In the context of home, many of my peers who wrote on the topic, depicted the idea with a particular sensation. The feeling of comfy, of warmth, and of company all string like beads through the various stories that I have read. Many depict home to be being with family, being with people who you love, and being with those who care for you while others found hearth in the security of their house. Among the plethora of stories, I had found two general categories that home falls into, among the stories that I had read among my peers.
Home is something that is found, and adapts; home changes. Many of my peers report home to be something that they struggle to define, particularly because many of them come from a place outside of Canada, or BC. As they come to UBC, they must rediscover their home, and like many people around the world, they struggle to figure out what home is. Many of my peers wrote that home isn’t a specific location, and it isn’t always the same. They change their definition of home to accommodate their new lifestyle and they find comfort in their new lives.
In another director, a few of my peers also reported home to be a place within places. Most often, they agree on the idea that home is found inside us, and that it is a state of emotions. The idea of home isn’t a place, a city, a house, a country, a continent, or even the earth; home is a feeling. For some of us, it is our connections that we have; home is with a significant other, children, our parents, our siblings and our friends. And for others we may find home when we are among a certain community. Because home is not a specific physical location, we can carry it around with us, always finding home wherever we may leave to.
The stories that I read included a focus on their family or background. For some, home is where their ancestors are from. Many of the students in the class were raised with stories of their ancestry or immediate family. Many of these stories were a great read, but it differed greatly from how I had imagined home to be. I didn’t consider my heritage or the country that I was raised in, nor did I consider the country that my family was raised in. I don’t consider home a place, or a setting. For me, my exploration of home centers on my present life and who’s in it. It’s the people, the relationships, and the communities. Perhaps I don’t need my home to be my heritage because I have spent less time with my heritage. In an age where our culture is defined so loosely, it becomes easy to blend into the background. Home is very difficult to define, and it is different for everyone. Home can be a place, a person, a state of mind, or even a set of feelings. But no matter where home is, we should all be grateful for our homes, and be mindful of the land we tread. As citizens or neighbors of the Indigenous people, we should be responsible for what our past has done to them and their home.
Works Cited
Beck, Julie. “The Psychology of Home: Why Where You Live Means So Much.” The Atlantic, https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2011/12/the-psychology-of-home-why-where-you-live-means-so-much/249800/, Accessed 1 February 2020.
Deer, Jessica. “Montreal non-profit launches toolkit on how to be an Indigenous ally.” CBC, https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/montreal-indigenous-ally-toolkit-1.4988074, Accessed 1 February 2020.