Title: Initiation rituals of music groups at Dartmouth College – Rockapellas 1

General Information about Item:

• Genre: Initiation Ritual
• Language: English
• Country of Origin: USA
• Informant: Alice Zhang, female, 19 years old
• Place Collected: Dartmouth College Library, Baker-Berry Lobby
• Date Collected: 10-23-2018

Informant Data:

• Alice Zhang was born in and currently lives in San Clemente in Southern California. She is a sophomore at Dartmouth College. Alice is a very involved member of the Dartmouth community. On campus she is a member of the Rocapellas acapella group, a member of the Fusion Dance Ensemble and a member of Kappa Delta sorority. She joined the Rocapellas because the focus of the group is on social justice and freedom.

Contextual Data:

• Cultural Context: The Rocapellas are an acapella group at Dartmouth College. They perform songs that deal with social justice. Many of the acapella groups at Dartmouth perform initiation rituals and the Rocapellas are no exeption. The Rocapellas’ initiation process is deemed important because welcomes the new members and allows them to see how they get along with the rest of the group outside of rehearsal.
• Social Context: The folk group that the Rocapellas consist of singers who feel deeply passionate about social justice. The setting in which one part of the ritual takes place is private – the new members are taken to an unknown location and initially made to believe that they are taken to a place in Canada, which creates an element of surprise as well as secrecy.

Item:

• After waking up at 9 a.m. to audition for an acapella group, Alice got a callback from the Rocapellas and ultimately decided to join. She was woken up at 3 in the morning by the old members, taken to an unknown location to sing and do games with the old members. After that, she was taken to the “Shack” in West Lebanon. They talked more and got to know each other better.
• Another part of initiation included the “Baby show.” All the new are featured as soloists in a show organized by the Rocapellas and Alice was no exception. At the “Baby show” they put together skits in which they make fun of old members for things they observed in the time they had spent with them.

Analysis: Initiation rituals consist of three stages: separation, transition and incorporation.

• For the first part of initiation, the separation stage can be viewed as the process of being woken up by the group and taken an unknown location as they are separated from the campus. The transition stage includes all the activities at the unknown location, including games and singing songs. Incorporation is the stage at which they go to the “Shack” and learn more about the new and the old members
• For the second part of initiation, also known as the “Baby Show,” separation is the stage in which they are tasked to come up with a skit and be featured as soloists. Transition is their task of performing their skits, as they are placed in a state of uncertainty because they are unsure if they had done their skit correctly. Incorporation comes at the end, when they are done with the skit and re-welcomed into the larger group.

Meaning and interpretation: Initiation rituals of the Rocapellas, much like the initiation process of the rest of the music groups, has the purpose of making the new members feel welcome. According to the informants, even though the process was somewhat strange and scary initially, it ultimately made them feel less anxious about being new in the group. The initiation process also had the purpose of creating a feeling of excitement and group unity.

Comparison:

• Comparison within the subgroup: More professional groups (those guided by a director) are notified that they had become part of the group prior to initiation. That is not the case with acapella groups (i.e. the Rocapellas). All the groups within the subgroup are surprised by the wakeups and all the groups get a meal as part of initiation. This is the case because the meal has the purpose of bringing the group together as the new members and old members get to know each other better. The goal of initiation for all the music groups is not to scare or test the new members, but to welcome them into their circle.
• Comparison with the rest of the subgroups: The subgroups differ dramatically across the board. Some of the subgroups focus on various ethnic groups while others focus on groups within Dartmouth. The initiation rituals of the groups within Dartmouth usually have the purpose of welcoming new members into their community and are symbolic. Ethnic-based group rituals have the purpose of testing the new members. Additionally, ethnic groups’ initiation rituals tend to be related to religious practices. Initiation rituals of Dartmouth groups are not religious in character. What all groups have in common though is the fact that the process of initiation creates closeness with the rest of the group and makes one feel completely immersed into the group.

Transcript: “The initiation made me feel pretty welcome – it was pretty obvious that they put a lot of effort into making us feel included and they were excited to take us on!”

Collector: Katarina Nesic, Dartmouth College, Russian 13, Professor Valentina Apresyan, Professor Mikhail Gronas, Fall 2018

Tags/Keywords:

• Initiation
• Ritual
• Acapella Groups
• Dartmouth