Elevator Ethnography: My 2 hours spent in an Elevator.

Why would anyone want to confine themselves in a small room, with four to five perfect strangers, for a duration of about 20 seconds, and why would they want to do this multiple times in a given day? I don't know, have you ever ridden an elevator before?

So you're standing on the first floor in Millet Hall at Wright State University, you push a button and a metal door opens to reveal a 5' by 7' room. You step in and the door closes, they open again and you exit. You look around at your new surroundings as you perceive a totally different floor than the one you just left, this all happened in less than 20 seconds. But what happened during those 20 seconds in that small room, can anything be learned about yourself or about others?

First off, what do people do in an elevator? Well, they check their watch, look through their purse, fiddle in their pockets, whistle a short tune or they gaze and glance.

The Picnic, overseen by a guide from Gaze's Tours....

Wright State University Primary Corporate Mark

Wright State University

Oh my, how they all gaze and glance. And the beep, ah yes, one cannot forget the beep. Every floor that is passed there is a beep; and that beep comes from the small light display in the upper left hand corner of the elevator. For every floor that goes by, that small light changes to a different number and it beeps. Elevator riders don't know it, but they love that beep. It is that very beep that saves them in their absolute moment of awkwardness, they hear that beep and they gaze at those numbers. They gaze so hard it hurts, and in their minds they wish that this elevator would just hurry up and get them to their destination, so they can just get on with their...