communitas

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin commūnitās.

Noun

communitas

1. An unstructured community in which people are equal.
2. The very spirit of community; an intense community spirit, the feeling of great social equality, solidarity, and togetherness.

Quotations

• 1986. Victor W. Turner. The Anthropology of Experience. University of Illinois Press: 1986, page 43:[1]

  A sense of harmony with the universe is made evident and the whole planet is felt to be communitas.

• 1991. Victor Turner. Contesting the Sacred, Routledge, 1991:

  The achievement of communitas is the pilgrim's fundamental motivation.

References

• Creating Communitas, a project at www.wechange.org
• Forbes Leslie
• Communal Sustainability
• Forming Tribalized Communities

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Latin

Etymology

From commūnis (“common, public”) +‎ -tās.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /komˈmuː.ni.taːs/, [kɔmˈmuːnɪt̪äːs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /komˈmu.ni.tas/, [komˈmuːnit̪äs]

Noun

commūnitās f (genitive commūnitātis); third declension

1. a community
2. public spirit, a sense of duty and willingness to serve one's community

Declension

Third-declension noun.

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	commūnitās	commūnitātēs
Genitive	commūnitātis	commūnitātum
Dative	commūnitātī	commūnitātibus
Accusative	commūnitātem	commūnitātēs
Ablative	commūnitāte	commūnitātibus
Vocative	commūnitās	commūnitātēs

Related terms

• commūniō
• commūnis

Descendants

• Catalan: comunitat
• English: community, communitas
• French: communauté
• Italian: comunità
• Portuguese: comunidade
• Romanian: comunitate
• Spanish: comunidad

References

• “communitas”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “communitas”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• communitas in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• communitas in Ramminger, Johann (2016 July 16 (last accessed)) Neulateinische Wortliste: Ein Wörterbuch des Lateinischen von Petrarca bis 1700‎^[2], pre-publication website, 2005-2016