Third Culture Kid / Individual (TCK / TCI) is an umbrella term which groups individuals who fall through the cracks of other labels or fit in too many labels. We are the seemingly culturally ambiguous or multinational people.

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The simplest definition of Third Culture Kids that I’ve seen is “people raised in a culture other than their parents’ for a significant part of their early development years,” provided by American sociologist, David C. Pollock. Now, however, there is a new inclusive movement to prefer the term, Third Culture Individuals, to include those who became multinational in adulthood. 

 

Due to the nature of the group, TCIs identify as such for different reasons. Very different reasons. Some of us are children of military personnels. Some of us are children of diplomats. Some of us followed our parents, who followed their career across the globe. Some of us are dual or triple or even quadruple citizens of countries by happenchance. Some of us went to boarding school in a different country for an extended period. Others attended international schools in their own native country.

 

Our backgrounds alone only reveal differences but the shared experience of third culture [parents’ culture(s) combine with your culture(s) to create a third culture, which is an amalgamation of cultures you were raised in] is what unites us.