How do you choose a name? That’s a tricky one. I have spent a lot of time thinking about names in my life. When I was about 13 or so, I started keeping a list of all the pretty or cool or just good names that I knew or heard of. Mostly because I like doing lists, but also as a reference, for the day when one of my characters might be in need of a name. This was during the time when I was convinced and completely certain that I would become a fiction writer and be the creator of an entire library’s worth of books, all full of characters to name. The list became quite extensive.
I guess I still have the list somewhere, in a folder on an old external harddrive. I haven’t looked at it for years. I haven’t felt the need to name anyone for ages. The few characters that I have written about have kind of come to me already named, with matching personalities.
But that’s just the thing. You can’t just choose a name randomly, because it’s pretty. A name has to have a meaning. A name can be like an extention of a person, the final detail to make a personality complete.
Names are important. They have the potential for an almost magical power over the person carrying the name. Or that is atleast one of the premises in two of my favourite fantasy novels/series: “The girl who circumnavigated fairyland in a ship of her own making” by Catherynne M. Valente and the Earthsea cycle by Ursula K. Le Guin. To reveal your true name to someone is an act of ultimate trust, because in doing so, you also give them the key to your soul. And even if these fantasy stories might take it a bit far, I still think there is something there. The importance of a name. It sets the tone. It is a starting point. And I’ve spent a lot of time thinking of what to name this blog – the documentation of my five months long inspiration search in North America.
In human geography, researchers often speak of different kinds of geographies. Feminist geographies, time geographies, geographies of inclusion and exclusion. The spatial aspects of different structures and networks in our societies. It is an interesting way of looking at the world, and ever since my first fateful semester of geography studies, I haven’t been able to shake off the need to think in these spatial terms. It’s thrilling, to be able to put some of all the confusing phenomena that I am confronted with every day into a greater context. That’s the way I look upon the world now.
And so. The name of the blog should start with geographies. What of the end? What is it, really, that I’m looking for? What is the point of all this travelling, the searching? The starting point of my decision to go abroad was the restlessness. I’ve written before that I’m looking for inspiration. But, in the end, what I think it all boils down to is belonging. I feel lost, and I am searching for a place in the world where I can feel that I belong. And this is not necessarily an actual place. Actually, I rather think that it is more of an abstract place, something that has to be found among people, in a way of being, in a way of looking at the world and your place in it. And it can look very different, depending on situation and need. And by meeting new people and being confronted with new places and new situations, you are kind of forced to think about and define this place where you belong. Perspective and inspiration.
So. That’s a little of what my trip is about. And there we have it. The name. Geographies of belonging.
Katja Malmborg 