Chapter Activities

  1. Together with a small group of your classmates, design a social movement to address an issue you identify as interesting and important. Consider, using information from the chapter, what you might need in terms of resources, how you might structure the organization of your movement, to whom you might appeal and how, and what obstacles you might encounter. Draw your plan on a sheet of paper and share it with others. How do they evaluate your plan? What kinds of comments, complements, and critiques does your plan invite? How might you revise the plan in light of these to make it more effective?
  2. Think about and list at least five “fads” prevalent today. How does each of the fads you identified illustrate (or challenge) the concept as described in the chapter? Do people engaging in the fads you listed seem to want to be different? What are they differentiating themselves from? Do you notice any patterns linking these fads together? Finally, of the fads you identified, which, if any, do you feel have the greatest likelihood of becoming fashions and why?
  3. Choose a social issue of importance to you. Imagine that you are part of a social movement that is seeking social, economic, political, or other change related to your issue and is interested in telling others about the issue and recruiting others to the cause. One of the ways in which activists sometimes inform others is through demonstration signs. Make a sign representing your issue and bring it to class to share. Work on making the sign a good visual and textual representation of your issue that clearly and concisely tells your “audience” about the issue. Share your sign with others and discuss what makes an effective presentation of an issue in this format.
  4. Overcoming the free rider problem is a significant challenge for social movements. Imagine you were a leader of a social movement working to significantly raise the minimum wage. How do you get people who support your position and stand to benefit if it is enacted to actually participate in the work of the movement? What barriers and costs keep people from participating? What could you do as a movement to lower these barriers and costs to make it more likely people will participate?