Asian Americans: The Model Minority Myth

The model minority myth perceives Asian Americans as the superior racial group in the United States, under whites, which in effect maintains hegemony. Hegemony is the domination of a diverse culture’s views in order to make these views the most accepted reality, this can be done through coercion and manipulation. Hegemony only benefits those who are creating these ideas and the people of the same ruling class. What this means when it comes to the model minority myth is that it creates the accepted idea that Asian Americans are successful in work, but do not become involved in politics. To show how Asian Americans’ “apoliticalness” gives power, through hegemony, to white supremacists, Claire Jean Kim writes, “When Whites then side with Asian

A not so bright side of this, is the United States’ Cambodian community. In the documentary, Pass or Fail in Cambodia Town, Cambodian Americans are identified to have one of the lowest graduation rates and being involved in self-harming things such as gangs. This Asian American subgroup shows how they do not fit in what it means to be the Asian American from the Model Minority Myth. This is not widely known and there is still the hegemony created by the Model Minority Myth keeping people from seeing the other situations that exist for Asian Americans. On the other hand, there are Asian Americans who challenge the model minority myth in ways that help push for better futures for them and others. A prime example of one of these Asian Americans was Yuri Kochiyama. She was an activist who supported the struggle for Black Americans and had a strong friendship with Malcolm X. By doing these things she stood out as an Asian American that becomes involved in politics and supporting a racial group that is not her own. In Hansi Lo Wang’s article, Not Just A 'Black Thing': An Asian-American's Bond With Malcolm X, he quotes Tim Toyama, who also had seen how different Yuri Kochiyama was, when he writes, “‘Malcolm X's movement was probably the last thing you would imagine a Japanese-American person, especially a woman, to be involved with,’ he says” (pg 1). Which shows how there were and still are Asian Americans who are involved activities not considered to be that of normal Asian American behaviour based on the model minority