The other day in class, we had an activity that was to come up with adjectives or characteristics for African Americans. Then we had to back up our adjective with the source. The objective was to come up with a portrayal, however false or true the characteristic was, and it was in no way intended to be offensive to anybody. Some of the things we came up with were:
-"gangster" speech, the source was rap music and movies
-athletic, the source was looking at professional basketball and football players
-young parents, the source was the book There Are No Children Here
-joyous/dancing, the source was old films and cartoons
It got me thinking, because I know that no group of people is "monolithic" as Mr. O'Connor likes to say. I know that there are other groups that are generalized and stereotyped, like that Asians are brilliant and amazing musicians, or that Jews have big noses. Then I started to think about what people think of kids growing up on the North Shore. Probably snobby, rich, arrogant, self-centered, etc. It made me think of my post about camp when another camper wasn't allowed to be friends with me because of where I was from.
None of those are fair assumptions to make. It's not right to just generalize people. Who am I to stereotype people, and who are other people to stereotype me?
Carolyn-
ReplyDeleteFirst off, your post was interesting to read, and I'm glad I did because it filled me in on the discussion I missed! But I completely agree that it is not right for us to make assumptions about others, and definitely not right to stereotype that everyone of one race or religion is similar. However, unfortunately I feel like it would be near impossible to get rid of all such assumptions; people will continue to make such generalizations. While it is likely that they may mean no harm, it is still unfair and false to categorize that all "Asians" or all "Jews" are like a certain way... because there is always exceptions However, we can only hope that in the future such assumptions will not be made.