Not Mixed, Not Half: Why Identity Language Matters in International Schools

International schools are considered proud sites of cross-cultural understanding, yet in staffrooms and elsewhere, the language we use to describe identity may fall short. Terms like “mixed race” and “dual heritage” are often the default for those whose backgrounds don’t fit into categories that divide us all into “races.” For many people, these terms may carry pride and belonging whereas for others (like me) they reduce lived complexity to fractions: half of this, a quarter of that. In schools that serve culturally layered communities and espouse values around belonging and inclusiveness, we always challenge ourselves to do better.

As an instructional coach working in an international school, and as a researcher examining how coaches experience cross-cultural settings, I've had to sit with this discomfort academically, professionally, and personally. Reflexivity is central to my methodology. In preparing to submit my research, I needed to make my own positionality clear on paper. The hours of semantic wrangling made me realize I could no longer accept that every existing label felt like someone else's framework rather than my actual experience. And yet, I had to refer to myself as something.

So, I coined a term for my own use: VIBE. Visibly Identifiable Blended Ethnicity. Maybe I have a thing for four-letter words, but each element does specific work. 

Visible acknowledges that identity is not only internal. It is something other people respond to before a single word is spoken, sometimes visibly, sometimes audibly, and anywhere on the continuum from negative to neutral to positive. In international school spaces, as with anywhere else, visibility shapes how educators are received: what authority and competency they are granted, which assumptions walk into the room ahead of them.

Identifiable names the particular experience of being visibly hard to categorize because we carry complexity on our faces, in our hair, in our skin. It is a word proven valid when we hear the question, “Where are you really from?” or “Where are you from originally?” by people who mean, “Why can't I place you?” For educators, and especially coaches, this can affect professional credibility and relational trust in ways that are rarely discussed outside affinity groups. 

Blended Ethnicity moves away from the biological essentialism that “mixed race” risks by implying the existence of pure (unmixed) races, even if it has become our standard description and even reclaimed by many. Ethnicity allows room for culture, language, food, memory, and belonging. Blended suggests layering rather than dilution. Some elements remain distinct while some become inseparable. Some come forward in one context and recede in another. Anyone who has worked in schools where cultural boundaries blur daily will recognize that feeling.

This matters beyond my own story. Students growing up among and between cultures, languages, and national identities — or cross-cultural kids (Pollock and Van Reken, 2009) — will never fit neatly into a single racial or ethnic category. Just as I struggle to choose the right tick-box on forms collecting demographic data, they will have moments where their “otherness” leads to a pause, a moment of questioning. If the adults around these young people lack precise, affirming language for blended identity, students absorb that gap. They learn that complexity is something to be smoothed over rather than named and it risks making some of their most culturally rich community members invisible. This is not a hypothetical prediction; it is a reality I have lived through and learned from alongside adults and colleagues ready to articulate their own experiences. 

I am not suggesting that VIBE be a replacement for terms that hold meaning for others. Identity language is deeply contextual. A word that promotes belonging in one person may feel awkward to another. What works on a census form may not work in a family story or a moment of self-recognition. People have the right to use the language that fits them while navigating the challenge that communication is not owned by a single individual; it happens between people.

For us as educators, coaches, and researchers the point is broader. Collectively, in our unique contexts, we need to reflect on the labels our institutions default to and ask whether they truly make space for the communities we serve. Each moment offers an opportunity where language can open a door or quietly close it, from a coaching conversation to a pastoral check-in to an admissions interview. 

VIBE gives me agency. It enables me to describe myself without being reduced to percentages. It communicates that my ethnicity is blended, that this blend is visible, and that visibility has shaped my professional life as well as my personal one. I am not suggesting schools or even other individuals adopt this term. I am suggesting every school examine its terms in collaboration with their community, because the people moving through our campuses deserve language that makes them feel whole.

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