Stereotypes go both ways. They can be positive, i.e. all tall men play great basketball, or negative, i.e. Chinese people can’t run fast, but they are great at sports that require skill like gymnastics or diving.

I seriously didn’t make these examples up! In fact, in the last Olympics a Chinese hurdler won a gold medal-much to the shock of the Chinese press who cautioned the home-country fans not to get too excited because the Chinese-by some genetic fluke-just can’t run as fast as other people. Imagine the surprise when that man crossed the finish line first!

Take a look at this one…and remember kids need to be taught stereotypes!

From “Overheard in NY”

Teacher: And Montana–
Asian girl, interrupting: –Wait, isn’t Montana somewhere near Germany along with Maine?

–Bronx Science

Overheard by: LSB

Have a great weekend.

With Respect,
Deb

This entry was posted on Friday, August 24th, 2007 at 3:49 pm and is filed under China, bias, children, community, culture, education, family, humor, kids, language, life, motherhood, motherhood parenting, multiculturalism, parenting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.