The Flag in Its Labyrinth

I could say that I’ve been thinking a lot about transnationality lately, but really it’s more accurate to say that I think a lot about transnationality in general. But for all that thinking, I can’t definitively say anything about it. I cannot define what it means to you, how the shape of its sound and meaning fit onto you like skin. I could copy out a dictionary definition, but were I to do so for a term so defined by its defiance of demarcation, I would feel that I had lost my way only two steps into the labyrinth. In truth, that labyrinth is different for everyone, just as unique as the maze in your fingerprint; I cannot offer you a map, a sequence of lefts and rights, some formula to decode your identity. All I can do is define what transnationality means to me, and hope maybe it gives you something to think about, or, god forbid, you feel something familiar along the way.

If asked where I’m ‘from’, I’ll say Italy (and if asked to elaborate, I’ll ask “how good’s your Italian geography?” followed by a knowing look when you hazard a guess “Rome’s in the…middle?”) — but the truth is far more complex. To put it concisely, I’m Italian-born and British-raised by my British brother, yet despite only holding a British passport I’ve always felt a pull back towards the Mediterranean, even before I understood what that call was. So, I’ve become accustomed to giving the simple answer, the most-correct of the possible oversimplified answers. Make no mistake, if there is a centre to my labyrinth, there is an Italian flag planted there, as though I am some celestial body to be claimed by the first standard driven into the dust. But a labyrinth is not its centre; it is the maze.

Yesterday I visited my old university for a few hours, meandering about admiring the snow-dusted campus while listening to How We Named the Stars by Andrés N. Ordorica on Audible: come for the gay angst, stay for the touching exploration of a second-generation immigrant’s transnational identity (in short, I recommend). To escape the biting cold for a short while, I ducked into the library and found myself on a perch between rows of books. After finishing a chapter (and drying my eyes), I looked up to see which section of the library I was in. There are over a million books in the University of Warwick’s library, and yet the first title I see is Transnational America. Of course.

In Transnational America, Inderpal Grewal proposes the idea that “nationalisms had divided people who were earlier connected.” Consider another metaphor: imagine a field that, after many years, has a fence built down the middle. Does this make it two separate fields, or simply a field with a fence in it? This perspective helps to illustrate how utterly arbitrary many borders are, and encourages us as writers, philosophers or simply as people to push, bend and break these lines drawn on maps; who is a cartographer to define a person’s identity? Yet however arbitrary the placement of the fence, if a separate culture then develops on each side, does belonging to simply ‘the field’ have the clarity of belonging? In other words, does it satisfy any transnational identity to declare oneself a ‘citizen of the world,’ or does that disregard the specific history and culture that identity entails? Another dead end, then. Let’s backtrack and try a different path.

Ordorica’s take on transnationality is commendable in its nuance; for the first two thirds of the book, it is neither a focus nor ignored, it simply is. Studying in the United States, the protagonist Daniel de La Luna is frequently identified, by himself and by others, as Mexican. Only as the narrative progresses, and we gain a deeper understanding of its characters, do we truly broach the subject of the protagonist’s transnational identity. When later he is in Mexico, amidst a heated argument he declares he is “not from here.” Daniel’s own characterisation of his shared national identity thus traps him in a perpetual sense of not belonging — no doubt familiar to many who feel torn between two places (a description Ordorica uses for Daniel’s mind also). The literary real estate a novel has at its disposal allows for this thoughtful transition, perhaps more so than a poem’s typically more compact stylings, but there are a wealth of means at the hands of the poet that are elusive and unavailable to the novelist. Consider, for example, if a novel switched language halfway through — it would dumbfound its readers, and probably not in a good way. More likely still, the story would never be published, deemed unfit for the market, ‘too experimental,’ ‘lacking broader appeal.’ Poetry is not shackled in this way; to put it bluntly, it has more licence to do whatever the fuck it wants. If a poem switches language halfway through the reader will more than likely take it in stride; I’m almost more surprised if a poem only uses one language. Poetry’s freedoms go beyond the linguistic, however; consider the potential of the poem to display itself boldly on the page, be it in its contours, shaping or flagrant lack thereof. In this sense, poetry is a form of visual art, allowed to mix media or colours. Poetry itself cannot be classified solely as literary or visual; it defies, existing at the intersection of both. Note my wording above: it cannot be classified “solely” as either, because it is “entirely” both; it is at once 100% literary and 100% visual; it is not ‘between,’ it is both. Is Daniel at once Mexican and American? Am I both Italian, as per my birth and my heart, and British, as per my passport and my brother? I suppose this to be a valid argument; I have never thought of things this way, but all the same I do not hate it.