Quote by Dionne Brand: “To live is to be unfaithful to origins.”

This provocative statement suggests that personal growth and adapting to new experiences inherently mean moving away from our initial starting points or expectations. It implies that true living involves a necessary departure from fixed beginnings.

The mid-1990s saw nuanced discussions around identity and belonging in a globalized world, challenging rigid notions of fixed origins. Brand's work explores the necessary evolution and transformation of self, particularly for those in the diaspora, moving beyond ancestral starting points.

Trinidadian-Canadian poet, novelist, and essayist who was Poet Laureate of Toronto from 2009 to 2012. Her 2001 work A Map to the Door of No Return explores the ongoing legacy of slavery and the Atlantic crossing in shaping diasporic Black identity.