Hatrack River Writers Workshop: College Fraternities

This is topic College Fraternities in forum Open Discussions About Writing at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by ChrisOwens (Member # 1955) on :

I have the begginings of a potential story idea. Has anybody here been part of a fraternity? From what I understand there are pranks, rituals, initiation task? How are the greek letters assigned?

I'd thought it'd be interesting to get general impressions other than the cliche ones I've absorbed from popular culture.

[This message has been edited by ChrisOwens (edited February 18, 2005).]

Posted by JBSkaggs (Member # 2265) on :

It all depends on the fraternity. Some are very banal others are insane.

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

My only impression of a fraternity was that you couldn't take them seriously. They existed purely to be havens for people that otherwise wouldn't be tolerated in society, so a society was created for them to play in.

When I was in grad school my department was approached by some national honor society who wanted to start a chapter on our campus. Two prancing ponys came in to make a presentation, dressed in nice little red jackets and I'm sure they starched their underwear. We listened to them and thanked them politely for the presentation and asked them if they knew how to get out of town. Embarassed the head of the department mightily.

Gosh! I miss those days. We LOVED it when frat rats came out to play.

Set 'em up, shoot 'em down!

So, I really can't tell you what it was like from their side, but from my side it was an awful lot like being at a carnival.

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

My knowledge of frats is fairly hazy these days.

Still...

Fact: Fiction hasn't yet come close to the reality of certain fraternities. I've never seen any movie or book cover the ubiquitous "Let's burn a dead cat in the middle of the floor" scenario, while the group sings "Light my Fire!" by The Doors.

Or the strange quest to collect as many traffic cones (pylons) as you can in 45 mins while hanging out of the passenger-side window wearing clown's makeup (or other unmentionables). Don't ask what happens to the cones afterwards -- nobody really knows for sure.

Or the very unsociable business of "hogging" which I will refrain from going into detail.

And these are but a few. The stereotypes are not too far off, yet they often miss the mark.

Yet, there are some that are not rowdy and very ... er... solemn... I guess. Rituals that are handed down for hundreds of years... brotherhoods that have nothing to do with wild parties.

Others function as networking groups for after college.

Still others are based solely on nepotism... so and so's father or brother was a member, so you're automatically in -- which is stereotypical, surely...

I don't know if any of this helps, really... sorry.

Posted by ChrisOwens (Member # 1955) on :

So, it ends up being more like a secret society?

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

All frats are sort of like a secret society. Some are more secretive than others about their activities, pursuits, and purposes.