Community Studies: Anthropological

The term "community" has been used by anthropology in a variety of ways and contexts. On a concrete ethnographic level, "community" and "community studies" have two main denotations. One is generic, echoing the interest anthropology and anthropologists have always had in ordinary, stable, small-scale localized collectives. The other pertains to studies of rural populations (e.g., villages, parishes, counties) and urban enclaves (e.g., neighborhoods and quarters) within industrialized, developed Western countries.Analytically, the term tends to denote a syndrome rather than an accurately defined phenomenon. Used in various periods and within different theoretical orientations in reference to territorially based units, professional circles, solidarity groups and informal sociocultural amalgams, it could imply permanent collections with well-defined boundaries as well as loosely defined and transient formations.The efficacy of the term "community" as an interpretative tool was rather limited prior to the 1970s. New anthropological and ethnographic vistas since, however, have imbued it with more theoretical currency. It became, for example, a significant element in new anthropological tool-boxes developed for the analysis of rural groups in the northern, southern, and western margins of Europe. Later it found new uses as anthropologists began grappling with the need to conceptualize and historicize transnational social formations in a globalizing world.