Introduction

In October, my sociologist professor assigned us a project on observation. The basic laydown of the assignment was to observe a small group or two of people, then try and explain their behaviors and actions with a sociological lense. We decided the theme of this project was “theater,” so hope you enjoy my observations, or “play,” called The Art of Research.

The Stage

The stage I chose for my show was a section on my campus, in Kamloops B.C, Canada. It was a busy crowded hallway, with booths with a table along the side. We were inside, since it was November, and it was a rainy cold day. It was a crowded hallway with people coming and going. It was noisy with a lot of chit-chat going on. The room smelt like rain, from people opening and closing the door. Also a hint of coffee from the student cafe around the corner. A few booths down from my are the people I chose to watch. The booths are, in my opinion, the comfiest places to relax, study, and chat with friends. The rain tapped onto the windows beside my booth, as I made myself comfy to start my observation.

Blocking

The Players

I sat two booths away from the group I chose to study, close enough to see their actions and listen to their conversation, but far enough away that they wouldn’t notice me. There were a couple other people hanging out around me I could have studied as well, but something was just so interesting about this group. There were 4 people in the group, all female. Person A, B, and C were all japanese women. All about the same age (18-20) and all dressed very similar. Person D was a caucasian women. Roughly the same age group, and dressed also similar. Person A was sitting across from person B, and beside person C, as well as person D was across from Person C and beside person B. They were all speaking english, I’m guessing for the caucasian girl. Although person A, B and C all had accents. They were all sitting around the table, two on each side, on their phones for most of the time. Their body language seemed pretty comfortable with each other. Some sat leaning their head on their arms, and some sat cross legged. They were laughing and giggling a lot, seemed to be passing each others phones around looking at pictures. After I while of of wondering what they were giggling about i looked over person B’s shoulder and saw they were all using a dating app called “Tinder.” I thought this was incredible because it is commonly used in North American app, yet people from other cultures were using it and so interested in it and experiencing it here.

Plot

Some of the key things I thought were important about the observation was the groups culture, race, sexuaity and motives. Firstly, culture and race. The 3 ladies who came from another culture seemed to be pretty into things in our culture. For instance, using tinder. A dating app used most commonly used in North American culture. Also, all 4 people were dressed more with a North American style, things that are “in”’ right now. Because Kamloops is a very multicultural city, with tons of international students, the girls may have experienced resocialization, from moving and adapting to our own cultural norms. Secondly, their sexuality. All the girls had long or nicely done hair, were all wearing heeled boots, jeans, or even dresses, I believe they all had a feminine gender role. I was able to see one of the pictures, or I guess, dating profile, of someone they were swooning over as they passed their phones around. From my view it looked like a male probably around the same age. All of them were commenting on his psychical features, saying he was attractive. I can assume they were all hetrosexual females looking at males. Lastly they were in another social setting, they may have acted differently then they would in their own culture. Vise versa the women who seemed to be from a canadian culture may have also acted different in a setting with 3 woman from another culture. There are various races and religions through our campus, but everyone seems to be going for the same motive; to get a “good job”to be financially stable. At Least through a Canadian student lense, getting a good job seems to be a common motive. These three aspects, I believe, were the highlights of interesting behavior during the 20 minute period I observed them.

Finale

Finally, to summarize, I did enjoy this project. I feel as it it gave me a better understanding on different sociological lenses, and a basic idea of why people behave how they do. My feelings at the beginning of this assignment were kind of mixed. I liked the concept but I felt weird sitting and watching people, and let alone I thought they would notice me. At the beginning of the observation I indeed felt a little strange watching people and taking down notes. But as time went on I realized they really had no idea what i was actually doing, or even payed any attention to me at all. Thank you for reading though my play, hope you all enjoyed it!