Sigma Chi Fraternity does not allow pledges to wear the Greek letters. However, they may wear shirts with the words "Sigma Chi" or "Sigs". This is a national regulation.

I also believe from someone I was told that Alpha Epsilon Phi new member members can't wear the greek letters AEPhi on anything until after iniation but can have the words Alpha Epsilon Phi on bags and bid day shirts.

Not to further the hijack, but why aren't they Hawaiian? I am just curious. Around here anything with an island-flair is described as "Hawaiian." Are you reserving that description only for things actually made in Hawaii? I'm just curious because I hadn't heard that objection before.

i could go on and on about "hazing"-my point being that in this politically correct (and law suit happy)world that anyone can interpret anything to be hazing, if it varies from the norm. chapters have to be so careful about this-the last thing those members would want is to have their charter pulled over something stupid like not allowing new members to wear letters, when that is not a national policy.

chapters need to follow their national policies. when they do not, over time the very essence of the national fraternity can be lost. several years ago a sorority at wake forest almost lost their charter because they were trying to hold on to traditions that were established when they were a local, that went against their npc fraternity's national policy. if all the chapters of all 26 npc sororities did their own thing, pretty soon the only thing they would have in common would be the letters they wear(or are not allowed to wear) on their shirts.

The prints and designs you're familiar with have their origins in the 1920's-30's when tourists started flocking to Hawai`i. Someone thought it'd be a good idea to design a shirt that had a bunch of pineapples and palm trees. Tourists wanted exotic souvenirs and the aloha shirt was born. It was officially registered in the mid-1930's IIRC. Call it an aloha shirt, just don't call it Hawaiian. :) Just like with locals, they may be from Hawai`i, but not all of them are Hawaiian. They're "from Hawai`i."

Historically native Hawaiians didn't even wear them.

Men wore the malo

http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/da...21/il40a10.jpg

And contrary to popular belief, the mu`umu`u isn't truly Hawaiian either. It gets its beginnings from the dresses the missionaries' wives wore when they arrived in the mid 1800s.

I'm so sorry to hijack this thread some more. If anyone wants to know more, feel free to PM me. :)

We're around the same age, and I agree with everything you've said. (You might want to quote that for posterity, LOL.)

The only restrictions I EVER heard of in my college years were 1) no crest till initiation 2) the locals could only wear spelled out letters, because they didn't have crests (they were pursuing national recognition, so I guess they figured why bother) 3) the "face" sorority only permitted their members to wear letters and jackets on certain days, not every Friday like the rest of us peons. :)

Personally, I think all these "letter rules" have sprouted in response to the actual pledging becoming easier as the years have gone on. We can't have you do a scavenger hunt, we can't have you do interviews, but we can give you 253623726547265 rules about when and where and what kind of letters you can wear.

what's a "face" sorority?

The one with all the pretty* girls in it.

*Supposedly.

FSUZETA,

I suppose letting chapters choose if they wore letters before initiation could lead to less national unity as a group, but to me it's only a question of when they get to wear them, not what they wear.

I don't see this as a slippery slope to national breakdown. Each chapter probably has a few traditions local to them, like what particular project they do to earn money for the national philanthropy.

I agree that the national group should be what guides most aspects of chapter life, and I believe that if a national policy exists, groups should follow it. In my perfect world though, the when-to-wear-letters decision could be left to the chapter. No matter what though, I think it would be very hard to make a legal cases that being asked to wait to wear letters is hazing. A violation, maybe yes; actual hazing, probably no. (Most definitions of hazing involve an element of harm. It's hard to see the harm in being asked to wait to wear letters. And let's be honest, whatever harm exists for letters would also exist for your badge, your crest, etc.)

I suspect we're more on the same page that it might seem. You and I both seem to think that hazing is wrong and that accusations of hazing get thrown around too much.

Anyway, I bet you are getting as bored talking about this as I am. And we need to get this back on an SEC thread track. Do you Seminoles like to see the Gators lose as much as we Dawgs do? I bet you do.

Pi Phi can't wear letters until they are initiated.

You're allowed to wear double-stitched letters. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise unless they can show you WHERE in your chapter bylaws it says, "New Alpha Xi's can wear and own the Greek Letters unless they're two layers of fabric on a jersey." Wearing letters means you can wear letters! If someone buys you a jersey between now and inititation, you are free to wear it. You can buy your own, borrow one, etc. On Game days, I'd be surprised if there weren't new sisters in borrowed Lambda Chi, Sig Ep, and PiKapp jerseys, depending on who your bus ride is with.

ETA to the conversation about hazing: If a sorority IHQ allows its new members to wear letters, then HELL YES it is hazing for the initiates to deny them that privilege, and that is one tradition that would be construed as hazing. Having an individual philanthropy event is not the same thing as choosing which sorority policies to follow and which to ignore.

What defintion of hazing are you using?
 

What defintion of hazing are you using?

Why NOT? I wear my boyfriend's letters around sometimes and we're both way out of undergrad.

no need to correct
 

[QUOTE=jessXIca;1318532]

Just off the top of my head, I've seen new members of Tri-Delt, ZTA, and Chi Omega wearing actual screened letters on shirts and bags that were given to them on Bid Day. The only sorority on UCF's campus that I know of that apparently does not allow new members to wear the actual Greek letters is Kappa Alpha Theta: they wear "Theta" on their shirts rather than the letters. I've been told members of Kappa Alpha Theta cannot wear letters until they're initiated, someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

QUOTE]

you aren't wrong!:)