Unraveling the "Model Minority" Stereotype: Listening to Asian American Youth

Journal of Negro Education, The, Spring 1996 by Donna Y Ford

Unraveling the "Model Minority" Stereotype: Listening to Asian American Youth, by Stacey J. Lee. New York: Teachers College Press, 1996.160 pp. $39.00, cloth; $17.95, paper.

Reviewed by Donna Y. Ford, The University of Virginia; and Deneese L. Jones, The University of Kentucky.

There seems to be a national obsession with explaining the high educational achievement of Asian American students, who are often referred to as the "model minority." Educators and researchers in particular have relied heavily on comparative research and theory to explain why some minority groups fare better than others educationally and economically. The most popular theory has been that advanced by Ogbu (1978, 1990, 1992), through his comparison of what he calls involuntary and voluntary minority groups. Unraveling the "Model Minority" offers a brief but interesting analysis of Ogbu's theory regarding members of this latter group.

Countering Ogbu, Lee contends that his analysis (a) fails to explain why Asians do not perform as well in their respective countries of origin as they do in the United States; (b) fails to explain poor achievement among Asian Americans; and (c) treats voluntary minorities as a homogeneous group, thereby ignoring within-group differences among various Asians (e.g., Chinese, Japanese, Korean, etc.). Like Ogbu, Lee places heavy emphasis on comparing the achievements of Asian Americans with African Americans. This is not a criticism, however, for Lee is to be commended for being one of few researchers who has put pen to paper in an effort to raise readers' awareness as well as their consciousness regarding the myths and motives surrounding the seemingly positive stereotype of Asian Americans. As Christine Sleeter states in the Foreword, "the model minority image authorizes flat denial of racism and structures of racial dominance, and silences those who are not economically successful" (p. ix). In unraveling the model minority stereotype, this work illustrates how it is used both as a hegemonic device to support notions of meritocracy and individualism, and as an obvious but long-ignored tactic to pit people of color against each other.

The book is based on a qualitative study conducted in a high school located in a major city on the East Coast, north of the Mason-Dixon line. Of the 2,050 students enrolled at this school, 45% were White, 35% Black, 18% Asian American, and 2% members of other racial/ethnic groups. Lee early explains that several questions guided this study, among them the following: What do Asian American student identities explain about the formation of ethnic//racial identity? How does the variation in Asian American student identity contribute to our understanding of the literature on immigrant minorities? How did the model minority stereotype influence Asian American student identity? What identities were encouraged and discouraged by the school? How did the model minority stereotype influence race relations? What influence did the school have on race relations?

In search of answers to these questions, Lee conducted semistructured interviews with 47 of the 356 Asian American students, a number of teachers, and several of the school's Black students. The book centers on the experiences of students from four Asian American identity groups: Korean-identified students; Asian-identified students; Asian Americanidentified students; and "New Wavers," a group Lee describes as personifying a culture of resistance to extant racial/ethnic identities. Accordingly, she notes that these four groups are categorized based on the students' levels of racial identity and pride, levels of acculturation, cultural orientations (values, beliefs, behaviors), and attitudes toward school and achievement.

After reading this book, readers may begin to sense how the model minority stereotype serves to ease the guilt and appease the conscience of those who wish to ignore the nation's most trenchant social ills-namely, racism, prejudice, and discrimination. As Lee makes clear, the illogical analogy promoted by this stereotype-"If Asian Americans can make it, so can Blacks"-serves another purpose as well by implicitly blaming Blacks for their failures. Additionally, the excerpts Lee includes from interviews conducted with Asian American students and their White teachers remind readers of a curious paradox: while holding tightly to the colorblind philosophy and attempting to ignore difference, many teachers (and other school personnel) actually magnify differences between minority groups. These and other data examined in this study point out the dangers inherent in the model minority stereotype. As Lee concludes:

The model minority stereotype is dangerous because it tells Asian Americans and other minorities how to behave. The stereotype is dangerous because it is used against other minority groups to silence claims of inequality. It is dangerous because it silences the experiences of Asian Americans who can/do not achieve model minority success. And finally, the stereotype is dangerous because some Asian Americans may use the stereotype to judge their self-worth. . . (p. 125)