Model Minority Myth: William Petersen In The New York Times Magazine

Model Minority Myth
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Model Minority Myth
The model minority is a population group that can be taken to be of a higher socioeconomic class than the average. This conclusion is drawn based on their education, income, low rate of criminal activities and the stability of families. The population group can be based on religion, ethnicity and or race.
In the 1960's the Asian Americans most especially the Japanese and Chinese were considered to be the model minority group in the US. “According to Chao, Chiu, Chan, Mendoza & Kwok (2013) even after the differences of the life and cultural interactions among Asian and the Americans, the model of minority myth continues to blossom in the United States of America. Considering a divided and shared theory perspective, it can be shown that the model minority picture or idea of being persevering, highly productive, and compliant is a trait representation of Asian Americans which is widely and commonly found in the Americans. Furthermore, most Americans have the notion that majority of the citizens in the U.S. expect Asian-born Americans to explicitly conform to the model myth. When taken holistically together, the outcomes indicate that the model minority myth representation is a divided and separately shared characteristic in the United States. This is as compared to the other minority groups like the African Americans, they displayed constant prosperity and stability both economically and socially. Most of them even had managed to secure white collar jobs. By this time the term did not exactly refer to all Asian Americans but mostly the Chinese and Japanese since as compared to the other members of the Asian community, their population was higher in the US and their socioeconomic status was relatively better than that of the rest of the Asian American groups.
William Petersen in The New York Times magazine in January 1996 first coined the term model minority. He described the culture of the Japanese as one that compromised of strong family values and very good work ethics. Factors that prevented them being the minority problem. He strongly believed that their prosperity was backboned by their respect for authority and their strong culture and beliefs.
The model minority myth does not agree with the observations about the current average incomes for Asian American families. Even though the myth claims that as compared to whites, more Asian Americans have white collar jobs, it doesn't consider the income received by these two different groups. Asian Americans receive a lower income as compared to the whites. the minority model also overshadows the fact that if the whites and the Asians are compared, poverty is higher in the Asian American families and their income is not very different from the other minority groups like the African Americans. In the period between 2005 and 2007 a community survey was conducted in America, the study aim was to investigate the ultimate and relative poverty levels among Asian-Americans in the United States. The outcomes showed that absolute and relative poverty is higher among Asians-born Americans than among the American citizens overall as well as by their native position and identity. Meaning the poverty level...