Parenting in multicultural society - what are your challenges?

 I was invited for a panel discussion in the company I work for - The topic was “parenting and culture”

3 of us women from different heritage and culture came together to talk about our challenges and advantages raising kids in multicultural society

I will write down the questions for you here. I would love to hear what you all think. For me the challenges are more about parenting this generation more than raising them out of our home country. 

• Did you find yourself making a conscious decision to incorporate, blend different cultural tradition within your family/ home life? or was it something that happened naturally?

• What values from your culture are important to pass down to your new generations? How do you incorporate them in to your family life? And what family tradition have you not been able to pass down to your Children

• What challenges do you face when raising a multicultural child/ or did you face as multicultural child? Do you feel you have to compete with society norms?

• What are some of the challenges you or your family struggle as multicultural person?

• Can you share a cultural practice from your adoptive country, that you have incorporated as your own? How did you find it

• How do you think you culture affects your relationship with members of you household? 

• What are the three most important values that people should know about your culture?

I will write about my thoughts in my next post. Or may be couple of posts. While answering these questions and listening to others talk about their experiences I realized parenting is tough regardless of culture, country or time. I am sure my grandmothers struggled as much as we do.

About the Saree - A loot from my moms closet, recent India trip. Kosa is a kind of silk from my home state and the style “Kantha” is from West Bengal, the saree is woven in my home town. A perfect piece to represent mom and my heritage.