Like many of my other fellow classmates I am a member of the Greek community here at Cornell as a brother of a Fraternity. According to Gemeinschaft we form a community under the basis of having strong personal ties as brothers, a common purpose of upholding our duties as members, and similar interest and perspectives. We make up the “actors” in this community by satisfying all of these principles according to Gemeinschaft. Since most of the brothers live together we all have strong ties that are similar among us, as opposed to weak ties which are rare contact. Social capital is employed by all of our efforts to invest in the fraternity and take advantage of social benefits and resources. One example could be networking with alumni, which are weaker ties that make excellent resources for jobs and knowledge.
Social capital is also observed through the Etzioni & Etzioni model. We have a group of social relationships and bonding establishing a social network. Equal measures of commitment and shared values to form common ground. And our interlinked relationships reinforce one another to give reciprocity. An example of reciprocity would be an idea being generated and the input of all the brothers being taken into account. The community is also present both offline and online in CMC. In CMC such things as facebook groups and listserves help brothers keep in contact with each other and maintain strong ties even when away for say a vacation. Also a lot of information and planning can be done using CMC were data is stored and recorded. An example of this is using e-mail to inform all the brothers simultaneously of meeting locations, times, and information. Thus this is how Greek life fits into social network analysis.
2 comments:
A fraternity is definitely a great example of a social network. Your analysis of the elements of the network was very solid. I also think there are a few other points that really back up your argument. One of the great things about being part of a long-standing organization like a fraternity is the extended alumni network. This is like an “outer ring” to the group, bound to the core group of current students by a series of weak ties based on affiliation with the organization. As was pointed out in class (and definitely reinforced by your example here), those weak ties are often the most important. They provide access to an often expansive resource of people that can help get jobs and other things.
It definitely seems that one of the major selling points of sororities and fraternities is the instant social network that it provides its members. For everything from job hunting to social connections and academic help, it’s nice to have a group of people you know you can turn to. You can think of each individual pledge class as the “close ties” because of the pledging process that brings them together as a group. The alumni network is the “weak ties” that are good for job hunting because not only are they weak ties, but they are also older and theoretically established in business.
As for CMC communications within a greek organization, I’ve noticed just through my friends how important e-mail listservs are to a fraternity or sorority. Since everyone in the house has a different house job, skills, social connections, and schedule, a house e-mail list seems like an effective way of letting everyone know what is going on when they can’t all meet in person.
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