As pre-frosh descended on campus this weekend, the Radcliffe Union of Students (RUS) and Perspective distributed pamphlets designed to inform both the visiting pre-frosh and current undergraduates about the history of exclusion at Harvard’s all-male final clubs.

RUS passed out copies of “Behind Closed Doors: Final Clubs” outside of the Science Center and Annenberg.

Alexandra Neuhaus-Follini ’04, RUS member and managing editor of the liberal monthly Perspective, spearheaded the project.

“It’s part of a bigger project to democratize social space at Harvard,” said Jessica M. Rosenberg ’04, RUS publicity chair.

The pamphlet offers a time line of the history of Harvard’s eight final clubs—the AD, Delphic, Fly, Fox, Owl, Phoenix, Porcellian and Spee—with a focus on the history of exclusion of women.

But the pamphlet also chronicles the decline of the defunct Pi Eta Speakers Club—a fraternity that closed in 1991 after incidents related to reckless partying and alleged sexual assaults.

RUS representatives said the pamphlet serves as a starting point in rectifying the Harvard’s dependency on these exclusive male institutions for a social scene.

“We see final clubs stuck in this anachronistic rut,” said Rebeccah G. Watson ’04, RUS co-president. “We expect them [final clubs] to move along with the changing tides in the University [to better reflect the changes of the student body in this half of the century].”

The representatives said they often are friends with individual final club members and say some RUS members frequent the final clubs. But the pamphlet, they say, reflects the troubled pasts of the all-male social institutions and the culture they create.

While most final club presidents did not respond to requests for comment, a final club president who spoke on the condition of anonymity said he sees the publication as the most recent development in the anti-final club movement.

“People have negative thoughts, but they are entitled to them and that’s fine,” he said. “I don’t think anyone in my club would necessarily be upset by this.”

Remembering Pi Eta

Besides profiling the current clubs, the pamphlet also detailed the history of the defunct fraternity Pi Eta.

Watson said the pamphlet included Pi Eta because even though it was not an official final club, the fraternity owned space in Harvard Square and followed similar rules and traditions.

“I feel like although Pi Eta is gone, its historical significance has a lot of relevance today. It created a culture that we can’t deny affected other clubs at Harvard,” Watson said.