Book pledged: the secret lives of sororities

[Lil' Hannah]

I finished it last night. I don't really have strong feelings about it one way or another. There were parts that I read and thought, "This totally goes on in my house" and parts that I read and thought "she really stretched this."

I'm not a big fan of her journalism at all. There were a ton of parts where she was really stretching to make fairly normal goings ons seem controversial.

I did like how she cited GC twice in her end notes though

[Lady Pi Phi]

Well I just finished reading the book and I have so much to say, that I have decided not to say it because you would be here forever reading my post. I mean I would have to write an essay about it and we all know how much we hate reading essay type posts .

So this is what I got from her book.

HWGLOs=bad
BGLOs=good
Co-Ed GLOs=even better because they have lots sex with each other.

Ok seriously. My biggest issue with her is her lack of research. While yes, she has a disclaimer saying not all chapter behave like this, her writing is so generalized that no matter how many times she says this some people will still think that they do (I also don't believe that she truely believed her disclaimer either). If she really wanted to show a balanced side of(like she said she did) she would have observed another chapter. She wuld have looked at chapters at smaller school, chapters in the northern U.S, she would have even looked at chapters in Canada. My experience is the complete opposite of what she writes about I cannot relate to anything she says.

I also have issues with her writing style. Sure she used end notes, but even using endnotes requires you to mark your references. She did not do that in her book. I also don't like how when writing about these girls she made it sound like she was writing a fiction novel. Someone mentioned her using direct quotes when the girls were talking. Were you there? Especially the part when "Amy" and "Spencer" were about to have sex and Amy told him no. It sounded like she was in the room with them taking notes and recording the episode. I don't think so! I also have a hard time believing that it's all true. She has changed some many things, names or sororities, people's names, colours, dates, etc, etc that it makes we wonder if she did make it up, or maybe some of it. It's hard to take her seriously when her facts can't be verified. I thought journalists were supposed to only use facts that could be verfied even if they were to keep their cources anonymous?

I could go on and on. But really my biggest issue with the book was her research (or lack thereof) and her writing. If this was an academic paper, she would have failed.

[sugar and spice]

Since a number of people have brought it up . . .

Recounting conversations verbatim that she might not have even been present for or would have to recall later is par for the course for "creative nonfiction," which is how she set up the Alpha Rho/Beta Pi sections. So please, stop complaining about it -- it's completely accepted within the writing world. However, do take what she writes in those sections with a grain of salt.

I have a question though. When I read the book, I was under the impression that Caitlin/Sabrina/etc. KNEW that Ms. Robbins was undercover and writing a book, it was simply the other girls in the houses that didn't. I think I read an interview that backs this up . . . However, everyone on GC seemed to think that she had been one hundred percent undercover -- maybe I just skimmed over the part where she mentioned this in the book? Somebody help me out here.

[ISUKappa]

Originally posted by sugar and spice
I have a question though. When I read the book, I was under the impression that Caitlin/Sabrina/etc. KNEW that Ms. Robbins was undercover and writing a book, it was simply the other girls in the houses that didn't. I think I read an interview that backs this up . . . However, everyone on GC seemed to think that she had been one hundred percent undercover -- maybe I just skimmed over the part where she mentioned this in the book? Somebody help me out here.

My impression is that yes, those four girls knew she was writing a book/researching sorority life. She doesn't specify how she approached them. Did she tell them what kind of book it was going to be? I don't know. Maybe even Ms. Robbins herself didn't really know what kind of book she was going to write until after the interviews wrapped up (though I highly doubt that). The other girls in the chapters, though, most likely didn't know Ms. Robbins was undercover.

Should that grain of salt be accompanied by a large margarita?

[sugar and spice]

Originally posted by ISUKappa

Should that grain of salt be accompanied by a large margarita?

Of course.

[Lady Pi Phi]

Originally posted by sugar and spice


Recounting conversations verbatim that she might not have even been present for or would have to recall later is par for the course for "creative nonfiction," which is how she set up the Alpha Rho/Beta Pi sections. So please, stop complaining about it -- it's completely accepted within the writing world.

Well I don't like it and it's not acceptable to me, so I will complain about it!

[sugar and spice]

Originally posted by Lady Pi Phi
Well I don't like it and it's not acceptable to me, so I will complain about it!

You're free to do whatever you want.

I'm just saying that it's like complaining that a book is separated into paragraphs or something.

I'm surprised that so many people haven't run into that convention before.

[angelove]

Does the convention apply if the book is billed as nonfiction/"a true expose' of sororities" rather than "creative nonfiction"?

[33girl]

The Dartmouth Review's review of "Pledged"

[ISUKappa]

Originally posted by 33girl
The Dartmouth Review's review of "Pledged"

Good review. Echoed many of the same sentiments some GCer's had about the book. And the review was written by a guy, no less.

[phisigduchesscv]

the book wasn't as bad as I thought. When I was reading the parts about the women I felt like I was reading a young adult novel about girls going off to the first year of college.

As for the ritual part, I was really nervous since she was supposed to have revealed info about my sorority. I had no reason to worry though - I think she got some of her info about passwords, etc from our signatures here on greekchat. From what I've seen most of the sororities on here have some form of LIT followed by whatever symbol. Well somehow she has the idea that LITP is our secret password.

Other "secrets" she supposedly reveals about other sororities talks about how different chapters in the same sorority have completely different rituals for initiation etc. From what i understand everyone of the national sororities have every one fo their chapters use the same ritual book so how could there be such different rituals for the same ceremony. Of course in the secrets section she is contanstly refering back to one particular website to reveal secrets.

I didn't like that she seemed to imply that all our older alum don't remember any of the meaning of our rituals. I've ran in to some alum that were initiated in the 50's, they aren't active as volunteers etc, but remember with love and pride the meaning behind things, etc.

The best way to think of this book is as MTV's sorority life in book form. Or even better this could have been the script for Sorority Life.

[sugar and spice]

Originally posted by angelove
Does the convention apply if the book is billed as nonfiction/"a true expose' of sororities" rather than "creative nonfiction"?

It's hard to say.

To me, I felt like this book was actually two books -- the story of Vicki/Amy/Sabrina/Caitlin, and the sorority "expose." The way she sets up the Vicki et al. sections are creative nonfiction. The way she sets up the expose is not.

So you could argue either way. But personally I think it's nitpicky.

And I agree with the review. The biggest problem with this book is not that it lies, but the fact that it sets up things that are legitimate problems at SOME schools, some chapters to be true of the entire system, which they are clearly not.

[PhiMuLady150]

I didn't find it half bad but the only thing that was irratating was the use of many sorority rituals within the chapters and supposedly greekchat was cited for where she got song lyrics...page 42 I believe.

[Taualumna]

Something interesting: I was online checking to see which stores in Toronto have this book. There were about 6 or so left one day, and 0 the next day!!!

[mullet81]

I just picked this one up for a little summer reading! I hope it doesn't suck or piss me off, haha A few have mentioned maybe IU as the possible setting for the book, so I'm especially interested to read and see what I think! A lot of the characterisitics described below fit IU (although we're not 'southern' per se, our system is very traditional and powerful), we have large houses that sleep lots of women, though we have 19 chapters, and hae deferred recruitment but technically start rush in the fall with the first round and continue it in january.

Also, the Beta Pi chapter of AXiD is at IU - i don't think we have an Alpha Rho - but we do have the Alpha Mu chapter of AXO... though i doubt she would make it that obvious!

Originally posted by swissmiss04
Clues she drops, though she admits some, maybe most, are fake:
- The school is in the South, probably Texas
- 18 sororities
- The sororities have about 120-160 sisters, or in that general range
- They have houses
- The houses are large and hold a lot of sisters -- Beta Pi is described as sleeping almost 90 girls
- They have deferred rush -- to me this is the most important clue as it's out of the ordinary, especially for Southern schools, and most likely one that was NOT changed
- They have Homecoming, which they also refer to as "Greek Week," and they do serenading/courting to decide who Homecoming picks are
- The school and the Greek system in particular seem very status/wealth-oriented