What is “community”?

Recently, I’ve wondered whether I’m a misanthrope. [For some good quotes about misanthropy, see link. ]

Part of my wonder is that I often hear the word “community” used by creators, curators, and commentators with respect to artists of all kinds and their creative processes and product.

“Community” is defined by my favorite dictionary here. That definition is about what you’d expect.

I rarely use the word “community,” and I can’t remember ever using the word “community” in connection with either my creative work or the results of my creative work. Am I missing out on something?

So, who is included in a creator’s community? Any of the following? Some of the following? All of the following? Are any of the following more important than the other? How does an artist decide which persons among the following types are part of the artist’s “community”? Does an artist need to decide so?

• The creator: If an artist senses a community, one could presume that the artist at least wants to feel like a member of that community.
• The creator’s pets (if any): e.g., the cat that sits on the desk while the creator finishes a verse (probably unable to understand why you aren’t feeding it already).
• The creator’s household or creative workspace cohabitants: Those who might appreciate the fact that the creator is in a process that might create something.
• The creator’s family: Those who, while personally supportive of the creator, have no real understanding or appreciation of what the creator is trying to accomplish.
• The creator’s true backers: Those other human beings who would have the creator’s back in any unexpected brawl, even if they could never articulate regarding their motivation to do so.
• The creator’s patrons: Those who’ve paid their own money for the creator’s artistic product.
• The creator’s “fans”: Those who have consistently appeared to appreciate–even enjoy at times–the creator’s work.
• The creator’s collaborators: Those who (whether through creative or business collaboration with, employment by, or hire of, the creator) influence the creative process or the creative product.
• The creator’s actual friends: Those who dig the creator, personally, but may have no appreciation for any qualities of the creator’s creative product.
• Grant-givers to the creator: Those who consider the creator’s work worthy of receiving (other people’s) money in support of creation or presentation.
• The creator’s target audience: Those the creator hopes will consume, understand, and/or pay for the product created.
• The creator’s social media contacts: Those people.
• Like-minded people: Those with whom the creator agrees on all issues important to the creator.
• The people with whom the creator interacts with daily or weekly: e.g., the creator’s grocer, barista, or librarian.
• The creator’s physical context: Those living in the same weather as the creator, i.e., the folks also breathing the same air as the creator in the creator’s neighborhood or city.
• The creator’s potential audience (unknown): Those whom the creator would, for sure, like, if they liked the creator or the creator’s work.
• All other human beings.
• The creator’s god, if any.

Is it simply marketing, this reference to “community”? Has that term ever been used by an introvert?

Has any creator ever created, for himself or herself, a work that was, at its creation, intended to benefit a “community”? If so, are those works qualitatively superior to other works by the creator?