Literature has defined the contours of Belarusian nationalism. This paper will demonstrate how a contingent of contemporary anticolonial writers navigate the question of Belarusian nationalism using its primary hermeneutic vector, literature. Tony Lashden and Darya Trajden are representatives of a new generation of Belarusian writers who are reappropriating the term tutejšasć or hereness, as a means of resisting dictatorship, and complicating traditional forms of nationalism that have harmed the region’s inhabitants for centuries. The texts, Cherny Les by Lashden and Gribnye Miesta by Trajden both emphasize soil over blood as they give voice to the newest expression of hereness in a long line of iterations on the word. Close engagement with these texts reveal thattutejšasć is not simply a synonym for Belarusian nationalism, but a framework for building a resilient community primed to live outside and/or beyond the state.