Introduction
A lot of books have been written by different authors concerning stereotyping in America. On my research concerning stereotype in modern America I came across many journals, books and publications written about this. In all of them the authors were arguing about who introduced stereotype in America. My goal in writing this paper is to discuss this phenomenon in the context of America. Before I discuss this I am going to define what stereotype is, sources, consequences and why people should know about it. This is what I now turn to.
Stereotype
In many instances people make a lot of assumptions concerning individuals or groups of people based on subjective and unverifiable content.This often lead to generalisation which is what is referred to as stereotype. In stereotyping one just consider one individual’s characteristics and make a generalisation concerning all the other people belonging to the group of the individual whose characteristics were studied. Here one assumes that individuals posses certain similar characteristics. For example a stereotype that has been used on me is that of intelligence and I have associated others as minority group.
Stereotypes come as a result of failing to get full information that we need before we make a conclusion concerning an individual and this results to unfair judgements which later lead to unfair discrimination, persecution and prejudice (unfavourable opinion that one hold against an individual).There are many sources of stereotyped characters which include televisions, books that we read and movies that we watch.
Despite the fact that these stereotype are true to some extent they often have negative results. For example, movies have always presented Africans-Americans as unintelligent which may not be so and physically attractive women have been related to sexual promiscuity (Greenwald and Banaji 2). It is important to learn this topic of stereotype so that one can understand this behaviour and those associated with it and be in a position to condemn them since they are inappropriate in modern society (Williams 28).
History of stereotype in America
In America, the physical characteristics and the color of the skin has been the key issue that has led to the idea of race. This played was essential part in shaping American society long before it stopped being dependent [2].In addition, in America’s early history, it is believed that Africans were in America due to slave trade and that is why to this day they are taken as slaves [3].In America there are three types of Americans that is native Americans, white Americans and African-Americans and each of this category has stereotype that are hold against it by others. I am going to discuss each of these in details in the discussion below.
Stereotypes of Native Americans
There are both positive and negative stereotypes that are held against Native Americans. The positive one includes associating them with being noble, peaceful and living in harmony among them self and with others(Hazard 13-14). However, when settlers began spreading in west the native Americans were seen as obstacles and their image turned to be negative. They were taken as uncivilized, wild, primitive and a threat to white settlers.
In addition their usage of words was criticized and color skin was associated with deep red and white settlers talked of them as being irresponsible and lacked self control. After colonization, there has been a stereotype that they are brave warriors and participate in sports. In the modern American society, there is a stereotype that one must own a casino or belong to a family that own one since the government does not regulate the construction of casinos (Holmes and Antell 62).
Stereotypes of white Americans
They are taken to be obese, lazy and dim-witted (Turner 78).
Stereotype of African Americans
There is a generalization about how African Americans individuals behave which developed in American culture after slavery and was heritable. In the 19th century there was a stereotype about the blacks being joyous … and ignorant which came as a result of belief held by slaveholders earlier. Scholars such as Patricia A. Turner noted that anti-black attitudes are created on black people when they are stereotyped as servile, primitive or simpleminded. Morgan Renee on the section of his book on the history of African Americans stereotype said that the dark color of the blacks was so cold to touch and they were associated with night. The above stereotypes have led to civil wars, murder and poverty causing migration and creating a bad history of America.
Works Cited
Pagden, Anthony. The fall of the Natural Man: the American Indian and the origins of Comparative ethnology. Cambridge Iberian and Latin American Studies. Cambridge University Press, 2010. Print.
Entman, Robert and Rojecki, Andrew.The Black Image in the white mind. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000, Web.
Greenwald and Banaji. Hate prejudice: Psychological Review. New York: state University, n.d, Web.
Greenwald, A. G., Poehlman, T. A., Uhlmann, E. L., and Banaji, M. R. Greenwald, A. G.Understanding and using the Implicit Association Test: III.Meta-analysis of predictive validity. Ohio: Elsevier/ Academic Press, 2009, Web.
Hazard, Paul. The European mind. Cleveland: Meridian Books, 1969, Web.
Malcolm et.al.The Stereotype of African Americans, n.d. Web.
Thompson and Hickey. Society in focus. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2005, Web.
Turner, Patricia. Ceramics Uncles Celluloid Mammies: Black Images and Their Influence on Culture. New York: Anchor Books, 1994, Web.
Whiteside and Gardiner.USA needs to find the net, Illinois: USA. 1993. Web.
Williams, Robert. Racism learned at an Early Age through Scripting, n.d. Web.