Chelsea Hunter

Professor Rood
ENC 1101
April 13, 2015
Sororitys Hierarchy, Genre, and Memberships Affect on The Discourse Community
Introduction
Last year almost a thousand girls went through the weeklong recruitment process
at University of Central Florida to join a sorority. This process is often referred to as
rigorous and exhausting, and some see it unnecessary. Here it is explored that the strict
membership process lowers girls self esteem initially, but will raise their self-esteem and
determination to do well in school later on in their college years. Saville Bryan and
Kristen Johnson from James Madison University, discovered that freshmen girls who
were preparing to go through the recruitment process, aka Rush, had a higher self-esteem
then freshmen who were not planning on going through rush. They proved that during
rush freshmen had a lower self-esteem but after girls joined a sorority they reported a
higher self-esteem then before rush (Saville 907). Along with the membership process,
the hierarchy within a sorority has continuously been under scrutiny by researchers,
claiming that it causes girls to feel intimidated and inadequate compared to experienced
older members, possibly in higher positions. Juliette Landphair, a writer for the journal
About Campus, claims the biggest private struggle for college women is the need for
perfection, and older members in sororities directly enhance that insecure origin. From
an outside view researchers have only seen what are in surveys and graphs. Here a
firsthand view will show the hierarchy is actually a major benefit seen clearly throughout
multiple sororities by keeping the discourse community organized and orderly. This will
be shown through analysis of our genres, ethnographies, and previous research. Although
many researchers disagree, they have never looked at this ranking from the inside. Being

an active member of a sorority for two years myself, this research will present a firsthand experience and example of why the hierarchy enables the discourse community to
work to their full potential by allowing constant communication, feedback and
opportunities.
Methodology
This discourse community was chosen due to the many inquiries written on
sororities, and my direct relation to them provided a first hand view that was utilized
during my primary research. Also my sorority has around 150 active members.
Therefore, it was easy to choose girls to interview. I interviewed one member from my
own sorority and then another member from a different sorority. This was able to give me
a different perspective and allowed me to remove any bias I may have brought into the
research. I searched my topic of Sorority Hierarchy and Sorority Membership on
UCFs article database called OneSearch. Here, I found multiple articles on the
correlation between self-esteem and sorority membership by researchers such as Susan
Basow, a researcher for the Psychology of Woman, Juliette Landphair, a writer for the
journal About Campus, and Bryan Saville. These articles led me to discover that selfesteem was found to be lower in sororities, which contradicted my original hypothesis of
sororities raising self-esteem. Upon further investigation, I discovered the self-esteem
these researchers measured were through written surveys and predetermined questions
that could have distorted their purpose behind their answers. The questions asked by
researchers were worded to scale their self-esteem but not their self worth. When the
members reported lower self-esteem that could have been from constantly being shown a
greater role model in their sorority. The goal of a sorority is to better yourself and how
can you do that if you already have the highest self esteem there is? There needs to be

some strive or motive for a better self. Through the observation of role models in the
hierarchy of women, these girls discover their possible potential and seek to be the best
version of themselves.
I then interviewed two members of sororities on UCFs campus. Allie and Cassie,
the two interviewed did not have serious positions, I did this so there would be no
positional bias toward my question of hierarchy. Coincidently, Allie, the one who defined
herself as a perfectionist, had no problem with the hierarchy within her sorority, while the
other interviewed member, Cassie, had a major problem with hierarchy and did not define
herself as a perfectionist. I then asked through a poll on my own sororities Facebook page
if sisters would consider themselves perfectionist as Juliette Landphair claimed was
spreading through sororities like a disease, and their opinion on hierarchy. My poll
showed an almost 50% split between members. This led me to believe there were roughly
two types of women in a sorority. The first group of perfectionists most thought hierarchy
was essential and even enjoyable. This group would see the hierarchy as a major benefit
to the discourse communitys ultimate goal. The second group were women who did not
define themselves as perfectionists and most of them thought the hierarchy is often taken
such advantage of it only sometimes is beneficial, although they all recognized the
necessity of it.
In order to study sororitys genre I went to the private Facebook of my own
sorority and chose a post by my President regarding Chapter, a meeting once a week. I
chose this informal post to analyze because it had rhetoric strategies I see almost
everyday, and because it was by the President, it gave it credibility or ethos. After I
dissected that post, I moved on to our Chapters Minutes, a certain agenda and highlights
for the Chapter. I analyzed the importance it held, and the structure of it. This represented

a more formal perspective of the hierarchy. The last genre I analyzed was Face-To-Face
Communication. I saw this through the oral report each position gave during Chapter. I
saw how the chapter advisor, an alumnus that proceeds over chapter, treated a member
with aggressive authority and observed the shocked faces of all the other members
around her. Through this event I was able to identify that even though hierarchy is
generally accepted, when its aggressive it is denied and further hinders the discourse
community.
The most beneficial method of research was my analysis of research done by
previous researchers. This allowed me to ask the proper questions about sororities and
guided me to the discovery of hierarchys role in sororities. After the primary research
though is when I was able to fully complete my claim that the use of genres, hierarchy
and membership benefited sororitys discourse community by providing constant
communication and role models to achieve the common goal of bettering yourself and the
community.

Presentation of Data
The first data collected was through a poll on a sororitys private Facebook page. The
question was asked if members identified themselves as perfectionist and then a follow
up question was their opinion on hierarchy. The results showed an estimated 50% split
between perfectionists and non-perfectionists. There was also a direct correlation between
the views on hierarchy and perfectionists. Woman who identified as perfectionists, agreed
that the use of a hierarchy was beneficial, necessary, and even enjoyable. Woman who did
not identify as perfectionists agreed that the use of a hierarchy was although necessary,
taken advantage of too often. This view of the hierarchy needs to be looked at by

sororities in order to reach their full potential. If this problem is addressed they could
have use of 100% of the chapter and not near 50%.

Analysis/Results
Although sororities are often under scrutiny by researchers, they are efficient and
successful in achieving their common goal, bettering themselves and the community. This
success comes from