Nashvill Symphony - Breaking a Social Norm

Breaking a Social Norm

In our society today, we have a number of society norms that we abide by without even knowing. For example, there is an unwritten rule of how one should behave in an elevator, or at family functions, the movie theatre, at restaurants, or even what you say when you answer or hang up the phone. When a social norm is broken people may respond in alarm, humor, fear, irritation, or an array of other emotions. In today's society we the people decide what is and isn't normal.

The norm I decided to go against or break was sitting on the floor of an elevator for three hours. I went to the Embassy Suites hotel in Murfreesboro, TN (partly because it is far enough from where I live for me to run into anyone I know and it was less likely that anyone I knew was there) and went into their elevator with no purse, luggage, nothing but just me in very casual clothing and my cell phone. For the first hour, I sat there and talked on my cell phone and as people came in and out of the elevator I got various looks, some people tried to ignore the fact that I was even there, will some people just stared and tried to scoot around me. I tried to play it cool and just still remained on the phone acting like I was having a really deep conversation.

For the second hour I just sat there and depending on the mood I was in I acted as though I was sleeping, laughing, crying or in fear of something. For the most part people didn't really didn't know how to react to this. Some younger people snickered and pointed while other were scared and thought I was a crazy person, some just waited until another elevator opened. I even had one lady ask me if I was lost and looked really concerned for my well-being. I told her that I was okay that my feet were hurting and I just needed a break from walking. Oddly enough she believed me and went on about her way. I felt sort of sorry for the older lady because she was about the only person that was truly concern about me and bothered to ask me any questions at all.

At about the third hour, it was starting to get a bit crowed and busy do to it being around the time that people were starting to have dinner and family outing and what not. As usual, people continued to stare, laugh, and even trying to whisper things like "what is doing in here," "Is she a crazy person mama," and even "I think she homeless". I felt so irritated throughout the whole day that people could be so judgmental on a person that they have no clue about. There were so many different times that I felt like cursing certain individuals out or even yelling at people. I knew this was for a project but I had never felt so insecure about myself and actually cared what people were saying about me. I got various reactions from laughing, the uncomfortable looks, to even receive you Okay, and this contradicted my hypothesis and prove that even

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