Q Find a SINGLE social location not on-campus, such as a religious setting, park, or other place—preferably one that you are unfamiliar with. You should spend a minimum of 3 hours in this setting observing and taking notes. You must keep a log of the time you observed in this setting, and you must submit your log and your notes with your paper. Apply the sociological imagination to this setting by describing and analyzing the social structure of this environment in detail. Make sure to pretend that your reader is completely unfamiliar with this setting, and focus on describing exactly what you saw during your observations. Who goes there? Why do they go there? How do people group themselves in this place? What is their purpose in going there, and is it similar to or different from what they actually accomplish by going there? What are the norms (the rules) of that social environment? Make sure to mention what your position was in this setting (did you feel like you fit in, were you an outsider, etc.), and use the vocabulary you learned when discussing symbolic interactionism. About 1200-1500 words. Guidelines for Presentations: Your presentation should be about 5 minutes in length, and the video should be submitted on the Blackboard Discussion Board under Course Modules. It may contain pictures you took of the site you observed, although they are not required. When presenting, try to provide sufficient details about the setting and norms so that your audience could guess the location you visited even if you did not tell them where you went. Your required powerpoint presentation should contain at least one slide addressing each of the following: (1) Description of the setting, (2) Description of the people (such as age, race, singles/families/couples, deaf/hearing, etc.), (3) Explanation of norms in the setting. Pretend that your classmates have never been to this kind of location and you are giving them advice and instruction on how to fit into this environment. SOC 101 Observational Notes National Arboretum: Capitol Columns Time Log 4/21 –> 1:00-2:30ish 4/22 – > 3:15ish-5:00 Notes Japanese girls-- focus on photos, pic of pushing apart towers, hugging in front of towers, praying? other couples take pictures of holding towers, photos angling up the tower lengths, usually walk holding hands. approaching groups stop to read info abt towers, look at tower, chatting ambly, stop at columns average 5-10 minutes mainly for pics. clothing -- jeans, shorts, sweatshirt, sunglasses, hat, camera, sneaker, handbags (dress warmly b/c of chilly breeze and clouds, otherwise it's sunny which is why people have hats and sunglasses) “American casual” clothing style walk slowly, wandering, chattering quietly, stopping frequently some groups focus on taking pictures of the columns while others focus on people in famous locations tend to not take pic of surround fields/trees, but tourist designated structures/areas every 1-2 minutes cars drive by (ppl don't speed here) family w/ small kids --little girl runs around column base, dad pushes stroller sometimes groups stop to rest in the meadows. Family of 6 spreads out blanket for picnic – dad kicks soccer ball around with little boy kids/teens in cars look bored, often listening to music on headphones, staring at their phones, or just looking out the windows (must be tourists b/c why else would you come drive around in a car with kids who look like they don't want to be there?) joggers and bikers stick to the roads, do not stop at special attractions b/c their purpose is to exercise, indicating that they're already familiar with the environment and come b/c they prefer to exercise in this environment rather than a gym or at home. Presumably bikers and joggers live nearby because most don't arrive or leave in cars, so they must be able to walk/bike a short distance to their homes families/couples walk on the paths and stop at the special attractions, presumably b/c they came to take pictures and view special attractions here, typical tourist behavior is to view well-known places in the cities they're visiting and take photos to document their trips.