Abstract
Director’s Comments: In 2008, I undertook an ethnographic study to better understand how women negotiated competing discourses of femininity within Southern sorority spaces—women-centered, member-only social societies that promote friendship and philanthropy in American colleges and universities. This final manuscript of three, exposes the small post-structural resistances of discursive discipline that sorority women negotiated both overtly and “accidentally” through mis-repeats as they moved from freshman to senior sorority women at USouthern, a large university situated in an active college town in the Southeastern region of the United States. The following three ethno-screenplay scenes are used to reintroduce the discourses of ladylikeness that have already been unpacked in prior articles, and to further develop and explore issues of negotiation and subversion around those discourses.
Keywords
Fade In: Mid-November: Unofficial Off-Campus Zeta Chi Apartment
The camera shows a white-out screen that eventually gets darker and darker to reveal the living room of Summer and Christine’s apartment where we find Summer, Christine, and Roommate S all in shorts and t-shirts eating dinner. Summer and Roommate S are on one couch eating a broccoli casserole. Christine is on the other couch eating a bowl of her infamous rice with stir-fry vegetables. It is one of the first times in the last month that Christine has been home for dinner. Coincidentally, it is also one of the first times that these three have been able to hang out without Roommate C. They all face the TV, which is tuned to the new sitcom “Greek,” although the girls find they are paying more attention to each other than to the new show. Summer swallows a forkful of casserole and lets out a massive burp.
Well, Summer, that’s not very classy.
But everybody burps.
You know I’m just kidding.
I remember when you wouldn’t have been.
Christine has grown used to her friends talking about how she has changed. It used to bother her, but now she takes it as a compliment. She has tried to change, and she is happy they notice.
I know, I know. I used to be all about acting proper. Can you blame me with my upbringing?
How funny is it how different we were raised? And now I’m more about being proper, acting as a lady should act, and you turned into the opposite. So weird!
Yeah, but it’s more like you both moved to the middle.
What do you mean?
Like, you were both extremes to start with. Like, Christine you grew up in the South, and had all that hazing for your high school sorority.
You got hazed in high school?!
Summer looks at Christine, surprised that her high school had a sorority, surprised that Christine would put up with hazing, and even more surprised Christine never mentioned it to her.
Yeah, it was like a tradition that even my Mother and grandmother participated in when they were in high school—the high school girls dress in all white and then the high school boys pee in cups and throw it at us. Like a really gross wet t-shirt contest.
WHAT?! That is absolutely disgusting! Why did you do it?
I never would now, but at the time it’s like you’re young and you want to fit in and the whole town does it. Like everyone is telling you that if you want to be in the cool group, you have to do it. It makes me sick to think about it now.
Wow, I have never heard of anything like that in high school.
Roommate S is frustrated that they have interrupted her. She likes to be the center of attention and often feels jealous when Christine or Summer steal her limelight.
Anyway, like I was saying, Christine, you grew up all Southern and all about being appropriate. And you, Summer, grew up, from what you say, in a place where it was okay to burp, or swear, or look kinda a mess.
Well not a mess, but not as polished or perfect.
Well, all I’m saying is that it’s not like Christine is never “proper” or that Summer, you now always are. You’re both a mix of things, like Christine, even though you aren’t as worried about fitting in as you were, you still dress the part when you go out and I’ve never heard you burp or fart or even talk about it, and Summer, you have changed and adopted Southern or Zeta Chi ways but you still burp and swear like a sailor.
Ahh, but now I don’t say God Damn or any words pertaining to the anatomy.
That’s only because it has gotten you into trouble. Like when you said GD in front of that guy at the football game and he was like “That really bothers me.”
Oh yeah, well since then I’ve proven to him I’m a good girl. We’re friends now. He just thought that cussing coming out of a girl’s mouth just sounded too harsh.
Well, let’s worry about what HE thinks.
Christine shows her newly found sarcasm, some of which she has picked up from Summer and Roommate S.
You know what I mean.
Hey, did you hear about our perfect little Roommate C?
She has really been getting on my nerves lately.
Mine too.
Well, then you are both gonna love this. Apparently, little miss perfect got completely sloppy last night and had some guy she met at the bar buying her drinks all night. She was making out with him in the bar and then he tried to take her home. Supposedly, she was at a point where she couldn’t make a decision.
Really? That’s scary!
That’s scandalous for her!
She told me that she wasn’t being bad, she was just sitting in a chair. But according to her friend, she was pretty sloppy and her friend had to pull her away from the guy to get her to not go home with him!
I guess it happens to everyone at some point, but there is a difference in like what level you take it to.
Yeah, but she’s always talking about other people’s behaviors and how she would never do this or that. I’d love to see her called into Standards. How funny would that be?!
It would be funny. But maybe it is good for her to loosen up a little. Even the good girls have their moments where they hook up with a guy—granted they may like kiss them once and then like go to sleep, but everyone hooks up.
The girls hear keys jingling and the front door opening. In walks Roommate C. The girls look at each other with evil smiles.
Hello?
Roommate C enters the living room to find all the girls smiling at her with eyebrows raised. She can tell something is going on.
Oh, hello.
Oh, hello there.
Well, hello.
Roommate C turns bright red.
Who told you?
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Director’s Comments
The strength of discursive discipline around femininity not only reproduced expectations but also opened the possibility for the women of Zeta Chi Sorority to negotiate and resist such expectations. It was clear that the women constantly took part in negotiations in which they “broke” or “bent” the rules, used “masculine” vulgarity/aggression, trash talked other members who acted outside of appropriateness, and participated in behaviors deemed unladylike such as swearing, smoking, getting drunk, and sleeping around. Such behavior indicated that the rules and expectations reproduced within Zeta Chi were also resisted and re-interpreted. However, except for those participants who intentionally resisted the sorority by de-sistering (leaving the sorority), the women’s resistance and re-interpretation within Zeta Chi did not seem to be intentional acts of rebellion. As many of the women accepted the rules and either accepted expectations or didn’t recognize the expectations of girl talk as negotiable (Berbary, 2012; Berbary & Johnson, 2012), there was less chance for purposeful rebellion against a “known” enemy. This left their resistance and re-interpretation more reliant on chance or opportunity or accidental re-interpretation during times when self-surveillance was more lax, such as while drinking, socializing in private spaces, or socializing in public spaces free of Zeta Chi’s “watch.” This is not to say that the women did not recognize that they were “bending” rules or acting unladylike, but that this behavior was not a direct act of defiance against the overarching power of Zeta Chi. Instead, their resistance was local, subtle, fleeting, and at times “accidental.”
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Cut to:
Intramural Fields at USouthern–Flag Football Field—6:00 p.m.
As we zoom in from a blue sky, bird’s-eye view of USouthern, we find the camera moving closer and closer to the open green space at the north end of campus. The camera sails over this green space, showing baseball diamonds, tennis courts, parking lots, and students playing Frisbee, walking their dogs, and jogging in sports bras and short shorts. The camera finally settles on a large, open field surrounded by a metal fence with a white square sign marked with a black number five. The lush green grass of the field appears to be well taken care of and is divided into sides and goals by perfectly placed white lines and orange cones. The field is overshadowed by imposing 30′ leaf-filled trees that are interspersed with seven large flood lights which turn on after dark, creating an atmosphere akin to that of a Centaur varsity game. From the flag football field, we can hear laughter, yelling, clapping, and whistles blowing from the other six fields that make up the whole of this impressive intramural green space.
Moving from the perimeter of the flag football field, the camera zooms in on the middle of the field where there is a group of nine Zeta Chis, among them new members, sophomores, and juniors, all of whom are standing in a circle throwing around a football and periodically diving to catch it before it hits the ground. These are the women who call themselves the “sporty girls” of the sorority. “Coach,” as they call the fraternity brother who has coached them the last 3 years, stands around watching, and at intervals yells out plays which the girls then enact, falling out of their circle formation while yelling “HUT, HUT!”
For this particular game, the Zeta Chis are all wearing dark colors, as they were told to do in the email the “intramural officer” of Zeta Chi sent out earlier in the day. Most of the girls chose to wear black shirts, some with ironed on Zeta Chi letters in animal print fabric, and black shorts, most of which are short mid-thigh women’s shorts or shiny men’s soccer shorts rolled up at the waist to bring the length to hit mid-thigh.
Two Zeta Chis are sitting on the sidelines watching the other nine practice. These girls are not particularly interested in playing but have come as back-ups to keep the team from forfeiting the win if the nine girls required to play do not show up. Sitting with these girls is Margaret’s dad, who has come to cheer on the team. Although Margaret doesn’t get as much playing time as some of the older girls, her Dad, a former football player, enjoys watching his daughter play and has made a special trip for this big game. He is wearing a gray suit with a white shirt, which makes him stand out among the casually dressed college students. Margaret yells to him as she practices.
Dad! What do you think of my new shirt for the game?
Dad
Very nice, Honey. Let’s see a win!
Zeta Chi has played hard to make it to this game, one of the final games in the women’s flag football tournament. Until this point they have only had to beat other sorority teams, but this game will be against a non-sorority team from another league. As the Zeta Chi team finishes practicing and walks to their sideline, they pass the non-sorority team who is practicing on the far end of the field. These opposing players are all wearing longer black shorts to the knee and orange shirts that they have decorated with stars on the front that say McLovin, a play off the recent hit movie Superbad, and their last name and number on the back. As the Zeta Chi team walks by, Yarah, a team captain known more for her positive attitude on the sidelines than her football skills on the field, sizes up the other team. She thinks to herself that these girls might be hard to beat because they seem much larger than most of the Zeta Chi players, many appearing overweight given the obvious stomach bulges which are hanging over the top of their shorts. As Yarah walks by she looks them up and down and gives those who catch her eye a hard stare of intimidation.
Okay, everyone gather round. Listen, the ref is being a real asshole and says we have to have shirts with no pockets, so if you have a pocket turn your shirt inside out. Also take off all jewelry and be real careful on the field—like watch your hands while you are blocking. Remember to keep them behind you so that they can’t call us on holding. Alright, gather round. Ready.
At the last minute, a few new members show up on the field. They throw their purses down into the existing circle of designer LongChamps bags, Zeta Chi wallets, sweatshirts, and key chains at the side of the field and run into the circle as it is being formed by the rest of the team.
Okay on three. One, two, three.
All the girls throw their hands into the middle of the circle.
GOOOO ZETA, GOOOO ZETA CHI CHI!
The girls all raise their hands and throw them into the air. The starting players take the field and the rest of the girls line up on the sideline next to “Coach” and Margaret’s dad. On the first play, the quarterback throws to Margaret who completes the pass.
There she goes. She’s a hot dog with ketchup and mustard.
The girls on the sideline look over at him and laugh while they clap and cheer in excitement. The Dad looks to his left and jokes to a new member.
I used to play football, but Margaret doesn’t get any of her athletic qualities from me, she gets it all from her mom.
The game continues with the girls on the sidelines cheering and clapping and talking among themselves. Every once in a while, players on the bench take the field to substitute for those who have been playing, although the key seven players stay on regardless of whether they are defense or offense. Yarah grabs the flag from the back of the shorts of a player from the other team, making her fall to the ground.
Yes!!! Oh I mean, oops that looks like it hurts!
That’s BA, that’s BA.
A sophomore Zeta screams “that’s BA” to Yarah, meaning that her behavior was Bad Ass.
Look at Yarah after she hits someone. She walks with her chest all puffed out and her legs spread like “What now!”
Yeah, you’re right. It’s funny.
The next play, Zeta Chi Player #1 gets called and flagged for putting her hands out while blocking the other team. After some confusion and a lot of yelling on the field, Player #1 and Player #2 run off the field and change places with the sophomore and junior on the sideline.
That girl called me a bitch!
Don’t worry. We are all saying shit under our breath to them. The ref hasn’t caught it yet.
Margaret’s Dad overhears this and jokes back to them.
Wow, you girls really play dirty. I would have sent Margaret to another sorority had I known that!
Player #1 runs up and down the sidelines yelling.
Come on, we need to start blocking better!
The excitement and intensity of the players and those on the sidelines rises as the refs continuously make calls against Zeta Chi.
It’s because we are sorority and they don’t like us.
Seriously, I’ve never seen referees be so particular or follow all the rules so exactly.
The quarterback makes a good throw to Yarah, who catches the ball and runs down the field as the other team pulls at her shorts. The pulling begins to reveal her red and white underwear.
Watch your pants!
Yeah, cute undies!
Annoyed at the new members’ lack of seriousness, Player #2 shoots them a nasty look while yelling to the team.
Come on, let’s go! We have to pick it up!
Player #1 and Player #2 exchange places again with the sophomore and junior girls running off the field. New Member A, a very sarcastic girl with parents from New Jersey, becomes annoyed that she is never put in. She begins to voice her opinion about her lack of playing time in a very monotone voice to New Member B.
Apparently, I’m a disgrace to the intramural team. I feel like a burden, like they have to put me in.
Yeah, but they don’t put us in. And in the rare case we do get in, the older girls yell at us cuz we don’t play good enough.
New Member A replies in a very sarcastic monotone voice with a non-heartfelt cheer.
Maybe we should just be the best cheerleaders we can be.
Go Zeta Chi.
Go Zeta Chi!
Someone from Zeta Chi causes the ball to go out of bounds near the Zeta Chi sideline. A girl from the opposing teams runs to get it while her own teammate yells to her.
Don’t get it for them, it’s on their time, let them get it.
I was just trying to be nice
New Member B looks at the girl and smiles. She feels kind of bad that everyone is being so nasty to each other. Yarah comes off the field for the first time just to catch her breath and everyone congratulates her. The sophomore Zeta takes her place on the field and congratulates her as she runs past.
Good job Yarah, you’ll get it next time.
Yeah, you go girl! Nice work.
Yarah, breathing heavy, points to a larger girl from the other team.
See that girl, she called me a bitch. I want to hit her. I want to hook her. I want to punch her!
The two new members look at her as to question her behavior. Yarah looks back at them both.
What? This is the only time that you can really take aggression out on girls, you know you can push them down during football.
Yeah, it’s like the only time it’s actually acceptable.
Yarah is put back in. The sophomore returns to the sideline cheering. Even though most people are caught up in the intensity, the two new members who have no hope of playing find themselves a bit disinterested.
I’m hungry.
You’re always staving and you eat dessert first!
Well, my mother always fed me the best food so now I just expect it.
The quarterback throws the ball to Margaret, still the only new member to play, and she dives for the ball making the catch. A flag is thrown and Player #1 is called again for using her hands to block. A fight breaks out on the field, getting the two new member’s attention.
Watch the defense! Get over here!
Player #1 runs in off the field.
That was the gayest call!
Player #2 is still on the field yelling at the referee. Yarah runs over to her.
You have got to be kidding me! This is bullshit! This is so retarded!
Come on, it’s not worth it, it just causes more problems for us. Come on.
It’s cause we are fucking sorority. I’m telling you. It’s not fair they keep calling us and ignoring everything the other team’s doing.
Come on, hush.
So fucking annoying. What an asshole!
Feeling a tension in the air, the girls on the sidelines, even the two new members, begin to get more rowdy and start trash talking the other team, especially making references to their weight and other outward characteristics.
Rollin’, rollin’, rollin’ down the field. Nice stomach rolls on them.
Fuck that bitch, that fat ass one, the blonde fat ass that keeps talking shit.
It’s like she is wearing pads under her shirt but she literally doesn’t need to buy them, she’s grown them herself.
A girl from the field overhears this.
Are you talking to me?
Yarah yells from the field.
Keep it down, you’re just making it worse. Let’s just beat them.
The sideline has gotten into the game. They are jumping up hitting each other chest to chest.
Make them bleed!
New Member B looks at Player #2 and jokes.
You’re a bad influence. You are a bad, bad person.
Player #2 ignores her and turns her attention back to her own team.
Come on, trash talk them back if you need to. Pull it together, pretend that girl is your ex-boyfriend.
The sideline moves back and forth between yelling to their teammates on the field and trash talking about the other team among themselves.
That minority girl is giving us problems; wait ’til I tell her how good her boyfriend was last night.
Come on butterfingers, hold onto it! I’m gonna be so depressed if we lose.
Yeah, that same Indian girl has baby oil on her, you grab her flag, you touch her, and you’re all greasy when you come back up.
Hold them, hold them!!!
Tension builds and it comes down to the final two plays. Everyone is talking about how competitive this is becoming and that the tension can be cut with a knife. In the middle of all the trash talk between the teams, the trash talk on the sidelines, and the encouragement from the sideline to the players on the field, Margaret gets an interception and runs it down the field for a game-winning touchdown. Everyone on Zeta Chi begins screaming and Margaret runs over and jumps into her Dad’s arms, putting her legs around his waist as they both laugh and scream.
Good work, good work!
Come on everyone!
Everyone runs over to Yarah and forms a circle with their hands all in the middle.
One, two, three!
Zeta Chi, POP A CAN!
Dad, did you hear that, Pop a can?!
I sure did, I’ve heard a lot of things tonight that I never thought I’d hear coming out of such nice young ladies.
These girls take this pretty seriously.
I guess so!
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Director’s Comments
Although discourse set up boundaries even around the resistance, re-interpretation, and re-creation of dominant rules and expectations, the women constantly negotiated within these boundaries. One of the more acceptable ways to resist or re-interpret the rules and expectations of ladylikeness was to invert expectations for femininity by engaging in more masculine performances. As the gendered system within Greek culture was based on a binary system in which women (passive, nurturing, respectful, prudish) were the opposite of men (active, aggressive, vulgar, sexual), it was easy for women to identify behaviors that were considered “stereotypically” male and take on those characteristics—something that was done at times intentionally and at times without awareness. The women recognized that these “more masculine” behaviors were not always appropriate, particularly in settings where they were supposed to be ultra-feminine (formal, date night, dances), and they altered their performances accordingly. In addition, even though they behaved in a more stereotypically masculine way, they all retained the appearance of “ladylike femininity” (the women never came close to performing “butch” femininity) even as they performed these “more masculine” behaviors. Therefore, even as they maintained a “more masculine,” “not girly girl” status among the sorority members, this “less feminine” performance still reinforced expectations of ladylikeness that were dominant within Zeta Chi culture.
In general, my participants’ negotiations of ladylike were “messy” because instances of absolute reproduction or resistance were less common than the more “messy” instances of negotiation that simultaneously reproduced, resisted, and re-created various aspects of dominant discourse. Such “messy” negotiations remained within the appropriate boundaries established by discourse. However, this re-working and negotiation of expectations opened up space for the women to purposely and accidentally alter or re-create that, which was disciplined as acceptable gender performance.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Cut to:
Zeta Chi House–Yarah’s Room—Monday 4:00 p.m.
The camera begins in the front hall of the Zeta Chi house and slowly makes its way up the stairs to Yarah’s room. It passes girls sitting silently in the living room doing schoolwork and girls dressed in sports bras and cheerleader shorts in the hallway doing crunches as they count out “one, two, three . . . ” The camera moves up the stairway and turns down Yarah’s hall. With Formal coming up in the next few weeks, the hall is lined with formal dresses hanging in clear dress bags outside of many of the girls’ doors. By the looks of things, royal blue seems to be the color of the season.
The camera continues down the hall, passing open doors that reveal short views of each room’s culture, including color schemes and musical tastes. There is a familial feel in the hall as we see girls freely walking in and out of each other’s rooms to join conversations, borrow clothes or jewelry, and text message friends about plans for the week.
As a girl walks toward the camera and enters a room to our right, the camera moves beyond her, turns to the left, and enters Yarah’s room where we find Margaret, Yarah, Roommate M, and Roommate Y sitting and talking. Margaret has come to the house for the weekly Chapter meeting where sorority business is discussed and for Monday dinner, a meal that, unlike nightly dinner that is provided only to those living in the house, is open to all Zeta Chis who have come to attend Chapter. Margaret’s roommate has driven her to the house and has come upstairs to hang out with the girls before they all leave her to go eat. Margaret has been telling a story about how a classmate made fun of her for being a sorority girl. The four have started talking about sorority stereotypes and how it stinks that Zeta Chi gets a bad reputation even when it is so different than all the other sororities.
Yeah, I feel like non-Greeks stereotype us pretty, pretty negatively.
Well the problem is that a lot of the stuff that we do that like sheds bad light on us is publicized more so than the good stuff we do. You’re not going to hear about when we go volunteer at the homeless shelter every day for the year.
You volunteered at a homeless shelter every day?
Roommate Y looks at them all half joking.
See what I mean?
Yeah, you know, I have learned that you can have an idea of people who are sorority, but they always surprise you.
There’s just such a diverse population here that you can’t really classify people. There’s always someone to break the Standards.
Seriously, I mean you’ve got your girly girls, you’ve got your flag football players, you’ve got your really smart girls, and your not so studious ones. I mean I feel like that’s everywhere though. You can’t really get that many girls in one place and have them all be exactly the same. Zeta Chi also is just not like the typical sorority stereotype either.
I feel like we are really, really diverse. That is one of the things we pride ourselves on.
At the same time, we aren’t really racially diverse.
Yeah, I was gonna say—
Well, we do come from all over the country, and we have a lot of Jewish girls, but I was really shocked that there weren’t more people of different races when I came here. So really, I guess it is hard to say we are diverse because we don’t really have other races, but I think we’re as close as we can get because we’re not all from the South in-state. We really try to get the girls from New Jersey and we really want girls from Chicago and California.
Yeah, we are diverse in comparison to others. There are a lot more cookie cutter sororities than we are. I feel like we have the most diverse groups of girls.
I think a lot of other sororities, they have a reputation of being all bleached blonde-haired girls and they care to keep that reputation up and have bleached blonde-haired girls. I think Zeta Chi girls still take care of themselves and care what they look like, but we’re not going to say this girl doesn’t really fit our stereotype or what we normally look like. I don’t really care what others look like and I’m not that concerned about what I look like in general.
Yeah, I heard from a friend that in other sororities, if you’re rushing a girl then they expect you to look cute and look thin.
But, you don’t feel like that happens at Zeta Chi?
I mean, I kind of feel like everyone here is size-wise pretty much the same, but I don’t think that it would be like, like—there are sororities that we know that demand, like before rush, you have to be a certain size. Like they’ll tell you to lose 10 pounds or you’re not participating. But we don’t do that.
Yeah seriously, we have cookies at Rush. We have cake and ice cream every day. Ms. Althea makes her bomb chocolate chip cookies. I think in general we don’t care as much about looks or money or stuff like that.
I agree. I don’t think looks or money factors in with us as much. It is more about personality. We try not to be superficial, like we really try. We hold our standards a little bit higher than others do in terms of personality and activities.
Yeah, but what about all the rules and expectations y’all have to like act in “classy” ways—and it’s not like any of you are ugly!
Well, those are in place just because there is a lot more at stake if you are sorority. YOU can be stupid, drunk downtown and you have no one to answer to. A lot of things that aren’t acceptable in sorority are fine for other people.
And too I think a lot of it is just about tradition. Like being part of tradition, you know?
To be honest I think it’s a lot worse in other sororities than it is here just because a lot of sororities have more rules, like especially around rush, like you have to wear this color dress, this style, which we don’t have.
I mean, I’ll admit that our rush can get superficial.
Oh, totally. Sometimes rush is really superficial, which makes me really unhappy and I think that’s why a lot of girls have such a hard time with it.
I think it is that superficial stuff that makes people not like Greeks.
Probably, but I don’t think people should say they don’t like Greeks. They would be smarter to say they don’t like certain aspects of some people who happen to be Greek or some aspects of Greek culture. Like, don’t buy into all of the stereotypes when you don’t know anyone who is Greek.
They all nod in agreement.
Well, again I think the problem is that sometimes the stereotypes are partly true, or at least they probably at one point were legitimate things. Not as much anymore.
Right—if they knew Greeks they would find out the stereotypes aren’t true all the time and maybe be less judgmental.
Yeah, totally. People always think we go out all the time and are like slutty and drink a lot and have sex with boys because they are in a fraternity. Then there is this whole other side where they think we are like prudish. So there is no in-between, we are either prudes or whores when really we are all in between. I think the same goes for anything. It would be the same for just about everybody. The same for sororities.
Yarah points to Roommate M.
And like you said none of us are ugly, but how many ugly girls do you see at USouthern? Everyone always acts like we spend so much time looking a certain way. I don’t think we spend any more time than anyone else. I mean, yes we have nice hair, good teeth, good skin, we are fashionable, but that is what society expects. We aren’t any different from everyone else who cares about what they look like, and most girls at USouthern care about what they look like!
At the same time, I mean I think we really are “supposed” to be cute, and if you look around Zeta Chi we are, but I don’t think it’s done on purpose. In our classes, we’re talking about this idea of “attachment theory” where you are drawn to people who look like you, like on purpose. I do think that in a way we do pick people to be in Zeta Chi who look like us.
Well excuse me, Miss Smarty Pants.
That’s another thing! People always think we are dumb, but the Truth is Greeks have like some of the highest GPA’s on campus.
Yeah! Tell that to the kid that made fun of you!
A member from across the hall walks into the room holding a dress and looks at the four of them.
Hey y’all, any of you have blue Yurman I can borrow, like maybe a ring or something to go with this dress?
The four girls all shake their head no in unison.
No, but ask next door, I think they both have some. If they’re not in there look on the dresser in the black box.
Yeah, but I’d ask before you borrow it. I think she got pretty mad a few weeks back because someone borrowed her stuff without asking.
I heard she thought the cleaning ladies had stolen her ring.
They’re Black.
Yarah ignores the comment as she has learned not to draw attention to her ethnicity.
Okay, thanks girls!
The woman walks out of the room.
I hate that David Yurman stuff, it’s so ugly.
I kinda like it. I didn’t like it at first but everyone is wearing it these days and it has kinda grown on me.
I think it’s very much like look how much money I have. And I’m like you could get something prettier for that much money—I’d like a car for that much money.
See, everybody’s different.
Well I better get going. Don’t y’all have dinner soon?
Yeah, we better get down there before they sing the prayer.
Yarah looks at her sarcastically.
Actually, I was hoping we might miss it.
Yarah!
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Director’s Comments
While there was not an atmosphere of “rebellious” resistance around women’s negotiations of rules and expectations within Zeta Chi, there was a strong attitude of resistance against societal stereotypes of sororities and Greeks. Although many of the women agreed that these stereotypes may have at one time held true and that in some “other” sororities they still may hold true, there was a general consensus among my participants that Zeta Chi was not a typical sorority and therefore the members of Zeta Chi were “not typical sorority women.” The stereotypes themselves and my participants’ resistance, understanding, interaction with, and use of them were complex and contradictory. Much of this complexity and contradiction seemed to come from the defensive stance my participants took in regard to their “identities” as sorority women, often defending themselves and their choice to be in a sorority. This resistance often forced difficult negotiation and blatant contradiction around their constructions of self as sorority women.
These experiences regarding stereotyping helped to show that outsiders often judged sorority women’s individual performances without recognition of the ways the overarching discourse disciplined and expected such behaviors. Rather than critique the discourse and its promotion of such performances, there instead was a lack of recognition of discursive “enablement” and an inability to see how the overarching culture, even the culture outside of the microcosm of the sorority, had a hand in enabling the existence of or the “thinkability” of such performances. This was problematic because, while it critiqued individual women, it left the cultural discourse free from “attack.”
Ignoring the larger cultural discourse also is problematic when analyzing my participant’s race and class-based values, interactions, and use of language. Many of the more racist, classist comments I heard were part of larger historical and geographic discourses on race—In this case, discourses that for many of my participants had been shaped within a culture historically influenced by specific geographic legacies of gender, race, and class. Often my participants’ negative comments about people’s race were a value or Truth that they were raised to believe and “take for granted.”
This manuscript exposed a few of the very overt examples of where race is discussed by the women of Zeta Chi—often in less than aware ways. Highlighted were examples of how the outward “face” of acceptance toward people of various races and classes that the women upheld in public, at times, turned ugly behind closed doors as the women showed through stereotyped comments and name calling their own complicity in discursive roots attached to a place and time still riddled with the legacy of slavery, lynching, plantations, divisions of wealth, suspicion of others, and racism (Woodward, 2011). These race- and class-based connections to underlying discriminatory perceptions and discourses further contributed toward disciplining the women to be proper women. However, because these underlying values positioned non-White and non-upper/middle class as less than ideal, being a proper woman in this case always already meant maintaining oneself within dominant White, upper-/middle-class legacies of appropriateness.
This particular raced and classed notion of femininity reflects Hill Collins’s (2005) argument that hegemonic masculinity is always already based on whiteness and “out of reach” for Black men. She noted that, “Black men, by definition, cannot be real men, because they are Black” (Collins, 2005, p. 193). Therefore, similar to the functioning of hegemonic masculinity, dominant discourses of femininity within Zeta Chi monitored not only notions of gender but also notions of race and class. These gendered, raced, and classed discourses converged to define femininity in ways that excluded non-White, non-upper-/middle-class ways of being and also at times led to a devaluing of identities that represented those alternative social positions.
There is obvious need to change these racist beliefs/comments. First reactions may simply blame individuals for participation in such acts. Yet, when such participation in racism is only attributed to individuals, with disregard to the cultural discourse that shapes those individuals, the values and beliefs of the overarching culture remain unchallenged and are allowed to perpetuate themselves. While I do not defend my participant’s use of racist comments, I do make a call to simultaneously recognize, deconstruct, and challenge the overarching cultural discourse that has enabled the women’s values, beliefs, and performances. Recognition of the power of racial and class-based discourse made it clear that these women were not only disciplined by and negotiating discourses of gender, but they were also disciplined by and negotiating discourses of race, sexuality, class, and other social categories.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Post-Structural Resistances: Mis-Repeats of Ladylikeness
This final manuscript from my ethnography of a Southern Sorority exposed the small post-structural resistances of discipline that sorority women negotiated. While a different analysis using critical theory as a framework might focus on larger emancipatory acts of resistance that more overtly challenged discipline within the sorority, my analysis instead continues, as in my other manuscripts, to use post-structural feminist theory to illuminate subversive repetitions, small cracks in contingent foundations, and/or civil disobediences in our constituted realities (Rajchman, 1987). These smaller subversions are often more difficult to capture through concrete examples; however, the use of creative analytic practices and screenplay helped to illuminate the small instances that can collect over time to form larger fissures, potentially providing space for local changes (Berbary, 2011).
In attempting to theorize these small instances of resistance, I have tried to understand why, in this highly disciplined system, some expectations of this discourse of ladylike remained hidden while others at times became apparent to the women and could be overtly resisted or subverted. To present a possible explanation for this phenomenon, I pulled from Butler’s (1990) notion of “failure to repeat.” The process of failure to repeat asserts that gender performances are compelled to repeat themselves to establish the illusion of a Truth of gender with a mis-repeat creating a space for “doing gender differently” though subversive repetition. In such mis-repeats, Truth is slowly revealed to be a discursive expectation that can be challenged or subverted. These failures to repeat potentially build up over time and collectively create small ruptures in hegemony, slowly allowing previously unthinkable questions about the compulsory nature of gender to form and open up new gender possibilities (Butler, 1990).
Such repetition and failed repetition of gendered Truths enabled women of Zeta Chi to both remain unaware of their complicity in discursive elements positioned as Truth when properly repeated, and also potentially become aware of discursive elements forced from the position of Truth through a failure to repeat. At times during my research, there was evidence of the collective effect of failures to repeat, particularly with my participants who began to “see” the sorority in a more negative light and resist the violence of consuming discourse. In particular, my participant who choose to leave the sorority had apparently “seen” enough of the gradual and subtle failures to repeat that she was able to become aware of the expectations of Zeta Chi and her ability to subvert or challenge them. Just as failure to repeat was gradual and often subtle, her transformation from “good Southern sorority girl” to “the one who de-sistered” took place over 4 years of high school and 4 years of college during which small ruptures in what she had always believed to be Truth began to create a space for her where she could see the possibility of something “other” that that which she had always been. Therefore, Butler’s (1990) notion of failure to repeat helped to illuminate the ways that some Zeta Chi women slowly became aware of their own complicity in and ability to subvert certain discursive expectations.
It is through such failures to repeat that there is the potential for the notion of “proper women” to be opened up to include more than just hegemonic, dominant “White, upper-/middle-class” notions of femininity. As mis-repeats potentially build up over time and collectively create small ruptures in hegemony, even Zeta Chi’s strongly disciplined discourses around ladylike may slowly open themselves up to previously unthinkable questions about the compulsory nature of gender and the potential for different gendered possibilities (Butler, 1990). Understanding the complex functioning of discourse, discipline, and failures to repeat in Zeta Chi helps to illuminate that sorority women’s gendered performances were not easily simplified or defined, but instead were caught in complex processes where constant messy negotiations were enacted among those discursive expectations that organized everyday lives through the production, reproduction, resistance, and mis-repeats of expectations of femininity grounded in dominant raced and classed ideals of appropriateness.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.