Is your 'half' child going to keep English in Japan?

Having two of my own, I prefer the term 'mixed', as in 'mixed-parentage' not 'mixed race': we all have 'mixed parentage after all, when not inbred.  I use 'hybrid' often too, as it hasn't taken on a pejorative yet.  'Half' is too close to 'half-breed'.  As a smart eight year old I taught once told me: "My father says I am not 'half'.  I am both."  I told him his father was smart.  And let's keep in mind that those of us without DNA from Sub-Saharan Africa only account for a fraction of human genetic diversity.  Put another way, two dudes across a river in Africa are more divergent than my Celtic forbearers from a Papua New Guinean.  'Race' is a bullshit concept.

We're all smart enough to know that, and to know that 'race', language, culture and religion are not coordinated, because we were not taught by the Japanese 'Ministry of Truth'.  I should get back to language, because many of my readers have a Japanese spouse, are Anglos themselves, and live in Japan and have children, like me.  Many of you are 'lifers', whether you know that yet or not.  I am not.  Gone in summer.  This topic would worry me far more if I were.  I may not teach you anything you don't know, but I can confirm it.

I've studied ESL/EFL, taught it, known families of linguistically mixed-parentage in Japan and in Canada of various combinations, both as close friends and as families of students I have taught.  Here are the generalities I am sure of, not that I haven't seen exceptions (exceptions are exceptional):
- it's called 'mother tongue' for a reason
- the primary caregiver in early years, who is more often the mother, gives the child their first language
- the second strongest influences are their school's language and the location's primary language, but which of those two is more important depends on many factors
- any two of those matching up of 'mother-tongue', location and school will overwhelm the third
- if all three line up and the other parent is trying to teach a second language it is a fruitless effort for all but the most motivated and consistent
- you do your kid no favours if you do not speak to them in at least one of the parents' languages, as immigrants used to do to Canada and the US thinking they'd learn English faster

Generalities that apply to Japan are:
- if the primary caregiver's tongue is Japanese, they live in Japan and go to a Japanese school, even if the other parent tries hard to teach them another language, they will lag far behind in the second language
- spending summers abroad helps some in this case, but not as much as you'd hope
- if the primary caregiver's tongue is Japanese, they live in Japan and go to an English school, if the other parent tries hard to teach them another language, they will lag far behind in the Japanese but less so in English
- spending summers abroad helps much in this case
- if the primary caregiver's tongue is English, they live in Japan and go to an English language school, even if the other parent tries hard to teach them another language, they will lag far behind in the second language, but they will do fine in English
- if the both parents' tongue is Japanese, they live in Japan and go to an English language school, they will lag far behind in both English and in Japanese
- if the primary caregiver's tongue is neither Japanese nor English, they live in Japan and go to an English language school, they will lag far behind in their 'first language', in English (even if the other parent is an Anglophone), but most of all in Japanese

So what are you going to do as an Anglophone father, not the primary caregiver, married to a Japanese woman?  Pay for international school at the cost to perfecting their Japanese if you have the coin; or send them to Japanese school at the cost of perfecting their English if you don't.  You may be the exceptional parent, but that doesn't happen often: that's why they're called 'exceptions'.

So what are you going to do as an Anglophone mother, the primary caregiver, married to a Japanese man?  Pay for international school at the cost to perfecting their Japanese if you have the coin; or send them to Japanese school at the cost of perfecting their English if you don't.  Your kids will do better at English than the Anglophone fathers' kids will.

Or you could fucking bail on the place, like me, because the natives will never look at your beautiful 'hybrid' child as one of them, quite apart from the kid's challenges with language, academics and identity.  I'm well aware that a living so the family can eat comes before all of these considerations, and there are work-arounds if stuck here, but don't ever forget that work-arounds is what they are, even if the kid manages to not be traumatized.