Belonging_-_Comparison_as_You_Like_It_(Shakespeare)_&_1984_(George_Orwell)

What’s your perspective' Belonging is an odd concept and means different things to different people. However, you either do or you don’t belong, no two ways about it. Whether you’re Kate Middleton being accepted by the Queen or the school ‘loser’ wanting acceptance by the Queen Bee, it’s all about your perspective. There has not been much change from Elizabethan times when William Shakespeare was writing about love, death and tragedy till today. The size of the skirts may differ but the role of perspective in belonging hasn’t. In ‘As You Like It’, one of Shakespeare’s many plays, he writes about the concept that your feelings of belonging depend on where you come from and the environment in which you grew up in. Throughout the play the contrast and juxtaposition of characters and images implants the sense that as the audience, we to should look around to see if we are being the ‘Queen Bee’s’ judging people to see if they fit the criteria of our own environment. The play “As You Like It”, has characters that represent many forms of belonging. There is Touchstone, the court jester, who represents one of the attitudes prevalent at the time the play was written. He does not grasp the thought that anybody’s life could be different from his own. He comes from the Court, and his prejudices stem from the prerequisite attitudes of that level of society. Where as, Corin, a shepherd that has lived in the Forest of Arden his entire life, has an entirely different perspective from that of Touchstone. He believes in the simple life, that he belongs and is connected to his land and sheep, but neither to the people nor their requirements in his surrounds. This contrast of attitudes highlights that with the change of environment, comes a change in attitude towards other people and their own environments and therefore demonstrates an altered perspective. Who should be able to assume the role of determining if someone else “fits in”, the concept of belonging should be developed and adjusted by the individual. This leads to George Orwell’s “1984”, another literary text that explores and investigates what would happen if that power to determine what you do and who you are was taken away from the individual. George Orwell’s “1984” is a novel that entwines the reader in the vivid imagery of its world of totalitarianism. “1984” was not written as a prediction but as a warning to what could happen if individuals freedoms were taken away, and you were only permitted to be the individual that “Big Brother” specified you to be. You belonged and functioned within the constraints of a pre-determined society and to attempt to live outside these boundaries resulted in death. In order to flourish in “1984” the individual was required to actively and publicly conform in words, actions and thoughts to the deliberately manipulated information from the “Ministry of Truth” and the ever watchful eye of “Big Brother”. Reporting your neighbours and co-workers deviations from accepted behaviours was expected, encouraged and rewarded. This provokes the question, in order to achieve status and therefore knowledge that you do belong, must you give up your individuality and conform' A persons place and the people they surround themselves is a basis on which they can be judged, either by others or by themselves. It allows for feelings of belonging only within the group itself but often sets the criteria by which the rest of society can judge your fitness to belong to it. Perspective will always determine if an individual belongs. The individual’s concept of belonging will depend on where they came from, the type of environment in which they grew up in, their feelings of acceptance within that environment and the views of others. Belonging is a multi layered concept in which an individual may find themselves at different stages throughout their life. Their feelings of belonging can be determined not only by their view of themselves within their environment but also by the perspective of others within that setting. Throughout life perspectives shift, therefore life is constantly changing.