Metaphor and Reality: Expectations of Vietnam from Millennial Eyes

Indianapolis, IN

By acknowledging the engines of 1960s American history, my preparation for the Vietnam field study was focused on the generational schism between veterans and students. Using the initial flights as an exposition, I wrote about the emotional associations, biases, and anxieties associated with international travel for the first time and being a foreigner. My perspective changed from personal narrative to one that speaks of the issues of travel in a figurative way. Using emotional cartography as a blanket metaphor, I wrote about my expectations and the ever looming horizon, an unreachable destination in the context of the study. As we reached the exit of the final airport, I realized that these flights were firsts in more ways than one: they were an attempt to bridge generational differences embedded in decades of national and personal wars.