Introduction
Asian Americans are citizens of the United States of America of Asian origin. Their ancestors were originally from the Asian continent. Indian, Filipino, and Chinese Americans make up the most significant percentage of Asian Americans. Asian Americans have roots in Southern, Eastern, or Southeastern Asia. They have a diverse demographic makeup. Despite certain commonalities, there are significant differences among Asian ethnicities due to their distinctive histories. Three-quarters of Asian Americans reside in cities with over 2.5 million inhabitants (Maertens n.p). In July 2015, only Hawaii was predominantly Asian American, while California constituted the largest population of Asian Americans. Asian Americans were the majority in just Hawaii. In press and media talks about Asian Americans, the group’s diversity is often neglected because of their small percentage of the U.S. population. Although the population of Asian Americans continues to rise and their media usage is rising, inaccurate depictions of this community are nevertheless frequent in the media and American movies.
The portrayal of Asian Americans in media and the challenges they encounter in the U.S.
Model Minority Myth – In his 1966 piece “Success story: Japanese American way” for the New York Times Magazine, White scholar William Petersen first used the term “model minority” (Treon n.p). This generalization about Asian Americans is false and stereotypical. On-screen, it has taken many forms, including the intellectual buddy, the Information Technology specialist, the arithmetic genius, and the exceptionally gifted Asian. Although these qualities may appear favorable at first glance, the model minority myth was established in the post-war era to drive a racial wedge and downplay the impact of systemic racism on the daily battle of other ethnic and racial minorities, particularly African-Americans during the upsurge of the Civil Rights Movement. The implication was clear: if Asians can succeed, so can you.
In addition, the model minority myth centers on South Asians or East Asians, obscuring the needs of other Asian American subgroups and removing them from discussions of economic inequality. A 2018 study by the Pew Research Center indicated that Asian Americans had the highest racial pay disparity. The 90/10 ratio is frequently used as a proxy for the disparity in wealth between the top 10% and the bottom 10% of earners (Maertens n.p). The 90/10 ratio for Asians in 2016 was 10.7, more significant than the ratios for any other community. This means that the income of those in the 90th percentile was 10.7 times that of those in the 10th percentile among Asians. Moreover, between 1970 and 2016, the Asian-white pay disparity widened by 77% (Treon np).
Women from Taiwan and India make 1.21 times as much as White men. Women from Burma are among the country’s lowest-paid, making only 52 cents for every dollar a White male makes. In addition, the poverty rate among Filipino Americans in 2017 was 6%, whereas it was 16.2% among Hmong Americans (Ramirez 7). In terms of policy justifications for economic assistance for Asian groups at the bottom end of the wage scale, the model minority myth is particularly damaging.
The false perception that Asians in the United States do not experience discrimination or racism is connected to the model minority myth. It may be easily disproved by the evidence shown here. The model minority myth contributes to implicit bias, as evidenced by research published in Harvard Business Review showing that Asians are the least likely to be promoted. Asians have a reputation for being competent workers but not inspiring leaders.
Perpetual Foreigner – The eternal foreigner myth is another harmful stereotype that contributes to real-world suffering against Asians in America, as Sunisa Lee’s account of being urged to “go back to where she came from” exemplifies. Asians in the media are frequently portrayed in a negative light, generally as being othered, exotic, or in some way incompatible with American values. These people have pronounced foreign accents, do not comprehend English, worship religions other than Christianity, and engage in “barbaric” behaviors like eating cats and dogs. To be clear, being an immigrant or possessing an accent is in no way a negative or insulting trait (Ramirez 7). However, in these clichéd depictions, Asians are picked out, denigrated, and derided for being the “other.”
In the 1850s, for instance, large numbers of Asians immigrated to the United States West Coast, where they were soon exploited by White American entrepreneurs who needed a cheap labor force. Racist, anti-Asian attitude rose in response to White Americans’ fears of economic rivalry and xenophobia and was often exploited for political benefit. One example is the Workingmen’s Party of California, which adopted the slogan “The Chinese Must Go” as its official party slogan (Hunter et al. 45). Art typically reflects reality. We see that “Yellow Peril” images have been around in popular culture, particularly in film and television, portraying people of East Asian and Southeast Asian descent as a subversive, evil, and alien threat to Western ideals and way of life (Ramirez 7). The fear of the “Yellow Peril” was so pervasive that even children’s pictures like Lady and the Tramp (1955), which included the evil Siamese cats Si and Am singing the racist “Siamese Cat Song,” were tainted with the fear of the other (Roka n.p).
Furthermore, the ethnic group being targeted can and does change depending on the political climate in the United States at the time. The villain in “The Cheat,” a film from 1915, was actually of Japanese ancestry. The film was re-released in 1918 with a Burmese villain due to improved relations between the two countries after the first film’s release depicted a Japanese evil (Treon n.p).
Hypertextualization of Asian Women – Asian women’s hypertextualization is just one example of the far-reaching effects of media representation. Full Metal Jacket, Stanley Kubrick’s 1987 film, is still referenced today as a source of racial slurs against Asian women, with the phrase “me very horny; I love you long time” being particularly infamous. The song “Me So Horny” by 2 Live Crew, which spent thirty weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1989, included a sample of this song (Ramirez 7).
Despite thirty years of effort, we have made little progress. Even now, Asian women in media are often portrayed in a sexualized light. Twenty-five percent of API women were dressed provocatively, and twenty percent of API women were depicted as being nude, according to a study of 1,300 of the most popular films from 2007 to 2019 (Ramirez 7). Female Asian and Pacific Islander characters are more likely to be objectified on film than female characters of any other race, according to a CAPE research study conducted in partnership with the Geena Davis Institute in 2021.
The lives and voices of Asian women are devalued due to these stereotypical depictions. An official, for instance, might have accepted the shooter’s sexual addiction explanation because he had a “really horrible day,” as in the case of the Atlanta spa. More than 60% of the over 10,000 anti-Asian hate incidents reported to Stop AAPI Hate between 19 March 2020 and 30 September 2021 targeted female victims (Maertens n.p).
Emasculation of Asian Men – Asian males are often emasculated and humiliated while Asian women are oversexualized and fetishized. Since the first wave of Asian immigration in the 1850s, when this practice began, Asian men have been relegated to jobs that were formerly held by women, such as child caregiving, cooking, and cleaning (Hunter et al. 45). Consistently, war propaganda would depict Asian men in a demeaning light.
Realize that the media created the stereotype of Asian men as being unattractive and unsuitable for sexual encounters. In the early days of the entertainment industry, Japanese actress Sessue Hayakawa was the first Hollywood sex symbol (Hunter et al. 45). The public’s reaction to his popularity with White women was one of fear, which in turn led to the strengthening of policies prohibiting the portrayal of interracial relationships in media. These policies included the Motion Picture Production Code and the Hays Code, which Hollywood imposed to avoid external censorship.
A study of 2019’s highest-grossing films found that although 37.5 percent of Asian-Pacific Islander female characters had no romantic relationship, 58% of API male characters did not (Hunter et al. 45). “Stop being gallant, no one wants to have sex with you,” a South Asian male character is advised in Escape Room.
Conclusion
Post-war propaganda created the model minority myth to diminish the impact of systematic racism on other ethnic and racial minorities. Asian Americans have the most significant racial pay gap, according to 2018 research. The Asian-white pay gap grew by 77 percent between 1970 and 2016. The everlasting stranger concept drives Asian American bigotry. Asians are mocked as the “other.” The widespread “Yellow Peril” terror affected children’s artwork. Hypertextualization of Asian women is one media effect. More Asian and Pacific Islander female movie characters are objectified. Stop AAPI Hate received more than 10,000 anti-Asian hate crime reports; 60% targeted women. Since the initial wave of Asian immigration in the 1850s, men have held women’s jobs. War propaganda denigrated Asian men. A poll found 58% of API male characters in 2019’s highest-grossing movies were single.
Work Cited
Hunter, Buehler, and M. Keeley. “Fashioning Race, Class, & Gender: A Critique of Dior’s 2007 “Oriental” Collection.” Iowa Journal of Communication 45 (2013).
Maertens, Yoeri. “The Portrayal of Asian Americans in Film.” (2016).
Ramirez, Maya C. “The other in Hollywood: Asia and Asian Americans and the fight against the Western perspective.” The Undergraduate Historical Journal at UC Merced 7.1 (2020).
Roka, Elizabeth. Racial Pyramidization: A Relational Analysis of Asian American and African American Women’s Hypersexualization and Its Implications for Cross-Racial Solidarity. Diss. The Ohio State University, 2022.
Treon, Chandler. “Modeling a Minority: An Analysis of Asian American Representation in American Film.” (2022).
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