Community Logic and Hybridization: Mechanisms of Community Continuity and Proliferation in the Case of Esperanto

• In Event: 1249 - Global Communities

Abstract

What can account for the continuity and proliferation of communities in a period of social transformation, differentiation, and rationalization? I offer a few lessons from the Esperanto community, one of the oldest and most diversified modern transnational communities. The Esperanto trajectory reveals the operation of two related mechanisms that ensure the continuity of Esperanto but also the proliferation of communities and rationalized organizations under the umbrella of Esperanto. (1) The institutionalization of a community logic specific to Esperanto unifies Esperanto activities at the local, national, and transnational levels across space and time but also creates the possibility of multiplying the manifestations of the community. (2) The hybridization of this community logic and its mixing with other institutional logics (bureaucratic, professional, business, etc.) allows for differentiation and community proliferation but also masks the existence of community. Community and rational associational life can coexist.

Author

• Ana Velitchkova, University of Mississippi