Not Native. Not Foreign.

On language, identity, and all the overlooked space in between.

Doing this podcast and building WeCultivate has made me realize more about my own experiences than I expected. Much of this “in between” work is about bringing forward voices that are common, yet consistently overlooked.

As I begin to create space for written pieces here on Substack, I keep coming back to the need to talk about what it means to live across multiple identities.

Not just as someone who is multilingual, but specifically as someone who grew up with a heritage language.

Many people don’t know the term “heritage speaker” or “heritage language.”

And when they do, it’s often flattened into a false binary: “native” or “non-native.”

From there, “non-native” gets grouped into “foreign language” and that’s how you end up with a classroom of learners labeled at the same “level” despite each person having completely different relationships to the language.

Photo by Kenny Eliason on Unsplash

Where this all started

I remember the first time I consciously thought about the difference between different language speakers. I couldn’t have been more than five, my mother talking to my grandparents about the best way for them to “teach me” Mandarin. Like many immigrant family kids, I would grow up as a “heritage” speaker. But they didn’t know what this meant yet.

As part of the first generation of my family born outside of their home country, there was no clear understanding of how to transmit the language. Priorities of food and shelter were always hanging in the background, but communication was lingering… well, everywhere. It goes without saying that there were no Instagram reels, no podcasts, no consultation services. Sure, my grandmother had technically, once upon a time, been a Chinese language teacher. But that was in China, decades removed from our life in the States, and she had never worked with “non-native” (a.k.a. foreign language) learners.

Everyone looked at me. I was my mother’s child so… I wasn’t foreign, right? Everything about me was native? Wasn’t blood the most important aspect?

A world where there were only two options.
And I didn’t really fit into either.

My grandparents had tried a mini language experiment on me the year before. Photographs confirm I was around four, given the way we had the living room set up at the time. I can rewatch the memory like it was yesterday.

My grandfather is taping flashcards to the wall. On one side, Chinese characters are written neatly in that greenish dry erase marker. On the back, English translations he copied from his bilingual dictionary. He’s labeled almost everything in the living room – the wall, the window, the table, etc.

He makes a gesture towards me, speaking calmly in Mandarin: “Michelle, try to read this.”

My grandmother’s voice cuts in from the other side, “Why aren’t you listening to me? There is NO way she is going to understand how to read. She was born in A-ME-RI-CA. She is learning ENGLISH. She doesn’t understand what these characters are. She CAN’T. She doesn’t see them ANYWHERE.”

“Well… isn’t she seeing them here? Why are you always so rigid in your thinking? Why can’t this work?” My grandfather counters but to no avail. My grandmother has already started undoing all his work. They battle it out. Cards come off, more tape goes on, and I’m just sitting there feeling unsure of what’s happening.

And a little sad.

See, I have archives of my own experiences and reflections on what it means to be a language holder: native, heritage, and foreign. And I know I’m not alone.

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Beginning next month, I’ll be launching a new series on heritage language here on Substack.

Inherited, Interrupted.

A series on heritage languages as they are actually lived — shaped by time, distance, access, and everything in between.

Despite the series name, these articles won’t just be about what was passed down or disrupted.

My guests and I will explore:

• the complexity of having multiple language identities

• how these languages shape our understanding of ourselves and others

• the ways we’re often pushed to “choose a lane” (or team)

• what this looks like over time, including the choices presented when raising the next generation

(and so much more)

Join us here, beginning this May.