Costumed honors students experiment in D.C.
Junior Cheryl Heatwole and first-year Kristina Landis dressed as Goths to participate in the group's experimentation with public reaction.
On Nov. 20, a group of EMU honors students traveled to Washington, D.C. for the first major honors activity of the year.
Members dressed as various societal subgroups that included groups dresing as Goth, homeless (including a simulated teenage pregnancy), plain (Amish), and formalwear.
The group first attended mass in costume at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, a gigantic cathedral on the campus of the Catholic University of America. After lunch the students split up into their subgroups and wandered into the city to perceive how strangers on the street reacted to them.
Participants dressed as typical college students were originally planning to form a "normal" group. However, after becoming interested in seeing how costumed groups would be received, the normally-dressed students decided to split up and follow each of the costumed groups at a distance as observers to get a better idea of how strangers reacted to them.
The costumed groups performed a variety of actions that would be expected of persons dressed as them, as well unexpected actions, in order to gauge responses. Actions included formalwear group members in suits and ties or high heels surprising runners by running along side them, homeless members asking for permission to use restrooms in an office building, and all groups asking pedestrians for the time.
A number of the participants were surprised at how blasé passersby reacted to them. Members of the homeless group felt that they were not convincing in their role, especially as they were stopped twice and asked for money to help the homeless, while members of the formalwear group felt that people simply assumed they were going to a formal function, and that they did not stand out. However, the Goth group did receive some interesting reactions while attending mass in costume. The group concluded the day by reconvening and discussing their experiences with one another.
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