This paper is meant as a contribution to the clinical reflection on the effects of dwelling, or living, and a feeling of “home”. Through these effects, an entire (and necessary) revolution of illusory unity becomes evident, wherein lies identity. And they become even stronger in a foreign land to the point of exposing certain expatriated subjects to risks of fragility that prevent them from investing in new relationships and from sustaining themselves in the world. Clinical experience shows that dwelling, or living [somewhere], as well as exile, cannot be restricted exclusively to territorial and ethnic considerations. They concern the relationship of each subject with the strangeness of his origins, his family ties and his destiny. Expatriation merely accentuates this suffering of the unknown that any individual can organize according to his own history. It also leads us to reconsider the difficulty of understanding the articulation between the individual subject and the community, between mental process and cultural factors.
Dwelling; exile; foreigner; sense of identity; intercultural