The Concept of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft

The Concept of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft  are German words that mean community and society respectively. Introduced in classical social theory, they are used to discuss the different kinds of social ties that exist in small, rural, traditional societies versus large-scale, modern, industrial ones. Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft in Sociology Early German sociologist Ferdinand  Tà ¶nnies introduced the concepts of  Gemeinschaft (Gay-mine-shaft)  and  Gesellschaft  (Gay-zel-shaft) in his 1887 book  Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft. Tà ¶nnies presented these as analytic concepts which he found useful for studying the differences between the kinds of rural, peasant societies that were being replaced across Europe by modern, industrial ones.  Following this, Max Weber further developed these concepts as ideal types in his book  Economy and Society  (1921)  and in his essay Class, Status, and Party. For Weber, they were useful as ideal types for tracking and studying the changes in societies, social structure, and social order over time. The Personal and Moral Nature of Social Ties Within a  Gemeinschaft   According to  Tà ¶nnies,  Gemeinschaft, or community, is comprised of  personal social ties and in-person interactions that are defined by traditional social rules and result in an overall cooperative social organization. The values and beliefs common to a  Ã¢â‚¬â€¹Gemeinschaft  are organized around appreciation for personal ties, and because of this, social interactions are personal in nature.  Tà ¶nnies believed that these kinds of interactions and social ties were driven by emotions and sentiments (Wesenwille), by a sense of moral obligation to others, and were common to rural, peasant, small-scale, homogenous societies.  When Weber wrote about these terms in  Economy and Society, he suggested that a  Gemeinschaft  is produced by the subjective feeling that is tied to affect and tradition. The Rational and Efficient Nature of Social Ties Within a  Gesellschaft On the other hand,  Gesellschaft, or society, is comprised of impersonal and indirect social ties and interactions that are not necessarily carried out face-to-face (they can be carried out via telegram, telephone, in written form, through a chain of command, etc.). The ties and interactions that characterize a  Gesellschaft  are guided by formal values and beliefs that are directed by rationality and efficiency, as well as by economic, political, and self-interests. While social interaction is guided by  Wesenwille, or seemingly naturally occurring emotions  in a  Gemeinschaft, in a  Gesellschaft,  Kà ¼rwille, or rational will, guides it. This kind of social organization is common to large-scale, modern, industrial, and cosmopolitan societies that are structured around large organizations of government and private enterprise, both of which often take the form of bureaucracies. Organizations and the social order as a whole are organized by a complex division of labor, roles, and tasks. As Weber explained, such a form of social order is the result of rational agreement by mutual consent, meaning members of society agree to participate and abide the given rules, norms, and practices because rationality tells them that they benefit by doing so. Tà ¶nnies observed that the traditional bonds of family, kinship, and religion that provide the basis for social ties, values, and interactions in a  Gemeinschaft  are displaced by scientific rationality and self-interest in a  Gesellschaft. While social relations are cooperative in a  Gemeinschaft  it is more common to find competition in a  Gesellschaft. Gemeinschaft  and  Gesellschaft  in Modern Times While it is true that one can observe distinctly different types of social organizations prior to and after the industrial age, and when comparing rural versus urban environments, its important to recognize that  Gemeinschaft  and  Gesellschaft are ideal types. This means that though they are useful conceptual tools for seeing and understanding how society works, they are rarely if ever observed exactly as they are defined, nor are they mutually exclusive. Instead, when you look at the social world around you, you are likely to see both forms of social order present. You may find that you are part of communities in which social ties and social interaction are guided by a sense of traditional and moral responsibility while simultaneously living within a complex, post-industrial society.

A History of Bow and Arrow Technology

A History of Bow and Arrow Technology Bow and arrow hunting (or archery) is a technology first developed by early modern humans in Africa, perhaps as long as 71,000 years ago. Archaeological evidence shows that the technology was certainly used by humans during the Howiesons Poort phase of Middle Stone Age Africa, between 37,000 and 65,000 years ago; recent evidence at South Africas Pinnacle Point cave tentatively pushes the initial use back to 71,000 years ago. However, there is no evidence that the bow and arrow technology was used by people who migrated out of Africa until the Late Upper Paleolithic or Terminal Pleistocene, at most 15,000-20,000 years ago. The oldest surviving organic elements of bows and arrows only date to the Early Holocene of about 11,000 years ago. Africa: Middle Stone Age, 71,000 years ago.Europe and Western Asia: Late Upper Paleolithic, although there are no UP rock art paintings of archers and the oldest arrow shafts date to the Early Holocene, 10,500 BP; the earliest bows in Europe are from the bog site of Stellmor in Germany, where 11,000 years ago someone lost a pine arrow shaft with nocks in the end.Japan / Northeast Asia: Terminal Pleistocene.North / South America: Terminal Pleistocene. Making a Bow and Arrow Set Based on modern-day San Bushmen bow-and-arrow manufacture, existing bows and arrows curated in South African museums as well as archaeological evidence for Sibudu Cave, Klasies River Cave, and Umhlatuzana Rockshelter in South Africa, Lombard and Haidle (2012) operationalized the basic process of making a bow and arrows. To make a bow and a set of arrows, the archer needs stone tools (scrapers, axes, woodworking adzes, hammerstones, tools for straightening and smoothing wooden shafts, flint for making fire), a container (ostrich eggshell in South Africa) for carrying water, ochre mixed with resin, pitch, or tree gum for adhesives, fire for blending and setting the adhesives, tree saplings, hardwood and reeds for the bow stave and arrow shafts, and animal sinew and plant fiber for binding material. The technology for making a bow stave is close to that of making a wooden spear (first made by Homo heidelbergensis more than 300,000 years ago); but the differences are that instead of straightening a wooden lance, the archer needs to bend the bow stave, string the bow, and treat the stave with adhesives and fat to prevent splitting and cracking. How Does It Compare to Other Hunting Technologies? From a modern standpoint, the bow and arrow technology  is definitely a leap forward from lance and atlatl (spear thrower) technology. Lance technology involves a long spear which is used to thrust at prey. An atlatl is a separate piece of bone, wood or ivory, that acts as a lever to increase the power and speed of a throw: arguably, a leather strap attached to the end of a lance spear might be a technology between the two. But bow and arrow technology has a number of technological advantages over lances and atlatls. Arrows are longer-range weapons, and the archer needs less space. To fire off an atlatl successfully, the hunter needs to stand in big open spaces and be highly visible to his/her prey; arrow hunters can hide behind bushes and shoot from a kneeling position. Atlatls and spears are limited in their repeatability: a hunter can carry one spear and maybe as many as three darts for an atlatl, but a quiver of arrows can include a dozen or more shots. To Adopt or Not to Adopt Archaeological and ethnographic evidence suggests that these technologies were rarely mutually exclusive- groups combined spears and atlatls and bows and arrows with nets, harpoons, deadfall traps, mass-kill kites, and buffalo jumps, and many other strategies as well. People vary their hunting strategies based on the prey being sought, whether it is big and dangerous or wily and elusive or marine, terrestrial or airborne in nature. The adoption of new technologies can profoundly affect the way a society is constructed or behaves. Perhaps the most important difference is that lance and atlatl hunting are group events, collaborative processes that are successful only if they include a number of family and clan members. In contrast, bow and arrow hunting can be achieved with just one or two individuals. Groups hunt for the group; individuals for the individual families. That is a profound social change, affecting almost every aspect of life including who you marry, how big is your group, and how status is conveyed. One issue that might also have affected the adoption of the technology may be that bow and arrow hunting simply has a longer training period than atlatl hunting. Brigid Grund (2017) examined records from modern competitions for atlatl (Atlatl Association International Standard Accuracy Contest) and archery (Society for Creative Anachronism InterKingdom Archery Competition). She discovered an individuals atlatl scores increase steadily, showing improvement in skill within the first few years. Bow hunters, however, do not begin to approach maximum skill until the fourth or fifth year of competition. The Great Technology Shift There is much to be understood in the processes of how technology changed and indeed which technology came first. The earliest atlatl we have dates to the Upper Paleolithic, only 20,000 years ago: the South African evidence is quite clear that bow and arrow hunting is much older still. But archaeological evidence being what it is, we still dont really know the complete answer about the dates of hunting technologies and we may never have a better definition of when the inventions occurred than at least as early as. People adapt to technologies for reasons other than just because something is new or shiny. Every new technology is characterized by its own costs and benefits for the task at hand. Archaeologist Michael B. Schiffer referred to this as application space: that the level of adoption of a new technology depends on the number and variety of tasks that it could be used on, and which it is best suited to. Old technologies are rarely completely obsoleted, and the transition period can be very long indeed. Sources Angelbeck B, and Cameron I. 2014. 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