Asian American Women Essay

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Media is an important component of American culture, from the music people listen to the movies they watch, the media people consume can and does consistently affect their views of the world, other people, and themselves. Women can be hurt by the media, and closing in even more, women of color. Representation in media is still quite low, despite how far America has come in terms of equality. This leaves the levels of exposure to races other than white relatively low and when there is representation of other ethnicities, they are often caricatures of demeaning stereotypes. No matter if someone identifies as European American or as another ethnic identity, the European American ideals and norms affect everyone who is exposed to them (Iijima-Hall …show more content…

The Hollywood depictions of Asian women are limited in number, categorized by Iijima-Hall as either the Dragon Lady or the “perfect woman.” An Asian woman in Hollywood can either be sexy or she can be “docile, gentle, and obedient” (Iijima-Hall 1995:6). The long-standing stereotype in American culture that says Asian women are passive and lack emotion contributes heavily to such depictions. In the San Francisco Bay area, a study was conducted to find why there was a sudden influx of Asian-American women undergoing cosmetic surgery (Kaw 1993:74). Many of the women were having procedures done such as having their eyelids restructured, nose bridges heightened, and their nose tips altered. The results were features that were described as more passive and dull. 80% of white women were found to apply for procedures such as liposuction, breast augmentation, or wrinkle-removal procedures. These surgeries have no relationship to conventional markers of racial identity, but the procedures desired by the Asian-American women had strong correspondence to the conventional racial markers, such as trying to attain smaller, narrower eyes or a flat nose. 40-46% of the procedures done of Asian-American women were eyelid surgery and 15-23% were nasal implants or nasal tip refinements (Iijima-Hall 1995:13). The Asian American women referred to the surgeries as “fixing” their appearance and considered it “an investment for their …show more content…

There is also the problem of eating disorders. Jefferson and Stake (2009:396) noted that eating disorders have been becoming more and more common since the 1970’s, particularly among teenage girls. While eating disorders are substantially less common among African American females (Jefferson and Stake 2009:398) (Parker et al 1995:103), they are hardly unheard of. It was found that white and Hispanic girls are the most likely of any ethnic group to consider themselves overweight despite being in what is considered a normal weight range while African-American females are more likely to consider themselves healthy when they are overweight (Parker et al 1995:103). Iijima-Hall made it a point to talk about how in China, saying to someone “You have put on weight” is considered a compliment and that this caused many researchers to assumes that there would be less Asian women desiring to be thin and developing eating disorders (1995:9). Despite this, Iijima-Hall continued on to say that the Asian American women sometimes will try to “correct the negative images of their culture in the United States,” and this can lead to more eating disorders (1995:10). Another idea was that there will be women who will reject their country of origin, and try to fit in by conforming to the beauty ideals as set by European American standards. Earlier research has found that American women of Asian descent are becoming more and more likely

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