“The best part is that my kids belong to two cultures which they love and embrace.” “I've noticed that you sort of reassess what you're doing in the sense of what kind of examples you are giving. When you are single and without children, you wouldn't think: "When I am doing this, what sort of example am I giving to my son or my daughter?" but when you have a child, pretty much everything you do makes you think: "Wait a minute, he's watching me and taking cues."“ |
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The Intercultural Child
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An intercultural child, as the name suggests, is someone who is exposed to more than one culture for their entire life through her or his parents. This will often involve more than one language, a combined set of ideals and a different outlook on life than if they were from a monocultural background. An intercultural child is more than just the sum of her or his parts – in other words, intercultural children consist of elements from both their mother and father’s side, as well as possessing their own unique features.
Duo’s Love and Parenthood Guide describes it as: “A child growing up in an intercultural family builds his or her identity with the building blocks provided by both his or her parents’ cultural backgrounds, but every child also has a great deal of something that is just him or her. Heredity, genes, outward appearance or parents’ wishes for their child don’t determine an intercultural child’s identity; instead, the child is more than the sum of all that he or she is made of”. (Love and Parenthood in an Intercultural Family: An intercultural child is more than the sum of his or her parts, pp. 21-25) The stage of searching for identity also includes experimenting. A child tries out different options and aspects of his or her intercultural identity – depending on the situation and age. A child may, for example, sometimes identify with his or her father’s culture and sometimes with the mother’s, or emphasise one side of his or her cultural identity and downplay the other.” (Love and Parenthood Guide: Bilingualism is a richness, pp 28-29) Although your child’s identity will develop automatically as they grow, in order to make it strong and positive you, as parents, can offer continuous help and support throughout. This will take a great deal of consideration and plenty of enjoyable work – just like bilingualism – but the rewards are incredible. In order to support your child’s positive identity development, you must first of all decide what is important to you and which parts of your culture, such as values, traditions and ways of life, you believe your child should be exposed to and, eventually, inherit. There will be many factors both you and your partner share and these will come naturally. However, there may be differences in your cultures and your way of seeing things and, given you cannot offer everything from your own culture, you should concentrate on and emphasise the parts you deem the very best. “Most of what you have selected from your culture will come naturally to the child. Just be open, both to your partner's differences, as well as your child’s, and remember that you can do it. Don't give up and don't drift away from those who may be in the same situation if you don't need the space. Also, remember yourselves as the baby will benefit from your well-taken-care-of relationship tremendously. All the best with everything. Tsemppiä!” The concept of identity itself consists of separate and distinct parts, including family, gender, culture, personal experiences and a person’s professional choices. All of these represent and contribute towards a fluid journey from being a child, through to pre-teen years, adolescence and adulthood. The formation of identity occurs over an individual’s entire life and contributes to the distinct personality of a person.
Duo’s Love and Parenthood Guide explains the development of an identity in the following way: “A child’s identity develops through comparisons. A child compares him or herself to his or her parents and other people close to them; for example, siblings, grandparents and friends. Through these comparisons, the child learns about similarities and differences and about his or her own identity. The development of identity is also affected by the way other people view the child and what kind of feedback he or she gets from others." Although your child’s identity will develop automatically as they grow, in order to make it strong and positive you, as parents, can offer continuous help and support throughout. This will take a great deal of consideration and plenty of enjoyable work – just like bilingualism – but the rewards are incredible. In order to support your child’s positive identity development, you must first of all decide what is important to you and which parts of your culture, such as values, traditions and ways of life, you believe your child should be exposed to and, eventually, inherit. There will be many factors both you and your partner share and these will come naturally. However, there may be differences in your cultures and your way of seeing things and, given you cannot offer everything from your own culture, you should concentrate on and emphasise the parts you deem the very best. While parents may wish or expect their child to be 50% one parent and 50% the other, the reality is that a child draws from so much more and, in the end, their identity is made up of influences from many different cultures, languages and traditions. At various times in their lives, they may feel closer to one side than the other, and this will change as they encounter different stages. Developing an identity is not simply black and white but rather many different shades and colours, all of which combine to make a unique individual. “It [intercultural parenthood] makes my life richer. I get to adapt more relaxed, easy going lifestyle, meet people from other countries, my daughter learns three languages "for free". I've made new friends due to our relationship, I've learned a lot. My daughter is super cute, she loves people and is open to new things. She is fearless and strong.” At some stage in their childhood, there is a chance your child could decide that they want to be ‘just Finnish’. This is perfectly normal and allowing them to work through this stage while remaining positive towards your own culture is the best course of action. For example, they may not wish to speak your own language out of the house, or they may have no desire to celebrate traditions or holidays that are not recognised in Finland. This may also extend to not wanting to go back to the expatriate parent’s home country time and again or deciding they are ‘no longer from that country’. The reason behind this shift to one side is that the majority of their friends and the people they encounter will be ‘just Finnish’, meaning your own child will want to conform and not be singled out. Allowing them to go through the various phases of experimentation will be easier for everyone concerned, as this experimentation is crucial given it lets a child build a solid and healthy identity. Being different may not be fun for a while and being ‘normal’ will seem much easier, but they will soon grow out of this and as a parent it is nothing to worry about. Instead, continue as you have done throughout and try not to become frustrated by the situation.
There are many different ways you can support your child as they develop their own, unique, identity. The first of which is very simple: love and respect your roots and your culture as well as love and respect your partner, their roots and the culture they come from. Secondly, in order to display the pride you have for both cultures, provide positives experiences of them (as well as other cultures). And lastly, make sure that both cultures are prevalent in your everyday life, as well in the more sporadic excursions and festivals. This will also lead to positive experiences, such as bedtime stories in a specific language or a Saturday night film with the family, throughout their childhood as well as serving to reinforce language skills and cultural awareness. Other options include cooking and eating together, going to the park, having set times each week for activities in each language, excursions and ending a long family walk with a café visit. These experiences will evolve as your child find’s his/her own interests, and may include sport, music and history, as well as childhood stories. “It's been brought to my attention on many occasions how warm, friendly, confident and courteous my children are. I have raised them via my own cultural norms - lots of smiling, plenty of hugging, clear communication. I tell them that I love them and verbally acknowledge their efforts. I have made sure to teach them basic etiquette as well as what would be considered polite behaviour in the US (waiting for someone to exit an elevator before shoving yourself in, for example, or holding a door open for someone with their hands full). At the same time they have learned a dedication to both tradition as well as innovation that is uniquely Finnish from their other parent. We've made a conscious effort as parents to work together to pick and choose the things that we both feel are the best parts of our respective cultures to pass down to the children. It's made us into very thoughtful, purposeful and communicative parents, which I think has been of great benefit to our entire family.” HELPING YOUR CHILD TO DEVELOP A SOLID AND POSITIVE IDENTITY: A CHECKLIST
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