This article discusses the need to (re)conceptualize and contextualize ‘community’ in tribal/Indigenous cultures and development practices. While the community has been a key concept in Indian village studies, it has been predominantly analyzed and applied in the caste structural framework of Indian society. Examining the concept in the spectrum of village studies, this article argues that the academic interest in enquiring about communities in India requires widening its scope beyond the caste framework to encompass tribal/Indigenous societies’ development and cultural experiences of community life. It posits to explore the possibilities of multiple meanings of community in the scope of studying tribal village communities.

Recognition that humans deserve their basic needs to be met and the emerging mechanisms for relief of destitution are clearly and coherently narrated as is the growth of organizations aiming to meet the needs of people economically harmed by major social changes such as industrialization and war. Social work activities became mechanisms for promoting the values of social justice, perhaps "peaking" in the 1970s and 1980s.I have read this book with the advantage of the long view, having joined the profession in the early 1970s. While feeling deep apprehension about the Covid injured global social condition I found this book illustrates historical precedents which offer optimism for the potential recovery of social work, now that challenges to concepts of deserving and undeserving, poverty and inequality are being voiced due to society's new, uncharted experiences of hunger, homelessness, and hopelessness. It is a very valuable reading for students and social work educators.

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