Observation Notes

For project 3, I am doing an ethnography to observe the differences in Watterson dining center and Southside in Feeney's dining center. I felt that the two different dining centers have very different atmospheres and therefore, the behaviors of students are very different in each. Watterson is known for its beautiful renovations and wide selection of food options. Southside is known for basically the opposite of that. I have observed each dining center at some of the prime lunch and dinner times to try and watch the behavior of as many students as possible during each observation. I have observed each dining center three times during these times that I thought would be most crowded. As I predicted in my earlier blog post, students who walk into Watterson dining center to eat typically act more formal. They have a destination in mind, get the food at that destination, find a spot to sit, and eat their food. In Southside, however, students do not typically have a destination in mind. They wander from food bar to food bar to weigh their options and decide what they want. You typically see very many students standing around and walking around aimlessly trying to decide what they want. Because of this, many students see their friends standing around and doing the same thing making the dining center a very social place. It is not unusual to see large groups of students standing in a circle in the middle of the dining center while other students walk around them figuring out what they want. Likewise, because Southside is a much more confined space, it is extremely likely to run into more people you know that it is to run into friends at Watterson which is very spaced out and much bigger of an area. Another thing I have observed is the amount of students in Southside who choose to carry their food out compared to the number of students in Watterson. There was a massive number of students who chose to carry out from South side compared to those in Watterson.  This is most likely because students have the option to go right back up in their rooms with their food whereas many students who dine in at Watterson live in different dorm buildings and would not want to walk all the way back to eat their food. Especially when they don't have the option to simply walk downstairs if they get hungry again. Likewise, students take much bigger portions while dining in at Watterson compared to South side because they probably don't want to have to walk all the way back if they decide they want to eat again within a short period of time. These are some of the main and most obvious observations I have seen so far in my research.