ASSIGNMENT 2: APPLICATION PROJECT
(Course Name and Number)
(Date Submitted)
Description of a Past Experience on Committing a Deviant Act
Background: My Past Experience on Deviance
Perhaps one of the most memorable experiences that involve the commission of a deviant act is my intentional use of a jar filled with eighty quarter-dollar coins to pay for items that cost close to, but not more than $20 in mall stores. During that time, I was very aware that there really is nothing wrong with paying for items using quarter-dollar coins inside a jar, given that there is no state or federal law that regulates the use and amount of certain currency denominations allowed for cash transactions. In fact, I came to argue that time that it is indeed absurd for storeowners to turn down customers who pay for their items using jars of coins, especially if those make up for the full amount of the item. I also thought that storeowners may even find customers who pay using jars of coins useful, given that they need to have a steady supply of money in smaller denominations for giving out change. Looking back at my past experience, I came to realize that my act of trying to pay for $20-and-below items for 80 pieces of quarter-dollar coins in mall stores constitute that of a violation of a folkway, which I will elaborate later on. My simple purpose for using a jar with 80 pieces of quarter-dollar coins amounting to $20 for transactions is this – I wanted to see how storeowners would react, as I presumed that they would be shocked once I give them a huge amount of coins for payment instead of, say, one twenty-dollar bill or two ten-dollar bills. With half expectations that my jar of quarter-dollar coins would either be rejected or accepted, most of the findings on the five storeowners I have tested constituted mostly of amusement (four of them gave me a laugh and asked me if I had bigger bills instead), while one of them actually accepted my payment and took time to count all the coins I have using plastic coin counters – which actually led me to think that my plan has backfired because of him! Given the foregoing overview, I have elaborated in the succeeding sections some of the concepts from the book Sociology in Our Times by Diana Kendall (2013), specifically from the chapter entitled “Deviance and Crime,” in order to provide a fuller conceptual understanding of my experience.
Kendall (2013) described deviant behavior as one that varies according to degrees of seriousness, with violation of folkways being perhaps the least damaging. Folkways are basically defined as preexisting “national and regional characteristicsthat are an outgrowth of the fundamental assumptions that shape societies” (Meslin et al., 2014; Summer, 1940).Violation of folkways include skipping class and feigning sickness in order to complete homework (Kendall, 2013) and the provision of allowance against autonomy by certain politicians in the United States (US), contrary to that accorded by their political culture (Meslin et al., 2014). Although the violation of folkways do not lead to the breaching of mores and laws – both of which being more serious, those nevertheless constitute deviant behavior in that it leads to a breach of existing conventions – formal or informal. In the case of my experience on using 80 pieces of quarter-dollar coins in a jar for paying for items worth no more than $20, I understand that the folkway I am violating concerns the usual practice of paying for larger denominations for cash purchases. Indeed, it is very tedious for a store owner to deal with cash payments for higher-priced items made in the form of extremely small denominations – pennies, nickels, dimes and quarter-dollar coins forming around ten dollars or higher, for instance. At the same time, however, a store owner may not dispute the value of small denominations, especially if those add up to the total amount of purchase the customer pays for. Thus, my past experience on deviance – which was actually a social experiment I personally committed to test my thoughts stated in the foregoing, is not really a serious one, given my choice to break a folkway out of curiosity on the kind of reactions I may get (Kendall, 2013; Summer, 1940).
Analysis of My Experience on Deviance
What I Thought
Basically, I used $20-worth of quarter-dollar coins stored in jars in order to test if storeowners would react negatively, given my awareness of the folkway on paying for cash purchases using reasonable denominations. In fact, given the rather foolish presentation of my simulated deviant behavior, I have already expected that some of the storeowners would scream at me and scorn me for paying for purchases using lots of coins. However, much to my amusement, four out of five storeowners actually found it funny that I am paying for items worth $20 using a jar of quarter-dollar coins. I also found it strange that one out of five storeowners actually took my offer seriously – using plastic coin counters. Overall, I found my personal social experiment funny that time, considering that storeowners actually reacted, albeit mildly, well within my expectations upon presenting them with my jar of quarter-dollar coins (Kendall, 2013).
What the Storeowners Thought
I seriously thought at first that storeowners would not take me seriously – even reject and get annoyed at me, once I pay for my purchases with them using my jar of quarter-dollar coins. Yet, my findings proved otherwise – the storeowners were rather amused with me using a jar of quarter-dollar coins for payment and actually took me seriously, with one of them having acted normal at the sight of my way of paying him. Whereas what I did constituted a breach of a particular folkway, the fact that the jar of quarter-dollar coins hold a specific monetary value crucial to storeowners gave me the confirmation that I did not do such an offensive thing at all (Kendall, 2013).
Conclusion
My experience with my social experiment on paying storeowners with quarter-dollar coins was very revealing in the sense that it allowed me to see the effects of violating a folkway typical in American society - the use of reasonable denominations as payment for cash purchases. Although I was initially pessimistic with regard to the outcome, I was surprised by how amusingly yet seriously they took my offer to pay for my purchases using my jar of quarter-dollar coins. Indeed, violating folkways would typically not elicit reactions as strong as that of breaching norms or laws, although people would definitely discern such as deviance.
References
Kendall, D. (2013). Sociology in our times (10th ed.). Retrieved from https://digitalbookshelf.southuniversity.edu/#/books/9781305450387/pages/111567106
Meslin, E., Carroll, A., Schwartz, P., and Kennedy, S. (2014). Is the social contract incompatible with the social safety net? Revisiting a key philosophical tradition. Journal of Civic Literacy, 1 (1), 1-15.
Summer, W. G. (1940). Folkways: A study of the sociological importance of usages, manners, customs, mores, and morals. Boston, MA: The Athenaeum Press.
