Abstract
Greek life in American colleges and universities is characterized by white hetero-masculine dominance. A large scholarship has documented Greek life’s association with women’s sexual violence, yet much less is known about how men—who are ostensibly privileged in these settings—experience sexual harassment and assault. Using 15 interviews with fraternity members attending an elite, midwestern university, we examine men’s experiences of intra-fraternal sexual violence. We describe fraternity members creating and deploying a white hetero-masculine discourse of “brotherhood” that institutionalizes intra-fraternal sexual violence, makes it illegible, and gives its perpetrators impunity. We also show how the brotherhood discourse differentially deploys resources and power to fraternity brothers based on their intersectional location and relationship to intra-fraternal sexual violence. Future applications of the brotherhood discourse in fraternities and other institutional contexts can help us better understand how such organizations reinscribe intersectional power hierarchies.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Journal | Men and Masculinities |
| DOIs | |
| State | Accepted/In press - 2022 |
Funding
This work benefitted from careful reading and feedback provided by: Claude Mellins whose groundbreaking contributions to the field of gender-based violence that inspired this work, with thanks for her critical advice throughout the conceptualization, planning, and execution of our study; Kate Walsh who guided the initial study; Deborah Tuerkheimer; Catharine MacKinnon; Joanna Grisinger and undergraduate students in the 2018-2019 Northwestern Legal Studies thesis seminar; the 2018-2019 cohort of Franke Undergraduate Fellows led by Sarah Dimick, Jessica Schwalb, and Evelyn MacPherson; the American Bar Foundation Doctoral Fellows Reading group including Jothie Rajah, Robert L. Nelson, Elizabeth Mertz, Reuben Miller, Brandon Alston, Amber Joy Powell, Charquia Wright, Isabel Anadon, Kumar Ramanathan, Alex Ross-Sorkin, Hardeep Dillon, and Sonya Rao; the staff of Northwestern University Center for Awareness, Response and Education (CARE) especially Saed Hill, Erin Clark, Carrie Wachter; members of Masculinity, Allyship, Reflection, Solidarity (MARS); and of course, the thoughtful anonymous reviewers recruited by Men and Masculinities. This research was supported by: the Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities at Northwestern University; the Franke Undergraduate Fellowship; and the Undergraduate Research Program (URP) of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University. Above all, we thank the participants in our study who chose to put their trust in us to share their stories. All errors remain our own.
Keywords
- college
- culture
- education
- hegemonic masculinity
- sexualities
- sociology
- violence
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Gender Studies
- History
- Sociology and Political Science
- Literature and Literary Theory
