Features
Imprint, Friday, February 27, 2009
12
From bottom to top diversity of all Asians. The model minority myth leads to the understating of the plight of certain Asian ethnicities such as Laotians, Cambodians, and Hmong, which have education and income rates far lower than the general population. For example, only 7.7 per cent of Laotians held a bachelor degree compared to the general population average of 24.4 per cent, or the Chinese-American average of 50.2 per cent.
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excuses US society from careful scrutiny on issues of race in general, and on the persistence of racism against Asian Americans in particular.” Like many other minority groups, Asians faced considerable discrimination for many decades. But much of the stereotyping and discrimination faded as Asians rose in socioeconomic status and certain Asian groups surpassed Caucasians in education
that is present in many East Asian countries such as China, Korea and Japan. Asian families place greater emphasis and resources on education to get ahead, as compared to other ethnic groups. The effect of stereotyping Asians as a model minority might seem to valorize Asians, However as author Gordan H. Chang notes “Such a label one-dimensionalizes Asian Americans as having those traits and no other human qualities,
Like many other minority groups, Asians faced considerable discrimination for many decades. But much of the stereotyping and discrimination faded as Asians rose in socioeconomic status and certain Asian groups surpassed Caucasians in education and income rates.
With increasing social success and upward movement on the economic ladder, the media portrayal of Asians has also shifted. Once regarded as poor, uneducated peasants, Asians are now largely seen as studious, hard working, very docile and willing to fall in line. As modelminority.com writes, “While superficially complimentary to Asian Americans, the real purpose and effect of this portrayal is to celebrate the status quo in race relations. First, by over-emphasizing Asian American success, it de-emphasizes the problems Asian-Americans continue to face from racial discrimination in all areas of public and private life. Second, by misrepresenting Asian American success as proof that the US provides equal opportunities for Page those 1who conform and work hard, it PM
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and income rates. Why have East Asians succeeded despite a history of racial marginalization, whereas other ethnic groups have not achieved anywhere the same levels of socioeconomic success? The suggested answers to this are still somewhat controversial, some hypothesis include; the self-selecting hypothesis. Many Asians living in North America are relatively recent immigrants and come from a highly educated upper middle class background. Furthermore, many come from economically well-off places such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, etc, thus ensuring that they continue to be fairly well-off even after moving to North America. Other hypotheses include cultural factors such as the Confucian emphasis on education
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t was not too long ago that Asians living in North America were regarded primarily as backwards cheap labourers with funny accents. Laws such as the Chinese Exclusion Act were passed to keep the threat of “yellow peril” from permeating culture within the US and Canada. Japanese-Americans and Canadians were put in internment camps for fear of being outsider spies. But within the last generation, Asians have grown to become regarded as the model minority – a minority group that has achieved socioeconomic success greater than the population averages. Both the Eastern Asian block (Chinese, Korean, Japanese) and the Asian Indian groups have succeeded substantially in North American society despite attempts at marginalization. Asians have higher incomes than the population average, higher levels of education, and infiltrated into many white-collar jobs that were long regarded for the exclusive domain for the Caucasian majority. With this success brings along a common misconception that the Asian community embraces their “model minority status,” and that this status is a source of pride among Asians. While there are certainly some individuals in the community who might embrace being held up as a model minority, among the academia in Asian-American studies, there is a consensus that perception of being a model minority is probably detrimental to the community. There is a tendency among the general populations to lump Asians into one large amorphous group, categorizing Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Laotian, Cambodian, Hmong, and others as one group rather than recognizing the ethnic AB_GENER06_imprint.qxd 3/29/06 8:48
such as vocal leadership, negative emotions, or intolerance towards oppression. Asian Americans are labeled as model minorities because they have not been as much of a ‘threat’ to the U.S. political establishment as blacks, due to a smaller population and less political advocacy. This label seeks to suppress potential political activism through euphemistic compliments.” Much like Jewish groups before them, Asians are currently regarded as the model minority. This label comes, however, with a double-edged sword: the Jewish population, for one, suffered anti-Semitism to an horrific extreme as a response to their minority’s success. Somewhat comparably, in southeast Asia, Chinese minority groups in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand have been the targets of violence and laws aimed at reducing their economic success.