Interminority Racism - Model Minority - Asian Americans As Model Minorities

Asian Americans As Model Minorities

Many Asian Americans have found success in the USA. They have well entered the worlds of business and technology with their traditional values of hard work and family support. In 2001, the U.S. Census Bureau declared 53% of Asian Americans owned their own home which is a convincing piece of evidence to show their success. This is a counter point to the idea that subordinate social groups cannot achieve upward mobility without overcoming structural obstacles.

American media and society uses Asian Americans as model minorities or the Model Minority due to the fact that Americans tend to disregard the fact that Asian Americans are all different groups of people. The media is a significant outlet for dominant ideology. In media, Asians are portrayed as successful, financially and socially. This becomes a part of dominant ideology through media. Media then reflects the changing political economy of Asian immigration and the attendant racial ideology. The model minority represents an unrealistic minority. Asian and Asian American success demonstrates to American society a false image of a lack of structural obstacles to upward mobility. The model minority is used as evidence that the American dream of equal opportunity is valid for those who conform, submit, and are willing to work hard.

There are negative aspects in using model minorities. It puts down other groups (even to those that are also subordinate) that are not so generally successful by hinting that if you work hard enough and conform to White America then the American Dream is accessible. Model minorities thus have potential to increase interminority ethnic tensions and create resentment towards Asian Americans for their perceived superior status as well as their assumed fair and equal treatment by White America.

The Asian-American model minority also can have negative effects on its own group. In magazine ads, nearly all Asian Americans are of East Asian descent: usually Chinese American, Japanese American or Korean American. While these ethnicities may share an equal success in America, there are many other Asian ethnicities that are far underneath such a comfortable level. The Asian American model minority stereotype conveys the belief that all Asian Americans are at that comfortable level with high success and low poverty and crime rates. This stereotype ignores the fact that two thirds of the Hmong American population lives below the poverty line. Other South Asian American and Southeast Asian American communities/ethnic groups along with Hmong Americans that are also virtually ignored in representation of Asian Americans (media or otherwise) is due to the fact that their socioeconomic situations don't conform to the model minority myth and these groups are Vietnamese, Bangladeshi, Laotians and Cambodians. These groups also tend to have higher to high crime rates within their communities and neighborhoods.