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Hazing News

Dartmouth writer tackles the burning issue of branding in Greek groups

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Excerpt from the longer piece by writer Parker Richards:

Hank Nuwer, a professor of journalism at Franklin College and a nationally recognized expert on collegiate hazing, said that branding is not an unusual hazing technique. Such brands are usually nominally optional, Nuwer said. He noted that in most Greek organizations that use branding, peer pressure and a mob mentality convince most members to acquiesce.

Nuwer added that, while researching a fraternity that utilized optional branding of the left side of the chest at Ball State University in 1989, a member noted that “No one has to get a brand, but no one in the organization is without a brand.”

“It may be a form of expression, but it falls into all those kinds of hazing activities that involve peer pressure and a sort of group expectation and groupthink, in terms of the camaraderie that is expected and certain penalties for not going along with the group,” Nuwer said.

Nuwer added that the derecognition of AD in response to the branding would “be the logical step” for Dartmouth to take.

 

By Hank Nuwer

Journalist Hank Nuwer tracks hazing deaths in fraternities and schools. Nuwer is the Alaska author of Hazing: Destroying Young Lives; Broken Pledges: The Deadly Rite of Hazing, High School Hazing, Wrongs of Passage and The Hazing Reader. In April of 2024, the Alaska Press Club awarded him first place in the Best Columnist division and Best Humorist, second place.

He has written articles or columns on hazing for the Sunday Times of India, Toronto Globe & Mail, Harper's Magazine, Orlando Sentinel, The Chronicle of Higher Education and the New York Times Sunday Magazine. His current book is Hazing: Destroying Young Lives from Indiana University Press. He is married to Malgorzata Wroblewska Nuwer of Warsaw, Poland and Fairbanks, Alaska. Nuwer is a former columnist for the Greenville (Ohio)Early Bird and former managing editor of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner in Alaska.
Nuwer was named the Ohio Society of Professional Journalists columnist of the year in 2021 for his “After Darke” column in the Early Bird. He also won third place for the column in 2022 from the Indiana chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. He and his wife Gosia, recently of Union City, Ind., have owned 20 acres in Alaska for many years. “The move is a sort-of coming home for us,” said Nuwer. As a journalist, he’s written about the Alaskan Iditarod sled-dog race and other Alaska topics. Read his musings in his blog at Real Alaska Daily--http://realalaskadaily.com and in his weekly column "Far from Randolph" in the Winchester Star-Gazette of Randolph County, Indiana.

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