As a bilingual child of immigrants, Michelle often had to adopt the role as a translator for her family. Her grandparents also immigrated, so as Michelle’s mother and father were occupied trying to make a life in America, Michelle assumed the additional pressure of helping her grandparents navigate life in the United States without knowledge of the language. Michelle is also the eldest child in her family, so that responsibility would fall onto her more than her sibling. At times, she would also have to step up into parental roles for her sibling, causing her to feel more grown up than her actual age. This experience of “feeling more grown up” is prevalent within children of immigrants, and it is a prominent topic of study within the social sciences. In the ninth chapter of the 1999 book Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance, Cuban-American sociologist Rubén G. Rumbaut explores the quality of familial relationships within immigrant families. Referring to a comprehensive longitudinal study of the children of immigrants, Rumbaut concludes that “growing up in immigrant families is often marked by wide linguistic and other acculturative gaps between parents and children that can exacerbate intergenerational conflicts…and even lead to role reversals, as children assume adult roles prematurely by dint of circumstance” (Rumbaut). These role reversals show how the shift in location also shifts traditional familial dynamics as parents navigate new surroundings and their children navigate between multiple cultures. As we see with Michelle and her grandparents, these role reversals are not just between parent and child but can span over multiple generations. 

Michelle’s split identity has caused her to feel disconnected from both her American and Chinese culture. Because she lives in America and is from a predominantly White American town, she has felt the need to push away her Asian culture. Even so, despite having lived in America her whole life, she does not feel like she necessarily belongs in the United States, especially due to the poor treatment of Asian Americans. However, she does not feel like she belongs in China either because she has never been there, causing her to occupy a liminal space common among children of immigrants. 

When asked about how she has found community and belonging, Michelle claims that culture is not the basis for many of her communities, and instead, she finds people through common personal interests, such as art and music. For instance, Michelle is in an A Capella group on campus, a welcoming community rooted in a shared love of singing. From my own experience, Michelle and I hit it off from our very first days at Vassar partly because of our mutual love of music, performing, and creative writing. 

However, Michelle specifies that at Vassar, her Chinese culture has helped her find community. She is an executive board member of a Vassar student magazine that celebrates AAPI voices. Cultural spaces such as this are extremely important, especially in college settings where students are often placed in a very unfamiliar environment their first year. Cultural spaces foster belonging as they help students bond with others based on traditions and common lived experiences, as well as help many people like Michelle reconnect with different aspects of their culture

In recent years, Michelle has taken strides in reconnecting with her Chinese culture. Some ways she has done this is through relearning traditions and learning Mandarin here at Vassar. She also explains that she does not have a connection to her family’s places of origin beyond the words of others—her family’s stories forming her understanding of China and Vietnam. Michelle expresses the desire to one day return to her family’s places of origin alongside them and to hear the stories actually there.  

Rumbaut, Rubén G. “Chapter 9 Passages To Adulthood: The Adaptation Of Children Of Immigrants In Southern California.” Children of Immigrants: Health, Adjustment, and Public Assistance., by National Research Council (US) and Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on the Health and Adjustment of Immigrant Children and Families, edited by DJ Hernandez, National Academies Press (US), 1999. National Library of Medicine, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK224442/.