Don't Settle For Survival: Help Your TCK Thrive
Photo by Alex Guillaume on Unsplash
“Where are you from?”
It’s the question he dreads . . . perhaps you do as well.
It struck me as I listened to him—an 8th grade student at an international school in Spain. It was dress rehearsal day. We were both giving TEDx Talks the next day. He was the last one to hit the stage to practice.
The theme was “Culture in Motion.” How appropriate.
As he walked onto the platform, something about him intrigued me. I couldn’t pin his accent or appearance. Everything about him was a unique and beautiful blend.
A TCK’s Story
He was a TCK—a Third Culture Kid.
At the age of 13, he spoke with the eloquence and maturity of a 25-year-old PhD student. Yet, his physical stature matched his age and school grade.
Elias Block bared his soul with true authenticity and rawness. He shared his heart, his experience, his wisdom, his advice with the world.
This global mother of TCKs sitting in the front row was mesmerized and hung onto his every word.
As I sat listening to his profound message, I heard the stories of my own four sons. I knew their stories well, but I entered into a different realm of their stories that day.
This young man, Elias, described so well the experience of every TCK in the audience and around the globe. It put words and images on that strange and uncomfortable feeling of being “stuck in the middle.”
He began his message with the perplexing question that everyone always asks upon meeting someone for the first time:
“Where are you from?”
Elias stated that his “short answer to that common question would be inaccurate, and that the long answer would require a map . . .”
His complex and global life adventure is not identifiable by a simple push pin on a map hanging on a wall.
Can you relate?
Elias’s humorous and personal story included a PowerPoint slide with an image of three soccer jerseys, representing three different countries: Morocco, the USA, and Spain. He described the tension he felt in his family home during the World Cup. His mother from Morocco was cheering for her team. His father from the US was cheering for his team. His older brother, also a TCK, chose the allegiance of Spain—the land where their family currently lived.
Elias, on the other hand, described “sitting in the middle” and feeling “pulled in three directions.” He couldn’t fully identify with any of the three soccer teams and countries. He strongly felt the reality of his cultural blend of all three places, wondering where to position himself, who to cheer for, and with what and where to identify.
TCKs—Back to the Basics
What about our own TCKs—these amazing and unique boys and girls, teenagers, and adult children—who at times feel lost in the “Land Between”?
Elias’s story seems to be a shared story.
It might help if we go back to the original definition of TCK.
According to Pollock and Van Reken, authors of Third Culture Kids: Growing Up Among Worlds, “a TCK is someone who spent a key period of their childhood or adolescence living outside their parents’ native culture. This experience leads them to form connections with multiple cultures without fully belonging to any single one, often finding a sense of community with others who share similar international backgrounds.”
Photo by Global Residence Index on Unsplash
The Third Space
Aligning with the first word in the acronym, third, Elias talked about living daily in the “Third Space.”
The idea of third space is a term originally coined by sociologist Ray Oldenburg in 1989, referring to a place that is separate and distinct from one’s home, which could be considered the “first place.” A “second place” could be a school or workplace that is more neutral and distinct from one’s home. It is often a community-anchoring hub that encourages relaxation and interaction. Examples of a “second place” would be cafes, parks, libraries . . . places that naturally “foster social equity, reduce isolation, and build community.”
And what about third spaces?
They can be described as “places separate from where you sleep (your first space) or where you work to make ends meet (your second space). They are the spaces in-between, where you freely encounter other people, ideas, and experiences.”
How does this concept of a third space apply to our TCKs—third culture kids?
The Third Space Theory was first defined by Homi K. Bhabha as a sociolinguistic theory describing “a person or community's continuous process of negotiating their sense of culture and identity.” Bhabha characterizes “The Third Space” as an “undefined middle ground, where different elements of a person’s cultural and environmental realities can be cobbled together into a constantly-evolving framework for self-identification.”
Bhabha’s theory is also referred to as “hybridity.” This involves a hybrid, in-between space where cultural identities are negotiated, blended, and re-imagined.
Living in the “Land Between”
That is what Elias was describing. He expressed that he constantly lived in the “Third Space.”
So, how do we help our children, our families, and ourselves learn to live comfortably in this “Third Space”?
When we made the decision as parents to pack our bags, purchase airline tickets, and move our kids abroad…we didn’t realize all that we were signing up for. Our kids certainly didn’t know what we were signing them up for.
But, we’re here now, so how can we lead our TCKs well, parent them well, and help them to not just survive the TCK life in the third space but learn to thrive here?
We will explore these questions further in a future article. For now, check out Elias’ full TEDx Talk to hear more on kids who dwell in the “Land Between.”