Model minority stereotype
Main article: Model minority
Asian Americans have also been stereotyped as a "model minority"; that is, positive traits are applied as a stereotype. Asians are seen as hardworking, politically inactive, studious, intelligent, productive, and inoffensive people who have elevated their social standing through merit and diligence. This label is given in contrast to other racial stereotypes which routinely accuse minorities of socially unwelcome traits: such as laziness or criminal tendencies.[17]
However, many Asian Americans believe the model minority stereotype to be damaging and inaccurate, and are acting to dispel this stereotype.[18] Scholars, activists, and most major American news sources have started to oppose this stereotype, calling it a misconception that exaggerates the success of Asian Americans.[19][20][21][22][23] According to those trying to debunk this belief, the model minority stereotype alienates Asian Americans from other minorities and covers up actual Asian American issues and needs that are still not properly addressed in America today.[24] For example, the widespread notion that Asian Americans earn higher-than-average income obscures issues such as the "glass ceiling"/"bamboo ceiling" phenomenon, where advancement into the highest-level managerial or executive positions is blocked,[25][26][27] and the fact that Asian Americans must acquire more education and work more hours than their white counterparts to earn the same amount of money.[28] The "model minority" image is also seen as being damaging to Asian American students because their assumed success makes it easy for educators to overlook Asian American students who are struggling academically.[29] Bhattacharyya, Srilata: From "Yellow Peril" to "Model Minority": The Transition of Asian Americans: Additional information about the document that does not fit in any of the other fields; not used after 2004. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Mid-South Educational Research Association (30th, Little Rock, AR, November 14-16, 2001): Full text available: [30][31]
For example, 25.2% of Asian Americans over age 25 hold a bachelor's degree compared to only 15.5% of the general American population, thus giving the impression of Asian American success. However, only 6.9% of Cambodians, and 6.2% of Laotians in this age group in America hold bachelor's degrees- albeit attributed by researchers due to poverty and severe mental health issues due to these nations' civil war.[32] [33] Despite this stereotype of supposed Asian American success, there is a high 80% unemployment rate among the Hmong Americans and other Asian Americans groups from refugee backgrounds.[28]
However, examples of criminal and unethical behavior are in contrast to the model minority construct.[34][35] In 2007, Asian Americans were implicated in cheating scandals, shooting sprees, and political corruption. Most notable is the Virginia Tech massacre by Seung-Hui Cho, which led to the deaths of 33 individuals, including Cho himself. The shooting spree, along with Cho's Korean ethnicity, stunned the Asian American community.[36] Other scandals which made headlines were the arrests of Norman Hsu, a former campaign donor to Hillary Clinton, Ed Jew, the former San Francisco Supervisor, and Kim Kyung Joon, a former Los Angeles City Commissioner who served as a business partner to current South Korean president Lee Myung-bak. Also in 2007, 34 MBA students, primarily of East Asian descent, were caught in a major cheating scandal at Fuqua School of Business of Duke University. Of those 34 students, 9 were permanently expelled, 15 were suspended for one year, and the rest received failing grades.[37]
Effects of Model Minority stereotyping
Asian Americans may also be commonly stereotyped by the general public as being overly studious, smug, materialistic, arrogant about their academic and professional successes, elitist, brand name conscious, yet paradoxically passive.
Some East Asians justify and defend their overly competitive nature and emphasis on prestigious universities and professional jobs on the belief that due to the existence of white privilege, East Asians (as a minority) must overcompensate in order to attain equal to or higher status than whites. East Asians also point out that due to the bamboo ceiling, East Asians need to earn more impressive credentials in order to get managerial positions with higher pay and higher responsibilities. For example, a white person may need to only earn a bachelor's degree from a mediocre state university in order to get a six figure managerial position; for the East Asian, he likely needs to earn a degree from an Ivy League school. The higher expectations placed on East Asians as a result of the model minority stereotype carries over from academics to the workplace.
In some cases this may have the effect of those with learning disabilities being given less attention than they need. As well, the connotations of being a model minority mean that in school, Asian students are often labeled with the unpopular "nerd" or aforementioned "prestige whore" image. Many Asian Americans resent the label of model minority and see it as another attempt to stereotype a minority group.
Asian Americans as a group have a very low crime rate, but a side effect of their success may be a downplaying of the presence of Asian criminal behavior and gangs in several cities, including New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, and Vancouver as well as in the state of Hawaii. Occasionally however, news of Asian American criminals receives widespread media coverage, such as the infamous Han Twins Murder Conspiracy in 1996, and the 1996 United States campaign finance controversy where several prominent Chinese American business individuals were convicted of violating various campaign finance laws. Other incidents include the shooting rampage by physics student Gang Lu at the University of Iowa, Esmie Tseng, an honor student, murdering her mother in 2005, the Virginia Tech Massacre in 2007 committed by Seung-Hui Cho who killed 32 people and wounded another 25 (total of around 57 people), and in 2008, six family members were killed in a murder-suicide by Karthik Rajaram, an unemployed businessman with an MBA in finance who was having financial problems due to the spreading economic crisis in the United States.
Model minority could be a euphemism for the definitive yuppie culture among young adult Asian Americans — particularly for those employed in typical white-collar occupations e.g. medical, law, investment banking, management consulting, and computer science. More recently, the Asian Americans who fit the typical model minority profile (Ivy League-educated, affluent white collar professional) have conscientiously tried to redefine the model minority image from the stereotype of being an emasculated nerd to a stylish, wealthy sugar daddy-type with plenty of money to burn who possesses the latest brand name materials and hangs out at the trendiest hot spots.
In the past few years, there has been a recent trend of highly educated East Asians deciding to forgo medical or graduate school to work for elite firms in Wall Street or Silicon Valley with the hopes of earning lots of fame and fortune at a relatively young age (before age 30). However, many East Asians working as professionals in elite Wall Street firms have been laid off in the aftermath of the recent credit crunch hitting America and the world.
However, despite — or perhaps because of — their success and yuppie mentality, there is a growing presence of Asian Americans (many of whom work at some of America's most prestigious firms and/or graduated from the most prestigious universities) committing white collar crimes. The most prominent example is that of Norman Hsu, a Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania) educated businessman and former campaign donor to Hillary Clinton who was captured after being a fugitive for sixteen years for failing to appear at a sentencing for a felony fraud conviction. Other Asian American white collar criminals who gained media attention include John Huang, Jay Kim, Ed Jew, Henry C. Yuen, and Kyung Joon Kim.
Furthermore, the model minority concept can even be emotionally damaging to Asian Americans, particularly since they are expected to live up to their peers who are part of the model minority. Studies have shown that Asian Americans suffer from higher rates of stress, depression, mental illnesses, and suicide attempts in comparison to other races.[15] The pressures to achieve and live up to the model minority image have taken a mental and psychological toll on Asian Americans.[16]
Arguably, the broad stereotype masks the underperformance of certain Asian communities such as the Vietnamese (including Vietnam born Chinese) and Cambodian communities who have arrived recently.[17]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_minority#Effects_of_Model_Minority_stereotyping
