I've had some interesting exchanges as far as stereotypes, recently.
A 73-year old Taiwanese artist in Taipei told me that he favored McCain in the upcoming election because Obama was from "Africa" and McCain was "American," and that, "people from Africa always fighting."
Another Taiwanese guy in his 30's told me about his friend who lived in Chicago who told him that Chicago was full of "spearchuckers." I then had to explain to him what a "slur" is, the words "spear" and "to chuck," and what a "compound word" is.
As far as perceptions of Jewish people go, whenever people find out that I'm Jewish they immediately ask me if I'm good at math. Of course, I am horrendous at math. I also tell them how Americans think that Asians are the ones that are good at math.
Anyway, Ima do my best to keep breakin down these stereotypes whenever I can. And maybe Obama can help me do that come November.
ConTEJous Presents - Pretend
12 years ago
4 comments:
Not a pic to delight a mother's heart!
does spearchuckers mean black people hahaha? and that's hilarious that they think jewish people are good at math an we think asian people are
hahaha i was surprised by latrice's question, and agree about the math thing, how do they react when you tell them our stereotype of them?
Here is a recent NYT column that parallels my post both in content and conclusion:
"The other day I had a conversation with a Beijing friend and I mentioned that Barack Obama was leading in the presidential race:
She: Obama? But he’s the black man, isn’t he?
Me: Yes, exactly.
She: But surely a black man couldn’t become president of the United States?
Me: It looks as if he’ll be elected.
She: But president? That’s such an important job! In
America, I thought blacks were janitors and laborers.
Me: No, blacks have all kinds of jobs.
She: What do white people think about that, about getting a black president? Are they upset? Are they angry?
Me: No, of course not! If Obama is elected, it’ll be because white people voted for him.
[Long pause.]
She: Really? Unbelievable! What an amazing country!"
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/opinion/23kristof.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
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