Block, Peter. Community: the structure of belonging. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2008. Chapters 1-2 The main focus of Block’s book is to “create a more positive and connected future for our communities, we must be willing to trade their problems for their possibilities.” The first chapter begins by laying out the format of the text and the multiple authors and their thoughts that Block will draw on to explain how to create and maintain healthy community. Block then goes on to discuss the importance of context within the community or the “fabric” of the community. Blocks makes it a point to discuss John McKnight’s three insights within a community: gifts, associational life, and community member power. Essentially, the context …show more content…
is acknowledged in the form of “assets of their citizens,” maintained by “groups of people voluntarily coming together to do some good,” and finally the effort the collective members put into building and maintaining the community. Next Block describes the power of the narrative and belief in possibilities. Basically, the historical narrative is what shapes the community thus far; however, if the members decide to change it, a new narrative will be born. The remaining of context of chapter one discusses ideas of wholesomeness, freedom, and accountability. The “quality of aliveness must be present in each step in the design and creation of the structure, or it to be present in the final product.” Such qualities are important to note because it will allow relationships between community members to form as well as being factors that can create a strong community. The last couple sections of chapter one propose some methodologies to building a community along with the engagement and patience that must accompany these arduous projects. Chapter two elaborates on the power of context and how it will shift as a community grows. “Context is the set of beliefs, at times ones that we are unaware of, that dictate how we think, how we frame the world, what we pay attention to, and consequently how we behave. It is sometimes called a worldview.” As a future conflict practitioner, it is crucial to understand a party’s worldview because without understanding where individuals’ mindsets are derive from. Overall, the tone of this chapter is future forward and focused on the possibilities rather than the problems. Block become slightly redundant by repeating McKnight’s three insights in a contextual sense; however, Block does elaborate on the power of narrative and how it can change the context of the community. Next Block explains the importance of not just sustaining symptoms of the community but actually fixing them, which requires mainly relationship building.
Story telling is one useful method of building relationships that Block highlights. Specifically, “restoration can be considered the willingness to complete and eliminate the power out of the current story we have of our community and our place in,” which creates an opportunity to produce a new story. Overall, this chapter discusses the power and effectiveness of creating or changing the narrative of a community to provide it a sense of identity. Wheatley, Margaret. Walk out walk on a learning journey into communities daring to live the future now. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2011. Wheatly’s recount of a community building process in Santos, Brazil lead by Edgard Gouvela Junior gives an example of theories and methodologies that apply to community building being put into effect. Throughout the text, there is a sense of “us versus them.” Warriors Without Weapons are a community building group from the Elos Institute. Concerned with this perpetual “us versus them” attitude of the community members, one Warrior without Weapons was skeptical of the project. Fortunately, Deborah decided to participate in a “thirty-day game.” “The purpose of the game was not to help, save or fix anyone else. The purpose of the game was to discover how play unleashes everyone’s creativity, how it invades us to see what’s possible …show more content…
rather than what’s so.” This quote resonates that community building is about more than just repairing the damage, it is about building upon what is already there. In the community there is the “room of the salted circles,” which is an abandoned building where drug deals occur and many homeless people live. It is essentially a metaphor for the problems in the community and each day, the Warriors Without Weapons go in and try to shovel through the layers of “shit and broken dreams…and dragging them out into the sunshine.” In reference to Block in another reading, the outside party coming in is attempting to understand the context and narrative of the existing community. The thirty-day game is to rebuild the “room of salted circles.” Specifically, the goal is to build an oasis; however, there were three rules. “1. Whatever we build has to simple, accessible, and easy. 2. It can’t cost anything…3…product has to be something we create collectively and with our hands. 4. It has to meet a real need in the community—as defined by the community.” Going with the idea of a metaphor, these three rules are important to community building in general. In order to fix a community, it does not need an elaborate plan. In addition, it cannot “cost” anything in the respect that no one should be exploited and everyone should be included in the community building process. Also, the community must collectively agree in order to create unity. Finally, a community’s identity can only be created by itself. In the end the two individuals groups finish the oasis that turns out to be a library-garden type of thing and the community is on its way to being reconstructed with a new narrative. Forsyth, Donelson. Group Dynamics. 6 edition. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing, 2013. Ch. 3 The idea of inclusion and isolation is the focus of chapter 3. It has been proven that ere is a need to belong or “the dispositional tendency to seek out and join with other humans.” This is basically why there are groups. It is a natural phenomenon. The idea of isolation, although some may argue as Henry Thoreau did, as a possible lifestyle is not practiced by most. With this in mind, the social interactions between human beings naturally creates groups. Forsyth goes on to explain the negative reactions individuals have to exclusion or isolation. Ostracism is the deliberate exclusion from a group. Victims of ostracism often respond with freezing, flight-or-flight, or tend-and-befriend. Being ostracized is hurtful and found to be the cause of extreme forms of violence such as mass shootings. Next, Forsyth discuss the idea of self-esteem. Sociometer theory is the practice of analyzing an individual’s self-esteem. Scientifically, the idea of groups is associated with natural selection because “individuals who were affiliated with groups were more likely to survive,” which is an idea observed in many species of primates including humans. Since self-esteem relies on the idea of being a part of something, next, Forsyth goes on to discuss individualism versus collectivism. Drawing from Fiske, the idea of communal relationships and the norm of equality is more appealing than exchange relationships and the norm of reciprocity. “Collectivist are enjoined to follow the dictates of social norms when making choices and selecting course of action.” This is a great trait to have when trying to build a community. However, since there are also individualist, is challenging to get every individual to be so gung-hoe about building communal relationships. Individualist tend to be independent and rely only on themselves. Lastly, Forsyth in relation to collectivism and individualism explores personal identity versus social identity.
Both categories of identity play into how an individual classifies him/herself as independent or interdependent. Self-stereo typing is also used to establish identity and find a specific group one can be associated with. “The [stereotypes] describe the typical characteristic of people in various social groups. They also include information about how a group is different from other groups.” This resurfaces the idea of us versus them. Groups end up in conflict due to their divergent characteristics and differences. After forming an identity, of course an individual will only want to protect their individualistic identity and collective identity to create a complete image of self. If this sense of self is challenged, an individual will often turn to a group seeking reassurance. Individuals are the building blocks of groups and multiple facets that should be considered when analyzing group
conflicts.
In the book Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman there are many different characters, and even some of them cross paths. A community garden was started just by one person therefore everyone follows. They all learn how to get along with other people, how to not stereotype so much, and how to depend on each other in their community. All of them struggle with something, whether it's with family, friends, or feeling stereotyped. They learn the importance of a community, and realize how much they really depend on each other. Having a community is important for all people to incorporate diversity, culture,and unique stories into their lives. You don't realize how much people depend on their community until its gone. The importance
Mary Pipher’s “Writing to Connect” focuses on persuading its reader through personal experience, expert testimonies, and figurative language that his writing can change the world. At the end of the text, Pipher hopes that her reader believes that one’s words have value and can impact others.
Beyond the basic need for a sense of control, people are driven by their sense of identity, of who they are. Each person lives in their own universes, which are centered upon their feelings of self-purpose. There are multiple types of identities, such as individual and group identities. Each person's identity is formed differently because of the unique experiences every individual encounters. The formation can be affected by many things such as their home environment, social interactions, and physiological health.
The author writes that in asset based community development and a core Public Allies belief, is that the symbolic “glass of water” is both half empty and half full. The author extends the example to individuals as well as communities in saying that “ever member of a community, no exceptions, has gifts and talents that contribute to the community.” Additionally, every individual and community has weaknesses, and the proper application of leadership is to combine everybody’s assets to counter everybody’s weaknesses in the process of improving our communities. Public Allies makes no attempt as an organization to find and correct weaknesses, they only identify Allies’ assets to train them into community leaders. These ideas align well with the authors definition of leadership.
Identity is a group of characteristics, data or information that belongs exactly to one person or a group of people and that make it possible to establish differences between them. The consciousness that people have about themselves is part of their identity as well as what makes them unique. According to psychologists, identity is a consistent definition of one’s self as a unique individual, in terms of role, attitudes, beliefs and aspirations. Identity tries to define who people are, what they are, where they go or what they want to be or to do. Identity could depend on self-knowledge, self-esteem, or the ability of individuals to achieve their goals. Through self-analysis people can define who they are and who the people around them are. The most interesting point about identity is that some people know what they want and who they are, while it takes forever for others to figure out the factors mentioned before. Many of the individuals analyzed in this essay are confused about the different possible roles or positions they can adopt, and that’s exactly the reason they look for some professional help.
Community is like a Venn diagram. It is all about relations between a finite group of people or things. People have their own circles and, sometimes, these circles overlap one another. These interceptions are interests, common attitudes and goals that we share together. These interceptions bond us together as a community, as a Venn diagram. A good community needs good communication where people speak and listen to each other openly and honestly. It needs ti...
In his book The Community of Those Who Have Nothing in Common, Alphonso Lingis (1994) discusses community and proposes an untraditional view of community, the “other community”. Traditionally community is known as a social structure in which individuals have something in common. This usually refers to a shared location, shared identity or common values or beliefs. In this traditional view or “rational community” these commonalities are crucial in uniting individuals.
Rothman, J. (1974). Three models of community organization practice. Strategies of community organization: A book of readings, 22-38.
Some of the strengths of the social identity theory are that; throughout the years it has supported many empirical studies, it has also demonstrated the social categorization in intergroup behaviors, allowed us to differentiate between social and personal identities and has provide explanations for other areas of psychology (conformity). A weaknesses of the Social identity theory is that its application is restricted in the sense that it has very low ecological validity. Another weakness is that SIT favors situational factors rather than dispositional is not supported by evidence. The social Identity theory can be used to how to explain how we form our social and personal identities in the terms of in and out groups. SIT can also be used to explain why there is conflict between humans and different societies.
Social identity theory can be applied to many different problems and real life situations. It demonstrates the role of categorization in behaviors, and explores how being part of a group affects social interaction in everyday life.
The McMillan-Chavis model consists of four elements that are necessary to evaluate a sense of community. They are interdependent and all exist on some level whether positively or negatively. These four elements are membership, influence, integration, and emotional connection. While some of these may be more predominant, they are all contributors to a psychological sense of community. To provide an example of how the McMillan-Chavis model is applied to a community setting that one belongs to, the University of New Haven Community Psychology graduate program will be the community of application. This particular community has a respectable psychological sense of community that provides a suitable example.
A community is comprised of a group of goal oriented individuals with similar beliefs and expectations. Currently the term is used interchangeably with society, the town one lives in and even religion. A less shallow interpretation suggests that community embodies a lifestyle unique to its members. Similarities within the group establish bonds along with ideals, values, and strength in numbers unknown to an individual. Ideals and values ultimately impose the culture that the constituents abide by. By becoming part of a community, socialization...
A Community can be defined as a group of people who don’t just live in the same area, but also share the same interests, experiences and often concerns about the area in which they live. Often when individuals have lived on a street or in an area for a while they become familiar with each other and the issues surrounding them. Children often attend the same schools and grow up together, again sharing similar experiences. In some instances adults may work together, and quite commonly all community members will share the same doctors, dentists, hospitals, health visitors and other public services and facilities.
..., & Bishop, A. P. (2005). Special section on learning in communities. The Journal of Community Informatics, 1(2), 116–133. Retrieved January 4, 2008 from http://ci-journal.net/index.php/ciej/article/view/335/243.
People are what make a community, communities may have disagreements sometimes, but they get through it in order to work. A good community is a place of shelter, trust, and encouragement. We should protect each other and work with each other to make our community great. Communication and respect fuel a community. Community is about feeling belonging. A community is a socially constructed environment where everyone in it works together. In the end, everyone can stand together,work together,support each other and it will be a beloved