section_path: Abstract
section_name: Abstract
paragraph_text: A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, town, or neighborhood) or in virtual space through communication platforms. Durable good relations that extend beyond immediate genealogical ties also define a sense of community, important to people's identity, practice, and roles in social institutions such as family, home, work, government, TV network, society, or humanity at large. Although communities are usually small relative to personal social ties, "community" may also refer to large-group affiliations such as national communities, international communities, and virtual communities.
  
  In terms of sociological categories, a community can seem like a sub-set of a social collectivity. In developmental views, a community can emerge out of a collectivity.
  
  The English-language word "community" derives from the Old French comuneté (Modern French: communauté), which comes from the Latin communitas "community", "public spirit" (from Latin communis, "common").
  
  Human communities may have intent, belief, resources, preferences, needs, and risks in common, affecting the identity of the participants and their degree of cohesiveness.