Assignment 7 Option 1: Fraternity

One of the communities that I am involved in is, arguably, one of the closest knit types of community in existence. I am a member of a fraternity, a community where your fellow members are not only friends, but “brothers”. Whether one buys into the whole brotherly love thing or not, a fraternity can definitely be analyzed using Haythornthwaite’s ideas of community and social networks. This fraternity is best described by Haythornthwaite’s example of a Gemeinschaft community, “a collective based on strong interpersonal ties, face-to-face interaction, a shared focus and common purpose, language and identity” (Haythornthwaite, 122). Adding onto this definition, the fraternity also takes on a CMC element in its community, with list serves to active brothers and alumni, a Facebook group, and a webpage (http://www.aepibeta.org/).

There is a definite social network built of different actors, ties, relations in the fraternity. There are strong ties that exist between the active brothers. Haythornthwaite describes strong ties as when, “actors maintain many relations, particularly when those relations includes social and emotional support and intimacy or self-disclosure…operate in the same general social circles we do…and(have) frequent exchange” (Haythornthwaite, 126). Every active brother spends a lot of time with each other, frequently socialize within the same social circle, and are always there to support and aid their fellow brother in times of need (whether that be helping them find a date for formal or how to deal with a tough situation that they have encountered in their lives). There also exist weak ties in the community, an example of which would be the alumni. These are people that we have little interaction with and are in different social circles than us. Although they differ from us, they have information and resources that are different from the active brother’s, so they can prove very useful with advantages we mentioned in class, such as job opportunities.

The brothers in my fraternity have a lot of common ground. Our common ground is mainly based on the fact that we are all Jewish. We share many of the same beliefs, attitudes, and even characteristics (ex: the infamous Jewish cheapness). When joining the fraternity, we all also pledged to promote the common goals of bringing together members of the Jewish community and providing philanthropy to Jewish charities. These shared goals prove to further bring us together through common ground.

There also exists a large amount of reciprocity in the brotherhood. Members, “take up roles of community maintenance, spending their energy responding to other in the community, giving help without requiring an immediate payback or even any payback” (Haythornthwaite, 129). Every brother is there for every other brother in the fraternity no matter the situation and that is sentiment is returned to them. On top of that, there are specific positions that are in charge maintaining the community (Ex: Master or House Manager) who are not remunerated for their work, they simply do it to help the community.

There exist clear online/offline synergies in the context of my fraternity. Using a combination of both face-to-face and CMC communication, we are able to efficiently pass on information to everyone. Chapter meetings are face-to-face opportunities to bring up new issues, tell stories, and explain concerns. List serves are used to keep in contact with abroad brothers and alumni, as well as active brothers at Cornell. AIM chats are used to discuss different fraternal issues. The CMC aspects are an extension of our face-to-face communications in the community. Using this blended method, our community, “would be able to bond better and share values more effectively than communities that rely upon only one or the other mode of communication” (Etzioni and Etzioni, 1999).

I commented on:
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/10/feeling-at-home-away-from-home.html
http://comm245blue.blogspot.com/2007/10/71-gemeinshaft-must-have-been-greek.html