Hi ASTU 100A,

This has been a really busy and engaging time for our class, having just read Phil Klay’s “Redeployment” and Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist, as well as having just had our second group lecture by our CAP professors, so I feel very excited to be able to cover this week’s dynamic and politically charged blogs. While there were some really great blogs regarding #blacklivesmatter, the topic of our group lecture (such as Jacqueline’s. Carolina’s and Kaveel’s), I am going to focus this blog on another concept that I found to be especially prevalent in the blogosphere, this being the concept of “home”.

This theme was most obvious in the blogs that reflected on Phil Klay’s short story “Redeployment”, as it follows the homecoming of Sgt. Price, an American veteran being redeployed into civilian life after serving in Iraq. As we have been discussing in ASTU, the phenomenon of coming home from war has taken on a new and perhaps more prevalent role in contemporary American warfare. This is because as the military’s medical system has improved, more people are returning from combat. Moreover, even though more people are returning relative to how many were deployed, the amount of people serving in the military is much smaller than it was during the big drafts such as Vietnam and World War Two. Thus this homecoming experience is concentrated among a very select few, perhaps exacerbating how disruptive or disorienting the experience of coming “home” is for the contemporary veteran.

Reflecting on why this homecoming can be so challenging, Priya discussed how being quarantined in military culture when on service can be seen as a form of assimilation, as for Sgt. Price, having his mindset militarized created a severe disconnect between him and his previous home culture. Sam also attempted to explain the impact that being assimilated into military culture has on an individual, and in doing so, he brings to the table a new perspective on the story’s tittle. He suggests that alongside “redeployment” being a military term used to denote the homecoming of a veteran or the deployment of a military personal back to a conflict zone, that the term can also mean the returning of one’s mind to the site of one’s body. Sam remarks that after being trained in the military to follow orders and to act through the body, “Not only are the soldiers redeployed back home physically, they are redeployed back into their conscious minds, redeployed into being able to think about their experiences.”

My other classmates who wrote on Klay’s story, expanded on the disconnect between veteran and civilian life. Raphael did so through comparing “Redeployment” to Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, as did Imaan through her personal example of how her dad found his friend to be “not the same man” after returning from duty in Iraq. Further on this note, Diego, rather poetically summarized the absurd sense of unfamiliarity between the veteran and his “home” in his blog, which he appropriately titled “Home (?) Sweet home (?)”. What becomes of home when it is no longer one’s ultimate source of familiarity and comfort? When what was once foreign (aka the brutality of warfare) becomes familiar, and what was once familiar (aka American Eagles Outfitters) becomes foreign, where does the veteran’s home lie?

And it is from this incomplete and blurry understanding of what constitutes “home” that I would like to make the jump to the second theme of home that I found in this weeks blogs. These blogs were in reference to Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist and its Pakistani protagonist Changez, who spent 4 1/2 years in the United States. A principal theme in the novel (or novella) is Changez’s struggle to feel at home in the U.S. and to identify with its new world sensibilities and post 9/11, racist society. And yet Changez also feels disconnected to Pakistan (for example, when he returns to his childhood home and hesitates to see its depilated state as beautiful). Without making gross generalizations, this sense of a split identity and a confused sense of home is felt by many immigrants, my own family included. Even though she immigrated to Canada as a young child, my mom still tells me that she sometimes feels too Canadian to be accepted as Korean, but too Korean to be accepted as Canadian. For example, just the other week she was at a climate change rally downtown and was told to “go home” by another environmentalist, even though she has lived here for the vast majority of her life. Thus, the concept of home is not simple for an immigrant, or really for any visible minority, just as it is not simple for a veteran. Rachel’s blog further discusses the difficulties of finding one’s identity in a new country through her own example of becoming very aware of her race after being referred to as “the other Asian girl” once moving to North America. Furthermore, Rachel discusses how like Changez and my mom, she has experienced racism in the west. She discusses a racist episode that she experienced on the bus (which I have to say, she dealt with in what can only be described as a badass way), during which she was told to “Go back to where you came from”. This just goes to show that making a place “home” is easier for some people than it is for others.

Sania’s blog also discusses complicated home identities. She explains that “I knew from a very young age about my hybrid-identity because of moving around and because I felt confused when I had to pick and choose from the differences the cultures and societies offered. I had questioned myself as to who and what should I be representing, and if I am supposed to represent a group over the other?”. To this point, I have heard very similar statements by my family members who have immigrated, as retaining old cultures and adapting to new cultures is a part of everyday life for them. And one can see this struggle in Changez’s own life, as being an immigrant in a society marked by manichean statements such as “you are either with us or with the terrorists”, constantly forces one to try to define the boundaries of oneself in a way that most people may never have to. Sania ended her poignant blog with an Ijeoma Umebinyuo quote that really resonated with me, as it speaks to the split identity that my mom has often talked to me about. Hence, with kudos to Sania, I would also like to end my blog with this quote, as I believe it can also speak to the sense of disconnection faced by veterans upon their homecomings.

“So, here you are

too foreign for home

too foreign for here.

never enough for both” 

– Ijeoma Umebinyguo

Thanks for the awesome, though provoking blogs ASTU 100A. Good luck with your final few weeks.

– Kihan