Adult third culture kids and sojourner intercultural communication: Exploring belonging through a multilevel approach

Abstract

How do Adult Third Culture Kids (TCK) discursively understand, negotiate, and communicate the concept of belonging? With a social ecological approach and the communication theory of identity (CTI) scaffolding this study, our goal is to answer this question to expand the limited literature on adult TCK discursive identity dynamics in the field of intercultural communication. We analyze the individual narratives of 12 adult TCKs collected through qualitative in-depth interviewing. The analysis shows that belonging for adult TCKs is indeed a multilevel phenomenon as it puts forth three themes, namely, adult TCKs’ multilevel discursive negotiation of: micro or intrapersonal dynamics of belonging through liminality, memory, and nostalgia; meso or interactional dynamics of belonging through social interaction; and macro or systemic/institutional dynamics of belonging in historical, political, and legal contexts. Also, adult TCKs’ communication (discourses) and sense of self (identity) are co-constitutive as their discursive negotiation of belonging affects their identity/ies and vice versa. Finally, adult TCKs’ discursive dynamics at the affective, personal, interactional, and institutional levels integrate to provide a comprehensive picture of belonging that complicates nation-oriented conceptualizations and presents a nuanced understanding of belonging through the idea of home, which discursively traverses several loci and levels of meaning-making. These findings build on earlier scholarship and reveal the need for multilevel theorizing that can present a complex picture of the impacts of sojourning backgrounds on adult TCK identity development/negotiation and reclaim an authenticity that reflects adult TCKs’ transnational selves.