[Greg]

A student in the course on race that I teach just asked about this stereotype. I always suspected it was that sort of self-fulfilling stereotype, where every bad white driver (and there are, of course, lots of them) gets forgotten, and any bad Asian driver just confirms the stereotype. But where’s the stereotype come from? I hadn’t prepared for this question, so off the top of my head I asked students to list the _stereotypical_ qualities associated first with Asians, then with driving. For Asians, (we had studied ‘orientalism’ the week before), their list included passive, feminine, and obedient/ law-abiding. What do cars mean in our society? Their list included aggressive, masculine, and bad-boy/ James Dean. What do you see? They’re complete opposites! So, just as women are stereotypically bad drivers (even though in fact their statistically safer drivers) Asians are stereotyped as being unsuited for the macho, sexy, high-speed, rough and tough job of driving. Notice that (1) Asians aren’t supposedly bad at using any other machinery, like computers, but if the old, ‘well, they’re from poor or rural places that don’t use cars’ argument were true, the stereotype wouldn’t be about driving (which any 16-year-old can learn to do in a couple of Sundays), but about, say, programming, or using VCRs or answering machines. Also, (2) the stereotype doesn’t apply to other immigrants, plenty of whom come from places that drive less than North Americans. The stereotype sounds like bunk to me.

User Detail :  

Name : Greg, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 29, City : Philadelphia, State : PA, Country : United States, Occupation : adjunct professor, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper middle class,