Fraternity, Sorority

While the terms "fraternity" and "sorority" (from the Latin words frater and soror, meaning "brother" and "sister" respectively) may be used to describe any number of social and charitable organizations, including the Lions Club, Epsilon Sigma Alpha, Rotary International, and the Shriners, in the United States and Canada fraternities and sororities are most commonly known as social organizations of higher education students - organizations like fraternities outside the US and Canada are rare, however one example would be the German Student Corps. Fraternities are all-male or mixed-sex; the female-only equivalent is called a sorority, a word coined for Gamma Phi Beta in 1874. Consequently, there exist some all-female fraternities which were named before this, such as Kappa Alpha Theta, founded in 1870, Kappa Kappa Gamma, founded in 1870, and Alpha Phi, founded in 1872. Fraternities and sororities are also referred to as student corporations or academic corporations, or simply corporations.

With few exceptions (notably "Acacia, "Pan Sophic", "FarmHouse," and "Triangle"), the names of fraternities and sororities consist of two or three Greek letters. For this reason, fraternities and sororities are known collectively as the Greek System, and its members are known as Greeks. The use of Greek letters started with the first such organization, Phi Beta Kappa, which used Greek letters to hide their secret name.

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