Dictionary of a Nomad (Wörterbuch einer Nomadin)

Volha Hapeyeva gathers words that have accompanied her through her nomadic years moving between Belarus, Germany, Crete and Japan, shaping them into a poetic, personal and political »dictionary«.

Each chapter begins with seemingly insconspicuous individual words, opening up enirely new ways of approach to its meaning, therefore new ways of seeing the world. Meanings overlap, diverge and sometimes contradict each other. A term that seems neutral in one context carries historical weight in another; a simple directional word such as »East« or »West« can echo with political memory in German. Through these shifts in meaning, Hapeyeva shows how language does not merely describe reality, it quietly organizes it, right down to something as concrete as the passport we carry.

Rather than a conventional dictionary, but a critical reflection on belonging, identity, and power emerges, questioning home and foreigness, gender and patriarchy, and being human beyond definitions.