Talk:Community/Archive 2

Archive &bull; 23 March 2006 &mdash; 31 July 2006

Hmmm
Simply put: 1. What defines between community and society? 2. What defines cosmic spaghetti?

--Lanoo 23 March (UTC)


 * 1. Structure. 2. Surrealism. Sunray 15:58, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
 * 1. The article Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft covers this. Gemeinschaft (often translated as community) and Gesellschaft (often translated as society or civil society or 'association') were somewhat distinguished by the German sociologist, Ferdinand Tönnies. The article states that "the juxtaposition of these two terms belonged to the general stock of concepts German pre-1933 intellectuals were quite familiar with and quite often misunderstood." I don't think much has changed, but I think modern sociologist, philosophers and psychologists might accept his terms.
 * 2. I'm not very familiar with cosmic spaghetti, but hey... let's do lunch!
 * CQ 17:15, 14 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Feels like home when people start talking Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft. I'll buy the lunch, but not spaghetti. Sunray 07:09, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Renaming of the category
Please note that Category:Community building has been proposed to be renamed into Category:Community. Please also note that we don't even have an article on community building.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 18:25, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Very good point Piotrus. I'm hoping you and others will participate in WikiProject_Community which is designed to be both a Community development project for the The Wikipedia Community and a project to unify all Wikipedia articles pertaining to community and the sociological context of it. A master category would be nice. Please take a look at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Community and we can discuss the prospects extensively and hopefully more comprehensively. Thanks in advance. CQ 13:04, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

To do?
Any thoughts on the structure, possible additions, etc.? Maurreen 09:29, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
 * The discussion above in the "Complete rewrite" thread has some good ideas, I think. This article has had quite a bit of review and many have dabbled with it, but as you can see, there are still no cited sources or references to speak of. I think the opening paragraph should have a more complete definition and a well-backed etymology of the term "community" (touched on in "The context of community" section). I'm wondering if there is a GA or FA-class article covering this broad a topic that we can look at to get some ideas on how to re-structure this one? Maybe "Agriculture" because its also about a very broad topic and has achieved GA status. CQ 15:06, 7 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Hi, CQ. Sorry I didn't answer sooner. But a complete rewrite is beyond my ambition. I came here mainly because the article won a collaboration, but apparently the other people who voted for it are otherwise occupied. Maurreen 11:25, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Oh, hey! I certainly didn't expect you to bear that big a burdon! It's beyond my ambition (and ability), too. I've requested Peer review to hopefully get some more collaboration on this job. I added a few pics to make it a bit more interesting but I'm still having a hard time finding authorative sources and refs. That's the big thing we need here... that and some ideas on structure. Given the number of articles that link to here, maybe the article's importance will become evident to folks. CQ 19:40, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I agree that the breadth of the topic makes it difficult. I found a link that might or might not be useful. It's about social capital in Tampa, Florida. Maurreen 20:57, 9 July 2006 (UTC) Oops, here's the link --. Also this, related to "third place":. Also, it might be good if we could have something on effects of technology. Maurreen 21:11, 9 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Hey folks, I'm one of those people Maurreen was referring to that "voted for [COTF but was] otherwise occupied." Should we perhaps generate a "To do" list of needed actions?


 * M: with respect to your social capital link (which is a good one), I think that should go with the article on Community development. However, there should, perhaps, be a brief section on community development (perhaps mentioning "social capital") in this article with a link to the main article. Sunray 20:46, 10 July 2006 (UTC)


 * As I begin to copyedit the article, I find some rather arguable passages. Here's an example:

"Related etymology for the word mun-ere expands the meaning to include something prized, precious and worth defending. It is the same root as used for the word munitions (defences)."


 * Common etymology doesn't usually go down this path. Munitions, after all, can be offensive, and are not generally considered to be community building tools!  I think that we should require sources for such assertions and rewrite if they aren't forthcoming.  Sunray 21:23, 10 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I get the idea that little is sourced -- should we start with a blank slate? Maurreen 03:01, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Not sure what you mean by "blank slate." Do you mean start from scratch?  Or go through from the top looking for references?  I would suggest we do the latter. Sunray 06:19, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * CQ adds on 17:51, 11 July 2006 (UTC) I'm for maybe getting the sections into better more standardized form like maybe:

Sections and subsections
My $0.02 worth:

Head
 * Overview
 * Sense of community
 * Prevailing theories
 * University studies
 * Effects of technology
 * Social capital
 * Community development
 * Community building (informal)
 * Community organizing (local)
 * Government and university-led efforts

Thanks for those links, Sunray and Maureen. Portal:Community tracks this article and links out to the various sub-topics, so anything relevant you want to throw onto there would be fine. I think I'm going to put a new section on the Portal just for the extensive acedemic treatment of the topic that I'm finding both here and outside. One problem I see cropping up though, is that most of the studies are US-centric.

The sections and subsections I think can just summarize articles we already have like we've done for Sense of community and Community development. At any rate, I think it's shaping up, don't ya'll? CQ 17:51, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I like this approach, CQ. It is simple and we can adjust/expand it as needed.  What I'm not yet sure of is how to organize the existing material in the article.  I need to think about it in light of your suggested approach. Sunray 18:12, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * If the "Community Development" section is going to be a brief summary with a link to the main article, I don't think we should have subsections there. Sunray 18:59, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeah me neither. I was kindof going by what I'm learning from the Better Together sites, Saguaro Seminar and the Oxford stuff. I haven't quite figured out what all we have yet, as far as main articles and such. ...And the way topically-related articles are categorized is a bit screwie, too. For example, there is no Category:Community development and Category:Community building seems way too big and Category:Community is way too small. Maybe we should look at that too. (As if we need more work - ha) CQ 19:12, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * The categories seem backwards to me. "Community," surely is the more general.  I think that much of what is currently in the "Community building" category should be in "Community." Sunray 00:01, 12 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I've moved "Sense of community" to the "Psychological perspective" section as it is a term primarily used in social and community psychology. Likewise, I've moved the "Social capital" piece to "Social perspective" as it was Bordieu (sociologist) that first developed that concept.  I've also added a "Notes" section, so we can begin adding citations. Sunray 05:33, 12 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Much better. That makes a lot more sense, Sunray. I see the etymology is fixed, too. I'm studying the infed.org article and tracking down some of their sources. I'm also looking at the Oxford CDJ. Lots of good stuff there, but most require subscriptions. I think we might also think about inserting a History section where it says "Over time, some cultures have progressed steadily toward ..." to cover the concepts of community through the eons beginning with the stone-age hunter-gatherer aspects and pull the effects of modern technology in through that. Then maybe end the article with a Future of Community section and the effects of the Internet and virtual communities, which seems to draw a lot of interest. I guess also we should touch on the various Types of communities which are listed on the Community (disambiguation) page and of course we'll have to somehow bring up spirituality, ceremony, ritual, religion, and other such things. Whew! Still a long way to go but we're getting there. And if it starts to bloat, we can always pull things out into the related specialty articles. I'm going to be heading over to Category:Community and its subcats to start straightening things up in there. I know that Maureen is a Category wiz. I left Sj and DoctorW notes and some of the WP:CBTF folk. Oh... have I mentioned Portal:Community? (hehe) CQ 08:35, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

This is good progress and a good plan. These sections are much more concrete. Maurreen 12:54, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

To do box
I can't do the box, so here's a bullet list of points and ideas. Please feel free to edit it. Maurreen 03:01, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * "Community" from various perspectives (such as psychological, sociological)
 * Effects of technology
 * Make more concrete somehow
 * Photo of neighborhood?
 * Social capital?
 * Sourcing

Well, on a different computer I can do the box. Here goes. Maurreen 06:03, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Social capital
Clarifying -- Do you mean I should move this to to Community development:
 * "According to the book "Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community," by Robert D. Putnam (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000), Americans' social capital is declining.
 * "For example, Putham's site for the book says that over the past 25 years, attendance at club meetings has fallen 58 percent, family dinners are down 33 percent, and having friends visit has fallen 45 percent." Maurreen 02:52, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Never mind, I was confused, I think I'm on track now. Maurreen 03:04, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * No, it's OK. I was refering to that external link you had. It seemed to be slanted towards community development.  However, I think that reference to social capital in this paragraph is fine &mdash; but it needs to be defined.  Sunray 06:10, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

However, "spirit of community" and "social capital" are not the same thing, IMO. Social capital has to do with networks and cooperation and is relativey easy to measure. Spirit of community is more elusive and intangible. It is also broader. Social capital is an element of spirit of community. Here's a statement that discusses the relationship:

"Anthony P. Cohen’s (1982; 1985) work around belonging and attachment is a great help in this respect. He argues that communities are best approached as ‘communities of meaning’. In other words, ‘”community” plays a crucial symbolic role in generating people’s sense of belonging’ (Crow and Allan 1994: 6). The reality of community, Cohen argues, lies in its members’ perception of the vitality of its culture (a significant element of this is what Putnam calls ‘social capital’ – see below). “People construct community symbolically, making it a resource and repository of meaning, and a referent of their identity’ (Cohen 1985: 118)." Sunray 07:27, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Neighborhood photo
Do you like any of these? Maurreen 06:04, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I didn't see any pics with people in them. Were there some? Sunray 06:17, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Good point. I was hoping to show where people live. But I am not finding both housing and people together. Maurreen 07:08, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Planned structure
I pieced this together. Please feel free to change it. I'm trying to integrate the comments, current article, etc., into the outline so that we might update the outline as everything evolves, so hopefully we can see at a glance where we're going. Maurreen 13:45, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Head
 * 1) Overview
 * 2) History
 * 3) Prevailing theories
 * 4) Psychological perspective
 * 5) Social perspective
 * 6) Social capital
 * 7) University studies
 * 8) Development
 * 9) Types
 * 10) Effects of technology
 * 11) Future

Comments
For the outline, I put "Effects of technology" between "History" and "Future" because that's where the effects might be most relevant. Maurreen 13:45, 12 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I've moved "History" to near the beginning. Otherwise it is looking good.  The material currently in the "Psychological perspective" section needs some work.  It was formerly titled "Processes of community," and consists of a mix of Psychological and Sociological theory.  I will try to fix that.  Sunray 14:03, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Psychological perspective --"first process"
This section uses the phrase "first process" apparently to refer to two different things.

In the second paragraph: "The habits and behaviors that a person grows into are largely a function of the community group behaviors that prevailed through that process. This is the first process of community (see Imagined community)."

And toward the end of the fourth paragraph: "So, identification, realization and socialization take an individual into a position of making choices about who he or she will socialize with and under what conditions and circumstances. From the perspective of the individual, selecting or deselecting groups to join is yet another process &mdash; the process of association. When associated individuals develop the intent to give of themselves to the group and maintain all of the processes from identification to association, they begin to bring into practice the first process of real community &mdash; the process of communication."

Thoughts? Should we maybe just get rid of each "first"? Maurreen 06:00, 13 July 2006 (UTC)


 * This seems like a case of the first being last. I agree that the "firsts" should go.  Sunray 07:45, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

This whole section drives me crazy. It had formerly been titled "Processes of community." That wasn't a very good title, IMO, but "Psychological perspective" doesn't work either. The processes are a mix of social psychological and sociological ones. So I've changed the title to "Individual and community." There may be a better title, but it does seem to me to be about the processes of individuals joining community. Much of the information in the section is useful. However, this paragraph eludes me:

"The habits and behaviors that a person grows into are largely a function of the community group behaviors that prevailed through that process. This is the first process of community (see Imagined community)."

I don't understand what this is trying to get at. The link doesn't help me. Can anyone elucidate this? If it says what I think it says, I don't agree with it, but it's vague enough that I can't be sure. Perhaps I'm just too tired right now. I will look at it again later. Sunray 08:45, 13 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes, it's physhy. :)
 * I think the intended point might be essentially that people learn how to act, what is expeced and accepted, etc., from the other people around them ... the influence of "nurture" added to "nature".
 * I had earlier removed the sentence immediately preceding, which might give a little more context, but seemed obvious to me: "A human being is born with a mind and a set of inherited traits."
 * I'm not sure how to fix it right now. Maurreen 15:43, 13 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Actually, it seems like the following three paragraphs (including the one you deleted) seem to say nearly the same thing:
 * "Shared experience, regardless of culture, class, religion or any other determinant, is derived chiefly through contact with others. This progressive development is universal in human experience, forming a sociological component which facilitates the process of identification.
 * "The habits and behaviors that a person grows into are largely a function of the community group behaviors that prevailed through that process. This is the first process of community (see Imagined community).
 * "As an individual grows into an adult, another process occurs &mdash; a progressive accumulation of facts, truths, and, perhaps, insights which all move together through the process of realization. It is during this progression that cognitive structures are formed within a personal scope, attitudes toward the local world develop, views toward the larger society change, and an understanding of how people relate one to the other takes shape. This process is called socialization."
 * I don't know about the Imagined community link, either. Maurreen 15:48, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Your interpretation seems right to me. So if it is about nature/nurture it needs to be re-worded, because it is arguable as is (implying that nurture is primarily by communities).  Sunray 15:52, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I see your point. I would think families would be the primary influence. Maurreen 16:09, 13 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, since I wrote most of the original crap that we're having to deal with here, I suppose I should chime in. When I found the article back a couple of years ago, it was mostly a bunch of link spam and fragmented blurbs. (my user name was Quinobi at the time). I just started typing away at some things I believed to be true about the formation of communities and what made people join them. You can find a "frozen copy" of my text at User:CQ/Community. So don't hesitate to refactor the "real" article freely. I'm just tickled pink that there is finally some collaboration which I've been begging for all this time. And yes... I was trying to show that infants encounter "first", their immediate family, then extended family, local community (including school) and then develop a world view and a set of associations that connect them to life-long community experiences. There is so much overlap between community, sociology and psychology that differentiating is nearly impossible. I've really found this out dealing with Category:Community and its related categories. If you have time, please-please-please have a look at WikiProject Community. I'm very serious about aligning WikiProject Community, Portal:Community, Community and Category:Community into a succinct Whole that is worthy of Wikipedia:Version 1.0. &bull; CQ 18:46, 13 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I reworked it. See what you think. Maurreen 16:47, 15 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Very nice. You have removed the psycho/socio babble and made it into a simpler, more readily understandable, section IMO. I plead guilty of not being able to do that for this topic: forrest/trees. Sunray 17:35, 15 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Thank you! I love teamwork. Maurreen 17:42, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

Community development
The phrasing on the "Community development" section troubles me somewhat. It seems to imply community development tends to be done by external organizations and seems to slight people improving their own communities. I don't have a solution at the moment. Maurreen 21:52, 15 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, I think that communities often do have to rely on an external resource in order to develop &mdash; just like people. There are many examples of internal community development, but these are often hard to measure (due to lack of baseline data or external reference points).  We could add something on Asset Based Community Development which focuses on the skills and resources of the community members.  Although it is a model developed by the ABCD Institute, it is often applied by the communties themselves.  Sunray 21:59, 15 July 2006 (UTC)


 * To me, the more formal studies and programs would be classed as "community development" where work done within and by communities themselves would be classed as "community building" or "organizing". I don't know if that's a viable classification or not. If it is, I'd like to suggest Category:Community development for the more formal university-led and government-connected stuff. I'm working on that List of community topics and finding all sorts of stuff we can merge in or reference to in this article, but it's like you said earlier - forrest/trees. CQ 18:24, 16 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree with your demarcation of the difference between "community development" and "community building." I'm not sure that Community Development needs to be a category, though. It seems to me to make more sense as a subcategory of "Category:Community." Sunray 20:13, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, I see I had an incorrect understanding of the term "community development". Do you think community development, building and organizing should all go in one section with a broader name, or do they deserve to be separate sections? Maurreen 11:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Duh, never mind we already answered that question further up. Maurreen 12:37, 18 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I'm looking at Community development &mdash; the article and created Category:Community development. I also made a single section "Community building and organizing" both here and there. Starting to get hairy! CQ 15:38, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Classification, types
I've been playing with the List of community topics and thinking about ways to incorporate into this article a way to link to the various actual communities. I added a subsection "Ecovillages" to the "Types of communities" section. I think a uniform classification would be handy for Portal:Community if not for this article. It might be good to have something that mentions examples of actual communities like The Farm - an ecovillage (actually an ecocity) and The Well - a Virtual community.

Also, i think the "Social perspectives" section ought to be refactored into something like a "Theories and principles" section like outlined here. What do ya'll think? CQ 16:31, 17 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I think that I agree with your first point, though wonder about the proliferation of lists... nice lists, though.:-) A small quibble: The Farm isn't a great example of an ecovillage.  Many there struggle with the idea of ecovillage and refer to the Ecovillage Training Center as "the ecovillage."  Nor an ecocity, I think.  Earthaven is a good American example of a full-featured ecovillage (though it needs and article).  I agree that The Well is a good example of a virtual community.


 * I agree on changing the name of that section. However, let's not turn it into a grab bag of principles and theories.  it should be well written and not too "in your face" with the theories, IMO.  Sunray 06:49, 18 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure ecovillages or intentional communities deserve more attention than other types of communities. Do you prefer more on different types in general or less on these? Maurreen 12:02, 18 July 2006 (UTC) Also, would religious communities such as Amish villages fall under these? Maurreen 12:03, 18 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Also, the expressions "community of practice" and "community of action" don't fit in the current pattern. The other examples are concrete and use everyday language. A couple of options:
 * Leave those to the Community of interest article.
 * Give them more context and combine them somehow. Maurreen 12:35, 18 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I vote for giving them more context (without overdoing it). I think that intentional communities are important enough to be mentioned in this article, but agree that Amish and other religious comunities are important (also Kibbutzim).  What is interesting about cohousing and ecovillages is their current growth, which is significant. Sunray 01:23, 19 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Then I saw your addition, which I think is an excellent summary and more appropriate here. Sunray 01:45, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I think I just adapted that from the main article, which I meant to note in the edit summary. I am going to try giving this section a new outline and wee bit more context. But I don't know what I'm doing; some of these expressions are unfamiliar to me. I tried a little research, but didn't quite find what I was looking for. Maurreen 14:05, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Major concepts
I hope ya'll don't mind, but I took the liberty of adding the "Major concepts" section adding the "Community and Society" section in place of the essay-ish "Social perspective" section which had no sources at all. I capitalized the word "Society" because I thought it should be "even" with "Community" in that context. I also refactored the other sections as subsections. I think it's fairly logical and easier to edit now, but let me know if I went to far, here. CQ 20:25, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I added a section "Organizational communication." It links to an article with fairly good sources and I think it's a good way to tie in the concept of "how" community works. CQ 22:12, 19 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't mind. I don't own the joint. :)
 * Let me know if either of you dislike my direction, etc. Maurreen 03:05, 20 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Those are good additions, good progress. Maurreen 03:21, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

I like the "Community and Society" heading.

Re: Major concepts: Two things struck me about these changes: I'm not sure that the meta-heading "major concepts" adds anything. It is somewhat arguable, since not everything that comes under that heading is a major concept. I'm inclined to remove it.

The other thing I have difficulty with is the section on "Organizational communication." That's related to community how? Are we trying to say that organizations are communities? That entities within organizations are communities? Either could be true, but are not necessarily true. I wish we had agreed on the organization of the article when we started as we seem to be making significant changes willy nilly at a time that we should be consolidating it.

While I'm voicing concerns, I will add that I think that the last section has become a bit of a hodgepodge. It needs cleaning up and a good summary to end, IMO. I will work at that. Sunray 15:37, 20 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't mind if you undo any of my changes. Maurreen 17:12, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Me neither CQ 17:17, 20 July 2006 (UTC)


 * You two are so... um... civil Sunray 06:42, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi. I always at least try to be civil, but I am some degree less flexible in situations that I am more confident of myself. On this topic, I am more confident of you. :) Maurreen 11:11, 21 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Sorry I was so grumpy. When I looked into it more deeply, I realized that the changes were not that difficult to work with. Now we need a good edit of the whole shebang. Sunray 18:08, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Maurreen 06:17, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Iran photo
I'm not sure this is good in the context, because I don't see any people. Maurreen 16:47, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
 * I chose it because it was a striking image, put in some international flavor and is listed on the gallery at Town square. I thought it tied in with the "public spaces" theme in the text. CQ 16:59, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
 * It is striking and it does tie in with the theme. Sunray 18:06, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Pictures
I know we've been focused on the text and structure but how do the pictures look and are they appropriate? I still can't find any pictures that have people in them acting like a community! I had in mind something like a circle of various sorts of folks gathered in a circle discussing things in a civil manner. Maybe Wikimania could produce such a picture this year, eh? • CQ 16:49, 21 July 2006 (UTC)


 * The photo of crosses burning is a little scary on first glance -- reminds me of the Ku Klux Klan.
 * I was looking for a photo of a neighborhood, but I didn't see much that showed people.
 * Couple other options: a park with people in it; volunteer or similar work, such as barn-raising or Habitat for Humanity work on a house. Maurreen 17:00, 21 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Maybe Habitat volunteer working or Hospital volunteer? Maurreen 17:08, 21 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Do you guys like either of these? Given the point we make about "community" meaning to give of oneself, I think it could be good to show it in one of the photos. Maurreen 19:27, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
 * The Habitat picture is along the right track, but I would prefer to see a number of people in it. The candy-striper picture fits (but for me hospitals are creepy). I threw the Street_Musicians_in_NYC.jpg on the conclusion section just for kicks. We can move it somewhere else if you think it's useful. CQ 12:04, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Article end
Sunray, your conclusion is well done. Maurreen 18:13, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Overview
The overview now ends with: "The idea of community is important in many academic disciplines, especially within the social sciences, such as sociology, psychology, anthropology, and many overlapping areas of thought. Community theories are important also in subjects such as economics, urban planning, social work and architecture. The body of knowlege about human organization within the context of community has grown to include community psychology, organizational studies, organizational development (sociology), social geography and even recently computational sociology."

I'm thinking this paragraph would be better either at the end of the introduction, before the table of contents, or immediately following the etymology. Maurreen 06:32, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * That makes sense to me. Sunray 06:35, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks. Now that I'm going over the whole thing at once, I'm seeing a little more.
 * I'm thinking the overview should be the etymology, the paragraph noted above, and then this from the "Community and Society" section: "An important concept is defining what "community" actually is. German sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies presented a concise differentiation between the terms "community" (gemeinschaft) and "society" (gesellschaft). In his 1887 work, Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft, Tönnies argued that "community" is perceived to be be a "tighter" and more cohesive social structure within the context of the larger society, due to the presence of a "unity of will" (Tönnies, 22). He added that family and kinship were the most perfect expressions of community but that other shared characteristics, such as place or belief, could also result in gemeinschaft."
 * And then maybe what's left of the current "Overview" section might be called "History."
 * Maybe it would have been more efficient if I had read it all over again together before making the suggestion above. Oh, well. Maurreen 06:46, 22 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Maybe it would have been more efficient if I had read it all over again together before making the suggestion above. Oh, well. Maurreen 06:46, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * This is an excellent idea. That's obviously why you are getting the big bucks as an editor! The front end had been bothering me. If we go the way you are suggesting, it will be much stronger. Sunray 19:07, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. But copy editors aren't rolling in dough. What I really want to do is be a fired CEO and get a severance package of millions. :) Maurreen 19:34, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Picking a nit -- "most perfect"
The "Community and Society" section says: "Tönnies argued that "community" is perceived to be be a tighter and more cohesive social structure within the context of the larger society, due to the presence of a "unity of will" (Tönnies, 22). He added that family and kinship were the most perfect expressions of community but that other shared characteristics, such as place or belief, could also result in gemeinschaft."

I'm inclined to dislike the double superlative of "most perfect", but maybe that's the best expression of what he wrote. Maurreen 06:57, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * We aren't quoting him, so it is a good idea to keep in mind good English. You cannot get better than perfect in my book.


 * Here's a nit pick from me: "... community is perceived to be a tighter and more cohesive social structure within... " Structure seems to me to be the one word out of place in this. Families, like communities, tend to have less stucture than society in general (oh, a pun, perhaps).  Kinship, on the other hand has a different kind of structure (deeper, more subtle).  I think I will substitute the word "entity" for "stucture." Sunray 19:07, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * That's good; it was bothering me too. Maurreen 19:39, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Communitarianism
This sentence confuses me: "The question of priority, whether on the individual or community, often has the largest effect in the most pressing ethical questions, such as health care, abortion, multiculturalism, and hate speech." Maurreen 07:00, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, the first thing that strikes me is that these are not ethical questions. Looking at the list, they could be described as social issues, but that still may be a bit opaque to the reader. As I re-read the sentence, the word on seems to be unclear.  But even if I change it to of it still doesn't seem clear. I believe the sentence wants to be saying: In communities, as with individuals, the question of priority often has the greatest effect in responding to ethical questions relating to such diverse social issues as health care, abortion, multiculturalism, and hate speech.


 * However, isn't that a bit of a tautology: Priorities determine the priority...


 * What could we usefully say about this? Sunray 19:17, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * That was what I was thinking, but wasn't up to articulating it. I don't see a way to salvage it, unless CQ can do it. I checked the Communitarianism article and it says exactly the same thing. Maurreen 19:39, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I will ask CQ to take a look at it. I think we need some fill or this section will be pretty thin. Sunray 22:45, 22 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I've had a bash at re-wording it. See what you think. Sunray 01:23, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Hey. Ya'll have been busy I see! I just went through the great mid-western blackout (bad storms) and have been without electricity for two days. I'll get back on it tomorrow, but I just did a quick read through and it looks soooo much better. Good work! CQ 02:04, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

B Class
After all that work! Only B class? How about we nominate it for GA or FA? Sunray 08:01, 24 July 2006 (UTC)


 * OK, I nominated it for GA. Should we delete the "to do" box? Maurreen 08:58, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Heh, I just wanted to bump it up one step at a time. From my point of view, the article has come a long way in a short time! The GA nomination has us under the microscope, now! We finally got a comment at Peer review/Community/archive1. The automated peer review refered to was run well before the re-write, so isn't particularly helpful at this time, but 4u1e has made some good points. &bull; CQ 11:34, 24 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Many of the comments apply to fairly recent versions, though, so perhaps we should consider them carefully. For example the remarks about the lead and the "Overview" section suggest we take another look at the front end. I've tried a different way of organizing the lead, eliminating one-sentence paragraphs and shifting things around. See what you think. Don't be afraid to revert if it offends your sensibilities.   I also agree with comments about the last two sections. More work is needed, I think.  Sunray 17:53, 24 July 2006 (UTC)


 * We also need more references. Working on that. 17:57, 24 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I like the opening statement a lot better now. I also like the "Overview" section namechange to "Significance of community". Additionally, I'm not sure where to put it, but in the news these days, we hear a lot of mention of some sort of nebulus "international community". Now that we have shooting wars all over the globe, especially in the Middle East, I'm wondering if we could craft a well-sourced NPOV message somewhere in the text that highlights the global aspects of the sense of community (or lack thereof) and how the term is being used (and abused). I'm thinking it would fit well into the "Challenge of community" section.   &bull; CQ 18:49, 24 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Oh, I like that! Sunray 19:21, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Considering the comments about the "Types of community" section made in the peer review, I thought it might be less confusing to eliminate the "Other classifications" subsection. As was pointed out, there were confusing repetitions in that section. Sunray 22:14, 24 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Good work, guys. Thank you. I might have jumped the gun, but I'm getting "communitied" out. I have a short attention span. Maurreen 07:21, 25 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Hehe. Quite understandable Maurreen! I never get "communitied" out, as you might have guessed. While keeping a close watch on Community, I'm moving over toward Portal:United States trying to use my community building skills to help boost it toward WP:FPORT status. I fell much better about this article than I have since I started WP:CBTF in September of '04. But behold! I'm following you! &bull; CQ 13:40, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Structure of the article
I agree with CQ that this article has come a long way in a short time. When I first saw it, I have to say that it was simply dreadful, just not up to encyclopedic standards. I was tempted to delete the whole thing and provide an outline for a requested article in its place. I would still like to throw out my idea now for that proposed structure, with apologies for its lateness.

When I wrote the Sense of community article last year, I envisioned that when more articles were written from other perspectives such as Anthropology (and especially Sociology) that the "Sense of community" article could become one having a brief summary of those various perspectives and the psychological perspective represented there could be moved to "Psychological sense of community," and "Sense of community (Psychology)" could forward to it. (The same could be done with main articles on "Sense of community" from other perspectives.) Some incorporation of a similar approach might be beneficial for Community: perhaps a section with subsections summarizing the various perspectives on community, such as Sociological, Anthropological, Psychological, Biological, etc. It would be a way to give the article additional logical structure (reflecting realities of how research and writing is carried out) and avoid potential conflicts over subtopics that are due to nothing more than variations in approach. - Do c  t  or  W  19:30, 25 July 2006 (UTC)


 * This makes sense. In fact, it might push the article all the way to featured article status. Would you be up for writing some of that? I can contribute to the sociological and anthropological perspectives and I'm sure CQ will have lots to contribute &mdash; he's never been shy before now. :-)  Sunray 22:40, 25 July 2006 (UTC)


 * It's very good to see you back around, DoctorW! Our biggest problem here has been the scarcity of academic references. We've tried to structure this article toward a "general audience" but provide links to more terse treatments on other articles. Topics like "Sense of community" and "community development" should also be directed (in my opinion) toward the layman. Community psychology though, should be chocked full of jargon and cryptic pedantry that would make an underclassman's eyeballs pop out. It can thus contain a section about the sense of community from the psycholological perspective. Social anthropology might contain a section about the sense of community from the anthropological perspective and so on. Subfields of sociology and philosophy probably have numerous examples of articles that might deal with various ideas of community that can link to and from the "general" articles. The main thing though, is to build up the reference materials in an acceptable and navigable way. That's what the WikiProject's primary goal is. What's neat is that we're working as a community! Again, thanks for your help and welcome back! &bull; CQ 23:52, 25 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Lol, at CQ's "chocked full of jargon and cryptic pedantry..." Readability is the sine qua non around here. So we musn't give too much license to psychologists and sociologists, :-) and bear in mind who we are writing for (a general audience).  So it's "full of jargon and cryptic pedantry that would make an undergraduate's eyballs pop out with the elegant turning of phrases, but he would have understood every word! Sunray 06:26, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Significance of community
Is there any mileage in taking the history of community a little further back in human history? I believe most current researchers into human origins believe that the 'last common ancestor' with chimpanzees would have been a very social animal (many theories of the development of the human mind are based on this as perhaps the driving force in our evolution). I may be able to reference that, as well as the development of communities from hunter gatherer to more complex agrarian, from a variety of (reasonably respectable) pop science books. My fear of course is that this really isn't my field, and both my refs and me are rather partial (in both senses). It's quite likely that I don't have a complete overview of the topic. On the other hand the development of humans initially as social animals seems quite fundamental to communities. Views? 4u1e


 * That's something we've really struggled with while rewriting this article. I too, am a layman but I've learned a lot aout the scientific treatment of this topic. According to the Wikipedia article Sociocultural evolution, "Authors such as Adam Ferguson, John Millar, and Adam Smith argued that all societies pass through a series of four stages: hunting and gathering, pastoralism and nomadism, agricultural, and finally a stage of commerce." If we were to do a "History of community" section (which we've tried), the sources of that article might be a good place to start.


 * Another section that appears to be lacking is "Definition of community." This was brought up early on in this discussion and just now reasserted at Peer review/Community. I'm thinking that the rewrite efforts would have been easier, if we had done the research first and written the article around the sources rather than attempting to find sources that back up what we've written. But we've made progress. Hey 4u1e, don't hesitate to jump on in here if the topic interests you. (Not quite as exciting as Formula One, eh? hehe). We have a few academics looking at the article, but us laymen have a part to play as well. You might take a look at List of community topics as well. Thanks for participating. &bull; CQ 19:07, 26 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Different, rather than less exciting. Any contributions I make will be rather slow I'm afraid - I don't have the depth of knowledge here to quickly dash off a suitable paragraph without doing some reading first! 4u1e

McMillan and Chavis
Wow! Check this out: McMillan + Chavis + Wikipedia at Google. Kinda scary to me. But seriously, I'm wondering if we should start McMillan and Chavis (not just a redirect to Sense of community). Thoughts? CQ 11:28, 27 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure what was scaring you, CQ. Anyway, it citing McMillan would give us an additional reference, so I will add it. Sunray 16:13, 27 July 2006 (UTC)


 * CQ: If you were to design a clever ploy to encourage me to be more involved again, you could hardly do better than to post the results of that Google search. Whether or not you had me in mind, thank you. It's heartening to know that Wikipedia has given the Sense of community article a wider audience and that people seem to like it.


 * On the specific suggestion of creating a McMillan and Chavis article, I think it would be redundant. McMillan and Chavis are most known for the content in the Sense of community article.


 * I agree with DoctorW's comments about creating an article about McMillan and Chavis. I've added a reference to M & C in this article, but, given the extensive coverage of their work in the Sense of community article do not think we need an article devoted to them.


 * BTW, I am not well acquainted with the literature on sense of community. The first two paragraphs of the Sense of community section of this article are very weakly related to the description of sense of community in the main article. Do you think we can find references for it, or should it be either a) re-written or b) jetisoned. Sunray 17:04, 27 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm very proud of myself. I just created Journal of Community and Applied Social Psychology, the first of a series of aticles about academic journals. This series is inspired by Piotrus's suggestion at Peer review/Community/archive1.


 * Citing sources is, in my mind, the most important thing for Wikipedians to learn to do. I would like to make WikiProject Community a place that academic skills are in play and peer-review becomes a way of life. The only thing that has brought wikipedia this far is its sense of community. The fact that we keep each other in check and enforce encyclopedic standards is, I believe, what Ciffolilli is referring to in Phantom authority, self–selective recruitment and retention of members in virtual communities: The case of Wikipedia.


 * The Wikipedia Community is potentially a learning community of both practice and a interest. It is also, by all assessments a benchmark Virtual community. We (and I love using that two-letter word) won the Webby Award for being best Community!


 * First Monday is chocked full of articles about Virtual community and is itself a viable Virtual community of practice. That is, of course a subjective statement based on my own evaluation of what I've read there. But the rift between subjectivity and objectivity is what peer review is all about. We must have diverse perspectives to create useful points of reference. First Monday is a hotbed for logical debates. A fine example of an article that furrowed a few brows is Tuomi's treatment of "Thought communities" and "theoretical models of community-based practice and learning ... combined with actor-network theory" in Internet, Innovation and Open Source:Actors on the Network. The proprietary software camp had a field day with this.


 * I'm planning an article named community practitioner, which is necessary, in that the term is found in nearly all source articles I've looked at, especially those of McMillan and Chavis (who  do need their own article, IMO). The idea of applying what we learn about community strengthen the fact that we are a community. The taskforce aproach is very familiar and even cozy here at WP. It is how we interact and work through the consensus decision-making process that makes us special and puts us in line to win another Webby. That's encouraging. But what is even more encouraging is the fact that we are creating the finest encyclopedia on the planet on a shoestring budget through a phenominal level of participation. &bull; CQ 17:19, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Perspectives on community
DoctorW has suggested a section entitled along the lines of "Perspectives on community"

"with subsections summarizing the various perspectives on community, such as Sociological, Anthropological, Psychological, Biological, etc. It would be a way to give the article additional logical structure (reflecting realities of how research and writing is carried out) and avoid potential conflicts over subtopics that are due to nothing more than variations in approach."
 * I would appreciate hearing more discussion of what people think of my suggestion just above. I will comment more on it soon myself. - Do c  t  or  W  16:37, 27 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Let us begin. I suggest we retitle the "Significance of community" section and use the text that is there as an introduction to "Perspectives on community."  Each of the fields Anthropology, "Psychology," Sociology, etc. would become sub-headings following the introductory text (some of that text might also be incorporated into the subsections, if appropriate). Does that make sense?  I think I will retitle that section anyway, as it is a better title. Sunray 17:17, 27 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm happy you put it first, and I like the name. Personally, I think it should become the biggest section, but that may be because I'm an academic. (On the other hand, most encyclopedia articles are written by academics, so maybe it's not such a bad bias.) In fact, last year, when I thought little could be saved from the article as it was at that time, I considered the division-by-field structure for the whole article. People here have improved the content enormously, however, so I think that's no longer appropriate, but it might be good for the references section in addition to the "Perspectives" section (which can contain varying definitions).


 * The "realities of how research and writing is carried out" that I mentioned refers to the fact that researchers in different fields (e.g., Sociology, Anthropology, Psychology) don't talk to each other all that much. Occasionally a sociologist will cite a psychologist, but he's likely to treat the ideas cited in a very different way from the psychologist. A psychologist may cite a sociologist, but perhaps only for the historical, heuristic value of the concept, and that heuristic has quite a different role in the two fields. Over on Social Psychology last December, the psychologists and the sociologists were talking past each other. What "Social Psychology" meant to the two groups was very different. The page still reflects an unfortunate lack of recognition of this difference. Most of the material is sociological, but is presented as an integrated field. The apparent inability of some people to discuss the issue or acknowledge that there might be a problem is one of the reasons I have been less active in the last 6 months. It was discouraging. - Do c  t  or  W  23:03, 27 July 2006 (UTC)
 * May I offer my compliments on the recent improvements to this article. It presents a nice balance thus far.  I am interested to see what a summary of community would look like from the fields DoctorW mentions.  But for now, my compliments folks. ... Kenosis 02:51, 28 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the feedback Kenosis. I must get back to Nature and see how that is progressing. I've seen your edits flying across my watchlist, so I know you have been busy there. Sunray 08:08, 28 July 2006 (UTC)


 * DrW: Yes, sociologists can be rather stuck in their theory bubbles (and before they reach for their guns, I will add that I am one &mdash; but I like to hang out with anthropologists, personally). You describe the disciplinary silos problematic to a tea.  And I agree with you about Wikipedia &mdash; I've left it for many months on end in the past.  Though my sense is it is much improved in many respects. The one issue types, consensus thugs and trolls are still there, but there are a larger number of people of good will, and a much more sophisticated skill base. Sunray 08:08, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Addition of navigation box
The box CQ added was very attractive. However, it needs more work, I think. The first thing that struck me was that most of it is a repeat of the Table of Contents. The other problem I noticed is that it moves the TOC out of sight and adds a huge block of white space beside it. I tried to reposition it, without success. It needs to be much smaller, IMO in order to not dominate the lead. What about modifying it to add info that is not already contained in the TOC. Sunray 15:50, 29 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I've found a way to move the TOC around, but I don't know how to edit the NAV box.


 * Further comment about the content of the NAV box. Let's lose the link to the various disciplines. They are not subjects directly related to community (as those subjects deal with many other things). Sunray 17:06, 29 July 2006 (UTC)


 * The Living Hell! I'm only an electrician from Kentucky! I've open dialogs all over the place to try to figure out how academic people (WikiProject Wikidemia) like sociologists (WikiProject Sociology) can work together with laymen (WikiProject Community) to find and propogate understanding. I've suggested a collaboration at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject Sociology called "Collaboration of the Month - August 2006" which is similar to WP:COTW. Maybe there is a good place to go into deeper discussions about how sociology, anthropology, psychology, economics, urban planning, rural community, and all the vast hosts of other topics are seen by academia. Lets discuss technical issues about the template at Template talk:Community. CQ 21:35, 29 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Re: "open dialogues." Once opened, there is an usually an obligation to listen for a response. Dialogues take at least two people. If one opens too many, at once, it may get scratchy, with conversations breaking out here and there and people getting frustrated if they are not responded to. ''N'est-ce pas? Sunray 22:20, 29 July 2006 (UTC)