Session format:
Regular session
Title:
Approaches to Communities in the Past and the Present
Content:
Community studies rooted in sociology are traditionally defined as a dichotomy between Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft (Tönnies 1964). Gemeinschaft refers to community defined by personal relations such as family, ethnicity, religion or rank, whilst Gesellschaft refer to society characterised by rationality, formalised conventions, and contractual relationships mediated by money, benefit or advantages. An evolutionistic development from an immature Gemeinschaft to a mature Gesellschaft is often presupposed (Brint 2001). These definitions, however, have proven inadequate in recent studies, and new concepts introduced, viewing communities as a set of variable properties of interactions at multiple scales (Harris 2014). These interactions, it is suggested, can evolve around specific locations such as a village or town; grow from individual identities such as ethnicity or religion; or they can be based on structures such as family, clans or profession. They can be morally or imaginably described, multi-scalar and emotional, and defined by things, landscapes, animals and plants.
The aim of the session is to explore the concept of communities as a dynamic phenomenon. We wish to target discussions on the processes that form, maintain and dissolve communities in the past and how we investigate these archaeologically. We are specifically interested in the discussion of how these processes can be defined and identified in the archaeological record. Based on these discussions, we would like to explore how studies of past communities can give new perspectives on - maybe even pose critical questions to - how communities form, are maintained and dissolve today.
On that note, we invite contributions that discuss the dynamic processes of communities with a starting point in either case studies from the archaeological record of any period; more general theoretical reflections; or studies that reflect on how theories of past communities can inform present day sense of community.
Keywords:
Communities, Social organisation, Assemblages, Multiscalar approach
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
Main organiser:
Trine Borake (Denmark) 1
Co-organisers:
Anna Beck (Denmark) 2
Caroline Heitz (United Kingdom) 3
Knut Austvoll (Norway) 4
Affiliations:
1. Museum Vestsjælland
2. Museum Sydøstdanmark
3. University of Oxford
4. University of Oslo
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