Talk:Society

More on definition and scope

I have read with interest the discussions in this connection. It seems to me, however, that the article may be suffering from lack of attention to one of the key meanings of society, that of the mass noun or, as Wiktionary has it: "The people of one’s country or community taken as a whole". This surely must be one of the most important aspects to document in Wikipedia. Perhaps it warrants an article in its own right (Human society???) where the origins and developments of society are described with sections on agrarian society, pre-industrial society, industrial society, post-industrial society, etc., as well as on global movements such as western society, communist society, consumer society, information society, global society... The danger at the moment is that the article is overly concerned with societies of various kinds (cf. associations) rather than the development of human society in general. At the very least I would strongly argue that the definition should be altered to specify clearly the meaning of society when it refers to human society in general.- Ipigott (talk) 10:29, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm a newbie, and society is one of my research interests, and I agree with the comment above, from way back in 2009, about "society" as a mass noun. There is a huge difference between and article on "society" and an article on "societies." I have just made a similar comment on the Talk Page for the Society Outline, where we have a section entitled "What Type of Thing is a Society," when most outlines would not have that indirect article in that formulation.--Mhbroder (talk) 03:46, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I have done a fair amount of editing here over the past few days. I hope others will come forward to contribute, perhaps especially to develop information about modern society. It would also be interesting to have a section on the use of the term to describe the social elite (sometimes referred to as high society) and how this concept has developed since the 19th century.- Ipigott (talk) 16:52, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, I agree with your fundamental criticisms. 'Societies' like 'the society of friends' (!!) shouldn't be on a page dedicated to society, and should be moved to their own (if there isn't already a page dedicated to these sorts of parties). I rather regret adding the page to the sociology portal, seeing as it is such a broad word and general topic that it will be almost impossible to form a coherent social scientific page with the number of arbitrary and haphazard editors. --Tomsega (talk) 16:34, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Remove picture in lead

I've never seen another article with a picture in the lead. I'd like to remove it. Does anyone think it should stay or be moved somewhere? Otherwise I'll remove it. On that note I move the table of contents out of the section on conceptions of society's. That was just silly. meitme (talk) 13:22, 29 October 2010 (UTC)

Those are both your opinion, the picture was not placed by me but I think it highly appropriate. I did put the TOC in a place where it is both aesthetically more regular and consistent with the requested rework of the article which I began. Of course there are other placements that would work but that one didn't, it just looked like a clumsy or botched edit. If you want to improve the article you have to put more time into it than that, just moving that one element without adjusting the overall flow of content was a failure. 72.228.177.92 (talk) 20:01, 6 November 2010 (UTC)

Wolves image

Regarding this: is this an article on the general concept of "society" even as it applies to non-sapient species, or specifically about human society as the lede suggests? If the latter, that edit should be undone. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 10:37, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

This sounds like a question of article scope, which guessing from the above sections is a recurring question. If there is no other place to discuss non-human societies, it would make sense to include that info on this page and have the lead clarify the scope like some of the proposals I see above. Til Eulenspiegel (talk) 13:46, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Would the article about social animals be relevant? Perhaps a link to that article should be placed on this article as a disambiguation hatnote (since this article is mainly about human society, and the societies of other animals seem to be outside its scope). Jarble (talk) 18:35, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Also, if this article is going to discuss human societies exclusively, then the content about other social animals might need to be moved to the social animal article. Jarble (talk) 18:38, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Understood Better VenomSubaS (talk) 00:27, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

Citations in lead section

From WP:LEADCITE:

"there is not, however, an exception to citation requirements specific to leads. The necessity for citations in a lead should be determined on a case-by-case basis by editorial consensus. Complex, current, or controversial subjects may require many citations; others, few or none. The presence of citations in the introduction is neither required in every article nor prohibited in any article."

Editor2020 (talk) 18:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Virtual versus Social Territory

Currently begins:

"A society, or a human society, is a group of people related to each other through persistent relations, or a large social grouping sharing the same geographical or virtual territory,"

The word "virtual" is technically correct, as in "real vs. virtual", but without being balanced by the word "real", just sounds odd. I'm going to change the word to "social" as that seems to balance better against the word "geographical". Feel free to revert it if you also explain why it was better the other way. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cutelyaware (talk • contribs) 03:19, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Agree, prolly an edit made by somebody born after 1990. 76.180.168.166 (talk) 21:59, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Notice of two related RfCs and request for participation

There are two RfCs in which your participation would be greatly appreciated:

• RfC re use of the term "assault weapon"
• RfC re use of the term "high-capacity magazine"

Thank you. --Lightbreather (talk) 17:19, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Notice and request for participation

There is an RfC a Requested move in which the participation of editors/watchers of this article would be greatly appreciated:

• Talk:Assault weapons legislation#Requested move

Thank you. --Lightbreather (talk) 23:06, 5 May 2014 (UTC)

It was an RfC, but I realized this is the appropriate process. Lightbreather (talk) 05:03, 10 May 2014 (UTC)

New section on structure

I think Hendrik 99 deserves yeoman's work on explaining Marxist social structure. While I think this article is currently lacks a strong discussion the classical sociological theories of society, I'm not sure an extended discussion the Marxist school belongs here, because it privileges one school of thought above all others. Can anyone suggest a better home for this content, perhaps at Marxist sociology? Nickknack00 (talk) 20:44, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

After a search, it looks as though the section is mostly copied from base and superstructure. In light of this, I suggest the section be removed here and left to discussion there. Nickknack00 (talk) 20:55, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

Poles in mythology

Now we have a new article Poles in mythology, Please see and include suitable improvements , if any, in article Poles in mythology.

Rgds Mahitgar (talk) 09:32, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

External links modified

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• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20091030225045/http://www.open-knowledge-society.org:80/summit.htm to http://www.open-knowledge-society.org/summit.htm
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20050205195736/http://www.askoxford.com:80/concise_oed/society to http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/society
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20160201125617/http://core.ecu.edu/soci/juskaa/SOCI2110/Lectures/Lect1.htm to http://core.ecu.edu/soci/juskaa/SOCI2110/Lectures/Lect1.htm
• Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20110529103904/http://www.cliffsnotes.com:80/WileyCDA/CliffsReviewTopic/Types-of-Societies.topicArticleId-26957,articleId-26856.html to http://www.cliffsnotes.com/WileyCDA/CliffsReviewTopic/Types-of-Societies.topicArticleId-26957,articleId-26856.html

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Citing sources...

Why are there some articles on Wikipedia about what are very important and complex topics that are either largely or completely devoid of citations and sources at the same time small, trivial articles and new editors get ripped to shreds for not citing everything they put in an edit of an article that is little more than a stub with ZERO chance of ever becoming more than an occasionally-viewed niche-topic puff piece? I see comments demanding cites and sources or recommending articles for deletion that have few or none that don't amount in total to the length of some single paragraphs in huge articles with none.

Why?