SHS

I think that we can definitely look at our high school as a subculture. A subculture is something that is part of a larger culture, and it has it's own unique cultural traits. It's weird to think that our school could be considered a subculture, but then that would help explain why so many people visit it every year. Whenever I see the random people being guided through the school taking tours I always think, "Why would people ever go out of their way to visit this school? What's so great about it?". But now looking at our school as a subculture definitely helpes answer those questions. There are different aspects that make up a subculture, such as material culture, mores, and languages. There are definitely examples of all of those at SHS that help us identify with our school and the people that go there. For example, our material culture is made up of things such as shs sportswear and parking stickers on the backs of cars. When I see people outside of school who have those items, I know that they go to SHS. There are also a lot of mores. At SHS, people know that they have to walk on the right side of the hallway or else other people will not be happy with them. They also know that only seniors can park on campus. All students know these mores and they are a part of what makes our school. The "language" used at SHS is very unique I think. We have different clubs like B.O.S.S, FMP, FEA and we also have names for different parts of the building like The Link and The Point. Only students from our school would know what we're talking about if we said any of these names, so they are definitely part of our school culture. I can see the effect that school "languages" have because I have friends that go to another school, and when they tell me things about they're school they use different names and phrases too so I always have to stop them in a middle of a story and say, "Wait, where did you go?" Using the names from my friend's school didn't seem weird for her because she is so used to it. SHS has many different aspects that define it as a subculture, and I can't really picture it without them.