Communities: A Profound Connection Between Members

Do the members of civilizations and communities share the same types of connections, or are communities the result of members finding more profound similarities with one another?  Can the concept of a civilization and community coexist? In the reading, "Civilization": What's in a Word?, it is claimed that early "civilizations" shouldn’t be called civilizations, because the word civilization implies being made up of people with "distinct and widely shared identities.” Instead, what we call early civilizations were just groups of people in that lived in a shared area.  They may or may not have had any physical or psychological connections, but they were labeled as civilizations because they lived within a region of land and worked together to survive. It wasn't until much later that communities were formed. 

I believe that the text contains a valid argument. When I look at ancient “civilizations”, I don’t see many connections that brought citizens together.  They worked with one another to survive, not to share something they were committed to. Civilizations actually had many problems because of the lack of connection between individuals.  Because of the wide range of different beliefs, necessities, and lifestyles, civilizations were hard to maintain.  Different sectors of people wanted to break off and make their own civilizations based on their sub-groups’ best interests.

To me, a community is made up of a set of people that intentionally bring themselves together through common perspectives, beliefs, and goals.  These people choose to be together because they find deep connections with one another than just living near each other. 

Communities then must have evolved from "civilizations."  This may have been because people saw the benefits of having deep connections with one another in order to achieve similar goals. Another possibility is that people felt more comfortable living and spending time with others who shared commonalities with them. However, civilizations and communities can still coexist.  I believe communities make up civilizations.  In other words, each community has a connection with one another, such as a geographic location, and therefore is joined together to make a civilization.