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Utopia, in its most common and general positive meaning, refers to the human efforts to create a better, or perhaps perfect society.
The term utopia was coined by Thomas More as the title of his Latin book De Optimo Reipublicae Statu deque Nova Insula Utopia (circa 1516), known more commonly as Utopia.
The term "utopia" is combined from two Greek words ? "no" (ou) and "place/land" (topos), thus meaning "nowhere" or more literally, "no-place/no-land". The word "utopia" was created to suggest two Greek neologisms simultaneously: outopia (no place) and eutopia (good place). In this original context, the word carried none of the modern connotations associated with it.
More's Utopia
Thomas More depicts a rationally organized society, through the narration of an explorer who discovers it - Raphael Hythlodaeus.
Utopia is largely based on Plato's Republic. It is a perfect version of The Republic where the beauties of society reign (eg: equalism and a general pacifist attitude), although its citizens were all ready to fight if need be. The evils of society, eg: poverty and misery, are all removed. It has few laws, no lawyers and rarely sends its citizens to war, but hires mercenaries from among its war-prone neighbours (these mercenaries were deliberately sent into dangerous situations in the hope that they would be killed, thus ridding the world of a parasite).
Utopia also reflects More's commitment to Christianity, as the people are united by belief in a Supreme Being, a priest administers the island's religious affairs, and belief in what is essentially the Christian Afterlife is mandatory. Furthermore the Utopians are depicted as readily accepting of Christian doctrine when introduced to such by European visitors. More extends the communism of property to all citizens, reflecting his familiarity with the early Christian society described in the Biblical Acts of the Apostles (Acts 2.44-45, 4.32-35). Furthermore, vices commonly condemned by the Catholic Church (to which More belonged), such as pre-marital sex, prostitution, adultery, gambling, theft and drunkenness, are outlawed and severely punished.
It is also likely that Thomas More, a religious layman who once considered joining the Church as a priest, was inspired by monastical life when he described the workings of his society. Thomas More lived during the age when the Renaissance was beginning to assert itself in England, and the old medieval ideals ? including the monastic ideal ? were declining. Some of Thomas More's ideas reflect a nostalgia for that medieval past. It was an inspiration for the Reducciones established by the Jesuits to Christianize and "civilize" the Guaran?.
His book reached high popularity so the term utopia became a byword for ideal concepts, proposals, societies etc. Like later utopian works, More's book contains explicit and implicit criticisms of perceived faults in existing societies. Utopian authors speculate that such faults could be eliminated in societies designed around their favored principles. The innovations portrayed in utopian visions are usually radical, revolutionary, inspirational, or speculative.
Throughout the years, many interpretations of Thomas More's work, Utopia, have arisen. Although countless individuals have chosen to accept this imaginary society as the realistic blueprint for a working nation, others have postulated More intended nothing of the like. Some maintain the position that More's Utopia functions only on the level of a satire, a work intended to reveal more about England than about an idealistic society. This interpretation is bolstered by the title of the book and nation, and its apparent derivation from the Greek for "no place" and "good place."
Examples of Utopia
Christian Kingdom of Heaven
Empyrean
Eden
Paradise
Jannah
Golden Age
Elysium
Tomoanchan
Valhalla
Hesperides
Avalon
Aaru
Perhaps for most of us here have been brought up with some idea of Utopia in some religious sense. But I am sure as we are growing up we had inside us a version of Utopia that may have been outrageously different from the ones already dreamed up by the people of the past ages.