understanding community

• Communities - could either be referred to as a territorial, a network of interrelationships within a common interest, or as a shared spiritual/emotional connectedness.
• Communities - are social constructs

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1. Community as a shared political territory and heritage - a traditional understanding of community ^^refers to a group of people living in the same geographical area^^

• INSTITUTIONS:
  • Educational
  • Military
  • Government
  • Health Care

GRASSROOTS:

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  • Enclaves (sitio)
  • Villages
  • Barangays

  1. Community as a network of interpersonal ties based on a common interest - these ties, as it turns, ^^provide mutual support, a sense of identity, and a sense of belongingness^^ for the members

         3.  Community as a profound sharing of spiritual and/ or emotional connection - This understanding of community ^^pertains to a sense of spiritual and/or emotional connection to others^^, or communication with others on the basis of an experience of a *common problem* (e. g., being afflicted with cancer or any form of terminal illness), *bond* (e.g., experiencing life after death), or a *situated cognition* (e.g., having realizations that individual actions are inevitably linked to others, which evoke meaningful attachments) (Wilmott 1989, Sunduram et al. 2012).
     

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Sense of Community - “a ^^feeling that members have of belonging, a feeling that members matter to one another and to the group,^^ and a shared faith that members’ needs will be met through their commitment to be together.”

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4 Elements of the Sense of Community

1. Membership - refers to the feeling of ^^belonging or sharing a sense of personal relatedness.^^

• Boundaries - allowing others to ^^belong and keeping others out^^
• Emotional safety - feelings of ^^security and trust^^ in revealing how one really feels
• Sense of belonging and identification - members’ feeling ^^that they belong, fit in, and are accepted by the community^^
• Personal Investment - ^^sacrifices made to maintain membership^^
• Common symbol system - ^^things used to represent the community^^

1. Influence - refers to the ^^sense of having importance or of feeling valued^^
2. Integration and fulfillment of needs - refers to the ^^feeling of fulfillment, which stems from the personal investments^^ that members make in maintaining community membership or in participating in community activities and affairs.
3. Shared emotional connection - refers to a ^^sense of shared cultural and historical heritage^^ and the feeling that common experiences will continue to be shared
   • Contact hypothesis - members of the community ^^become close when there are lots of opportunities for interaction^^
   • Quality of interaction - when ^^interaction brings about positive experiences^^ and good relationships, it would then fosters a great bond
   • Closure to events - when ^^iterations are ambiguous and community tasks are unresolved^^, then community cohesion will be inhibited
   • Shared event hypothesis - increased importance of shared event ^^results into greater community bond^^
   • Investment - the community becomes ^^important to someone who has given time, energy, money, effort, and^^ ^^emotional openness^^ to other members of the community
   • Effect of honor and humiliation to community members - members who have been ^^publicly rewarded or recognized by the community^^ will be more attracted to that community, similarly, members who have been publicly humiliated
   • Spiritual bond - the ^^spark of friendship where members are able to be with other members in the community^^ in order to have a setting and audience to express unique aspects of one’s personality and see oneself mirrored in the eyes and responses of others

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