Sociology is a fairly new subject for me. I think I know more than I really do. I enjoyed learning about what sociologist do and study and how much sociology surrounds us every single day. In class, we watch a video about the Asch Experiment. I had never heard of this experiment but it really stood out to me. For me, I understood it as peer pressure. Even when you know you are not supposed to do something, you do it anyways just because everyone else is doing it and you want to fit it. With that being said, I was reminded of this clip that I found a while ago on Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fl3RPRvI5JE
In this video, one kid is pressuring other kids into doing illegal stuff to prove that people do anything to fit in. What I appreciate most about this video is that there are kids of different races participating and not all one race. I found it humorous that most of the kids didn’t even have an explanation as to why they decided to do it.
I think a lot of people can relate to this because often times, at least for me, people tend to “just go with the flow” and it almost always never ends well. I truly believe that you should follow your gut instinct.
Another thing that was discussed in class was this idea about culture shock. I had never heard of this term before class but I picked up on the idea very quickly due to personal experiences. Culture shock is defined as a sense of disorientation that occurs when entering a radically new social or cultural environment. A few years ago, my family visited my grandmother in Colima, Mexico. My siblings and I were so thrilled to be going on a vacation to Mexico. We could not wait for the tropical beaches and endless smoothies in a coconut. Um, newsflash! This was anything but that! The houses were on the ground meaning no fancy 5 star hotels. On top of that, it felt like we were working to survive there. We had to hike miles and miles to get fresh water and one night we even fished for our food… yuck! It was a major culture shock for us to see the poverty town my grandma lives in and made us very appreciative of what we have in the United States (like McDonald’s).
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Sociology Through Heidi's Eyes 