What is home? Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah
Premise students gathered for the second session of our course centered on the enduring question: What is home?
In the first session, we had a lively conversation a series of Joan Didion’s essays about home, place, and family. Many students left the class wondering, “Does place define home?”
In an attempt to dig into that question, we grappled together with Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s novel Americanah (2013). Americanah tells the story of a young Nigerian woman, Ifemelu, who immigrates to the United States to attend university. Adichie traces Ifemelu's life in both countries, threaded by her love story with high school classmate Obinze. Adichie’ won the U.S. National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction for Americanah.
The class session was smaller than expected. We had 10 students sign up but for various scheduling reasons, five students attended. It was an amazing opportunity to share the air and spend time thinking together and listening deeply to the thought, opinions, and insights of group members. The intimacy of the class provided an unexpected depth and connection with the text and one another.
Premise students talked together about the experience of making home as an immigrant, the ways that place and memory play tricks on us in our conception of home, and the role of race and racism in defining concepts of home.
““How was it possible to miss something you no longer wanted?”
