Assignment: Attending An African American Wedding

Assignment #1: Attending an African American Wedding
Weddings are an occasion of great celebration. Expectations do vary greatly, depending on culture, tradition and environment. I received a wedding invitation from an African American co-worker several weeks ago. My initial thought was not to attend the wedding, which I did not RSVP or inform her that I would not be attending. I did, however, send her a card and expressed my congratulations to her. After I received my assignment, I decided that this would be a good event to attend and to experience my first African American wedding. Once I decided to attend the wedding, I contacted my co-worker and explained to her that I did not have a chance to RVSP for her wedding. She informed me that

I did not know what to expect, since this would be my first African American event I have attended. The only example I had to go by was from watching shows on T.V. I expected that the women would wear very bold, colorful outfits with large hats and the men with 3 pieces colorful suits with hats and canes. I expected the ceremony to be long. I decided to stay for the reception and I expected it to be a large feast since my coworker said that it will be a buffet. Once we went to the event, some of my expectations were on point. Many of the women’s outfits were very bold and colorful, but very few wore hats. Most of the men did wear different colored, long suits with hats. I noticed the common them among the outfits were the hats. I did feel out of place wearing a modest tan color dress without a hat. I did feel out of place since were two out of four Caucasian people attending the wedding. I felt as if I was constantly looked at and I think everyone questioned me who I was and who did I know from the wedding party. Not many people talked to us at our table, except the cousin of the groom. He seemed more comfortable talking with my son than me. It was difficult to strike up a conversation with the people at our table and that did make me feel uncomfortable and that I should not be