Tag Archives: Multicultural Relationships

Making Multicultural Relationships Work: Our Experience as a Chilean-American Couple

On one particular day in October 2011 (I am not sure of the precise date), I was making my way to class at the Pontifical Catholic University in Santiago, Chile, where I was studying abroad for a semester. The class was held in room N2 in one of the university’s central buildings, a ‘California style’ classroom complex with all the doors facing out to the open air. I took my seat in the second row where I sat next to the other American students, two boys and two girls from the University of Notre Dame. At the beginning of each lecture, the teacher would silence the pre-class chit chat and take attendance, but on that particular day he was occupied with another task in the first couple minutes of class. So the professor delegated the attendance to an agronomy major, Juan, with whom he had been talking before class about his farm in southern Chile. Juan had black hair, tanned skin, and stood about 5’7” tall, and as he sat at the teacher’s desk calling off the list of names, I remember thinking that he had the most wonderful deep baritone voice. Today I hold this memory dear to my heart as the first time I remember seeing and hearing the man I am going to marry.

I have always liked the phrase, “If you want to hear God laugh, tell him your plans.” In Chile they have a similar phrase, “Uno propone, Dios dispone” which means something like “Man suggests, God decides.” At that point in my life, I had no idea how true those words would become. I certainly never planned on marrying someone from another country. And yet several weeks later, Juan and I went on a date, salsa dancing, after which he walked me back to my apartment as we talked and talked. We started studying for class together and going on long walks, and our conversation would turn from to what we were interested in and our thoughts on life and faith. We began to realize that this might be for real. Even though we had no idea what the future might hold, with a little faith and a lot of discernment we decided that we would continue discerning a life together despite the long distance and obvious challenges that our relationship presented. And so, after the 11:00 Sunday mass on my last day of the semester abroad, we said goodbye with no fixed plans to see each other again but a certainty God was not yet done with us.

My plans to study more than one semester at the Pontifical and eventually do my Master’s in Linguistics at the University of Chile (which is what I’m doing now) made our relationship possible, albeit with lots of time as a long, long, long distance couple. Juan visited my home in Wisconsin and met my family a year ago. This past April, 2 years and 5 months after we met, he asked me to marry him. Needless to say, I said yes.

The story of how God calls two people to marriage is always beautiful and is unique for every couple. Our story has certainly been unique. At times I have wondered why God would call us to marriage if we are from such different places. Then again, why wouldn’t he? If there is one thing I have learned in my life over the past five years, it is that God has a habit of surprising his followers with plans far more wonderful and challenging than they would ever have made for themselves.

As I reflect on our journey, I would like to talk a little bit about one aspect of our relationship that is not so unique, which is that fact that Juan and I technically speaking are what one might call a multiracial/multicultural couple. I’m not a fan of the label, but the situation it describes is becoming more and more common given the diversity of the United States. Cultural differences, like any other differences we bring to a relationship, can present their own blessings and challenges. There is often a greater need for communication about topics which are taken for granted when you share the same cultural background. It is important to learn about the culture of your significant other, and to make sure you talk about things like: How are gender roles different in your respective cultures? How are children raised? What is the role of extended family? What are politics like? Which values are most important in your respective cultures? And most importantly, how does your significant other feel about these aspects of their culture? After all, we do not adhere to everything our culture dictates. As practicing Catholics, Juan and I find that our values and worldview are often profoundly countercultural in the both the United States and Chile.

Communication, as in any relationship, is very important. Hopefully an engaged couple shares the same values of faith and family. When little issues do arise, which can often stem from cultural differences, be willing to try and understand where your significant other is coming from and to know the difference between non-negotiable values and cultural preferences.

And these little issues will arise. For example, we still haven’t decided what to do about my last name when we marry. According to my cultural traditions, I would take Juan’s last name. But according to Hispanic tradition, I would keep my last name and our children would have two last names, first Juan’s paternal last name and then mine. There are also other issues that we will need to discuss when we have children. In Chile, for example, babies are often not baptized until they are over one year old. I prefer Baptism at a few months, as is typical in the U.S. Besides timeline difference like that, there are also often differences across in the types of educational systems. For example, when I first brought up the idea of potentially homeschooling, this was a completely foreign concept for Juan, as homeschooling is almost non-existent in Chile. And of course there is a language issue. I am the only Spanish-speaker in my family and Juan is the only English-speaker in his, so it will be a priority for us to make sure our children speak both Spanish and English fluently. How we go about doing that will surely be a topic of discussion down the road.

When one person in a relationship is not just from another culture but is also an immigrant, or will be, this can add a new level of stress to the relationship. Juan and I are currently in the process of making decisions about where we are going to live and how and where we are going to pursue our careers while prioritizing our family. Sometimes I worry about Juan facing discrimination in the United States or my children not getting as good an education in Chile. Decisions like these are stressful and incredibly complex, as they will have a tremendous impact on our future. Juan and I try to approach everything with as much openness and honesty as possible, as well as with a lot of prayer and discernment. While these decisions are very stressful, Juan and I have found that they also increase our intimacy as a couple, as they require a lot of in-depth and frank conversations about what we want out of life and how we believe we are called to live out our vocation.

Despite the challenges, multicultural relationships can also be incredibly enriching, so I would leave you with this little piece of advice: Celebrate the best of both cultures. Learn to cook the food, speak the language, and have fun celebrating the holidays and traditions of each. Also, being exposed to how different cultures express their faith can enrich your own. For example, my exposure to Chilean Catholicism has certainly deepened my relationship with Mary.

Finally and most importantly, while I’m very proud to be an American, and Juan Chilean, at the end of the day our true heritage is in Christ, and our citizenship is in heaven.

About the author
Megan grew up in West Central Wisconsin, the second-oldest in a family of four girls. She studied Theology and Spanish at the University of St. Thomas and is currently working toward a Master of Linguistics degree at the University of Chile. She met her fiancé Juan while studying abroad. Juan, also the second-oldest in a family of four kids, grew up on a farm in Tinguiririca, Chile and is currently finishing his degree in Agronomic Science at the Pontifical University of Chile. The couple will be getting married next July.

Intercultural Marriage: Making It Work

When nurses call out Becky Wang’s name in waiting rooms of doctors’ offices, they usually get a confused look when she stands up.

“I can tell they are looking for someone Asian and when they see me they have to re-shift their thoughts,” she said. Her husband, Dennis, is Chinese American, and she is from a white family. “A lot of people assume you are a matched set. They don’t expect me to be Caucasian.”

The occasional confused look is the least of the challenges faced by couples in interracial and intercultural marriages. Being raised in different cultures means couples have to negotiate different communication patterns, agree on what they want for their mixed-race children, and learn to accept new traditions.

Marriages between partners of different races are happening more and more often. The rate of interracial marriages increased by 28 percent in the last decade, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. That number will only continue to increase as minority populations come to outnumber the white majority in America in the next 30 years, as projected by the Census.

Just like any marriage, however, the thing that binds interracial couples together, and what helps them bridge the divides they face, is having the same values and shared vision of life. “Despite having different families of origin, our values are aligned,” Becky said. “Our priorities all align despite our different upbringings and heritage. That’s what makes it work.”

The Cultural Divide

When a white person marries a person of color, they step into a new world. Their spouse knows how to navigate both the culture of their own race as well as the mainstream majority culture in America. For a white person who has only known that majority culture, it can be eye-opening to see things from a new perspective.

For example, Christa Burson grew up in a white family who ran a buffalo ranch in rural Minnesota. She married Mike, who grew up in an African American family in Chicago, and the two liken their story to the country mouse meeting the city mouse.

“When Mike and I got married, I knew some of his background, but I didn’t know the depth of it,” Christa said. “I was a little naïve at first, thinking that his background was a thing of the past, that we were starting something new. I thought, ‘I’m not racist, so it won’t be an issue.’”

Mike explained that his family has experienced some of the unique challenges faced by many people of color in America, from lower socioeconomic status and education levels to housing trouble. His mother struggled with finding housing and consistent work, his father was struck with a disability and now lives in a nursing home, and his sister suffers from a mental illness.

“Christa didn’t expect the level of challenges my family would present,” he said. “Her family of origin is intact with loving, stable relationships. They are college-educated and have two jobs. They just don’t have the same level of stress.”

Christa had to take on these realities as part of her own story, now that she had tied her life to Mike’s—they were not part of her experience before. “I didn’t understand the depth of what we were getting into,” she said. “I had to learn to accept it—that this is my life and that this is our marriage. I had to grow up.

“I never really thought that these things would be my issues, and they definitely are my issues,” she said. “But that is the beautiful thing about marriage—you don’t know where it will take you. It was kind of a leap with our different family dynamics.”

Pulled from Both Directions

When a person of color marries a white person, they do not enter a whole new world, but that is not to say that they get no pressure. They often feel a pullback to the culture of their family of origin.

“My mom worried that I would forget about her if I didn’t marry a Latina,” said Jesse Herrera, who married Emily, a white woman. Extended family is an essential value for Mexican Americans, he explained. Marrying a white person means losing some of those customs that would have bonded his new family with his extended family. His daughter, for example, probably will not celebrate a quinceañera, the ritualized celebration of a girl’s 15th birthday, when she reaches that age.

“My kids won’t know Spanish nearly to the extent that I would like them to simply because no one is speaking Spanish to them day in and day out like my parents did to me,” he said.

The Language Barrier

For couples who have families who speak different languages, communication itself can be a challenge. Emily’s family is white, and Jesse’s parents speak very little English, so when the couple spends time with his extended family, Spanish is the language everyone converses in.

Emily studied in France for a year, so she knows what it feels like to be displaced culturally, but missing whole conversations feels different, she said. “I know how to be open and flexible to different attitudes and cultures, but not being able to understand the conversation is difficult.”

Becky Wang relies on actions when words fail her in relating to her Chinese mother-in-law, who does not speak much English. “I may not be able to get to know her in a depth of what her life experiences have been, but what I can do is show my love and respect to her as an elder, as the mother of my husband, and grandmother to our kids,” she said. “Mostly what helps is knowing that she has the best intentions at heart for me and our family. This is maybe too simplistic, but short of learning Chinese, it is the best that I have come up with.”

Becky has the same experience as Emily when she is with Dennis’ family—everyone speaks Chinese, and she finds herself on the outside. “You can’t get bothered about not understanding what everyone says all the time,” she said. She focuses on the tone of the conversation, and she inquires about what they are saying. “I’m not afraid to ask what everyone is talking about,” she said.

How to Make it Work

For Mike and Christa Burson, it was important to find other interracial couples with whom they could socialize and a place to worship in which people of color are not severely outnumbered. “We can connect on a deeper level with other couples who understand our level of challenge,” Mike said. “I learn a lot by example—seeing other people move through life. Older couples who have been married for decades, especially. We watch how they relate. How they navigate life is valuable.”

And, of course, as with anything else in marriage, communication is the key. “Interracial marriages have an added onus to communicate because there is less that we share culturally,” Mike said. “Our experiences are different, so we need to get good at communicating pretty fast or things break down.”

For couples preparing for marriage, Christa encourages spending time with each other’s families. When they were engaged, she would make weekend trips to Chicago to spend time with Mike’s family, but “you can hide a lot on a weekend visit,” she said. “When you are married, the issues emerge quickly. We were thrown into the deep end pretty fast. Spending more time with his family wouldn’t have changed my mind, but it would have given me more background going into it.”

The Good News

The good news about interracial marriage is that every couple has to negotiate differences in their families of origin, no matter their heritage. Spouses of different races simply have cultural distinctions as part of their journey. And those distinctions are not always only a disadvantage.

“Being in a mixed-race marriage makes me more open-minded,” said Emily Herrera. “I have to put my own thoughts and presumptions on the back-burner when I’m around his family. It pushes me to be more flexible and patient. When things are happening in the family, I have to wait to understand their customs and traditions.

Mike Burson agrees. “Interracial couples are under certain levels of stress, but it has been incredibly encouraging and uplifting. We’ve learned to love each other and listen and support each other,” he said. “There are always hardships. Hard things bind you together. Our love is being forged in these fires—we’re proud of that.”

The bottom line is not the color of skin in a marriage, according to Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers, an international speaker and author on family life and spirituality. He says that every couple, regardless of their cultural heritage, should ask themselves this question: “Is this person the one God has put in your life to help you get to heaven, no matter what color you are?”

He is in an interracial marriage himself (his family is from Barbados and his wife is white) and he has been ordained a deacon for 10 years. Among his responsibilities is the task of preparing couples for marriage. “I’ve had couples come to me for all kinds of things,” he said. “No one has come to me with concerns about race. It is all about the usual things: money, sex, kids—those kinds of issues. Never has someone come to me and say, ‘Our race is an issue.’

“Those cultural differences enhance marriage by bringing a new level of richness and beauty and tradition,” he said. “Even though they come from different cultures, if the important things in life are the same, they can transcend those differences.”