Just an Average Model Minority

The model minority emphasizes that Asian Americans are more academically successful than other racial groups. This is dependent on their hard work and individual effort (Atkin et al., 2018). We tend to see Asians being good at math and science, over all excelling academically. Due to the racial discrimination associated with Asian/Asian American, those who identify as Asian/Asian America are much more susceptible to negative health outcomes such as depression, anxiety, substance abuse, etc (Narra & Li, 2018). It is …

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“Ignorant White Girl”: One Man’s Attempt to Defend his Sexism

We’re pleased to feature this special guest post authored by Muhlenberg College (and Contemporary Racism) alum, Brittany Smith (’17). Brittany is at Columbia University pursuing an MPH focusing on health promotion and children’s health equity. A few weeks ago, I went dancing at a few bars with some college friends who were visiting. I also encountered one of the most fragile and aggressive examples of masculinity I’ve ever seen. (And, as a woman who dates men, I’m no stranger to …

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Daily News Roundup?

This morning, I had my coffee with my parents as we watched the morning news. When you watch the news with a critical eye, race, sex, and sexual orientation have a tendency to pop out. Racism, sexism, and heterosexism touched almost every news story, either within the  content itself or by a comment the reporter makes. I could do a detailed analysis of just one story, but I think the sheer volume of things that I noticed within one hour …

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Racism in aisle ’14

Since I have been in this class, it is amazing to me how many things I see on social media sites that relate to everything we are talking about in class.  This week I was browsing my Facebook news feed and I saw two posts, one after another, that completely shocked me.  A woman, that goes to Muhlenberg, had a post that explained a recent experience with racism. Her post stated: “So I went to my local grocery store and …

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Are positive stereotypes detrimental?

Recently, I watched Chelsea Lately during a episode of my insomnia. The host, Chelsea Handler, poked fun at one of the guest cohosts that she would go him to fix electronics over the Jewish cohost, because he is Asian. The prodded cohost began ranting about stereotypes, specifically how it’s not O.K. to generalize and assume that every Asian is good at computers. When he was told to relax, and that it’s positive, he responded that it wasn’t a positive stereotype.

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