Courtney Pauls- Communitas vs. Community

Community and communitas has two completely different meaning. Community is structured and is forces upon people in society. A good example of community is when groups create mentor programs. These are forced friendships that are not spontaneous. In communities, we make friends because we have something to gain from them. Communitas is a relationship that occurs when everyone is at the same social state and the relationships form spontaneously. Communitas occurs when there is liminality. According to Turner, liminality is a threshold state when the participant leaves previous structures. In liminality, everyone is at the same social structure. The main difference it that communitas happens spontaneously.