As a member of the Greek community, I think it produces some of the most fascinating social networks. In many ways, fraternities market themselves on the basis of Haythornwaite's benefits of group membership. In a fraternity the actors are obviously the brothers and the ties connect all of the members to form the brotherhood (or network). However, unlike most other groups like sports teams, colleges, or companies where membership generally takes a backseat to a primary goal (winning, teaching, working), fraternities are in many ways a group for the sake of being a group. They are one of the few examples in which membership is not just a side-effect, but the primary focus.

For the people who do enter the Greek system it is often the initial similarity in perspectives that allows a potential new member to join one house instead of another. However, soon after joining, members' common ground grows beyond just similar perspectives by extending to shared experiences, knowledge, and struggles. Creating this common ground in the pledging process is key in developing the group identity. This group dynamic enforces the notion that by joining together members reap social capital benefits like:

"...the ability to trust network members, to have a
common language and to depend on network-
based mechanisms to manage behaviours."

According to Hawthornwaite's definitions, fraternities create the perfect scenario for a network to become a community. They have the "strong ties" and frequent interaction of the 70 or so undergrad brothers to provide norms and trust. Which are then combined with the "weak ties" of the fraternal alumni who provide information regarding new opportunities (especially in the job market).

Hawthornwaite states:

"...from a network perspective,
a well-working community of practice shows
a set of actors interacting in such a way as to
create social capital."

In fact, in many ways this is exactly what a fraternity does. It allows individuals to consolidate resources in an effort to produce more social capital. The fact that members refer to each other as brothers is in no way insignificant. In many ways a fraternity is very much like an actual family. There are the strong ties of an immediate family, because you live in the same house and frequently interact, but also the weak ties of a more distant relative you only see during the holidays (or alumni weekend) who provides you with opportunity information.

While the "weak ties" created by a fraternity were in existence long before the development of the internet, CMC has drastically multiplied the number of "weak ties" one is able to keep open. CMC has also made the altruistic acts of older brothers much easier to execute. Multiple times a week a graduated brother will send out job openings through our email listserve. Other alumni have been more than willing to help mentor undergrads through email and IM communications. It is even common for a younger brother to email their resume as an attachment to an alumni, requesting their help in editing it. All of these acts which enrich the social capital of the community would be significantly more difficult without CMC.

The notion of generalized reciprocity becomes very important when examining fraternities. Without, what Haythornwaite refers to as, "altruistic" acts, members would not be able to achieve more social capital than they would through pairwise interaction. The act of providing assistance without requiring immediate payback sits at the very backbone of the brotherhood. The alumni who pulls strings to get me a job probably expects very little from me in return. However, the expectation is that I will in turn "pay it forward" in a few years and help another fraternity brother get a job.

In more ways than one fraternities are networks that thrive as actual communities by using Haythornwaite's notions of general reciprocity and social capital.