This past Tuesday, the Emory Multicultural Greek Council (MGC) held its annual MGC Showcase not only to represent the values their fraternities and sororities strive to uphold, but also to reach out to potential new members who are interested in recruitment into these groups.
The Emory MGC Council currently consists of four groups: Xi Kappa fraternity, Lambda Theta Alpha sorority, Delta Phi Lambda sorority and Sigma Beta Rho fraternity, the latter of which began their colony, or new chapter, this fall.
While Xi Kappa fraternity and Delta Phi Lambda sorority are Asian-American interest organizations, Sigma Beta Rho was founded as a South-Asian interest fraternity, and Lambda Theta Alpha was founded as a Latin-American interest sorority.
Additionally, there are two new Greek organizations coming to campus this fall: Lambda Upsilon Lambda fraternity, a Latin-American interest fraternity, and Theta Nu Xi sorority, which has no specific interest history.
The MGC Showcase saw each fraternity and sorority giving a presentation on their history, values and philanthropy efforts.
At the end of the presentations, each organization gave a “stepping” performance accompanied my music. Stepping is a form of dance, which relies heavily on rhythmic clapping and stomping in synchronization with music. It is one of the hallmarks of multicultural Greek life and binds the members as part of a bigger community.
“The prime reasons I joined a fraternity were the brotherhood, diversity and community service opportunities that it offered me,” Lambda Upsilon Lambda alumni Omar Rodriguez said, who hopes to colonize a new chapter of Lambda Upsilon Lambda at Emory University. “Being a part of a Greek organization changed my life.”
The MGC Showcase serves as a means for the multicultural Greek organizations to educate the Emory community on who they are and clear up any misconceptions about multicultural Greek life. While many multicultural Greek fraternities and sororities initially began to serve certain ethnic communities, they have since expanded their membership and actively seek to represent a diverse array of people, regardless of ethnicity, College sophomore and Xi Kappa member Jason Yu, who is also MGC president, said.
“Being part of a Multicultural fraternity does not only encourage me to embrace and recognize my own culture, but also become aware of the cultural diversity that exists within our communities,” College senior and Sigma Beta Rho President Serik Tukupov said.
College freshman Neeraj Chawla found the MGC showcase experience to be enlightening.
“I’m interested in Greek life because it offers me a chance to not only get involved in campus and in my community, but also create bonds with other students on campus,” Chawla said. “The close-knit brotherhood that fraternities embody is really something that appeals to me and it offers me the chance to get to know other students on Emory’s campus.”
– By Vikrant Nallaparaju, Contributing Writer
Film Critic Vikrant Nallaparaju is a College Sophomore from Houston, Texas studying Anthropology and Human Biology. This is his second year writing for the wheel and the first serving as film a critic. When it comes to movies, he can usually be found watching the films of Joe Dante and lamenting the fall of John Carpenter.
