Belonging

Belonging is an emotional connection to a place, culture, person or group. It can also be an inner place that can be reached through experiences and reflection. Belonging also relates to the notion of a sense of place, a feeling of belonging to the local, being enmeshed in an environment, a social class, a cultural context or a particular area. In addition, belonging can be associated with the construction of the self through socialisation and the desire to belong. It can result in a sense of identification and a means of locating oneself within discourse and ideologies or it could lead to the downfall of the individual through the comfority.
Texts explore many aspects of belonging, including the potential of the individual to enrich or challenge a community or group. They may reflect the way attitudes to belonging and are modified over time. Texts may also represent choices not to belong, or barriers which present belonging. Perceptions and ideas of belonging in texts can be constructed through a variety of language modes, forms, features and structures. In engaging with the text, a responder may experience and understand the possibilities presented by a sense of b
elonging to, or exclusion from the text and the world it represents. This engagment may be influenced by the different ways perspective is given voice in or are absent from a text.
Skrzynecki’s poetry has shown to do more than just recall the journey he and his family have made from their homeland. His poetry has also shown to continue this journey and also invites the reader to participate through his usage of descriptive languages and imagery. Such poetry that serves this function includes Feliks Skrzynecki and Migrant Hostel and Postcard. Throughout the 3 poems, all three are shown to hold one particular theme, journey. Each poem is shown to relate to a different period of that journey indirectly, through the usages of description of a particular thing, event or person, which he found to be...