Cultural Reporter Project Intro- Shelby Merry

      The word culture is something that is hard to understand to begin with due to all the definitions and things that it can encompass. The deinfition that I felt best defined culture was how Live Science defines it, "Culture is the characteristics of a particular group of people, defined by everything from language, religion, cuisine, social habits, music and arts," (livscience.com).Culture can be so many things. I believe it's very important for eveyone to discover and learn about a number of different cultures, far from their own. After thinking about it I believe the culture I am going to reserach is the Sigma Lambda Gamma Sorority here on UNL's campus.

     I am involved on a sorority here on campus but I'm very interested in seeing the differences and similarities between a my personal sorority, Delta gamma, and this multicultural one. There are many multicultural sororities and fraternities on campus and this is just one of them. Sigma Lambda Gamma is dedicated to academics, social interaction, community service, cultural awareness, morals and ethics. It is is the largest Latina-based national sorority with a multicultural membership in chapters and alumnae associations throughout the United States. The sorority was founded in 1989 by collegiate women who knew there was a need to form an organization to empower women from all different cultural backgrounds. Their motto is, " Culture is pride, pride is success." Personally, I am sad to see that there is no interaction between PHA sororities and the multicultural sororities. I am so excited to build relationships and discover the commonalities between the sorority systems.
      I plan to further my research by connecting with some one the women involved in Sigma Lambda Gamma. I'm excited to break down the barrier between the two sororities and learn more about these women and what they stand for. According to their website, many of our standards and morals are both very similar. I plan to go to at least one of their events, weather it be a philanthropy or something else to see and learn more about their culture.