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Stevenson, Samuel
Community Observation Analysis
1. Go to a public place and OBSERVE the community of people in that place for at
least 30 minutes; perhaps as long as 60 minutes. In your report, describe the setting
and note the date and time of your observation. Describe the element of
“community” that you observed.
The public place I chose to go for this week’s assignment was a Christian church. This
church is in Philadelphia. The worship service happens every Sunday at 12pm. Normally the
length of worship for this specific church is two hours. This church is about 100 years old. At
the current moment it has about 60 active members.
I went to this church on the tenth of September. I stayed for the complete worship service of
two hours from twelve to two. The elements of community that I observed were community
sentiment, similarity and particular name.
“Community sentiment” is observed because the church members have been coming to this
church for twenty plus years; hence they have a sense of togetherness and belonging.
“Similarity” is apparent because the members live in the same neighborhood and basically share
similar culture and values. The community has a distinguishable name, “Pentecostal”. This is the
name the community prefers to be identified as other than by the name of the church itself
(Mondal, 2014).
2. Take notes describing your observations, giving special attention to the ages and other
demographic characteristics that are observed; elaborate in your description about how
you determined demographic characteristics such as socio-economic class and education
levels.
As per my observation I primarily saw people who were above the age of forty. The ratio of
women to men was about equal. The congregation was predominantly African American.
Education level was not something that I was able to determine due to the fact that I was just an
observer. The income level was hard to tell but looking at the cars in the parking lot and the way
the congregation members were dressed, I would say they belong to a middle or lower middle
class. The marital status, occupation and size of family also were something that was not
determinable unless an interview of the church members was done.
3. Take notes describing your observations, giving special attention to the folkways,
