Liberian Literary Magazine
Promoting Liberian literature, Arts and Culture
ourselves. We were living them, living in
them and shaping them. They and our
experiences had merged into an oneness
with the locality hosting them. It did not
matter the physical location, we could
call into existence ‘home’ any location.
In the split second it takes the speaker
to pop these two questions, I had to deal
with two critical issues- one more so than
the other. The second question gets us
thinking below the surface…. Deep down
into our core. Where do you belong seeks
more than just a place. It sends us inward
to bring outward our true selves.
Interestingly, the more we look inward,
we tend to realize that we often must
define ourselves by looking outward at or
to others. Their actions, failures and
attributes, help us further define or realize
what or who we are as opposed to what
others make of us. It confirms our own
attitudes. It reinforces those traits that
form our essence. In short, to find us, we
reflect on what matters. To reflect, we
often look at or towards others. This
means we need relationships to be
defined.
For you see, as Mr. Sherif noted,
belonging is relational. It must be
completed by and with others. He speaks
about the love from family as he grew up
in the vibrancy of the African extended
family; the security it provided. We hear
of his quest for finding home, his
challenges, his desire to assimilate, to
conform in hopes of landing a home. He
then tells how these all fell short of
satisfaction, because he still lacked that
piece. When he goes back to these
places, a strange thing happens, he feels
less connected; lonelier, still wanting.
The reason they fall short, I believe is
because these are all locations he had
localized in ‘thought[s]’, ‘memor[eis]’ yet,
they proved incapable of providing him
the
things
he
most
desiredbelongingness.
Belongingness forces us to confront the
fact that we need relationships; we need
others to find us. We must relate our true
essence to the greater world and this is
reflected in how we see ourselves in
relation to others; how we view ourselves
in relation to the spaces we occupy.
One can easily argue that I don’t need
people to feel belonged. I can find a
place to belong minus the ‘other’ factor.
But is that really true? Is that beach front
house, that secluded space, that quiet
path in the park or the hideaway that
brings you all the comfort from a harsh
world not an ‘other’? Is it not relational? Is
it not selected precisely because it is
relational?
In celebration of women the world over,
we are running this piece gathered from
a couple of sources.
29