Page 12 - Flipbook: Sociology Shortcuts Issue 3

What Is Society?

ociety is a concept that's easy to reference, we all

understand what is meant by “our society”, be it Indian,
SMauritian, Nigerian or British or whatever, but it’s a lot

more difficult to define…

One key feature of a society is that people see Anderson (1983) captures the significance of
themselves as having “something in this idea when he categorises societies as
common” with other members of “their "imagined communities"; something that
society” and, by extension, see themselves as exists only in the mind. As he argues, “the
different to members of “other societies”. In members of even the smallest nation will
this respect, different societies involve two never know most of their fellow-members,
types of space: meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the
minds of each lives the image of their
1. Physical space in the sense of a distinctive communion”.
geographical area marked by either physical
border (such as a river) or a symbolic border Societies, in this respect, are mentally
(an imaginary line, for example, marking constructed in a range of ways that include
where one society ends and another begins). things like:

� geographic borders that set
physical boundaries - we
might, for example, consider
everyone born within these
borders to "belong" to a
particular society.

� a system of government,
which may involve things like
a monarchy, parliament and
civil service.

� a common language,
customs and traditions that
people share.

� a sense of belonging and
identification that involves
2. Mental space that relates to the various developing an awareness of “our society” as
beliefs people hold about the similarities they different to other societies; Indians, for
share with those belonging to “their society” example, may see themselves as different to
and the differences between them and people Pakistanis or Bangladeshis.
who belong to a different society.

Defining a society in terms of physical space
is, in itself, a mental construction; we’re
giving a particular meaning and significance
to what is effectively lines on a map.

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