Third Culture. No Culture. Best Culture
From Israel to Hong Kong, to Thailand, and many other places. As a child of an expat of Moroccan and French parents. She has built her career by bridging networks all across the world, and now as the managing editor of Prestige Magazine Thailand, Ms Sienna De L’Orpaz is a pretty big deal. With a myriad of separate backgrounds and wildly different cultures, it’s hard to pinpoint Ms De L’Orpaz’s first culture. With such a rich history of “settling down” in a lot of different places, all of these cultures Ms De L’Orpaz has been exposed to eventually built a conglomerate of all the cultures combined into one. This is where third cultures begin. Ms De L’Orpaz says it’s no culture. I think it’s best culture. Now I’m not a TCK in any sense. Both my parents and I grew up in the same city, so with this blog post, I aim to compare the differences in building identity between me, a non-TCK, and Ms De L’Orpaz.
Building from the ground up
Constructing identity is a lot like playing an RPG or a survival or a survival RPG game. You build from the ground up. Now just like how you would level up in games by completing missions, you “level up” your identity by knowing more cultures and meeting more people. There are perks of being non-TCK, like knowing firsthand your norms and taboos, which situations should you avoid or which hand to use when eating. But the same speaks true for TCKs aswell, the network of people you’ll know and befriend over the years, or the flexibility of your “culture” in favor of rigidness. But at the end of the day, all of us level up the same.
According to the Georgia State University, a constructed identity is basically the aggregate of life experiences, relationships, connections, mentality, and emotional stamps of a person. Ms De L’Orpaz describes her identity as “pieces of a puzzle”. Which can also be a term to describe a non-TCK identity. But what makes the puzzle different for a TCK and a non-TCK are the pieces and the puzzles being given. Where the puzzle is a constant for a non-TCK, the pieces continue to add and the borders of the puzzle become more and more ambiguous as they “settle down” in more and more places. Making the puzzle of identity harder to solve. So is third culture, no culture or best culture?
Question of “no culture”?
A question repeatedly asked during the guest speaker sessions with Ms De L’Orpaz was “how do you shape your identity?”. And what I like about Ms De L’Orpaz’s answer was that she kept it blunt. She said “we don’t necessarily connect with people who have one place, one culture, one identity.” In essence, TCKs culture is like the puzzle piece I described earlier. A conglomerate of cultures that keeps expanding. A definitive answer would be that TCK culture is ambiguous. It depends on the number of cultures you’ve been exposed to or how long you’ve been exposed to these cultures or how much of an impact does these individual cultures mean to you. So technically, Ms De L’Orpaz is right when she says that it’s no culture because it’s ambiguous. It’s also maybe a time where we should look at what culture and identity mean. Because culture and identity isn’t only the matter of arbitrary definitions, but it’s flexible, even for non-TCKs. This is also part of the reason why I think TCK is best culture. Because of the flexibility you’re given. Yes I know, TCK struggle with a lot of different aspects and I won’t suddenly change to a TCK if i was given that chance, but it something to recognize too. That the positive aspects and the things we can and should change as matters of something important and not secondary.
IDENTITY THEFT IS NOT A JOKE JIM
Constructing identity is a lot like playing an RPG or a survival or a survival RPG game. You build from the ground up. Now just like how you would level up in games by completing missions, you “level up” your identity by knowing more cultures and meeting more people. There are perks of being non-TCK, like knowing firsthand your norms and taboos, which situations should you avoid or which hand to use when eating. But the same speaks true for TCKs aswell, the network of people you’ll know and befriend over the years, or the flexibility of your “culture” in favor of rigidness. But at the end of the day, all of us level up the same.
According to the Georgia State University, a constructed identity is basically the aggregate of life experiences, relationships, connections, mentality, and emotional stamps of a person. Ms De L’Orpaz describes her identity as “pieces of a puzzle”. Which can also be a term to describe a non-TCK identity. But what makes the puzzle different for a TCK and a non-TCK are the pieces and the puzzles being given. Where the puzzle is a constant for a non-TCK, the pieces continue to add and the borders of the puzzle become more and more ambiguous as they “settle down” in more and more places. Making the puzzle of identity harder to solve. So is third culture, no culture or best culture?
Question of “no culture”?
A question repeatedly asked during the guest speaker sessions with Ms De L’Orpaz was “how do you shape your identity?”. And what I like about Ms De L’Orpaz’s answer was that she kept it blunt. She said “we don’t necessarily connect with people who have one place, one culture, one identity.” In essence, TCKs culture is like the puzzle piece I described earlier. A conglomerate of cultures that keeps expanding. A definitive answer would be that TCK culture is ambiguous. It depends on the number of cultures you’ve been exposed to or how long you’ve been exposed to these cultures or how much of an impact does these individual cultures mean to you. So technically, Ms De L’Orpaz is right when she says that it’s no culture because it’s ambiguous. It’s also maybe a time where we should look at what culture and identity mean. Because culture and identity isn’t only the matter of arbitrary definitions, but it’s flexible, even for non-TCKs. This is also part of the reason why I think TCK is best culture. Because of the flexibility you’re given. Yes I know, TCK struggle with a lot of different aspects and I won’t suddenly change to a TCK if i was given that chance, but it something to recognize too. That the positive aspects and the things we can and should change as matters of something important and not secondary.
IDENTITY THEFT IS NOT A JOKE JIM
MILLIONS OF FAMILIES SUFFER EVERY YEAR! If you don’t know, then you should definitely watch the office, like seriously it’s hilarious. Ogay, last but not least, the comparison. TCK and non-TCK cultures and identity. TCK are involved in a myriad of different cultures, meaning their first/original/culture they want to be assosiciated culture is wildly ambiguous. Non-TCK are less ambiguous than a TCK. On matters of identity, TCK’s puzzle piece would continue to add and it’s borders would continue to be more blurry, as for a non-TCK, hardly change.
Y’know, this is the first time I’ve heard the term TCK. it was coined in the 50s. This journey, of imagining, listening and asking questions about TCK has been awe inspiring. I just love the differences. The mystery and ambiguity. The blurriness and trust. I came to the conclusion that we don’t need to speak the same language, to worship the same god, to eat the same food, to make us understand each other. What separates us is not what makes us weak, it’s what makes us unique.
Keywords
Third Culture Kids, Relationships, Identity, Ambiguity, Puzzle
Sources:
MILLIONS OF FAMILIES SUFFER EVERY YEAR! If you don’t know, then you should definitely watch the office, like seriously it’s hilarious. Ogay, last but not least, the comparison. TCK and non-TCK cultures and identity. TCK are involved in a myriad of different cultures, meaning their first/original/culture they want to be assosiciated culture is wildly ambiguous. Non-TCK are less ambiguous than a TCK. On matters of identity, TCK’s puzzle piece would continue to add and it’s borders would continue to be more blurry, as for a non-TCK, hardly change.
Y’know, this is the first time I’ve heard the term TCK. it was coined in the 50s. This journey, of imagining, listening and asking questions about TCK has been awe inspiring. I just love the differences. The mystery and ambiguity. The blurriness and trust. I came to the conclusion that we don’t need to speak the same language, to worship the same god, to eat the same food, to make us understand each other. What separates us is not what makes us weak, it’s what makes us unique.
Keywords
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