Minhlieu Dang
Professor Dr.Bolen
English 1A -30784
10 July 2014
Some stereotypes of Asian Americans The United States is a nation of immigrants - people of different races, ethnic, religion, and languages. Therefore, American culture have some stereotypes that are created by the social, intellectual, topographical, and religious histories of an ethnic group. In the book "Dialogues", stereotypes are defined as generalization about people based on characteristics such as race, ethnic origin, social class, religion, gender, or physical appearance. Stereotypes are also cognition about people based on their categorization into an identifiable group. Thus, people can make assumptions about others based on stereotypes. Sometimes stereotypes that attribute positive qualities to certain groups such as the assumption that Asian American are naturally smart and work hard. Asian Americans is known as an immigrant from any part of Asia to the United Stated. According to Elaine H. Kim in the book " Asian American Psychology: Current Perspective", she said that "there are over sixty different Asian groups in the United States today". These groups are people who come from countries of origin include East Asian Countries such as China, Japan, and Korea, Southeast Asian countries such as Cambodia, Thailand, and Vietnam. Asian Americans are also viewed as a "model minority". The model minority stereotype may be linked to the Immigration Act of 1965, which allowed large numbers of Asians to enter the United States. After that, second - generation Asian Americans began moving into urban centers to live and work among white Americans. Consequently, now there are some famous places including Chinatowns, Korea towns, and Little Saigon. Here is some stereotypes that represent for Asian Americans. First, Asian Americans are petite and short. Like another ethnic group, there are many sizes in Asian Americans. People mostly are short, but not all. The reason they are short and petite is their origin are Asian. Asian tend to be shorter than Whites is a statement of fact. However, there are still many Asians peaking beyond 6 feet tall such as Yow Ming, Chinese basketball player who is 7'6" tall and there are some short Whites such as former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich is 4'8" tall. Second, Asian Americans are also passive and compliant. Asian Americans may behave differently and have different level of self - efficacy. Most Asian Americans are shy to speak in front of the crowd. Besides, they may feel more comfortable speaking to Asian Americans than Whites. The reason make them shy is their English. Because of the different pronunciation, sometimes they cannot hear that word even though they know it. Personally, I felt lack of social skills because I was timid. That was something I had to struggle with for a long time. In fact, Asian Americans tend to be quieter than Whites in some aspects. However, it would be inaccurate to say that Asian Americans never talk, whereas Whites always talk. Three days ago, I had a live interview with Trang Nguyen who was born in Viet Nam but living in United States for over twenty years, so her primary language is English. She told me that she was shy to communicate with strangers after settling in United States for a few months. But now she is really active and confident. She was one of the best students of Buchanan high school. Finally, Asian Americans have done remarkably well of getting a good education. According to the article " The "other" Gap" written by Lesli A. Maxwell, Asian American students sign up for harder classes, take more AP tests, and score highest on the SAT in Mathematics. Asian-Americans also enroll in colleges and universities in far higher proportions than their overall share of the United States population, which is 4.2 percent,