We decided to study the TV show: Shipwrecked, Season: 2009, Episode: 7. Two teams living on two separate islands compete with each other for new members; the largest team wins a cash prize at the end. The tribes are named the Sharks and the Tigers, yellow and red team respectively.
1) Provide a comparison of your team’s answers to the individual observation questions above. How were your impressions similar? Where did your impressions differ?
Overall, the team has agreed on the following points:
-Objective: clearly understandable main goal
-Evident tendency to leadership from Danny
The concept of friendship between the Tigers’ members has been differently perceived from the team members. There is a contrast in the team members’ opinions, whether the connection among the Tigers’ members can be defined as “true” friendship, or, most likely, a superficial relationship, which is still individually based on the desire to win the final prize.
2) ) What evidence did your teammates use to form their initial impressions of the group, its members, and the dynamics?
After the first view of the episode, the first impressions of the team were equally dealing with
friendship and the group spirit among members. The members of the team expressed evident happiness, most likely generated by the obvious excitement of the game and of the
dream-like location (desert island in the Caribbean).
Another clearly visible characteristic of the group, on which the whole team agreed, was one of the very first impressions; the leadership demonstrated by Danny. He takes position, brings order and ideas in the group. Danny’s leadership may be initially helped by his strong and commanding physical appearance.
3) Was there evidence of prejudice, discrimination, or the use of stereotypes in the show – either between group members, between groups depicted, or from other people on the show? Describe your observation.
Among the different types of discrimination, there was no evidence of racial discrimination.
The team is composed of members with different social backgrounds and of different race, but the well being of the team seems not to be threatened by this diversity.
A point, on which the team agrees, is the evident prejudice towards Greg (the “insider” from the Sharks team). He is seen as a spy and despite the willingness to integrate him in the group, there is a general prejudice towards him, making the Tigers believe he will threaten the team’s well living and strategies to beat the Sharks.
Defining this behaviour a source of prejudice is demonstrated by the fact that Greg himself, when interviewed individually, states that he does not aim to threaten the well being of the “hosting “ team and he will not act strategically to reach personal goals. The real Tigers members don’t know Greg’s sincere feelings but base their ideas on, as previously mentioned, a prejudice.
6-a) The group's biggest weakness or problem:
As a group we discussed a few weaknesses that might ultimately affect them as a team and their goals. The example we came up with was the possible deviant behaviours that the team could be experiencing later now that they have learnt that the money prize will only go to one person of the team. Deviant could essentially break down team chemistry and their aptness to actually get through their challenges as a group to win the competition.
6-b-c) Strategies that we would suggest if we were to go there and improve their performances:
As a group we thought that they should improve on doing more activities together to bring their skills together, and elaborate them to reach a more competitive state than that of the sharks. There were already signs of good teamwork and leadership settled by Danny. So we thought that he should be the one responsible to bring the team together and have more meetings, divide tasks in order to accomplish a project as a group.
Furthermore we think that the team should lift their spirits after they lost in this episode. So we think they should have more fun, move around more and enjoy their situation as best as they can. A good team spirit is essential to win this competition. The sharks proved that this was a fundamental part of their victory over the tigers.