VCE Sociology Unit 3 Outcome 1 Community and society ‘Factors that help both maintain and weaken a sense of community’

Sense of community A sense of community focuses on the experience of community rather than its structure, form or physical features It involves a feeling that members have of belonging and connection to one another and the group A sense of community is often a “sense of belonging”, aka “community spirit” It can be maintained, strengthened or weakened

Sense of community Think of a community you belong to Identify any pre-requisites for membership to the community Explain why the community is important to you or why you benefit from it Describe how a sense of belonging is created within the community

Maintain sense of community A sense of community can be maintained or strengthened by: ▫Shared values and beliefs ▫Identifying features ▫Typical behaviours ▫Shared interest and purposes

Maintain sense of community Shared values and beliefs ▫Members share the same religion, ideologies or codes of behaviour ▫A karate community may:  Support Japanese militarism  View karate as a psychological endeavor promoting perseverance, fearlessness, virtue, and leadership skills  Aim to be inwardly humble and outwardly gentle

Maintain sense of community Identifying features ▫Members can be identified by language spoken, symbols/flags, anthems, clothing, food, music, dance, etc ▫Some private school communities may have:  Compulsory school uniforms  School logo on school bag  All students conforming to certain haircuts

Maintain sense of community Typical behaviours ▫Behaviour that brings members together such as meetings, social days/nights or working bees. ▫A sporting community may participate in:  Team training  Raising funds through a sausage sizzle at Bunnings  Competitions against other teams

Maintain sense of community Shared interest and purposes ▫Fundraising, achieving a goal or promoting a cause ▫A health-based community might:  Lobby for a change to fast food advertising  Increase fitness in children through school programs  Educate adults about childhood obesity

Maintain sense of community Think of a community Identify examples of how SITS has developed, maintained or strengthened a sense of community Explain whether a community can exist without incorporating all of the SITS categories

Maintain sense of community American sociologist Roland L. Warren (1963) categorises a community as: ▫A place in or near a definite geographical location ▫A place of physical and psychological security that serves as a home base ▫Performing the following functions:  Mutual support  Economic welfare  Socialisation  Social control  Social participation

Maintain sense of community Mutual support ▫Helping each other with tasks that are too big for one, and achieving common goals Economic welfare ▫Production-distribution-consumption ▫Consumption of goods and services and the related employment in production and distribution is contained within the community

Maintain sense of community Socialisation ▫The teaching of morals, values and rules to its members Social control ▫Ensuring that members adhere to the groups values and rules Social participation ▫Meeting the needs for human companionship, often through religion

Maintain sense of community Rank Warren’s MESSS functions from most to least important in maintaining or strengthening a sense of community Choose one function and describe how its omission would impact on the sense of community Explain how a sense of community can be weakened by applying the MESSS theory

Maintaining or Weakening? Other factors that may maintain or weaken a sense of community include: ▫Political changes  laws or policy, free trade agreement ▫Economic changes  loss of funding, global financial crisis ▫Environmental changes  drought, rising sea levels ▫Technological changes  use of mobile phones in Cronulla riot, transport ▫Social changes  sexism, racism, ageism, etc

Maintaining or Weakening? The Cranbourne gas leak may have unintentionally brought the community together through a class action The rebuilding of Kinglake after the fires has simultaneously maintained and weakened a sense of community Changes to clearway times has brought Stonnington Council traders together as a community to “fight” the State Government

TO DO Write definitions of the following terms in your glossary: ▫Sense of community ▫Sense of community (MESSS) ▫Sense of community (SITS)