1st Observation
The following ethnography field notes were taken at Lucille Roberts, a women’s only facility.
Data
Observations made during Feb 24th –Feb 28th:
I am already a member at Lucille Roberts so it was easy to integrate myself into the setting and make discreet observations without disturbing the other gym members. I go to the gym about 4 days a week so I was able to make several observations during this week.
This particular Lucille Roberts has 3 floors. The first floor is full of nothing but cardio equipment such as treadmills, elliptical machines, and stationary bikes. The lower level is a large open space where several different group classes are held such as cardio fusion, zumba, strictly step, and chic boxing. The top floor has even more cardio machines and a handful of other recently strength training machines. There are also 2 small weight racks are located in the back corner of the gym and do not go passed 30lbs.
On my 2nd day there I observed two females that were probably in their early 20s who I had seen sporadically in the past 3 months. These two girls were not over weight but did not look to be in shape either. They spent most of their time chatting about their personal lives, increasing the time they spent on some of the machines which seemed to annoy some of the other members. They used very little resistance and did not seem to be paying much attention to using proper technique. They were also frequently taking pictures of each other. At one point one of the girls said to the other, “Do you want to try out the weights?” The friend replied, “no, I don’t want to look like a man either.” Once Zumba was announced over the loudspeaker the two girls including most of the other members of the gym that were on the 2nd floor cleared out to the lower level to attend the class. This left me and a handful of other women spread out on this floor including another woman that I began to observe. The 2nd subject was a 34 year old female in very good shape that I
Data
Observations made during Feb 24th –Feb 28th:
I am already a member at Lucille Roberts so it was easy to integrate myself into the setting and make discreet observations without disturbing the other gym members. I go to the gym about 4 days a week so I was able to make several observations during this week.
This particular Lucille Roberts has 3 floors. The first floor is full of nothing but cardio equipment such as treadmills, elliptical machines, and stationary bikes. The lower level is a large open space where several different group classes are held such as cardio fusion, zumba, strictly step, and chic boxing. The top floor has even more cardio machines and a handful of other recently strength training machines. There are also 2 small weight racks are located in the back corner of the gym and do not go passed 30lbs.
On my 2nd day there I observed two females that were probably in their early 20s who I had seen sporadically in the past 3 months. These two girls were not over weight but did not look to be in shape either. They spent most of their time chatting about their personal lives, increasing the time they spent on some of the machines which seemed to annoy some of the other members. They used very little resistance and did not seem to be paying much attention to using proper technique. They were also frequently taking pictures of each other. At one point one of the girls said to the other, “Do you want to try out the weights?” The friend replied, “no, I don’t want to look like a man either.” Once Zumba was announced over the loudspeaker the two girls including most of the other members of the gym that were on the 2nd floor cleared out to the lower level to attend the class. This left me and a handful of other women spread out on this floor including another woman that I began to observe. The 2nd subject was a 34 year old female in very good shape that I