Quest for Community
From Internet: Knowledge and Community
Oldenburg draws upon small town america to illustrate his concept of the “quest for community”. Looking beyond the physical structure or the size of the town itself, rather Oldenburg pulls from our existing schema of what a small town brings emotionally. The feeling of personal connection, friendship, and a sense of place.
I think these concepts are just as relevant today as they were a hundred years ago. Human beings are a social creature, we desire a sense of community as well as personal identity, the later can be largely drawn from a sense of place. With the advent of new media, gathering places such as Facebook, Twitter, Myspace etc., are becoming a community onto their own. To interact within your community can now take place in physical isolation if a member so chooses. Could it be that the the popularity of these new social gathering networks came at a time when americans were longing for a sense of community?
