Quote:
Originally posted by Erik P Conard
Sinfonia and Sigma Alpha Iota were never even close
to being "social" on my campuses.
|
and
Quote:
|
perhaps Sigma Alpha Iota and Phi Mu Alpha now consider themselves as "social." But I doubt it.
|
Erik, your perspective, at least as to Sinfonia, is understandable. When you would have been in college, we were a professional fraternity, no argument about it.
For us, though, it's not quite as simple as "we decided to become social." We were founded in 1898 as a social fraternity, albeit a "special interest" one, not unlike Triangle, Farmhouse, or Alpha Gamma Rho. We filed a niche in conservatories and similar schools where general fraternities didn't exist. It was in the 30's and 40's that, for a variety of reasons that our histories document, that the leadership of the Fraternity steered us in a decidedly professional direction. By the 50s and 60's, partly influenced by a desire to differentiate ourselves from "Animal House" type groups, were were calling ourselves "The Professional Fraternity for Men in Music."
But by the 70s, many brothers were looking to move us back to our roots. In the 80s, the Fraternity officially decided to return to our roots as a social (again, albeit special interest) fraternity -- "professional" was removed from all documents and publications, and we committed ourselves to become again what we had been founded to be.
But as you can imagine, such a process takes a while -- we're still seeing some of the effects today. This is especially true when you've got decades worth of alumni who think of Sinfonia in terms of "professional fraternity." We're still explaining to some schools what kind of organization we are. And, of course, we still belong to the PFA -- this has occasioned quite a bit of discussion among us as we assess the implications of that and consider what might be a better fit for us. On a growing number of campuses, we have joined the IFC. (And I believe that mutual exclusion is in fact practiced in such cases.)
As many others have noted on here, a lot depends on the actual campus. With us, I suspect that greater involvement with the IFC/NPC/NHPC Greek community is more likely on smaller campuses, while on larger campuses we are perhaps more likely to stay in the music school/department and perhaps form a music-Greek council with SAI, TBS, etc. Some of our chapters, perhaps because of campus culture, still act like "professionals" despite steps taken by the Fraternity as a whole to move back to our roots as "social." It all takes time, and it happens at a different pace on different campuses with their different cultures.
I don't mean by any of this to imply that we "are just like" NIC groups, because we're not -- we have a special interest focus that permeates what we do and how we act and that makes us different from a "general" fraternity. But I did want to clarify that, for us, being "social" is not a recent change as much as it is a return to the principles and purpose on which we were founded.
As to the OP's question/comment, I agree that there will always be one group closer to one's heart. Doesn't mean better or worse, but personally more important.