'Guangchangwu', 'Schlagermusik' and 'The Red Sun in the Sky': A transnational digital exploration and the trans-positioning of culture among youths - three teens with mixed Chinese and German backgrounds in transnational families

Abstract

In this paper, I explore how Chinese culture and transcultural identity come together for second-generation youths with mixed Chinese and German heritage in the context of family upbringings. In doing so, I draw on the notions of 'liquid modernity' (Bauman, 2000), 'trans-positioning' (Li & Lee, 2023), and the 'transcultural flow' (Pennycook, 2007). I focus on how second-generation youths reconstruct, protest, and negotiate transcultural identity via digital interactions and social media spaces. I also investigate (a) how Chinese culture is passed on to a second generation with mixed Chinese and German heritages through digitalisation in three transnational and transcultural families and (b) how the liquidity of identity is constructed during the trans-positioning process in which an individual youth is 'unlocating oneself - not dislocating' (Li & Lee, 2023, p. 5). The data presented in this paper are derived from a wider ethnographic study about different facets of transcultural families.