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I have a young cousin who is just like the OP.
Relax and do it. Part of maturity and adulthood is getting comfortable with being uncomfortable. There are a lot of good ideas here. There's a lot of ways you could do this assignment without breaking the law or even without being highly annoying to others. I think this is a good life experience for many young people.
If you wanted to do something really basic and simple, you could put on black-tie attire and go to the grocery store, McDonald's, a football game, whatever.
As far as invading personal space, it would be interesting to do an informal study and see if people of different genders, ages, races, etc. react differently. It could be done by sitting next to a stranger on a park bench at a park, or right next to a person in a diner. I work with senior citizens and I tell you, it would not bother many of them and they would probably strike up a conversation, whereas I suspect a young person would feel uncomfortable and be likely to move seats.
Let us know what you and your group end up doing!
Go to a movie theater... be the first one in. Sit there and wait. When a couple comes in and sits down-- stand up and move seats. Go sit right next to them. It will be just you and the other two in the theater. Should be funny... to see if they say anything...
i have never felt so uncomfortable about doing an assignment like this in my life and believe it is criminal to do this since it could be considered harassment.
here is the description of the assignment. its for my interpersonal comm class, nonverbal project.
[SIZE=3]Some ideas, you can invade someone's personal space by standing really close to them, standing facing backwards in an elevator or sitting right next to someone on a bench when the whole bench is open. You could set up a secondary territory in a public territory by playing a game in a busy hallway at school, or blocking off a lot of table space during a busy time at the dining center. You could also wear clothing into stores that would be "inappropriate" to that store such as wearing clothes from Abercrombie and entering a Hot Topic. So as you can see the possibilities are endless. You do however have to have your topic approved so once you start brainstorming you will want to start running your ideas by me[/SIZE].
I don't see anything in there telling you to commit a crime.
what if i were to follow somebody around and stand next to them, they grew tired of it, and attacked me? yeah, that's fun.
the project has too many uncontrollable variables. you dont know what reaction you are going to get when your goal is to **** them off.
i dont want to be attacked, i dont want to deal with the negative consequences.
I have a great idea for you, if this assignment is still on.
This used to drive my little sister nuts.
Stare at someone. Intently. Only whenever they look at you, quickly look away and act innocent. When they stop looking at you, stare at them again, always quickly looking away when they look in your direction.
When I took "speech" in college the professor asked us to do the same things. Sing in an elevator, or just do something out of the ordinary.
It was an exercise to break the walls of societal norms in order to confront the/your fear of public speaking, nothing more.
You ever see the Seinfeld episode in the Chinese restaurant where Jerry bets Elaine to take an Egg Roll from a table and eat it with out saying a word and he'll give her $50 bucks. He says, "You'll give them a story they'll remember for the rest of their lives."
The whole point of the assignment is for you to learn how to look outside the narrow little box of what you've been taught is socially appropriate.
Also, the university experience is about learning and growing as an individual... otherwise you could just memorize texts at your local library for later recitation from rote memory instead.
The bottom line is that if you are so deathly afraid of confrontation of any sort that sitting down in the hallway of a mall to play a board game with friends, or wearing different status clothes than normal into a store, seem like a criminal acts to you... then you are exactly the sort of person that this assignment is designed to benefit.
How are you going to function in life as an adult, if you can't even bring yourself to stand the wrong way in an elevator for a graded assignment?
Your professor is doing you a much larger favor than you realize.
and i dont get why a delivery guy delivering pizza to class would be a big deal.
Ever heard of Jeff Spicoli? Nah, you're probably too young.
Anyway, this is a silly thread. Nobody can be this up tight.
Are you for real? If so, you're in for a rough life.
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I have a young cousin who is just like the OP. 
