After having spent my past college semester studying abroad in Sydney, Australia, I became part of a community that is currently very important in my life despite my physical removal from the individuals who are a part of it. I went through a housing program called "Study Australia" which takes students from all over the world and places them in the land down under to "study" abroad. Thanks to CMC, I am able to remain in touch with, and continue developing relationships with individuals who I had not met before studying abroad, but automatically upon entering this experience together, we became each other's community.
Haythornwaite (2007) distinguishes between "Gemenschaft" (a community) vs. "Gasellschaft" (a society), noting that communities are based on strong interpersonal relationships, shared focus, and common identity, while societies involve a group of individuals who lack commitment, have little shared concern, and are not highly connected. Haythornwaite (2007) also uses SNA factors to address the properties of communities, in terms of common ground and reciprocity. Common ground is more specifically defined as "commitment to a set of shared values, mores, meanings and a shared historical identity – in short, a culture." (Etzioni & Etzioni (1999) p. 129). Within my Study Australia community, common ground was what led to the formation of such strong relationships in the first place, as it involved a group of individuals with similar goals, passions, and senses of adventure. Thus we immediately engaged in a community based relationship (rather than society based) despite our lack of prior knowledge of each other's lives. Reciprocity involves to degree to which individuals within a community support, reflect, and criss-cross each other's beliefs. Within by Study Australia community, our physical removal from all things and people familiar in our lives, caused an immediate network of support among this group of individuals who had so quickly bonded of shared beliefs and common ground.
Leaving Sydney, and my Study Australia community, is one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. I had to physically remove myself from both the strong ties (other American students in my program) and weak ties (Australian natives I developed friendships with) of my community, and return to a place where my past community had remained stagnant while I changed dramatically. Because of the strong bonds we formed abroad, and our shared desire to support each other's current endeavours, my Study Australia community has made a valiant effort to keep our community alive, largely through CMC. However, among this community, my choices of media to keep in touch are certainly variable depending on the individual involved. Those to which I felt very strong ties, I often communicate using AIM, email, phones, and lastly facebook. However those to which I felt weaker ties, including both other Americans and Australians, I have chosen leaner channels, primarily facebook, to keep in touch. I have become friends with many Aussies on facebook to keep up on their current lives, but have also joined and "Study Australia" group so that I may publicly associate myself with this community which, thanks to CMC, has become synchronous in both on- and off-line settings.
Below is the link to the Facebook individual known as "Study Australia"
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=687550005&ref=ts
On the profile page, you can find lists of individuals who have all been involved in the Study Australia experience, in addition to groups and photo albums on individual trips/groups within the community. The transition from physical proximity to the online social networking provided by facebook, changed the community to a much bigger one which I am proud to be a part of. By joining the online version of my physical community, I am now part of a social network which connects me to excellent resources and facilitates flow of information about a culture in which I was so deeply immersed. However, CMC allows me to keep "my Study Australia community" alive by using richer media choices.
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The community that you described is very interesting in that it is very unique, and most likely, a less common type of community. Most communities that I have observed or that I am personally involved in, have evolved over time. People develop interests and usually through already existing ties, build up a community. Your community in Australia, on the other hand, was very different in that it formed rapidly among a group of complete strangers. I agree with your point in that the factor that brought everyone together was the common ground in that everyone was there to study abroad in Australia. This factor pulled everyone together and served as a foundation for the close-knit community that eventually evolved. The abrupt end to this close community is also rare and it was interesting to hear about how this transitory community impacted your life.
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