Sorority Rituals - Reflections On Rites of ... - Mari Ann Callais

One of the participants explained why ritual is “secret”:
Ritual is there to bond us together and it is not anything to be afraid of. It is secret
because it is something that we have as a sorority, which bonds us together. It is not
because we are doing something bad that we have to hide from the outside world, it is just
something special that we share between us as sisters and it enhances our bond to one
another.
Some participants explained ritual as a bonding experience because they perceived that ritual
created continuity beyond their personal experience:
If we didn’t have ritual, we wouldn’t keep ongoing relationships with sisters because
there would be no continuity and there would be nothing that would be passed down. You
can only pass friendships so far, but ritual is that stuff that sororities were founded on and
that is what makes the difference.
Several participants also mentioned ritual as bonding them to other women who are members of
their sorority but who are members at another chapter or even older women who are no longer
undergraduate members: “Ritual is what connects different generations and different chapters.”
An additional comment was made that acknowledged this as well:
Ritual is a secret that you share with one common bond. Everybody in our chapter is
different, but when we do the ritual ceremony, it brings us all together. Even if you are
young or old, you could even be an 80-year old member of our sorority and we all know
the same thing and that is our ritual.
The theme of “connection” continued to surface as the participants described their perception of
the meaning of ritual:
Ritual is to make a connection and to realize that we share something that most people
will never understand . . . you realize that ritual is the only thing that every single chapter
of your national organization has in common are your ritual ceremonies.
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