A secret society is a club or organization whose activities and inner functioning are concealed from non-members. The society may or may not attempt to conceal its existence. The term usually excludes covert groups, such as intelligence agencies or guerrilla insurgencies, which hide their activities and memberships but maintain a public presence. The exact qualifications for labeling a group as a secret society are disputed, but definitions generally rely on the degree to which the organization insists on secrecy, and might involve the retention and transmission of secret knowledge, denial of membership in or knowledge of the group, the creation of personal bonds between members of the organization, and the use of secret rites or rituals which solidify members of the group.
Anthropologically and historically, secret societies are deeply interlinked with the concept of the Mannerbund, the all-male "warrior-band" or "warrior-society" of pre-modern cultures (see H. Schurtz, Alterklassen und Mannerbunde, Berlin, 1902; A. Van Gennep, The Rites of Passage, Chicago, 1960).
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Other articles related to "secret society, society, secret":
... La Santa is a secret society within the 'Ndrangheta, a criminal organisation in Calabria (Italy) ... Security concerns led to the creation of a secret society within the secret society ... Finally, the current highest rank of associazione (society) was established – reserved for the supreme bosses of the 'Ndrangheta ...
... campuses in the United States have been considered secret societies ... Perhaps one of the most famous secret college societies is Skull and Bones at Yale ... Georgia has a similar, highly secretive society called Gridiron Secret Society ...
... North Carolina at Chapel Hill contains the archives of the Order of Gimghoul, a secret society headquartered at the Gimghoul Castle ... The society is open to "notable" male students (rising juniors and higher), and faculty members by invitation ... The society centers itself around the legend of Peter Dromgoole, a student who mysteriously disappeared from the UNC campus in 1833 ...
... Secret Society is an American hip-hop group from Brooklyn, New York ... on numerous occasions prior to Secret Society's formation ... Previously, all five members of Secret Society had been notable contributors in the underground rap scene ...
... Elmo was the third senior society (after Berzelius, 1848 and Book and Snake, 1863) at the Sheffield Scientific School, Yale's sciences and engineering college from 1854 to 1956 ... societies at Yale Skull and Bones, Scroll and Key, Wolf's Head (secret society), Book and Snake, Elihu (secret society), Berzelius, and Mace and Chain ... The Society’s original Club House, at 111 Grove Street, was built in 1895 ...
Famous quotes containing the words society and/or secret:
“I’m afraid for all those who’ll have the bread snatched from their mouths by these machines.... What business has science and capitalism got, bringing all these new inventions into the works, before society has produced a generation educated up to using them!”
—Henrik Ibsen (1828–1906)
“Awareness of having better things to do with their lives is the secret to immunizing our children against false values—whether presented on television or in “real life.” The child who finds fulfillment in music or reading or cooking or swimming or writing or drawing is not as easily convinced that he needs recognition or power or some “high” to feel worthwhile.”
—Polly Berrien Berends (20th century)