Stereotyping Ethnicity

Find examples of how the following ethnic groups are represented in TV drama (British or American):

• Black
• White
• East-Asian
• South-Asian

Find examples from three TV dramas (not soaps or films) for each ethnic group.  Make it clear which TV dramas your examples are from.  Post your examples to your blog, and answer the following questions about each of them:

1. Are the representations stereotypical or not?
2. How and why is this the case?

The 3 tv dramas that i will use for example will be Prison break, The walking dead and Mr. Robot.

Black people:

African Americans have a long history in Hollywood. They have won Academy Awards for acting, screenwriting and music production, to name a few. Despite the fact that an increasing number of three-dimensional roles have opened up to blacks, African Americans continue to be stereotyped as thugs, domestic workers, Magical Negroes and more in film and television. This analysis of the common ways blacks are typecast in Hollywood reveals why stereotypical roles do a disservice to the African-American community.

Magical Negro

Magical Negro characters have long played key roles in films and television programs. These characters tend to be African-American men with special powers who make appearances solely to help white characters out of jams, seemingly unconcerned about their own lives. Movefone also points out that Magical Negroes are problematic characters because they have no inner lives or desires of their own. Instead they exist solely as a support system to the white characters, reinforcing the idea that African Americans aren’t as valuable or as human as their white counterparts. They don’t require unique storylines of their own because the lives of blacks simply don’t matter as much. Morgan Freeman has played in a number of such roles and Will Smith played a Magical Negro in “The Legend of Bagger Vance.”

Black Best Friend

Black best friends largely function in films and television shows to guide white characters out of a crisis. Usually female, the black best friend functions “to support the heroine, often with sass, attitude and a keen insight into relationships and life,” critic Greg Braxton noted in the Los Angeles Times. Like Magical Negroes, black best friends appear not to have much going on in their own lives but turn up at exactly the right moment to coach white characters through life. In the film “The Devil Wears Prada,” for example, actress Tracie Thoms plays friend to star Anne Hathaway, reminding Hathaway’s character that she’s losing touch with her values.

Thugs

There’s no shortage of black male actors playing drug dealers, pimps, con-artists and other forms of criminals in television shows and films such as “The Wire” and “Training Day.” The disproportionate amount of African Americans playing criminals in Hollywood fuels the racial stereotype that black men are dangerous and have zero respect for the law. Often these films and television shows provide little social context for why more black men than others are likely to end up in the criminal justice system. They overlook how racial and economic injustice make it more difficult for young black men to evade a prison term or how policies such as stop-and-frisk and racial profiling make black men targets of the authorities.

Brash Women

Black women are routinely portrayed as sassy, neck-rolling individuals with attitudes in television and film. The popularity of so-called reality television serves to fuel this stereotype. To ensure that programs such as “Basketball Wives” maintain plenty of drama, often the loudest and most aggressive black women are featured on such shows. Black women say these depictions have real world consequences in their love lives and careers.

Domestics

Because blacks were forced into servitude for hundreds of years in the United States, it’s no surprise that one of the earliest stereotypes about African Americans to emerge in television and film is that of the domestic worker or mammy. Television shows and movies such as “Beulah” and “Gone With The Wind” capitalized on the mammy stereotype in the early 20th century. But more recently movies such as “Driving Miss Daisy” and “The Help” featured African Americans as domestics as well. 

Source: http://racerelations.about.com/od/hollywood/a/Five-Common-Black-Stereotypes-In-Tv-And-Film.htm

Examples;

Here is a clip from the walking dead, showing the character "Michone", which conforms to the racial stereotype of Black women being "Brash". This is shown through her lust for violence and her attitude shows us that she is very confident of her own abilities in order to survive, as she takes on and beats a herd of walkers when completely outnumbered.

Here is my second example, it is a clip from Prison break, showing us the character "Lechero", which again conforms to the racial stereotype of black people in media. This time it shows a black male being shown as a "Thug". This is shown as he is in prison and when he is being accused of hiring a prosistute the female character says "wouldn't of been the worst thing you've done". Also again relaying this firm stereotype he goes on to admit that he has done wrong by saying "I would never hurt you again".



Here is my final example. This time from the tv program The walking dead, showing the character of "Morgan". This clip shows Morgan chained up behind a women, women are portrayed in the media as also being inferior so for this character to be possessed like an object to a women shows the stereotype towards level of weakness of black men in society. It also shows the stereotype of black men being "domesticated" as a reference to the slave trade in the early 1800's. Also the other characters saying "good catch" reiterates this point.





East asian:

Long-running British soap operas such as EastEnders and Coronation Street have each introduced only one East Asian character in their entire history. And those very few British East Asians who manage to appear in mainstream broadcasting often find themselves having to conform to stereotypes.

“Many of these representations are … still heavily accented, outsiders, foreigners made to be the butt of the joke or cruel shady gangsters exploitative of the poor hapless and helpless indigenous people like Caucasians,” said Lucy Sheen, a British Chinese filmmaker and actress.

STEREOTYPES OF EAST ASIAN MEN

EMASCULATION AND ASEXUALITY

In the mid-1800s, Chinese laborers were given an emasculated image due to their physical appearance, and the fact that they did what Americans considered to be "women's work" The Chinese workers sported long braids and sometimes wore long silk gowns. Because Chinese men were seen as an economic threat to the white workforce, laws were passed that barred the Chinese from many "male" labor-intensive industries, the only jobs available to the Chinese of the time were jobs that whites deemed "women's work" (e.g. laundry, cooking, and childcare).

According to Cajayon, "Mainstream America, for the most part, gets uncomfortable with seeing an East Asian man portrayed in a sexual light. Asian men are often portrayed as feminine or sexless in American media.

PREDATORS OF WHITE WOMEN

East Asian men have been portrayed as threats to white women in many aspects of American media. Depictions of East Asian men as "lascivious and predatory" were common at the turn of the 20th century. Between 1850 and 1940, both U.S. popular media and propaganda before and during World War II humanized Chinese men, while portraying Japanese men as a military and security threat to the country, and therefore a sexual danger to white women.

MISOGYNISTS

Another stereotype of East Asian men is that they are misogynistic, insensitive, and disrespectful towards women. This stereotype is that all eastern asian are gang related and all know martial arts and are often the antagonists of a story line. Guy Aoki of the Media Action Network for Asian Americans (MANAA) said that in The Joy Luck Club, white men were presented as more suitable romantic interests than East Asian men.

STEREOTYPES OF EAST ASIAN WOMEN

THE DRAGON LADY

East Asian women have been portrayed as aggressive or opportunistic sexual beings or predatory gold diggers using their feminine wiles. Western film and literature has continually portrayed such stereotypes of East Asian women: depicting East Asian women as cunning "Dragon Ladies".

"CHINA DOLL" STEREOTYPE

According to author Sheridan Prasso, the China [porcelain] doll stereotype and other variations of this submissive stereotype exist in American dramas.

This includes the "Geisha Girl/Lotus Flower/Servant/China Doll.

Submissive, docile, obedient, reverential.

the Vixen/Sex Nymph: Sexy, coquettish, manipulative; tendency toward disloyalty or opportunism; the Prostitute/Victim of Sex Trade/War/Oppression: Helpless, in need of assistance or rescue; good-natured at heart."



Many examples that conform to these stereotypes, or infact the Countertypes. These can be found easily in the media, or more precisely tv dramas being British or American.

My first example conforms to the Countertypes. The character glenn, shown in the walking dead, is shown in the media as being the complete opposite as a predator of white women, this is won through his relationship with the southern american character maggie throughout the series. Here is an example. This clearly shows glenn's affection for maggie and his respect for her feelings.

An example of the stereotypes of men can be found within the tv program prison break, Feng Huan, was a Chinese businessman interested in purchasing Scylla from Cole Pfeiffer (Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell) and Gretchen. He has little or no remorse for any associates who fail him. this conforms to the stereotype that asian men are misogynists and being related in a gang. Also his reluctance towards characters is shown throughout and the ruthlessness of his nature.

White people

• Educated

White people are shown throughout the media as being of a high social class and being superior to ethnic counterparts through knowledge. This is most predominantly shown in the british media as it is bias toward the patriotism of the country.

• Rational

Commonly again through brutish media white characters are shown as a sort of voice of reason nd there decisions are mostly quantifiable by the audience.

• Socially awkward

White people may also be shown as quite socially backwards meaning that they struggle to interact with other characters making the audience feel pity towards them, this kind of character often invites the narrative to have him narrate directly to the audience.

• Arrogant

Arrogance is a common theme in white characters this may be positive or negative as sometimes it can be done by a white antagonist to create a hatred from the audience or to show the audience who is in control when it is shown by a white protagonist.

• Leaders

Finally often in TV dramas the leaders are most likely going to be from a white background this is mostly because of the other positive stereotypes and characteristics they have been given through other stereotypes.


An example of this stereotype can be found within the character Rick grimes, shown in The walking dead,  He fits the stereotypes of white people craving leadership and being unsettled without it. This clip shows him as being a leader as he says, "my people" and also the fact that he is trying to reason with the antagonists shows his rationality and maybe even arrogance.

Another example of stereotyping may be found within the character Elliott Alderson, shown in Mr robot. This character conforms to the stereotypes of white men being socially backward and also highly educated. This is demonstrated in the clip.




South asian

• Glamorous
• Educated
• Very religious
• criminal/brutal
• Villains  

An example of this may be found within the character Naveen Banerjee was a man who worked with Christina Scofield before he was killed. He was the son of one of India's most important minister and he was a very famous scientist. This follows the stereotype that south asians are educated and slightly villainous.

Another example of a stereotypical south asian in media is Trenton is a young Iranian-American woman who is a member of fsociety in the programme mr robot. She is won as being very intelligent as she is an internet hacker and slo religious and she is always shown to be praying.