Week Ten- Unraveling the Model Minority Myth of Asian American Students

This week, we continue our study of Asians and their representation in the media. If we want to discuss this topic however, we must talk about the "model minority". The "model minority" is a stereotype of Asian American students that suggests that they are more "academically, economically, and socially successful" than other racial groups.  Many people believe this is true because of Asian Americans supposedly unique Asian cultural values that emphasize hard work, strong family values, and the belief of American mediocrity. The myth of the model minority originated in the US civil rights movement, where politicians pointed out Asian Americans and stated "If Asian American can succeed in America, why not Black, Hispanics, and Native Americans?" The success of Japanese Americans quickly became generalized across all Asian ethnic groups, regardless of their diversity in culture and class.

How many times have you seen Asian Americans in a television show, film, or any other form of media? Out of those appearances, how many depict the Asian as extremely intelligent, with seemingly little to no evidence to show that they worked hard for their intelligence? They all seem to be born geniuses, and this is the myth of the model minority in media. Now, the question is, is this model minority label true? There is, of course, a tiny bit of truth to the comparative success of Asian Americans. On average, they do better on standardized tests, and they have more advanced degrees. However, there are many examples that debunk the model minority myth.

One such example would be the fact that the model minority completely disregards the heterogeneity of Asian American groups, and their different levels of success. While the Chinese, Japanese, Indians, and Koreans have been successful in completing high school, many Southeast Asian Americans including Cambodians and Laotians never finished high school. The model minority myth also fails to capture the more complex representation of Asian Americans in the education system. " The myth suggests that Asian American students are over represented in the U.S. higher education. In actuality, the National Commission on Asian American and Pacific Islander Research in Education (2008) recently found that the increasing presence of Asian Americans in higher education parallels similar increases of other racial minority groups."

In my experience, as an Asian American girl growing up in the American education system, I cannot tell you how many times people have told me "Wow! You're so smart! I'm so jealous, all Asians are so smart, I wish I was Asian!" and/or some derivative along those lines. The model minority makes the suffering of Asian Americans invisible because it normalizes all Asians into one successful minority group. It justifies the oppression of other minority groups because they are seen as inferior.

Article- http://www.education.com/reference/article/unraveling-minority-myth-asian-students/

Citiation- Yoo, B. (2010, October 25). Unraveling the Model Minority Myth of Asian American

Students. Retrieved February 20, 2015, from http://www.education.com/reference/article/unraveling-minority-myth-asian-students/

Week Nine- Asian American Portrayals in Mainstream Media

This week, we will be taking a huge shift from studying marketing and distribution practices of young adult films to something that is in dire need of attention- representation and portrayals of Asian people in media. With this shift, I will be addressing issues, posing questions, and overall, focusing on the collective identity that is created by whatever representation that we are exposed to.

"[In studying representation] it is important to first understand from a sociological standpoint that hegemonic ideology in media emerges from the way power relations have been historically constructed before seeing how alternative media responds to hegemony. "  The old tried and tested theme in Hollywood that “imagery and themes are polarized around fixed relations of subordination and domination,” stems from a history of colonization and oppression, and as a result, legitimizes white superiority and non-white inferiority in popular culture. To understand the collective identity being created and how it reacts to this, we must understand how Asians are portrayed in media.

Close your eyes. Think about the last movie/TV show/magazine that included a person of Asian descent. What did they look like? How did they act? Who did they interact with? Did you like the character or hate them? If the character was a girl, I can almost predict your answer. She was either a beautiful, virginal, timid girl, quiet and demure, or a fierce, skimpily clad warrior princess, who used her womanly wiles and her devastatingly sensual personality to destroy anyone who stood in her path. If the character was male, he was either a geeky, nerdy boy who loves computers or a born martial artist, doing karate kicks every so often and a master of Kung-Fu and eight other fighting styles. Was I close?

Analyzing gender representations is the first step in understanding what media thinks of Asians. It is interesting how popular media has imagined and created Asian women and men to be polar opposites. The two most popular tropes for females is the virgin and the whore, the chaste, submissive character and the cunning, sexy character. The way Asian women are shown through mainstream media eroticizes their race and culture, legitimizing white male power.

On the other hand, Asian males are shown as polar opposites too- the hyper-masculine gangster/martial art master OR the "asexual, geeky computer nerd", unattractive and unassuming. In this case, mainstream media completely desexualizes these men, immediately making them less powerful and ultimately inferior to other men. Here, the "Asian male identity's role is to also bolster and reaffirm the white male image over all other minority masculinities."

These gender roles have been perpetuated by American media since the beginning, and "when we look to alternative media to challenge dominant imagery of Asian Americans, we are stepping away from any parallel structuring to the hegemonic and a restructuring that encourages, appreciates, and celebrates “a multiplicity of racial, gendered, sexual, and classes identities” in Asian American men and women ."

Article- https://hyphenproject.wordpress.com/laying-the-groundwork/asian-american-portrayals-in-mainstream-media/

Citation- Asian American Portrayals in Mainstream Media. (2010, November 21). Retrieved

February 6, 2015, from https://hyphenproject.wordpress.com/laying-the-groundwork/asian-american-portrayals-in-mainstream-media/