Gemeinschaft
[ɡə-MAHYN-shaft]
Part of speech: noun
Origin: German, early 20th century
1.
Social relations between individuals, based on close personal and family ties; community.
Examples of Gemeinschaft in a sentence
"Even though Mennonites have a close Gemeinschaft, they don’t live separately from the general population."
"Meghan wanted to study the effects of globalization on traditional Gemeinschaft."
About Gemeinschaft
This word stems from the German “gemein,” meaning “common” and the noun-forming suffix “-schaft,” denoting the collective individuals of a group.
Did you Know?
“Gemeinschaft” is often mentioned in conjunction with “Gesellschaft.” The loose translations from German mean “community” and “society” respectively. More personalized social interactions and the beliefs, roles, and values that stem from them fall under the umbrella of Gemeinschaft, whereas the more indirect interactions that set more formal values and impersonal roles are attributed to Gesellschaft.
