Identity matters. It matters most amid flux, which the 21st Century is riddled with. Compromising the past and adding new components always knock on identity doors. Distinguishing the non-negotiable identity components from the negotiable gives us a head start. Our non-negotiable component remains Sonar Bangla, and all that that entails. We directly draw that term s romantic tones and drawn-out hues from Rabindranath Tagore, indirectly from others in our cultural pantheon. Their political manifestation was Bangladesh s 1971 birth. Ever since, negotiable components stole the limelight, exposing how mobile empathy is part of our tapestry.
No country can escape identity mobility. The Statue of Liberty, whose huddled masses tag (which invited the tired, poor, and those breathing to be free from the late 19th Century to a land of opportunity ), can barely be whispered today: still a louder Make America great again voice of a less welcoming country has not tarnished its land