…