| Whose Community Is It Anyway? | |
|
by: Suellen Hozman*
The Universal Community will meet everywhere, tonight at eight. The fictitious announcement appeared as galactic skywriting. What if everyone came? Would everyone stay? Probably not. Some would leave because people from over there, you know, that place, came. I struggle with the word community. What does it really mean? I feel heretical taking issue with the word. It’s the social apple pie of language. Sometimes it gets flung, hits you in the face and it doesn’t taste sweet.
Communities are groups of people with something in common. There’s the scientific community, the Asian community, the gay and Lesbian community, the Jewish community, the disabled community, the vegetarian community, the church community, the sex without partners community and on and on. You can declare yourself as part of a community or wait for others to declare you as part of a community. It will happen.
I’m Jewish on my parents side. Some people consider me part of the Jewish community, despite the fact that my community of friends, at this time, doesn’t include any Jewish people. I’ve been asked to give explanations of what Jewish people do at some milestone life event. “You’re Jewish. What do Jewish people do when someone dies, gets married, divorced?” Do I have the right to speak for anyone but myself? Who speaks for the Jewish community? Any member? Who speaks for any community?
Perhaps this attraction to community is simply about our need to belong. If so, how do you explain hermits? Okay, hermits are the exceptions. But if communities are about people with something in common, then hermits constitute a community. Imagine their meeting announcement. “Hermit community meeting. Tonight at eight. Don’t come.” In the spirit of community, together, they could make it not happen.
Maybe the hermits are onto something about the nature of community. If community is more than the need to belong, perhaps it’s about the need to keep others out. Wow. That sounds contrary to community spirit. But isn’t that true? Does the vegetarian community want to include bow hunters at their monthly dinner meeting? I don’t think so. Do singles want married people at their community events? Probably not without a note from their spouse.
The practice of community is as much about exclusion as inclusion. Community is as much about defining how you are different from others as it is about how you are the same. The word is a noun: a person, place, or thing. That’s my problem. I don’t like it that the word is a noun. I want the word to go deep and describe a universally shared feeling that’s part of the Jungian collective unconscious. I want community to be an action verb describing behavior. Let’s community tonight at eight and end world hunger.
I want to belong. I want to be included. I embrace that social apple pie in my own way. On those applications that ask you to make one selection that includes Asian or Pacific Islander, Caucasian, African American, Hispanic, Native American, or Other, I choose "other" and write in human being. Whether you want me or not. I’m part of the community.
*Suellen Hozman juggles (really) and she believes life is all about the journey. To comment or commune, you can contact Suellen Hozman. Suellen
Next page >
Community - Gone?
1
2
Get a Printer Friendly Version
Previous Features
About HR Home Page
