The Icarians. No one really has ever heard of them.  Why spend so much time to learn about a detailed aspect of the lives of a group of people who had too much internal strife to survive even half a century? Mankind has always searched for the perfect life, the perfect being, the perfect existence.  Utopian communities such as the Icarians are building blocks to piece together an understanding of these desires and how different groups and ideologies have sought to achieve perfection.

My research of the Icarians is largely focused on the exclusivity of the group: who did they include and who did they not allow into the community? What qualifications did one have to bring into the community in order to be valuable?  I am not researching particularly because I find their systems to be completely entrancing and fantastic, I am looking into their community’s regulations because even in the pursuit of allowing men and women to become the perfect versions of themselves, they drew arbitrary lines in the sand about who they wanted and who was not wanted on deciding factors as simple as language. These trends of arbitrary designations allows a broader view of the tendencies of mankind.  Our pursuit of perfection while demanding to be surrounded by people we like and identify with. 

I believe my research can provide valuable insight into the Icarian community itself, while also painting a picture of human nature.