Theoretical Perspective On The Communities In The Macro Social Environment

Human societies have also evolved from simple structures of early hunting-and-gathering communities to the more complex cosmopolitan cities of today. The hunting-and-gathering communities were fairly simple societies demanding the minimum of resources. Complexity grew with farming communities and more energy was necessary to sustain the larger populations and the demands of a stable, non-nomadic life. Early civilizations saw an increase in complexity with the introduction of specialization and trade. Which, again, required more energy to sustain even larger communities. Cultural evolution has evolved so much that cities today are only possible because of humans’ ability to control energy by the movement of food across large distances to easily accessible locations (McNeill 2003, 320-321).

From the early prehistoric society until now, we often heard the word “adaptation”, which means the process of changing something or changing our behavior to deal with new situations. The ways people adjust their natural environment varies according to time, place, and tribe. Foraging is common way of adaptation that people uses for most of human history; however because of the population pressure, some people adopt agriculture to fulfill their need. This essay, will discuss the positive and negative aspects of life in hunting and gathering societies compared to the agricultural societies based on Martin Harris’ article “Murders in Eden” and Jared Diamond’s article “The Worst Mistake in the History of Human Race.”

Assessing how environmental and geographical factors, such as location and availability of resources have affected and continue to affect the development, distribution, and diffusion of the human race over time is intriguing. There are several examples of how society’s start and why. One example is the site of ancient Mesopotamia, the birthplace of the world’s first civilizations. Diffusion is the movement of things and ideas from one culture to another. When diffusion occurs, the form of a trait such as tea drinking may move from one society to another but not its original cultural meaning. Two significant

Ecological perspective is a useful framework in which to view the individual in context with their environment. According to Rogers (2013) ecological theory was originally developed by a psychologist, Urie Bronfenbrenner in 1979 (p. 42). A fundamental tenet of ecological theory is that people are actively involved with their environments and their perceptions of the environment “significantly affects their well-being” (p. 42).

The book defines ecological, as “a type of sociological approach that emphasizes demographics and geo

On Chapter 2, The Developmental, Ecological-Systems Frameworks Haight and Taylor presented “the five levels of social context critical to human development: the microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem, and macrochronological system” (Haight and Taylor, 2016, p. 32). I think that as future social workers we have to consider people in the environment and the presentation of these five levels of social context play an important

The feeling of belonging to or pertaining to an organization where common goals are expressed and pursued through the joint efforts of the members of that community defines social-psychological theory. In other words, community members convey similar thoughts and emotions regarding the betterment of their community through the devotion of fulfilling a goal. Additionally, this communal effort stirs a sense of togetherness, fitting in, of making new friends, and of belonging to an organization that is providing a functioning environment. Ultimately, social-psychological theory emphasizes on how members of a community feel about their relationship with other community members.

During the first 2 million years of the United States’ history, the human population was a minor element in the world ecosystem, with at most 10 million members. One Hundred thousand years ago, with the dawning of the Stone Age, the number of human beings began to increase more rapidly. The relative balance before these times gave way when the human population developed methods of agriculture and animal breeding. This enabled them to stay in one location upon the earth instead of searching for food.

The societal levels of organization clearly identify the transitioning of institutions from: bands, small nomadic herds of people, to tribes, a stable village of hundreds, to chiefdoms, when centralized governments prevail, and states, large productive societies. Stages will find that as they move up the ladder, progress is indirectly related to food production. Food production goes hand-in-hand with our ever increasing population and is responsible for turning bands into states. The domestication of plants and animals lead to complex societies where sedentary living and dense populations encouraged germs, with the interaction of farm species, and technological innovations, in the form of guns and steel.

The term “civilization” describes a society with several distinct features that distinguish it from any other earlier form of human community. For the first time in human history, societies contained large populations that were concentrated

One of the greatest revolutions in the history of homo sapiens was the adoption of agriculture, which changed the face of communities at every level of class. Though this change was built upon new ideas and allowed us to provide more food for more people, was it in fact a positive change at the time? Today in 2017, we can all look around and see where the agricultural revolution has gotten us in the long run, but authors such as Yuval Noah Harari (2011) claim that during the infancy of the agricultural revolution, life for the average citizen was often a worse one than that of the common forager. A change in food production created many other changes, such as permanent human settlement, biologically unconventional labor, and a larger population density. This paper explores the pros and cons of the agricultural society and the hunter-gatherer society

Tonnies discusses the concepts of Community and Society in great detail, from the differences between the two to the wills that fuel them. Perhaps the main argument in the book is the differences between Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft, or Community and Society. Tonnies defines Gemeinschaft as a more intimate grouping of people who rely on each other and have shared goals that places emphasis on the cohesive unit. On the other hand, Gesellschaft is the impersonal grouping mainly found in city and urban areas. Societies are made up of people more interested in personal goals and the places an emphasis on individualism. I agree to an extent that communities are more personal and intimate and can foster stronger relationships within it. Communities require people to be more dependent on each other than cities and metropolitan areas and as a result the chances for tighter bonds are higher. However, present day Society and Community are vastly different than the time it was written. With technology and travel, communities can grow all over as well as virtually and can be present in a society location.

The revolutionizing transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture was a central shift in the way homo sapiens lived that occurred twelve thousand years ago. Consequently, several factors contributed to this astonishing modification of life including increasing population size, favorable environments such as the Nile River in Egypt and the Fertile Crescent in the Mediterranean. Furthermore, the transition from hunting and gathering to agriculture allowed for mass production of food in order for the sustainability of the increasing population size, but with agriculture also came specialization and the division of labor ultimately leading to moral inequality.

These Ecological concepts demographics, competition, segregation and integration can help social workers analyze a community in terms of its fairness and support to all of its members. One of the strengths gathered from this perspective is that it allows for the issues to be identified and it implements change as needed. The Human Ecology perspective can help frame subsequent questions like how to change the situation. It has concern for the individuals within the community but its main focus is on the environment. With the focus on the environment it will be better to determine why people behave the way they do. One of the concepts of this perspective is also one of tis strengths and that is when integration occurs. Members will come together and function as a whole. However, this theory does have its weaknesses. For one when the demographics mentioned are becoming unlivable members will compete and segregate themselves. This causes the community to always be in chaos. Viewing communities from a Human Ecology perspective it provides a useful assessment mechanism for understanding why people act as they do within the context of the larger community macro system.

Understanding community and social networks is important in the Child and Youth Counsellor (CYC) field in order to help create and encourage positive communities and networks for the youth within the CYC care. Community and social networks are important for self-esteem, sense of belonging, and overall happier and healthier individuals. Understanding the communities or social networks within an individual’s life will assist in the appropriate goal making and action planning in order to meet the individual’s needs. As described by Oxford Dictionary, a community is “a group of people living in the same place or having a particular characteristic in common” where as a social network is “a network of social interactions and personal relationships” Examples of a community include neighbourhood, church or place of employment and examples of social network includes friends, families, classmates and colleagues. (“Community”, 2014; “Social Network”, 2014). Despite this traditional definition of a social network, it is also currently described as “a dedicated website or other application which enables users to communicate with each other by posting information, comments, messages, images, etc.” Facebook, twitter and Instagram are all examples of this. (“Social Network”, 2014).