Matthew--
French comes from Latin so the two words probably orgingally ment the same thing.

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Once in every lifetime, you'll know what life is. Oh I need you, you need me, oh my darling, don't you see? The Young Ones. Darling we're The Young Ones. The Young Ones. Shouldn't be afraid! To live. To love. There's a song to be sung. 'Cause we may not be The Young Ones for very long!!!

Another question... in AGD you have a pledge pin but you get a BADGE when you are initiated. Many sororities and fraternities have the same thing, but a lot have a pin for initiated members... anyone know why?

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If your going to go greek, why not be a goddess?

as far as this goes, for us, only initiated members can wear the badge of the order - however, usually the badge is worn in the form of a jeweled formal pin, which would only be worn to formal chapter or with formal attire. so the badge is a 'brother pin', making your pin and your badge the same thing.

We have the same rule on wearing our badges. Only initiated Brothers can wear them. Other situations obviously would include formals, formal functions, weddings.

Thanks, so does italian, spanish, potuguese, romanian some other languages - sorry, I couldn't help... http://www.greekchat.com/forums/ubb/smile.gif

Romanian comes from Latin?? Cool, I never knew that.

You are right, but brother does not always mean only men! I know that's how we use it nowadays, but in the past a lot of words were asexual or multisexual. Or often, they were unisexual only because women weren't allowed to participate in that particluar activity. I think the point is the word does not so much refer to what the sex of the person is who feels it, but what the actual (fraternal) feeling is or the genetic relationship between the two people.

Oh, SuperXO,
I agree 100%, I was just referring to what CutiePie stated at the beginning of this thread about the ancient greek word "phratria" -
she said: "the Greek derivative phratres of phratria, meaning tribes or groups of people with similar interests and backgrounds, was the basis for the title, fraternity" -

And I was just meaning to say that I had my doubts about this being the origin of the word fraternity.
I didn't want to make any sexual distinctions even though "soror" is the latin word for sister. However, I am sure, in former times people were just not as concerned about finding a new "womanly" name for fraternity as they are nowadays. That was just not as an important issue as the founding of the sorority itself.


[This message has been edited by matthewg (edited February 12, 2001).]

As every Alpha Gam pledge (oops--new member!) learns, " ' fraternity' comes from the Greek word for 'family,' or 'clan.'" The word sorority was coined when Gamma Phi Beta was founded in 1874. (I have not looked that up in the Oxford English Dictionary--I think "sorority" was around before 1874, but that was the first time it was added to a Greek-letter organization.)

As far as I know, these NPC groups are legally incorporated as fraternities:
Kappa Alpha Theta, Kappa Kappa Gamma, Pi Beta Phi, Alpha Phi, Delta Delta Delta, Alpha Chi Omega, Alpha Delta Pi, Alpha Gamma Delta, Chi Omega, Phi Mu, Zeta Tau Alpha, Delta Gamma, Alpha Xi Delta, Alpha Omicron Pi.

As for being "started by men," yes, in more than one instance a man helped the women founders with aspects of ritual, choosing a motto, etc. Alpha Phi (1872), Gamma Phi Beta (1874), and Alpha Gamma Delta (1904) were all assisted by Dr. Wellesley P. Coddington, a professor at Syracuse University. More than one of us in the "Syracuse Triad" has wondered how much our mottoes and rituals have in common!

Hi all -- I recently acquired a pledge handbook for "Alpha Chi Omega Fraternity" (as titled) and found an interesting paragraph under the "Customs" section:

"We use the word "fraternity" instead of "sorority" because it expresses best the ideals for which we are organized. We differentiate among the organizations by saying "men's fraternities" and "women's fraternities."" (p. 21).

I too have always listed "Alpha Chi Omega Fraternity for Women" on my resume.

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"Alpha Chi Omega - If you only had 2 wishes, what would your second one be?"

Wow, what a response this has generated. This is great! http://www.greekchat.com/forums/ubb/smile.gif
I had thought that the older NPC groups go by "fraternity", whereas the younger groups go by "sorority" (generally speaking...not etched in stone), but upon closer examination, this doesn't appear to be true either, since Kappa Delta and Gamma Phi Beta are definitely in the older end of the spectrum and they both go by "sorority" (at least KD's website refers to itself as "Kappa Delta" sorority)

Some thoughts:
it would appear to me, that men's groups use fraternity from the Latin:
i.e. fraternity = frater (brother)
whereas women's groups use it from the Greek:
i.e. fraternity = phratria (similar bond or interest)....(although then, wouldn't it be spelled phraternity?? Just a thought.. http://www.greekchat.com/forums/ubb/wink.gif

AOII is a fraternity and we say it as the same above about when we were founded all were known as fraternities!