"Imaginary Homelands" Homelands Analysis

In “Imaginary Homelands,” Rushdie explores two phenomena which occur when you spend a substantial amount of time away from your home. The first of these phenomena is the change in the way that you perceive your home when you return to it. Rushdie describes this feeling while discussing her return to her childhood home, which she remembers only from a photograph. She describes an “eerie” (9) feeling upon returning. She felt as though her childhood home existed in “reality,” (9) while her everyday life existed apart from the home as an “illusion” (9). As I have mentioned in class before, I experienced a similar feeling when I returned to my own childhood home after being away at boarding school. I have a diary entry saved on my computer which I wrote the second month that I lived away from home (October 3, 2015). It reads, “Fifteen...the year the town is behind me before I can look back. My heart still thinks it is there, yet my feet lie on the path before me.” Perhaps the similarity between Rushdie’s recollection and my own suggests that the sensation of dissonance between the past and the present is familiar to anyone that has left their home.
            The second of the phenomena is, in a sense, the synthesis of the past and present. It is the challenge of integrating the past into your present identity. Rushdie considers this question in relation to her Indian identity. She writes, “To be an Indian writer is to face, every day, problems of definition. What does it mean to be ‘Indian’ outside of India?” (17). While Rushdie’s call for self-definition is critical, I would submit that considering how our past defines us without our own choosing is valuable as well. One way through which our past inevitably defines us is through the human tendency to consider the present and the future in relationship to our past. People naturally look to find similarities and differences in everyday life and they often use the past as the basis of these comparisons. Take, for example, my own experience of coming home from boarding school. In that moment, it was impossible for me to separate my present perception of my home from the perception of my home the day that I left it. Perhaps Rushdie is mourning this limitation when she cries out to ‘open the universe a little more,’ (21). If we can only form our understanding of the present and future in relationship to the past, it is imperative that we are intentional about forming our past when we have the ability to. The Bridges is acutely aware of this reality. They know that the past forms the foundation for the imagination of new ideas. This is why the program frequently exposes students to successful college students and community members. Dr. Ellis recently shared the value of our role as tutors by explaining that our presence gives students an everyday exposure to college that they may not have otherwise had. We serve as role models for what students can accomplish if they work hard in school. Eventually, these interactions will become a part of the students’ past and it will inform their ideas for what they can achieve in the future. 

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