Immigration and the “Third Culture Kids”

My Dad left Lebanon in 1976. It was a year after the civil war had started, and the economic situation of the country had plummeted. What used to be internationally known as “the Paris of the Middle East” had turned into no mans land, and opportunity for financial success was fast becoming obsolete. Companies of the world were moving out fast, and so my Dad, an employee with Kodak at the time, chose to leave his home and family behind to follow his work to Athens, Greece. That was the last time he lived in Lebanon.

The majority of immigration occurs for financial and economic reasons; people who live in a poor or troubled country are given the opportunity for a higher standard of living in a developed, politically stable country. They can make wages that constitute to a fortune compared to what they would have made doing the same job back home. And it works both ways. Poorer citizens of Britain often choose to retire in less developed places like Spain and Portugal (also referred to as ‘Chav land’) where the cost of living is cheaper and therefore easier to live more luxuriously.

General reasons for immigration are as follows:

• Economic
• Professional
• Political
• Persecution and oppression, including genocide and ethnic cleansing
• Retirement
• Sentimental
• Personal

My Dad says he gained a lot from his travels. His business knowledge is greatly enhances, and he has developed an understanding of many different cultures. But what about us? My sister and I were born outside of Lebanon, and have since been raised in a very eclectic mix of England, Singapore and Dubai. We carry two passports and have never been back to our ‘homeland’ for more than 2 months at a time. We’ve never lived in one property for more than 7 years and have had to let go of many precious things in our moves, including poor rosebud the cat. We are what one might call ‘Third Culture Kids’.

Sociologist David Pollock defines a TCK as "a person who has spent a significant part of his or her developmental years outside the parents' culture. The TCK builds relationships to all of the cultures, while not having full ownership of any. Although elements from each culture are assimilated into the TCK's life experience, the sense of belonging is in relationship to others of a similar background”.

I’m not complaining about my situation. I’ve loved every minute of my past. It’s a great conversation starter. I know that my family wouldn’t be able to afford half the things we have now if it weren’t for my dad’s choice to immigrate, and I’ve made some really strong connections with people who are in the same situation as I am. Being a third culture kid has its downfalls (for example I wish I spoke Arabic fluently) but in my case I think the pros outweigh the cons. Luckily a lot of my cousin’s are TCK’s and live in Dubai with me, so I’ve always had a strong sense of family around me, and the ones that aren’t have had to experience the political hardship that defines Lebanon all too often in the news.

Why did you immigrate?
Because of the civil war, and my company transferred me to another location which was Athens, Greece. At that time Lebanon was not safe to do business.

Benefit?
I gained a lot of international experience. Living in different countries of the world enhanced my business knowledge and my understanding of different cultures, and has brought me to where I am financially today.

Would you have stayed there if you could?
Had you asked me this 30 years ago I would have said yes, but now I see that what has happened to me has really enriched me. So No.

What about your family?
Well, my family became enriched because they where exposed to the world, and they have an enhanced tolerance to other cultures compared to young people back in Lebanon. But as a result of never living in their homeland, they have no roots, no real connection. We’ve tried to go back as much as possible but I can see that it’s not their home.

How was it leaving your family behind?
It wasn’t a pleasant experience. But then you get over it and move on. It’s not like I haven’t seen them, but it’s something I had to do to give myself a future.

The Australian flag with union jack ensign

Australia

The 2009 Australian entry of the CIA World Factbook states the population of Australian being around 20 million, the ethnic group is recorded as 92% white whilst 7% are Asian and a mere 1% is other or aboriginal.

By looking at the range of languages and religions that make up Australia you can gather that Australia is a very diverse nation – made up of many different cultures and countries that have merged together to form Australia as we know it today. Whilst mainly British influences other countries include Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Croatia, Vietnam. In contrast France a country with 3 times the population of Australia speak 100% French as there language.

The country of Australia however was founded by aboriginal settlers who arrived from the continent from southeast Asia. According to sources these settlers arrived some “40,000” years before any European explorations which began in the 17th century. Then in 1770 James Cook took possession of the territory and claimed it in the name of Great Britain.
Six colonies where created and these federated in 1st January 1901 to become the Commonwealth of Australia.

At first the British sent there first migrants over to resolve prison spacing, as it was an island it was considered ideal as it gave little chance of escape. However soon many migrated to Australia as a new land it gave idea for a new life. To escape the hard times and religious persecution in Germany or communist governments in Vietnam, some early migrants came over as part of the gold rush too.

The aboriginal flag

The aboriginal flag

The new settlers however seemed to neglect the very people who founded the country in the beginning the indigenes people of Australia the Aboriginals.
On the 26th May marks Australia’s national sorry day. A day of forgiveness from the Aboriginals. Why? During 1869 and 1969 the Australian government and church missions under the act of their parliaments removed children of Aboriginal descent from their families in attempt to “attain white racial purity“, avoid Miscegenation and to protect the children. This is known as the stolen generation.

During 1992 and 1995 an inquiry into this act was reviewed marking the national sorry day. In the same month the Aboriginal flag along with the Islander strait flag where recognized as official flags of Australia under the flag act of 1953.

The flag was designed in 1971 by an Aborginal artist called Harold Thomas, it was oringnally used as a protest flag but has since been used to represent the Indegious people of Australia.
Harold Thomas has witnessed the stolen generation for himself at age 7 he was separated from his family, he explains that he only spent 7 years of his life living in his birth town before being separated and being forced to live in a, “segregated area called the Cottages where part-Aboriginals were to live in specially built houses.” He explains his disappointment of being 1 of 13 children but not being housed “under the same roof.”

He became an Aboringinal activities and artist. His flag represents strength and passion.
Harold had a job in the South Austrailian Museum there he saw the biggest collection of Aborginal art and artifacts in the world, he explains that he “gleaned over every artifact, every design” and felt “there was something powerful and strong here that should be expressed.”
From there he created the flag, he explains that it came from simplicity and power of Aboringnal art itself. He choice simple designs, simple colours that have a powerful meaning. The red ochre represents the “red soil – the country of Austrailia is red” The sun is commonoly used in Aboringanal art and is a “great symbol” the ocre yellow is often used too. He goes on to explain that the “black represents the pride of being black in Australia. Because, at the time, black pride came into Australian culture -- during the ‘60s and ‘70s -- influenced by Black American pride of their culture. If this is going to be an Aboriginal flag, it has to have black, because it represents the black people of the continent.”
He believes the flag helped give the Aboriginal people an identity, because of the suppression many Aboringnals where ashamed of who they where. Before the flag was given offical status, Cathy Freeman waved the flag alongside the Australian flag after winning the 1994 commonwealth games 400m. Flags have power. This is demonstrated with the Nazi flag.

The union black – proposed design in 2003

The Australian flag and other flags

In 1901 the commonwealth of Australian flag was flown, the flag was was designed to commemorate a new nation as the six colonies merged into one to form the 6th largest country in the world. A competition was administered to deiced the design for the flag. The finalized design included the ensign of Great Britain in the upper left corner. The large 7 pointed star known as the commonwealth star represented the federation of the colonies of Australia. The points of the star represent each colony the 7th representing all of Australia’s colonies. The remaining stars represent the Southern Cross Constellation.

Proposed design for Australian flag with

Aboriginal flag ensign (Fig 2.)Figure 2 shows a flag proposal to incorporate the aboriginal flag into the Australian flag replacing the union jack ensign. What is interesting is that the Union flag is included into the design of the existing Australian flag to represent Australia’s history with Great Britain and her ties to the queen. Yet facts state that the original ties to the country where the Aboriginals. In contrast the union jack was given a proposed makeover in 2003 to include black stripes to represent the black people of the nation. The flag was considered racist and has since been scrapped. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2981038.stm). Many flags used black to represent hardships and the people of the nation. Examples include the south African flag with the black triangle as well as the Jamaican flag.

Australia the land for tomorrow

Once the Australia became a federation nation in 1901, a new white policy was introduced which meant that the country would allow only whites to enter – preventing especially the Japanese and Chinese who where considered a threat to the “newly formed federation.” Chinese people where oringnally excluded to prevent them from taking claim of gold during the gold rush in the1850’s. Australia wanted its country to be populated from British people. A scheme was introduced to encourage British people to come to the country. After all Australia considered a new life with land waiting to be plowed.


For the first time Australia decided to look outside Britain to other European countries to fill the population. In 1948 after the 2nd World War a shift in thinking was adopted and Australia’s view on immigration changed. Many migrated to Australia to escape the threat of a nuclear war, many came to escape there homeland. At a time when the Soviets where taking over many Eastern European countries. Between 1945 and 1965 more than 2 million people migrated to Australia. But this was not enough to sustain the country and with the threat of communism the government set up a campaign “populate or perish.”
In response to the scheme the poster “Australia – Land of Tomorrow” was a poster deigned to encourage Europeans to come to Australia– use of European colours, green blue and yellow where used to entice.

“The creator of this poster, Joe Greenberg, was told later by a Czech migrant that it had been displayed in all the migrant camps in Europe, and had influenced him to come to Australia1.The poster has historic value as evidence of post World War 2 mass migration and the attempt by the Australian government to build the nation’s population with European migrants at a time when the White Australia Policy was firmly enforced.The poster has social value as a reminder of the experience of thousands of post war migrants and the apartheid years under the White Australia Policy. The poster is well provenanced to Joe Greenberg and the Victoria Museum Collection. The poster represents a time when Australia saw itself as a predominantly European culture and assisted nearly 200,000 people from Europe to migrate while maintaining the White Australia Policy and the Immigration Restriction Act to keep Asian and Pacific Islanders out.The interpretive potential of the poster is considerable. The poster displays Australian Government promoting Australia as the land of prosperity and growth to prospective European migrants with the banners such as “Australia: Land of Tomorrows” and imagery of opportunity. The poster interprets the attempts by the Australian government to build up Australia’s population of European migrants at a time when the White Australia Policy was firmly enforced.
Many fled to leave behind hardships, in return they had to work in jobs given by the government. Some of these jobs included building bridges and Dams.”
Another era of immigration began in the 50s and 60’s, countries included Italy, Croatia, , Malta, Greece and Turkey. The people from these countries sought for better employment and better living conditions.

The programmes encourage people to immigrate to Australia where considered a huge success, “the origins of “new Australians” changed dramatically, with British migrants only making up half of the intake, and many migrants coming from southern, eastern and northern Europe.” Mass migration to Australia continued until the 1960s.

Time for change

Today migrating to Australia is no longer and a easy thing to do. There are now restrictions to enter the country and a Visa requirements given based on a points system. Aboringnals have now been given more rights and are recognized and have since been given more land. Australia have tried to rectify there wrongs by setting up National Sorry Day.

Web design

Although not to do with our chosen specialism of language, I believe this is an interesting finding in our research.

Barack Obama's Official Website

The British National Party's Official Website

Its obvious how similar the layout and graphic style of the two websites are. This suggests that the BNP support Obama's presidency and his policies on immigration. However, the video below would strongly suggest not:

But if the BNP are opposed to Obama, then why the graphical tribute on their website?

Obama - The Expected Victory

So by aligning themselves graphically with Obama, they hope to feed off his success, whilst being politically opposed to his policies. I believe this shows a distinct lack of professionalism in the graphic design of the BNP and of the BNP itself.

Nick Griffin’s Use of Language on Question Time

By Luke Thompson

Question Time - Thursday 22nd October 2009

“If you put (getting rid of black people) as your primary aim, you won’t get very far. Instead talk about identity, we use sailable words: freedom, security, democracy – nobody can come and attack you on those terms.”

This quote reveals the BNP’s secretive technique of couching their words to gain an air of credibility and the votes of the majority, without changing their fundamental controversial party policies.
Instead of talking openly about the mass deportations and ethnic cleansing that they really want to perform, they talk about the positives of British society, something most people would agree on and support. By saying British national identity is being threatened, they get people on side while they can select a scapegoat to channel all the dissatisfaction onto. This scapegoat is of course racial minorities and immigrants, the people they want to get rid of not because they truly believe are damaging the British national identity, but because they are opposed to them racially. In short, they subtly spread their hate to other potential supporters and build their membership based on deception and the spread of hateful ideas.

When asked about his previous denial of the Holocaust, “I have changed my mind, mostly about figures, but I cannot explain why or how or the extent of the change as my freedom of speech is threatened"

In this quote, Nick Griffin plays the victim of censorship and a contravention of his right to freedom of speech. In actual fact, when the European Union wide anti-racism xenophobia law in 2001 was announced, the UK didn’t accept it, saying the voicing of racist views, although unpleasant, could not be banned in a country with freedom of speech. The reason for Nick Griffin’s refusal to answer the question was to avoid admitting he did and still does deny the Holocaust, an extremely controversial viewpoint bound to lose him many supporters and thus something he would not risk. By playing the victim in this area, he dodges revealing his views that would be detrimental to his party, deflects the conversation onto the nature of free speech and takes a stab at the current government for imposing this fictional contravention of free speech.

“In the Daily Mail I was misquoted saying black people walk like monkeys.” – In response to whether a quote attributed to him was true.

This is another attempt to deflect a question and get support by using terms nobody can disagree with. He cites an example where it is highly likely he has been misquoted in order to play the victim of regular misquotation. The above quote is an obvious over-the-top racist quote that is easy to deny because of its childish nature, but although he may not have said it, that doesn’t stop him from being correctly quoted a lot of the time. Just because he has been misquoted, doesn’t mean everything he has purportedly said is misquoted. In fact, this assumption of continuous misquotation allows him to say whatever he wants and if challenged on it later, he can chalk it up to a misquotation.

Miscegenation - to mix or not to mix, why is it still a question?

The language used towards mixed race people throughout history.
by Rhea Babla

Excuse me
standing on one leg
I’m half-caste.

John Agard – Half Caste (extract)

Over the centuries, the question as to whether people of different races should marry and bear children has long been unanswered. Even today, in the 21st Century, people cannot agree on whether it is an acceptable or wise decision. However, whilst there is no universal agreement, there has been a rise in multicultural societies and mixed race families. They symbolise hope for a world without prejudice – but is this a reality or just a dream?

Since this is such a huge topic, and (sadly) there are so many examples of different forms of racism today and throughout history, I have chosen to concentrate on three key areas; a historical example – mixed race people in an era of slavery (particularly concentrating in America); a modern example – Barack Obama; the future – a personal account and how the attitude towards mixed race people will affect me and my (potential) children.

From an article written in 1899, written by the ‘coal black negro of unmixed blood’, Rev. J. C. Collins. Quite often, when we read historical accounts during the era when slavery was predominant in North America, we expect them to be written by rich, white folk against Negroes. However, interestingly, this article written by a black man speaks against miscegenation also.

At this time interracial marriage was against the law. Therefore, mixed race children were ‘doomed from berth’. Collins rightly observed that ‘the law forbidding the intermarriage of the races renders every child so born illegitimate… the child must go through the world with the brand upon its brow’. That brand he spoke of included his skin colour; an unchangeable trait which stated ‘I am a bastard’.

Collins speaks against miscegenation mainly because of this, and partly because mixed race slaves were given better tasks than darker pure bloods. To Collins, this seems advantageous but the dilemma of the mixed race person was that he/she was favoured by nobody- to white men, they were slaves, and to black men, they were the reason that the black-skinned negro was ‘put off to more menial labours, which require nothing but sinew and muscle.’

The language that is used in this article was probably not written to offend or encourage racism due to hate, because Collins is mainly observing what is actually happening, but his stance against miscegenation influences the language in his argument.

Mixed race children were referred to as ‘mulattoes’ – the product of mixed white and coloured blood. This word was derived from the Portuguese and Spanish word mulato, which is derived from mula, or mule – the hybrid offspring of a horse and donkey. Clearly this term was derogatory.

Phrases such as ‘dreaded amalgamation’ would not have served to help mixed race children be encouraged and this article fails to recognise that they are people just as well. Whilst Collins passionate view against illegitimacy may be admirable, he forgets that the children themselves need love and affection as much as any other child.

Today, it seems that the attitudes towards mixed race people have changed dramatically – America celebrate the inauguration of their first mixed race president, Barack Obama. Interestingly, however, in most headlines he is noted as America’s first black president. It seems that a trace of the ‘one drop rule’ that Booker T. Washington observed in the 19th Century is still evident now.

It is a fact that, if a person is known to have one percent of African blood in his veins, he ceases to be a white man. The ninety-nine percent of Caucasian blood does not weigh by the side of the one percent of African blood. The white blood counts for nothing. The person is a Negro every time.

However, I do think that the view of him being the first black president was not supposed to be degrading his white heritage. He has both African American and Caucasian heritage.

But in most cases, he is either referred to as half-white, or half-black. Although these terms may not always be used in a derogatory way, this language has caused discussion as to what is ‘politically correct’. Firstly, to be simplified to a colour seems to be too basic; this is merely the average colour of a person’s skin and not a description of anything else (and may I note, Barack Obama would then be coffee coloured). If one wants to speak culture, they’d have to do more than look at a picture.

The use of halves also proves difficult - if he is called half-white, his African heritage is being discounted, and if he is called half-black, his white heritage is being discounted. So he can be ‘proved’ to be racist by either community. But then many have noted, is he half of one and half of the other? Is he wholly both? Or is he something altogether new? To me, the fractions are just to explain the history of his heritage; by saying half this and half that, it is describing that one parent is from this background, and the other is from that.

It surprises me that there are people today who still believe that interracial marriages and children are wrong; Nick Griffin from the BNP described mixed race children as ‘destructive and unnatural’. As a mixed race person, I am no more or less destructive than any other person, unless I chose to be (which isn’t determined by my Anglo-Indian heritage). Nor am I unnatural – I have eyes and ears and skin… and they’re definitely not synthetic!

This made me think, if I had children, there is no hope for them being ‘pure bred’ (not that I consider either better). There is no way to undo the mixed racedness – my children will be mixed too. It seems ridiculous that I will have to carefully explain to them where they are from, because if they repeat it to others it could cause all kinds of upheaval. Do I tell them that they are multiracial, with Indian and English heritage (and whatever else, depending on their father’s heritage)? Do I use halves and quarters? Do I intricately explain the strands of their DNA; the percentage of homozygous genes and heterozygous genes that go into their genetic makeup?

It just goes to show that these things really shouldn’t matter so much. My heritage is only a part of the description of myself; it does not define who I am as a person. And that is what I am.

Suggestion of summary

This is in no way a masterpiece.

From these studies we have carried out into various areas of this topic, it is possible to see that there are strong views involved and that people seek an outlet for these views. This calls into question ideas of their ethical values, ownership and how willing they are to compromise the work they carry out in the future for what they believe in. We have found that there are people who have put there name to various beliefs and as such have made their own decisions about how much they value their principles and how much they value the money that the receive from doing certain projects. From carrying out in depth research we see what other designers have achieved by putting into practice their on views and it becomes more clear that in order to successfully manage our views in relation to our professional practice we must make certain decisions about our priorities. Do we create a ‘First Things First’ style manifesto to proclaim our intent to only take part in meaningful design? Or do we value money above the desire to only produce things for the greater good? These are all things we must consider in order to accomplish what we want within our careers.