Community Definition: What Makes a Group a Community

Meaning of community: the main senses

1. People who live in one area. "The whole community turned out to clean the beach." Here the link is geography.
2. People who share an interest, background or identity, even if they live far apart. Examples: the medical community, the deaf community, an online gaming community, the Gujarati community in New Jersey.
3. A feeling of fellowship. "There is a real sense of community in this office." This is the warm, uncountable use.
4. The public in general, as in "giving back to the community" or "community service."
5. In biology, a group of different species living and interacting in one place, such as a coral reef community.

Community meaning example sentences

• Our apartment building started a weekly potluck, and it slowly turned neighbours into a community.
• The scientific community was slow to accept the new finding until other labs repeated it.
• After the flood, the local temple and the community hall both became relief centres.
• She found a supportive community of runners who meet in the park at six every morning.
• Students must complete forty hours of community service before graduation.

Beyond the community definition: what makes it real

Not every group is a community. Passengers on a train share a place, but most would not call themselves one. Social scientists often point to a few ingredients:

• Shared ground: a place, interest, belief or need.
• Repeated contact: people meet or talk often enough to know each other.
• Belonging: members feel they are part of something and are accepted.
• Mutual support: people help one another, formally or informally.

This is why a city can contain many communities, and why one person may belong to several at once.

Common pairings and word forms

As a modifier, community appears in many fixed phrases: community center (US) or community centre (UK and India), community college, community health worker, community garden, community policing and community guidelines for websites and apps. Adjectives often paired with it include local, close-knit, tight-knit, wider and global.

The related adjective communal means shared by a group ("a communal kitchen"). In Indian English, communal often refers to tension between religious groups, so choose it with care.

Roots of community

English borrowed community from Old French in the late 1300s, which in turn came from Latin communitas, meaning fellowship or shared quality. That noun is built on communis, common. The same root gives us common, communicate and communion, all of which carry the idea of something shared. You can explore one of them on our communication page.

Community in different settings

Everyday life: neighbourhoods, schools, places of worship and clubs. Work: professional communities, like the legal or tech community. Online: forums and groups built around a shared interest. Policy and news: phrases like community leaders or community consultation. Science: in ecology, a community is all the living species in an area, which is a smaller idea than an ecosystem, because an ecosystem also includes soil, water and climate.

Groups spread across the world from a shared homeland are often called a diaspora, and the way of life they share is their culture. More social vocabulary is on our law, politics and society page.

Define community: mistakes to avoid

• Singular or plural verb? In American English, community usually takes a singular verb ("the community is upset"). British and Indian English sometimes use a plural verb when thinking of the members ("the community are divided").
• Spelling: two m's, one n: c-o-m-m-u-n-i-t-y.
• Overuse: in formal writing, saying "the community" without saying which one can be vague. Name the group if you can.