I still remember the time I flew to England to study in Oxford. I couldn’t sleep the night before, I was so excited. I was only 16. Meeting new people and experiencing a totally different culture. What I didn’t know back then, how moving to another country can shape someone’s personality and cultural identity. Those growing up with multiple cultural identities are often called TCK or Third Culture Kids. Belonging everywhere and nowhere. At How to Date a Foreigner, we meet many TCK every day. Read this post to help you identify your cultural identity.
If you are an avid traveler like me or your parents moved to another country when you were young, or your parents have different ethnicities themselves, you probably thought about your cultural identity at one point in your life. You are part of a new generation of TCK, who are wondering the same.
What is your culture? This is a question that can also arise among global travelers, who lived several years abroad.
At How to Date a Foreigner, we help you explore these.
When you are a TCK with a multicultural background, you tend to think differently and maybe even behave differently than those in your homeland. However, you can also feel a bit out of place in your new country (host country). You probably love being there, have lots of friends, but at the same time, something is still missing.
This difference usually comes down to culture. The culture you were so used to.
If you were born into a family of immigrant parents, you might also have this feeling. Your parents raised you according to their cultural identity (eg. Chinese), but society around you expects something different (eg. American). You can perfectly navigate both, but at the same time, you are asking yourself ‘Who am I‘?
The word around us expects us to fit into ‘boxes’. Have you finished school? Box ticked. Do you have a job? Box ticked. But if you are a TCK and don’t fit into any of the boxes, it gets confusing – when really, it should NOT be.
What is your cultural identity?
We live in a society where the answer to ‘who are you’ dates back to hundreds and thousands of years prior to globalization. Back then, traveling wasn’t as easy.
Our identity was defined by our country of origin, race, gender, language… and our society today still lives by these.
The belief today is still ‘you have to belong somewhere or you don’t belong’.
You can’t belong to two or more or you are believed to have multiple identities – that is somehow difficult to grasp for most people. Maybe they even label you as someone with an ‘identity crisis‘ – when in reality you just belong to a unique group of TCK with multiple cultural backgrounds.
This is because despite the exponential growth of the travel industry, still, less than <1% of the global population lives in a country different from their cultural origin.
Hence our small group of less than 1% is either trying to convince the 99% our mixed cultural background is totally normal or question who we are and try to fully assimilate and fit in to please the 99%. It’s totally a personal choice. Do what makes you feel good.
Assimilate into the new or embrace the old?
At the time, I moved to England for the first time at a young age, I wanted to assimilate. Then after partially moving back to my homeland and additionally traveling around the world for several years, learning about cultures, I now embrace it.
Younger people usually tend to assimilate, whereas the older generation either don’t care or even embrace their own culture.
Maybe you go through phases.
I look at it as I have something special to show and teach people, wherever I go.
This is what make the world colorful. …PEOPLE LIKE US! 😉
I’m not Asian, but did you know my country of origin (Hungary) is a Western country with Asian values?
I love it and it fascinates me!
What is your personal culture?
As much as the world is keen to make us fit into one box, we are all slightly distinct with unique experiences.
Your country might be very individualistic, while you prefer to work in teams. Or your country might have very defined social gender roles, but you prefer if they overlap.
When you have a mixed cultural background, you probably ask yourself which one is your culture? Your homeland’s or your host country’s?
There is a high probability that your personal culture will be closer to a 3rd country’s that you haven’t even thought of!
Hofstede’s cultural dimensions:
Your individual cultural identity
If you are from China but immigrated to the US, your countries’ cultures based on Hofstede’s 6 dimensions will be as below.
However, as you developed your own individual cultural identity, your personal culture probably won’t agree with any of these two countries. Your cultural identity will highly likely be somewhere between the two countries.
If your personal identity is like in my 3rd column (below), then your cultural identity will be probably be closer to Brazil’s as a TCK.
It doesn’t mean that your culture will be that of Brazil’s (without ever even living there), but your personal culture will be closer to theirs.
For the sake of this example, I left out Masculinity and Uncertainty Avoidance as those figures wouldn’t have agreed with Brazil (I didn’t want them to confuse you).
Of course, this is just a very small sample, but enough to give you an idea.
| China | USA | Personal Culture (Brazil?) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Power Distance | 80 | 40 | 69 |
| Individualism | 20 | 91 | 38 |
| Long Term Orientation | 87 | 26 | 44 |
| Indulgence | 24 | 68 | 59 |
Why do you get a culture shock?
Now that you are familiar with some of the cultural differences, let’s look at why you get a culture shock.
Culture shock is an experience a person may have when one moves to a cultural environment which is different from their own (Wikipedia).
Based on Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, let’s compare individualism of different countries on a scale. See picture below from Researchgate
If your cultural identity is American with high individualism, and you go to New Zealand you will probably still feel comfortable. However, if you go to Ecuador or China, you will experience a culture shock due to the extreme differences.
Same the other way around. If your cultural identity is Chinese, and go to New Zealand or the US, you might not feel comfortable in the beginning and it will take you a while to adjust. When it comes to intercultural dating, these are some of the factors to also take into consideration.
For some, it will take longer to adjust than others, but the host country’s culture might eventually become your new ‘normal’ – as the stages of culture shock diagram shows below.
Who to date based on your cultural identity?
If you are from China (one of the countries with the most immigrants abroad) you will probably get on well with someone in a similar situation to yours.
However, please keep in mind that some people will assimilate a lot more than others. Being ‘in the same shoes’ as a TCK doesn’t necessarily mean having the same personal culture, but it is more likely you will get on.
Another good match could be someone with a totally different background to yours, but with a similar personal culture and view of life.
They could be either mono-cultural or multi-cultural.
After traveling around the world for so long, I have however noticed that majority of TCK with multicultural experiences tend to gravitate toward people from other cultures (either mono-cultural or multi-cultural). This is probably because of their curiosity of the world.
Dating someone from a totally different background will give you novel experiences and teach you something original every day.
If you have a multicultural background, did our article give you a fresh perspective? Let us know below.
Read next: Chinese Calendar Converter – How To Find Out Your Western Birthday