Where Is Home? Perf. Pico Iyer. TED.com. N.p., June 2013. Web. 24 Sept. 2014.

In this TED Talk, writer Pico Iyer talks about the idea of home. In this global age, one cannot clearly define home as a single, particular place. Iyer specifically identifies with multiple places. His blood and ancestry come from India. But he has never lived a single day there and he cannot speak any of the dialects. So he cannot fully identify as Indian. He was born, raised, and educated in England. However, he left the country right after his undergraduate education. And he never quite fit in with the typical image of an English person. He has lived in the U.S. for 48 years now. He pays his taxes here and does what other citizens do. However, this is not quite his home either because he always carries around a card declaring him as a permanent alien. Lastly, the place that resonates the most inside of him is Japan. However, he has never been more than a tourist there.

Iyer looks back at the traditional idea of home and challenges it. Home does not have to be clearly defined as the place your family comes from, the place you grew up in, or the place you currently live. Home does not have to be one place. Rather, it can be an idea – an ever-changing representation of yourself. Nowadays, we are constantly moving. 220 million people live in countries that are not their own. But while movement is a privilege, it only means something if you have a home to return to. Home is the place where you sleep. But home is not only that. “It’s the place where you stand.” It is the place where you everything around you stops, where you find stability, where you discover serenity, and where you get in touch with yourself.

This definition of home is particularly fascinating in how modern developments in society are reshaping one of the most basic elements of the human experience: home. In relation to my study on cities and narratives and community, Iyer’s personal narrative gives a strong perspective, especially for a city as global and diverse as New York. This will help me direct my research on how people build communities in NYC and how personal narratives and experiences of the city shape the city.