Word: joining
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Ironically, it is the most repellent qualities of the Clubs that give the system this advantage. Their snobbishness, their secrecy, their uncreativity, their preoccupation with an isolated social world all tend to dissuade most undergraduates from any any wish to join. Dean Bender, in the same breath as he criticizes the Clubs for "narrowness," feverently hopes "that the Clubs never start getting democratic." If the Clubs were to elect people on a basis of creative merit, he points out, then undergraduates might really begin to care about joining. The Clubs would become a generally recognized elite, and the punching season...
...punching season also seems to be lagging in a world gone by. There once was a time when practically all the sophomores punched were convinced from the very start that they wanted to join a Club. They had been brought up in families or schools where the Clubs were considered an integral part of a Harvard career. But this is no longer true today. A great many punchees have little idea of what goes on in a Club and, because of the general mystery that surrounds the Club's inner workings, they are never really told. And so they join...
...descriptions of their alumni, it is still necessary to ask why the institutions exist. The answer seems to be that in their college system there is nowhere else for the Yalies to drink and be social. As one New Haven collegian is quoted in his press as saying, "I joined a fraternity because I couldn't fit a bar in my room." Other reasons seem to be prestige, ambition and the desire subsequently join to a secret society...
Besides the seven regular secret societies, some of which are over a century old, there are now numerous underground ones. Fraternity membership is not actually necessary for election to a secret society, but potential members are well investigated. Even the deans and faculty members join in, and make recommendations to the societies...
Ironically, it is the most repellent qualities of the Clubs that give the system this advantage. Their snobbishness, their secrecy, their uncreativity, their preoccupation with an isolated social world all tend to dissuade most undergraduates from any any wish to join. Dean Bender, in the same breath as he criticizes the Clubs for "narrowness," feverently hopes "that the Clubs never start getting democratic." If the Clubs were to elect people on a basis of creative merit, he points out, then undergraduates might really begin to care about joining. The Clubs would become a generally recognized elite, and the punching season...