490 RURAL SOCIOLOGY 



sociated forces by introducing a new force in behalf of a more 

 symmetrical and wholesome country life. 



It is sufficient justification for a community's taking a sur- 

 vey and inventory of its social forces and assets, if the survey is 

 calculated to prompt these quickening questions and lead to 

 a readjustment of its social structure so as to produce a bal- 

 anced social life that will fit the whole community and meet its 

 larger needs. 



Who Shall Take the Survey? Any group of community- 

 minded persons in the community can undertake this interest- 

 ing problem. One person should be general head and director. 

 A staff of five or ten careful, tactful people to take the home 

 census and organization census will be sufficient. 



THE SOCIAL ANATOMY OF AN AGRICULTURAL 

 COMMUNITY 1 



C. J. GALPIN 



A NEW rural and urban point of view has grown out of the 

 attempt to answer satisfactorily the following series of questions : 

 Is there such a thing as a rural community? If so, what are 

 its characteristics? Can the farm population as a class be 

 considered a community? Or can you cut out of the open 

 country any piece, large or small, square, triangular, or irreg- 

 ular in shape and treat the farm families in this section as a 

 community and plan institutions for them? Would the eighty- 

 five farm homes in a Norwegian settlement, bound together 

 by one church organization, form a community? Has each 

 farm a community of its own differing from that of every 

 other ? What is the social nature of the ordinary country school 

 district? What sort of a social unit is the agricultural town- 

 ship? 



Is it possible that the farms are related to the village clus- 

 ters in such an intimate way that in any serious treatment of 



i Adapted from Rural Life, pp. 70-87, Century Co., 1918, and Research 

 Bulletin No. 34, May, 1915, Agricultural Experiment Station of the Uni- 

 versity of Wisconsin, Madison. 



