I am struggling with the definition of reality in some of the online community articles I have read. They seem to make a distinction between physical and virtual communities, sometimes pulling in "imagined communities" but fail to really discuss the perception of reality from the point of view from the individual. Maybe I'm completely missing something, and if I am please correct me or maybe point me in the direction of some articles, but isn't this a very important distinction to draw. Community in one sense is a perceived notion, possibly a perceived connectedness with others. So let's say my reality as an individual does not involve a high degree of face-to-face contact, then I must have on some level a constructed perception of my community - something which dictates my behavior within and around those community activities...to a certain degree wouldn't the same apply for online communities? Maybe I'm digging to deep within the individual to gain a clear perspective... Steve
sometimes pulling in "imagined communities" but fail to really discuss the perception of reality from the point of view from the individual. the problem here is that the concept of an 'imagined community' does not necessitate that there is a 'real' community. You might investigate the book entitled 'Imagined Communities' about this, which put forth the start of much of this related research. One problem of course is that if you focus on the individual you significantly undermine what it means to be in a community because the level of analysis, normative, and otherwise is entirely problematic for the concept, which necessitates a level of analysis where the organic parts of the community are more important than the essential parts(the individuals). The group identity entails the individual identity, not the opposite. Does that help?
jeremy hunsinger jhuns@vt.edu on the ibook www.cddc.vt.edu www.cddc.vt.edu/jeremy www.dromocracy.com
participants (2)
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jeremy hunsinger -
Steve Fox (NLG)