Belonging

The concept of belonging is an ambivalent notion depending on one’s individual experiences, emotional state and relationship with self and others. Our desire to belong is universal but expresses itself in different ways. While our perceptions of belonging can be influenced by connection to place, they are also deeply affected by connection to people and cultural or religious ideals. However, belonging can lead to one’s loss of identity as one conforms to set standards of a community. Feliks Skrzynecki (Feliks) explores that when one fails to connect with culture and tradition, they lose their self-identity, Migrant Hostel (Hostel) reciprocally reveals the alienation experienced when one is in a foreign land and unable to fit in mainstream society without compromising own past and Postcard reveals the struggle or the inability to be able to relate and the alienation of unfamiliar places. In contrast, Nai’ma B. Robert’s novel “Boy vs Girl” shows the strength in upholding religious values in seclusion. “The Forest” explores maintaining strong connections with nature, where one can meditate and reflect.
Feliks Skryznecki explores the conflict of the persona and his father, while the persona fails to belong and laments his displacement, his father Feliks cherishes his Polish culture and sustains his strong identity. The poet persona’s lack of identity is depicted when he has just “remnants of a language” that he “inherited unknowingly” implying that he has fragments of the Polish culture but he is unable to connect or remember and the language is not significant to him, which divides him from his father and his heritage. The persona’s father “Watched” him “peg” his “tents/further and further south of Hadrian’s wall.” metaphor   emphasizes the growing distance between father and son and, the historical allusion implies his dislocation from culture and tradition, the negative connotation of “south” representing their gradual fragmentation. In contrast, Feliks tends to...