Have you tried mapping the complexity and richness of your life (and career) with an overlapping Venn diagram?
Here's what turned up when I did one for GlobalNiche -- you can see all the relationships of our personal and professional influences and communities as we operate at the intersection of content, culture, and identity.
There's power in your diversity, how you combine your worlds, and the hybrid result!
If you've attempted a Venn of some part of your life, you're invited to share it on the GlobalNiche Facebook page here.
This month we're acknowledging that where we come from counts (see this urban psychology article on the geography of temperament, and take this quiz to pinpoint how to make life choices "congruent with your temperament") -- and by bringing what we uniquely have to offer, we're cross-pollinating the culture.
And we extra-extra-extra love to hear this => Pluralism is always practical: when we draw on our own mixed identities we're more creative!
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Meanwhile a Third Culture Kid and food activist in Colorado says no to the American predilection for huge cups of coffee consumed in the car, and yes to the communion found in ethnic dining rituals from her childhood and travels.
An American born and raised in Japan finds a way to bridge the cultural divide through the whimsical folk art of etegami.
So much good stuff coming our way, impossible to share it all....here's another way to get on the same page with us: we're now attempting to round up the zillions of resonant links that fly past us every day -- like these ones about global careers, and international politics and the hybrid souls we all possess.
And for the collectors, from the filmmaker, author, producer, and musician known as DJ Spooky comes this compilation of essays examining 500 years of collaborative creation, "from the history of stop-motion photography to Muslim influences on early hip-hop."
The expat+HAREM COMMUNITY AIMS TO HELP YOU:
1) DISCOVER your psychic peers + global community
2) CREATE a hybrid identity from your many worlds
Why do you need our help? The short answer: Because liminal life is a bittersweet limbo -- coming, going, never quite arriving -- and here at expat+HAREM the community embraces this unmoored and central reality of our globetrotting, multicultural, hybrid times.
A PLACE WHERE DIGITAL NOMADS, EXPATS, IMMIGRANTS, FUTURISTS AND WORLD CULTURALISTS ARE UNIQUELY SUITED TO SUCCEED
The psychic limbo and identity adventure global citizens experience today is expat+HAREM's sweet spot. Our neoculture.
This neoculture is our situation in life and our world view. What we work to make sense of, and to capitalize on.
Here at expat+HAREM we've defined the problem, and provide the solution.
MAKING LIMBO A PRODUCTIVE STATE Limbo is usually considered a place in-between. A state of suspended animation. Paralysis, a spinning of the wheels. Nowheresville. But it can also be an unconstrained place where anything is possible. That's how expat+HAREM choses to see it. Multifaceted people like us have strength and flexibility and experience and access to multiple perspectives. These are all assets.
WE'RE IN THE VANGUARD AND NEED EACH OTHER Globalization has had an unfortunate disenfranchising effect. (Perhaps like many in our community you've been there personally!) However, despite the resistance and misunderstanding and worrying 'purity' movements we're witnessing in populations large and small, at expat+HAREM we believe fostering our particular dialogue of culture and identity is a way forward. A chance to find new and meaningful connection to the world while making sense of conflicting situations.
IT'S NOT ALL BIG PICTURE Sure, we like to talk about the big picture -- whole hemispheres and societies! -- but at our heart we're concerned with the smallest details of the individual. Navigating relationships with people in your life. Achieving psychic location independence. Negotiating our personal connection with the many worlds we love to belong to. That's how we'll find our global niche.
Our most important bonds are no longer solely decided by geography, nationality or even blood. When we find where we uniquely belong in the world we've found our global niche.
expat+HAREM, the global niche embodies the Expat Harem concept* -- localized foreigner, outsider on the inside -- while speaking to intentional travelers, identity adventurers and global citizens of all kinds.
This 2-year archive of neoculture discussions delves into perspective on the crossroads and dichotomies of our hybrid lives:
modern existences in historic places
deep-rooted traditions translated in mobile times
limiting stereotypes revisited for wider meaning
the expat mindset as it evolves from nationalism to globalism
* The site is inspired by the cultural embrace and self-exploration of that best-selling and critically acclaimed 2005 expatriate literature collection.
Glo· bal· niche, n. psychicsolution to your global identity crisis
Don't coin too many terms, warn the smart search engine optimizers. "No one will know what you're talking about plus they won't be able to find you!" At expat+HAREM we like to talk about unconventional, unbounded and unmapped life as we experience it, and if we could find the lingo we need in common usage, we'd certainly use it.
On Twitter someone asked, “is ‘hybrid life’ kinda like what a salamander leads?” Uh, sure...you could call us cultural amphibians. Water, air, land, we (try to) do it all.
If you've arrived in the expat+HAREM community, perhaps you do know what I'm talking about. Or maybe you want to see what's next in neoculture (another coined term to-be-explained).
Here’s the deal.
WE'RE ALL BORN GLOBAL CITIZENS even if that knowledge gets trained out of us. A global identity seems nebulous, and ungrounded. Better to bond with the more concrete: family, culture, nation.
Problem with concrete though: it cracks over time, in quickly changing conditions, and sometimes even under its own weight.
Globalization means we’re entering a permanent state of psychic limbo about who we are and where we belong in the world.
The more we move around the less home is one place -- not to mention the mirage home becomes as soon as we leave it -- so our associations spread and bifurcate and split again. Our capacity for inclusion grows, and our sense of self expands along with it.
Coming, going, never quite arriving. This is where we live today. We’re searching for our place in the world, our people, the hybrid lifestyle that will make it all cohese. We know this:
Our concrete center will not hold.
OUR PEOPLE ARE NOT WHO THEY USED TO BE We also recognize we’re unbounded by the communities in our physical midst and traditional markers like geography, nationality or even blood.
Virtual technologies like social media and mobile devices help identity adventurers, global nomads and digital citizens integrate even faster across out-moded boundaries.
In the exquisite pull of online social networking -- as opposed to the usual blunt force push of actual social circumstance -- we demand more value and relevance from our connections. They demand the same of us, filling our interactions with dynamism and serendipity.
To become the global citizens we truly are, we need to find our place in the world.
This has always been the case. But the 21st century offers new ways to find where we uniquely belong, and a new urgency to actualize our global citizenship.
Here at expat+HAREM we believe you can create a psychic solution to your global identity crisis.
She'sNext interview: Here I'm talking about how multifaceted, 21st century women can find their global niche.
TAPPING INTO OUR OWN GLOBAL BEING When we discover our psychic peers and foster a global community with them -- fashioning a hybrid identity and a 'salamander' life that intersects and honors the many worlds we belong to -- we've found our global niche. It's good to be home.
No surprise, it's the way of the world: multiracial and multiethnic Americans are "one of the fastest-growing demographic groups”, according to the New York Times.
This month we’re pleased to highlight numerous people negotiating the ever-shifting space where cultures meet (it can get bumpy!)...what happens when we explore beyond our original environments (sometimes we go too far! other times we identify valuable parts of ourselves)...plus, a variety of innovative attempts to make our invisible connections with others more tangible.
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Nose bump, air kiss, surprise bear hug. In a topsy-turvy world, handshakes can be stand-offish, kisses formal and hugs too-intimate. Our favorite food blogger in Israel suspects it’ll be awkward when we meet, in a funny post about the greeting norms of multiple cultures -- sometimes happening all at once.
We’ve also been talking about catalytic experiences. Like the unravelling of British creative Susannah Conway, who reveals in a Turquoise Poppy "build your global niche" interview how she built an introspective livelihood from loss. Nomad artist Elizabeth Briel shares how the wider world lured her out of a box, and an expat blogger in Holland discovers...
...it takes arriving at the brink of disappearance before you realize you've over-assimilated to a new cultural identity.
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AROUND THE WORLD & AROUND THE WEB
We wonder if this CulturaLinks model will encourage other metropolitan areas to embrace their cosmopolitanism: Rebecca Blankinship (who we were happy to take out for lunch when she was in Istanbul!) heads a network for Seattle-based globalists to connect and participate in global awareness adventures and internship programs.
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YOUR THOUGHTS
Earlier we asked what terms you use for your global identity. Ethel “Eppie” Ozen, writer of “The Village Bride” in the Expat Harem anthology, sends us some expressions that encapsulate the arty Tennessee native/Istanbul resident’s hybrid life.
“Cultural trapeze act. Global compassing. Earthy roadie. Globular jugular.” And our favorite Eppie term? “Globalance.” As you can see, we’re borrowing it! :-).
Have you tried mapping the complexity and richness of your life (and career) with an overlapping Venn diagram?
