Stereotypes
Stereotypes are divisive—hatred, bias, and racism are all rooted in stereotypes. A prevalent stereotype is that, for the most part, the Chinese are racist. Due to this widely held belief in the West, I was very eager to teach a class about stereotypes to a group of Chinese adults this past week.
The class I taught on stereotypes was small—I only had two students and, while their English was comprehensible, they both had very limited vocabularies. To start the lesson, I listed several stereotypes about Chinese people—good at math, not a lot of fun, hardworking, no sense of humor, etc. While the students agreed with some of these descriptors, there knew people who didn’t fit into any of the categories. Good, I thought, they may be beginning to understand that stereotypes are, for the most part, mean and false.
Next I asked the students which characteristics they would use to describe Jewish people. Unfortunately, the list contained all of the usual suspects—good with money, rich, and clever. I found this use of clever to be interesting, so I pushed the students and asked how to say clever in Chinese. They both responded, cong ming, which I understand to mean smart, not clever. After explaining that stereotypes were not always true and that I knew a lot of jews who did not fit into any of the categories they listed, I asked them what they thought about black people.
The list about black people was, in a word, nauseating. According to my students, black people are: dumb, good at sports, wear funny clothes, American, ugly and foul-smelling. Wow. After both lists—the one about jewish people and the one about black people—were on the board, I told them that I was jewish. This was, indeed, shocking for both of them. “you don’t look jew,” they said. “well,” I responded, “not all jews look the same.” Next I asked them if they knew any other jews or even a single black person. “no,” they obviously responded. Next I told them that I actually knew a lot of jews and black people who did not exhibit any of the characteristics they had listed.
Unfortunately, I don’t think that either of them was able to draw the connection I was trying to make between stereotypes not being true for all groups.
The reason that these deeply ingrained stereotypes are so powerful—and so important—in a place like china is that most Chinese will never have the opportunity to meet a foreigner, let alone a jew of black person. Therefore, the vacuum of actual information is filled by stereotypes that are based on hearsay and falsehoods. I don’t want to drum this incident into a grand theory on Chinese xenophobia and notions of Chinese superiority, I simply want to say that in a country that is for the most part very homogenous, it is very hard to disprove stereotypes.
The class I taught on stereotypes was small—I only had two students and, while their English was comprehensible, they both had very limited vocabularies. To start the lesson, I listed several stereotypes about Chinese people—good at math, not a lot of fun, hardworking, no sense of humor, etc. While the students agreed with some of these descriptors, there knew people who didn’t fit into any of the categories. Good, I thought, they may be beginning to understand that stereotypes are, for the most part, mean and false.
Next I asked the students which characteristics they would use to describe Jewish people. Unfortunately, the list contained all of the usual suspects—good with money, rich, and clever. I found this use of clever to be interesting, so I pushed the students and asked how to say clever in Chinese. They both responded, cong ming, which I understand to mean smart, not clever. After explaining that stereotypes were not always true and that I knew a lot of jews who did not fit into any of the categories they listed, I asked them what they thought about black people.
The list about black people was, in a word, nauseating. According to my students, black people are: dumb, good at sports, wear funny clothes, American, ugly and foul-smelling. Wow. After both lists—the one about jewish people and the one about black people—were on the board, I told them that I was jewish. This was, indeed, shocking for both of them. “you don’t look jew,” they said. “well,” I responded, “not all jews look the same.” Next I asked them if they knew any other jews or even a single black person. “no,” they obviously responded. Next I told them that I actually knew a lot of jews and black people who did not exhibit any of the characteristics they had listed.
Unfortunately, I don’t think that either of them was able to draw the connection I was trying to make between stereotypes not being true for all groups.
The reason that these deeply ingrained stereotypes are so powerful—and so important—in a place like china is that most Chinese will never have the opportunity to meet a foreigner, let alone a jew of black person. Therefore, the vacuum of actual information is filled by stereotypes that are based on hearsay and falsehoods. I don’t want to drum this incident into a grand theory on Chinese xenophobia and notions of Chinese superiority, I simply want to say that in a country that is for the most part very homogenous, it is very hard to disprove stereotypes.
posted by jr at 2:52 AM
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