The following outline is provided as an overview of topics relating to community.
A community is a group of people whose identity as a group lies in their interaction and sharing. Many factors may affect the identity of the participants and their degree of adhesion, such as intent, belief, resources, preferences, needs and risks.
Geographic and physical communities
Human geography – who people are and where they live
European Community – founded on March 25, 1957 by the signing of the Treaty of RomeCommunity council – tier of local government in Wales and ScotlandAutonomous communities of Spain – Spain's fifty provinces are grouped into seventeen autonomous communitiesCommunities, regions and language areas of Belgium –Local community – town, city, neighborhood, rural area, or any locale and everyone in itUnincorporated community – geographic area having a common social identityResidential community – small town or city, composed mostly of residentsIntentional Community – planned residential community, usually of people that share personal and cultural values.Cohousing – intentional community composed of private homes centered around a common house and other common facilities.Ecovillage – intentional community formed with social, economic, and ecological sustainability as its goal.Commune (intentional community) – intentional community where most resources are shared and there is little or no personal property (as opposed to communities that only share housing)Monastery – community of monks practicing a religious disciplineConvent – community of clergy particularly in the Roman Catholic Church and, to a lesser degree, in the Anglican ChurchWorld Brotherhood Colonies – idea for spiritual based intentional communities based on shared spiritual principles, begun by Paramahansa YoganandaWorld community – global aspects of community from the perspective of governance and the humanitiesInternational community – global aspects of community from the perspective of governance and the humanitiesGlobal village – global aspects of community from the perspective of telecommunicationsBusiness community – total body of business people its relationships and interactionsReligious community – total body of religious people its relationships and interactionsScientific community – total body of scientists, its relationships and interactionsEpistemic community – those who accept one version of a storyDiscourse Community – users of a particular style of languageMoral community – group of people drawn together by a common interest in living according to a particular moral philosophyVoluntary association – group of individuals who voluntarily enter into an agreement to accomplish a purposeCooperative – group of persons who join together (co-operate) to carry on an economic activity of mutual benefitCommunity of...
Action – group of people organized to support a cause or bring about social changeCircumstance – group of people bound together because of circumstances usually beyond their controlInterest – group of people who share a common interest or passionPlace – group of people bound together because of where they spend a continuous portion of their timePosition – group of people who share a particular station in life (such as teenage years, marriage, parenthood, etc.)Practice – group of people who choose to collaborate over an extended period to share ideas, find solutions, and build innovations.Purpose – group of people who are going through the same process or are trying to achieve a similar objectivesee Group (sociology)
Housing cooperative – legal entity that owns real estate, usually one or more residential buildingsRetailers' cooperative – network of retailers which employs economies of scale to get discounts from manufacturers and to pool marketingConsumers' cooperative – cooperative which employs economies of scale to get discounts from distributorsUtility cooperative – public utility such as electric, water or telecommunications owned by its membersWorker cooperative – business entity owned in part or exclusively by its workersAffinity group – small group of activists (usually from 3-20) who work together on direct actionIntentional community – planned residential community with a much higher degree of social interaction than other communitiesLearning community – cohort-based, interdisciplinary approach to higher education covering distinct fields of studyVirtual community – See Virtual community section belowWeb community –Lists of communities, co-ops, etc.:
Intentional communitiesCooperativesLists of virtual communities:
Benchmark virtual communitiesAdditional virtual community listingsThe world community:
Note to dialup users: the following lists are massive
List of countries (a comprehensive list of countries of the world)List of subnational entities (a comprehensive list of subnational entities, such as states, provinces, communities, etc.)Craigslist – centralized network of urban online communities, featuring free classified advertisements (with jobs, housing, personals, for sale/barter/wanted, services, community, gigs and resumes categories) and forums sorted by various topicsCommunity concepts, movements and schools of thought
Affinity (sociology) – in terms of sociology, refers to "kinship of spirit", interest and other interpersonal commonalitiesCenobitic – monastic tradition that stresses community life as opposed to eremitic (like a hermit).Collective – group of people who share common interests, working together to achieve a common objectiveCollectivism – school of thought, antithetical to Individualism, in which the collective takes precedence over the individualCommunitarianism – group of related but distinct philosophies advocating phenomena such as civil societyCommunitas – Latin noun for the spirit of community having significance in cultural anthropology and the social sciences.Community politics – movement in British politics to re-engage people with political action on a local levelCommunity television – television stations that are owned and operated by communities rather than governments or corporationsConsanguinity – quality of being descended from the same ancestor as another personConsensus decision-making – inclusive decision-making processes that accommodate even the minorityEmergence – complex pattern formation from simpler rulesGemeinschaft and Gesellschaft – terms introduced by German sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies to distinguish community from societyGroup (sociology) – collection of people who share characteristics, interact and have a common identityGroup dynamics – field of study within the social sciences that focuses on the nature of groupsImagined communities – concept that nations are socially constructed by the imaginations of peopleInternationalism (politics) – political movement which advocates cooperation between nations for the benefit of allInterpersonal relationship – connection, affiliation or association between two or more peopleLiminality – period of transition related to initiation, rite of passage or other entry into a groupMeeting – two or more people coming together to have discussions or produce a predetermined output, often in a formalized wayMeritocracy – form of government based on rule by ability (merit) rather than by wealth or other determinants of social position.Organization – formal group of people with one or more shared goalsOrganizational learning – area of knowledge that looks at how an organization learns and adaptsPlenary session – part of a meeting when all members of all parties are in attendanceScientific Community Metaphor – approach in computer science to understanding and performing scientific communitiesSense of community – look from the psychological perspective at how and why communities form and why people join themSmall-group communication – communication in a context that mixes interpersonal communication interactions with social clusteringSocial capital – concept with a variety of inter-related definitions, based on the economic value of social networksSocialization – process by which people learn to adopt the behavior patterns of the community in which they liveSolidarity (sociology) – feeling or condition of unity based on common goals, interests, and sympathies among a group's membersCommunity studies – academic discipline, drawing on sociology and anthropology with emphasis on ethnography (participant observation)Community psychology – use of the principles of psychology to understand how communities work (or fail to work)Computational sociology – recently developed branch of sociology that uses computation to analyze social phenomenaCultural anthropology – field of anthropology comprising the holistic study of humanityInternet studies – emerging field of academia dealing with the interaction between the Internet and modern societyOrganizational Development – branch of Sociology that deals with how and why people organize themselvesPhilosophy of social science – scholarly elucidation and debate of accounts of the nature of the social sciencesRural sociology – field of sociology associated with the study of life in small towns and the country.Social geography – how society affects geographical features and how environmental factors affect society.Social philosophy – philosophical study of interesting questions about social behavior (typically, of humans).Social sciences – groups of academic disciplines that study the human aspects of the world using scientific methodsSociocultural evolution – theories of cultural evolution and social evolution – describing how cultures and societies have developed over timeUrban planning – discipline which deals with the development of metropolitan areas, municipalities and neighbourhoodsCommunity development – efforts to improve communities:
Community organizing – process by which people are brought together to act in common self-interestCommunity building – the more informal (or intangible) aspects of community development; the establishment, broadening and deepening of links between community membersCommunity economic development – efforts to improve the material aspects of local communitiesCommunity development planning – Public participatory and usually interactive town or neighborhood planning and designCommunity practice – type of social work practice that focuses on community level interventionsCommunity service – service (voluntary or compulsory) that a person performs for the benefit of his or her local communityVirtual community Virtual community – group of people communicating with each other by means of information technologies:
Bulletin board system –Chat room – online site in which people can chat online (talk by broadcasting messages to people on the same site in real time)Computer-mediated communication –Discourse community –Electronic mailing list – special usage of e-mail that allows for widespread distribution of information to many Internet usersInternet activism –Internet forum –Internet social network –Massively distributed collaboration –Motivations for Contributing to Online Communities –Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing GamesNetwork of practice –Online deliberation –Social network –Social evolutionary computation –The Virtual Community –Usenet – distributed Internet discussion system that evolved from a general purpose UUCP network of the same nameVirtual Community of Practice –Virtual Ethnography –Virtual reality –Web community –Web of trust –Wireless community projects – development of interlinked computer networksWorld Wide Web – global, read-write information spaceSee also Category:Virtual reality communities
Global Ecovillage Network – global association of people and communities (ecovillages) dedicated to living "sustainable plus" livesCommunication – process of sending information to oneself or another entity – usually via a languageGathering place – phenomenal natural location crucial to culture and civilizationCommunity Boards – community-based mediation program, established in 1976, in San Francisco, California – USACommunity garden – small plots of land allocated to groups of people by some organization for collective gardeningWELL – (Whole Earth Lectronic Link or The WELL) - one of the oldest virtual communities still online.The Farm (Tennessee) – spiritual intentional community in Summertown, Tennessee – known informally as a hippie communeCommunity college – educational institution providing post-secondary educationCommunity foundations – institutions that pool donations into coordinated investments for grantsCommunity (trade union) – trade union in the UK