After reading the blogs and picking out similarity after similarity I realized it was actually going to be much harder to find the differences. While the stories were very unique and diverse, the themes and values within them were very similar. Since the similarities seemed to be more noticeable to me I am going to start with the top similarities I observed:

1. The value of experience
2. The idea that home is not a physical place but a feeling
   1. Also the ability of physical place to affect the way feel, through providing stability, security and comfort.
3. The role houses play in our perceptions of home
4. The importance of stories to our understanding of home
5. The importance of the people you surround yourself with
6. The idea that our sense of home changes and grows with us

While each blogger presented a very different story to define their individual perception of home, most blogs seemed to suggest that the concept of home is personal. This recurrent theme was not only that home is personal, but also that it is more of a feeling than a physical place. We define home as feelings such as, stability, acceptance and connection. Also many of us seem to highly value the relationships and people in our lives that allow us to feel at home.

As I mentioned earlier I thought finding differences was a much harder task. One blog that provided a very different interpretation of home was Kathryn Fraser’s blog. Her outlook on home was unique because instead of exploring the concept of home from an individual perspective she looked at the national perspective. In her blog Kathryn examines peoples’ perceptions versus the reality of their home country. Where many blogs shared thoughts on the personal concept of home, Kathryn made me think about the importance of the national understanding of home. She stresses the importance of “bring together our differing understandings of home,” so we can create a nation in which all citizens feel the security, acceptance and connection of home. How we as a group define our country has substantial influence on an individual’s ability to relate to it as home.

Defining home is a very difficult task because it is a complex idea made up of both macro (national) and micro (individual) components. And while a home might be shared by many people, it can also differ from person to person, and even change for each person through time. I feel that the differences in people’s stories define the individual component of home and the shared themes and values within these stories give us a glimpse of the national component of home.

Works Cited

Fraser, Kathryn. “Question 4, Blog Post 2.” Kathryn Fraser’s Blog. Web.