In recent years, the Internet has given us the idea that connection can happen even between four walls. However, people are turning to those who are physically close to them.
The situation is due to the seeking supportgiven that childcare is expensive, rent and grocery shopping are expensive, and weather emergencies are more frequent.
According to , digital tools are not replacing local physical relationships, they are helping to streamline them. Knowing your neighbors is nothing new, but your visibility is.
After decades of isolation and a flight to digital connections, people are returning to an old idea. Communities function best when people feel responsible for one another.
“Long-distance calls were expensive. Email didn’t exist and people’s lives revolved around their home. And at the time, women were less likely to be part of the paid workforce, so they spent more time closer to home, where they were the center of the family’s social life,” explained the sociology professor, Eric Klinenberg.
Platforms have made it possible to meet people anywhere, leading many of us to build relationships around shared interests and stories rather than shared spaces. As more of our social lives have moved online, the daily, in-person interactions that once structured everyday life started to disappear.
This form of connection starts to feel superficial. As the “neighborism“, connections between neighbors (or “neighborhood”, in free translation) grow, social networks are not disappearing, but their role is changing. Instead of replacing local relationships, applications are becoming a tool to make them easier.
For example, a way to keep in touch with parents at the playground or pool, organize a joint grocery shopping trip, or find out who lives on the block.
In this sense, this generation has something that previous generations did not have — connection means with easy access. The same platforms that once promised a global, limitless, frictionless sense of belonging can now be repurposed into something smaller, slower and more rooted.
An example is the case of Alec Patton45 years old. Patton created a Whatsapp group for his neighborhood in South Park, in San Diego. Printed 50 flyers and placed them in the mailboxes on the streets extending from his house. Currently, the group has around 50 members and continues to grow consistently.
Chat has already proven its valueboth in small details and in more important situations.
On one occasion, Patton realized that he had lent the car seat he keeps in his car to a friend and that his wife had left with the other. “I needed to get the kids to school in half an hour, so I posted an urgent chat message. A neighbor responded within five minutes and saved the day,” he said.
In a more serious moment, the group became a real-time information center during a raid at a nearby restaurant, helping neighbors understand what was happening and coordinate support.
Robert Sampsonprofessor of sociology at Harvard Universitystates that getting to know your neighbors does not necessarily mean building intimate friendships. In his research, he discovered that neighborhoods function better when residents have less intense ties, but are willing to help each other, whether to maintain order or simply to lend a hand with small things.
This level of cohesion does not require strong intimacy or even liking everyone you meet. It requires regular interaction and a shared sense of responsibility to those around you.
Finally, “neighborhood” may have less to do with feeling and more with functionality. After years of isolation, people are rediscovering that life is better when someone nearby knows your name and has a general idea of your comings and goings.
