Transnational Bridges or Multicultural Tokens? Navigating Multicultural Policies and Second-Generation Identity

Based on forty interviews with adult children of Southeast Asian immigrant mothers and Taiwanese fathers, this paper explores how these youngsters of mixed heritages navigate multicultural programs and second-generation identity. Bolstered by Taiwan’s New Southbound policy, the emerging regime of “geopolitical multiculturalism” (Lan 2023) reframes immigrant background and transnational links as assets, rather than liabilities, that can advance national development and diplomatic relations. The government has provided resources and opportunities for the second generation to cultivate linguistic skills and social ties related to their mothers’ home countries, including fellowships, internships, and travel grants to visit their grandparents in Southeast Asia. Second-generation individuals react to these programs differently—across the spectrum of resistance, indifference, ambivalence, and embracing. Some embrace a claim of bicultural identity to enhance their life chances and social recognition, by accumulating transnational ethnic capital or strategically displaying ethnicity across situations. Some feel indifferent to the new policy due to lack of access or relevance, and some criticize the programs for tokenism and patronism. The others develop ambivalent feelings while accessing multicultural dividends. Growing up with earlier assimilation measures, most second-generation children have only a limited grasp of their mother’s home language and culture. They face questions about their cultural authenticity and even feel like imposters. I also argue that social positions, including gender, educational achievement, family socioeconomic status, and transnational experience, shape their uneven orientations toward these programs.