Young Stephen identifies himself with a list of signifiers given to him by his Irish geographical and social space. Yet, thinking about something beyond the listed signifiers, he feels a headache, which can be read as a symptom of the reality omitted from the list, the reality of Ireland`s colonization. His headache ensues as a response to the discordance between his list and his geography lesson, and above all, to the dissonance between the political and social reality of Ireland and the `Ireland` on his flyleaf list. He turns over the flyleaf, but later, realizes his displacement and his colonial otherness through his engagement with the Irish English language, which dissolves his previous sense of a unified identity. He inevitably feels anxiety about the space of colonized Ireland and his identity as an Irishman. However, such uneasiness doesn`t lead him to join the contemporary rebellion against colonialism. He resists the insidious reproduction of the colonial situation by intentionally refusing to be categorized or established as an Irish subject who unknowingly and unconsciously colludes with the British colonization of Ireland. Searching for the possibility of and space for resistance, Stephen defines his race`s consciousness as "uncreated" and through exile, attempts to differentiate himself from the traditional net which compels him to fix his identity to a social or national space. Offering an anti-Bildung narrative, an account of anxiety caused by place and displacement, and the suggestion of an undiscovered Irish consciousness and identity, A Portrait draws attention to the reality of the displacement of the Ireland that exists beyond the text and demands that readers react.