"When I visited the Arab world they would say, 'This is an American,' and when I came back to America, where I grew up, they would say, 'He belongs there, so where do I belong?' I'm in trouble, me both, and that's what makes me the person I am."

This is how (1) actor and comedian "Mo Amer" expressed his personal experience of living between several countries, during his interview on the program "AbTalks", as he is a Palestinian born in Kuwait, and then moved in childhood to the United States, where he grew up, settled and spent most of his life.

This "predicament" as described by Mo poses a kind of challenge faced by those who are known today as "children of the third culture", those who are confused between the identities of their countries of origin and the countries in which they grew up, if you are one of them, you may have just formed a bond with "Mo" and with everyone who expressed this predicament in his speech or work, as if you were members of the same family, who are the children of the third culture? And how can we understand living between different worlds and its impact on the people around us?

Children of the third culture

In the fifties of the last century, sociologist and anthropologist Ruth Osem and her husband John Osem went to India to study how Americans in India to perform political, commercial or economic tasks during that period of time dealt with the local Indian culture, and focused their attention on the children of these expatriates, that is, the children who accompanied their parents to this new environment, and announced in their study that the outcome of the interaction between American and Indian culture generated a new culture, and they called these children "children Third Culture" (2).

The child of the third culture is influenced by three cultures: the culture of his parents' home country, the culture of the host country or country of asylum, and a culture that arises after the child gets acquainted with children from other cultures. (Shutterstock)

Years later, sociologist David Pollock defined a "third culture child" as "a person who spent most of his formative years in a place with a culture different from that of his parents, and who succeeded in forming relationships with all the cultures he experienced, without owning any of them," and although his life experience may imbibe some elements of these cultures, his sense of belonging is often associated with others with a similar background (3).

David tells us about several cultures that affect this child, not one culture as often happens, where children are born in their parents' countries, so they learn about the culture of their homeland, and integrate into it spontaneously, before they are forced to migrate to countries with different cultures. David considers that the child of the third culture is influenced by three cultures, namely the culture of his parents' homeland, known as the "first culture", the culture of the host country or the country of asylum, which is here the "second culture", and a culture that resulted from the mixing of the first and second cultures after the child got to know and interact with children from other cultures living in that host country, which he called the "third culture".

David considers that the children of the third culture carry traits from the three cultures, but they do not fully belong to any of them, that is, they do not show any of the three cultures completely (4), if we go back to "Mo" as an example, his first culture is the Palestinian culture, his second culture is American, and the third is a culture that carries features of the Palestinian and American cultures along with elements of the cultures of his friends if he has friends from cultural backgrounds different from these two cultures.

Mo Amer is an example of a third culture who have traits from all three cultures, but do not belong entirely to any of them. (Social Media)

However, there is still controversy in the scientific community about the definition of those who fall under the concept of "children of the third culture" and those excluded from it, there are those who considered that the movement of parents from one city to another within the same country and without crossing borders makes their children children of the third culture, and there are those who considered that the child is not the son of a third culture unless he spends the majority of the first eighteen years of his life outside the homeland of one of his parents (5).

With the rapid development of this era, and the resulting globalization of the continuous and increasing movement of millions around the world, and the devastation of war from the flow of migration, it has become difficult to frame the concept of "children of the third culture" accurately, and this is what "Ruth Osim" acknowledged when "David Polk and his colleagues who co-wrote the book "Third Culture Kids", discussed some of the differences that appeared in their description of the concept of children of the third culture and the cultures that affect it, from what she did in her research, and she told them that she She believes that no concept can be fully and permanently defined because we know more every day, or because we live in a world that is constantly changing (6).

This means that the concept of "children of the third culture" continues to evolve, and from here also arose a long list of terms given to children and adults of the third culture, including "temporary visitors", "cultural chameleons", "global Bedouins", "strangers", and so on (7), who, whatever the term they are called, experience challenges ranging from the definition of the homeland to the crisis of identity and instability, and show unique skills that make them stand out clearly.

Growing up in the Diaspora

In her research on the impact of growing up in a different culture on children, researcher Mikayla Carroll of the University of Waikato explains that the first challenge for children of the third culture is the formation of identity, that is, their ability to answer themselves to the question "Who am I?" , and "What does it mean to be who I am?" The concept of identity differs from culture, which includes everything that a person must know and believe in to behave in a manner consistent with what his society recognizes and accepts from him (8).

Let's give a simplistic example, if we talk about dress as one of the most prominent features of different cultures around the world, wearing the dress code in a person's culture gives him a look that corresponds to his society and is easy to accept for it, but what if an Italian girl wears an East African kanga? Or did a young Korean man wear an Arab dress? What we mean is that the appearance of elements of culture on a person facilitates the identification of his culture, and this is different from a person's attempt to describe his vision of himself and determine his values, ideas and goals, which may also be influenced by culture.

Michaela also mentions that there is a scientific division about the impact of growing up in the formation of the identity of the child of the third culture, there is a scientific team that uses the psychosocial perspective and believes that the child of the third culture faces a problem in the formation of his identity and delays in its formation, and even shows a confused identity that lacks commitment.

These children also face a challenge related to their sense of belonging, or what is known as "spatial identity", where people form an emotional link with a certain place, and about the sense of belonging among children of the third culture, researchers are also divided between those who assert that they either feel belonging to several countries or "non-belonging". In general, the sense of belonging is affected by several factors, such as the child's personal experiences, emotional connections with places, and factors affecting the construction or loss of connections with places around him, and this is a topic that still needs a lot of research that analyzes and clarifies its aspects (9).

At the level of personal relationships, the children of the third culture do not differ from the children of the same culture in their need to build social relationships in which they feel love and can provide it, and the meaning of their lives, and the ability to learn, think, make decisions, and other benefits of social ties, but their movement from one country to another may affect their movement to meet this need, so you find them more reluctant and cautious towards participating in activities in their places of study or work, trying to keep dealing with the environment or culture to avoid the formation of close or long-term social relationships, in an attempt to avoid the pain of paradoxing these relationships when they move to a new place.

David Polk likens the children of the third culture to a tree that is moved to cultivate from one place to another, and its roots never find the opportunity to extend fully deep into the new land. Perhaps this is what reinforces in these people the constant desire for change. (Shutterstock)

This crisis extends to make them feel rootless, as they have difficulty answering the questions "Where are you from?" and "Where is your homeland?" According to Michaela, researchers such as Anastasia Lejadi and Gretnia van Schalkoek of the Department of Psychology at the University of Macao and Christopher Spencer of the Department of Psychology at the University of Sheffield agree that home is the spatial space that brings together intimacy, comfort, acceptance and roots, and it is where the family comes together to bring about social and emotional interactions.

David Polk uses this definition to emphasize the absence of roots in the lives of children of the third culture, and likens them to a tree that is transferred to cultivation from one place to another, and its roots never find the opportunity to extend deep into the new land completely. Perhaps this reinforces in these people the constant desire for change, whether in their relationships, jobs or places of residence, and you find them moving frequently in pursuit of their constant expectation that the new place will be their home, but can there be any benefit from the experience of the third culture?

The bright side of the third culture

Returning to the challenge of identity formation, according to Michaela, a team of scientists used the sociocultural perspective to conclude that the children of the third culture have after a while the ability to form a rich identity resulting from their continuous exposure to different cultures, and they also criticized the first group that accused the child of the third culture of confusion or delay of identity.

This team of scientists believes that the children of the third culture are able to form adaptive, hybrid, and multiple identities, in which they integrate all the elements of the cultures to which they have been exposed in their lives, and they are based on the idea that identity for any person does not stop at a certain time or situation, but rather it is a continuous process in development, and in various aspects, because it is a mixture of a person's experiences in the past and future, and of fact and fiction, as if he constantly reformulates his personal story creatively (10).

As for the children's sense of belonging in the third culture, it is surprising to note that during their adaptation stage in the environments in which they are located, they develop a strong sense of belonging to their peers, to the network of personal relationships and the society they contemporary, so their belonging turns from belonging to the place, home or homeland to belonging to peers, friends and everything that resembles and harmonizes with their life experiences.

Children of the third culture become more positive about cultural diversity, and are better able to communicate with different cultures, through their understanding of cultural differences between people in ideas, customs and beliefs. (Shutterstock)

In the same context, it is noted that the children of third cultures are exposed at an early age to different cultures, in the classrooms, or sports club stadiums, or even in the vicinity of their homes, so they develop during their formative years a higher sensitivity to cultural diversity than the children of the same culture, and cultural sensitivity is defined as caring for the views of others, their needs and beliefs, so these people become more positive towards cultural diversity, and are more able to communicate with different cultures, through their understanding of the cultural differences between people in ideas and customs and beliefs (11).

This group also shows confidence in its ability to deal with different cultures higher than the confidence of children of the same culture, who view this high confidence at times as a kind of show of superiority, but the life experience of the children of the third culture explains this, mixing with people from different cultural backgrounds made it easier for them to understand and accept cultural diversity, in a way that made them more able to influence individuals, integrate different points of view, and direct this difference within the groups they join in school Or work toward goals that the culturally diverse group achieves and adds to its value.

Thus, the children of the third culture gained confidence in their ability to deal positively with cultural diversity, and this confidence extended to include their confidence in their competence in dealing with the challenges that they may face when taking a new experience or making a difficult decision, which makes them risk-takers, able to take risks because of their confidence in their ability to deal with any situation and any challenge (12).

These people also have high cognitive flexibility resulting from this experience, which made them more able to change their previous thoughts, opinions and habits to deal with situations that involve change or radical challenges, relying on the self-learning experiences they went through in their previous experiences, and their ability to see patterns in these experiences, and build on them to reach solutions and strategies that enable them to face the unexpected.

It is noted that over time and the diversity of experiences, the profits of their life experiences accumulate in their knowledge portfolios to gain them the ability to fully integrate into any situation or context, while retaining their ability to withdraw from it to their insides at the same time, to see things from a broader perspective and with a view away from emotion, and to assess the surrounding situations with the elements they contain, such as people, and to develop a clear understanding that helps them propose creative solutions to the problems they face in the workplace or in their personal lives, in addition to developing their ability to adapt. To turn adversity into grants, and to direct changes to create opportunities that enable them to reborn themselves, the new personality appears with better abilities and higher superiority than the previous image.

These people also succeed in showing social intelligence, higher levels of maturity and independence, higher demand for academic qualifications, and higher opportunities for learning and self-development (13), but there is still a need to fill the gap of knowing more about this group, specifically from the children of Arabs in different countries, as a large number of current research focuses on the children of expatriate American citizens, so it cannot be generalized, and the main research is old research that may lack some information related to the global situation Today, current research lacks scientific analysis and therefore does not offer a clear understanding that can be relied upon when studying or dealing with this category.

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  • Sources:
  • ABtalks with Mo Amer – with Mo Amer
  • Third Culture Kids
  • Third Culture Kids: The Experience of Growing Up Among Worlds Book
  • Previous source
  • How does growing up as a Third Culture Kid (TCK) impact life choices? Effects on ATCKs and their educational and career experiences
  • Third Culture Kids: The Experience of Growing Up Among Worlds Book
  • Global nomads, cultural chameleons, strange ones or immigrants? An exploration of Third Culture Kid terminology with reference to the United Arab Emirates
  • How does growing up as a Third Culture Kid (TCK) impact life choices? Effects on ATCKs and their educational and career experiences
  • Ibid.
  • How does growing up as a Third Culture Kid (TCK) impact life choices? Effects on ATCKs and their educational and career experiences
  • Third Culture Kids, their diversity beliefs and their intercultural competences
  • The Skills That Global Cosmopolitans Bring to the Table
  • SAUDI THIRD CULTURE KIDS: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL CASE STUDY OF SAUDIS':13 ACCULTURATION IN A NORTHEAST OHIO ELEMENTARY SCHOOL