Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Stereotypes About Southeast Asians

People create stereotypes not always to be hurtful, but it stems from ignorance. However, we can not blame them because media consistently portrays specific races in a certain manner. For example, Asian Indians are widely stereotyped for a variety of characteristics such as being hairy, dancing through fields or being cheap. With people not knowing how the Indian culture actually is, they fall into this belief of stereotypes that makes it hard for them to see Indians in any other light.



One of the most well known stereotypes about Indians is that they either become doctors or engineers. Indian parents have always valued education and had steered the younger generation in the direction of medicine or engineering because these professions provided stable jobs. This can be linked to the 19th century, a time when most Americans were working in the boom of the manufacturing industry. 

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Peters' family was not accustomed to his hobbies that they did not know how to accept it because it was out of their norm.

 


People either look at Indians in two ways: dirty, smelly and uneducated or exotic, happy and interesting people. Granted some stereotypes have some truth hidden in there, but people have to keep in mind that it does not apply to the entire race and some people take offense to what they're saying.





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