ABSTRACT
What does it mean to be an outsider? Although the answer to this question will vary, those of us who feel this way usually do not share some of the important ideas and values of the society in which we live. In the diverse and mobile population of the UK today it can be commonplace for individuals to live cut off from their extended families and for the children of those families, the second generation, to have to navigate a path between the home culture of their parents and that of school, work, and the wider community. But what is it like for the children of families where the parents come from conflicting backgrounds? In this chapter, Gwendolyn Rowlands, an art psychotherapist who works with children and adolescents in primary and secondary schools, examines her background. The child of a British father and a German mother who was born in the 1960s, Rowlands reflects on the impact of living in the shadow of the Second World War. To feel misunderstood is arguably a condition of adolescence and one that youth culture has always played upon. In seeking to understand her own background, Rowlands has found her work with young people who are questioning their identities, society, and their place in it to be a useful prompt, furthering her thinking.
