Stereotypes

Estereotipos

It's the thing I resent the most, being stereotyped by people who know absolutely nothing about your experience.

- Texas native Sharon Portwood

Stereotypes define individuals and groups of people by fixed characteristics. Some typical stereotypes: Asians are smart; African Americans have rhythm; Southerners are slow; Northerners are rude. Like other aspects of culture, stereotypes can be handed down from one generation to another. Here in the South, the most deep-seated stereotypes involve blacks and whites.

Stereotypes often contain grains of truth — one reason they are so powerful. But they exaggerate and oversimplify, keeping people from seeing each other as they really are.

As our region's population diversifies, the potential for stereotyping increases. But as diverse people get to know each other, stereotypes can begin to lose their power.

We all stereotype others, whether we want to or not.
Todos estereotipamos a otros, queramos o no.

Who judges you without knowing you?
¿Quién te juzga sin conocerte?

Who do you judge?
¿A quién juzgas?

Coming from Denver, when I first came here, I was told, "Man, you be careful, you know, it's the South. It's the South. You know what they say about the South." You know, all these preconceived notions about how I was going to be treated.... It was a big race thing. The black friends I had... ‘You might want to be careful, you know, there's some Jeds or Bubbas, you know, all these nicknames and things people have, and telling me to be more careful... And a lot of the stereotypical perceptions of the redneck and the white trash down here. I haven't experienced an overt act of racism or stereotyping since I've been here. It could go on behind my back, I don't know, but I have not experienced any overt things like that.

I did not have any particular misconceptions or images about the South or Charlotte because I came from Serbia. So we perceived the United States as a whole, not a country that's very different from North to South.

I have to be careful who I tell that I'm from New York — because there's the attitude about the New Yorkers.

You had to let go of your preconceived notions and let go of all of your stereotypes and all of the things that you might have thought. And open your mind to a different way that people might do things. Where in New York everything was very direct and fast moving, here sometimes things aren't quite as direct and don't move quite as quickly. So it was really letting go of a lot the ways that we knew how to do things and learning how to do them a new way. Learning to reserve judgment until a later time. Great, great learnings that really should have been learned earlier in life, but in that world maybe were not.

See, for me, and this is brutally honest and maybe we'll be editing this out, but the day I get an accent is the day I want to move back. I do not want an accent and I don't want my kids to have a Southern accent.... I hated when I sounded like a New Yorker and I worked very hard to get rid of that accent and now I'm here and I'm afraid I'm going to start saying "Ya'll". I guess it's maybe that coming from New York kind of thing where you can be stereotyped or whatever from your accent.

The drive to push your kids for that education... that education means you can be a doctor, a lawyer... that way you can basically provide for the whole unit and not just an individual.... So they say the Asian kids are smart. Well, no, that's not true. It's because they basically [say], "You will study, study, study, study."

Personally the comment I get a lot is "You don't look Jewish."

I was subbing one day and it was seventh or eighth grade class and they were writing an opinion paper on schools having enough supplies for their students. I collected the papers and I read one boy's rant about how if they wouldn't keep letting Mexicans in, we'd have enough supplies for ‘us.' I didn't know what to do with it.... I mean, I wanted to pull him aside and talk to him about it. But, you know, he comes from a long line of people that feel that way.

At school, one of those common things you'll hear is "Oh, that's so gay" and it makes you feel bad on the inside.... I know it's something people often do without being intentionally mean, but it's something we need to look out for.

My middle name is Akhmed and they're all, "Oh, you must be a terrorist." They were really kind of harsh about it. I spoke out, "No, not every Muslim is a terrorist. Do you think every German is a Nazi? No."

Charlotte strikes me as a very, very polite town, in some regards, where politeness sort of supersedes having honest dialogues about difference. I think there is very real difference amongst races, primarily Caucasians and African Americans... You always hear these conversations about CMS [Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools] and there's a lot of code language that's used.... And never do people really sort of get to what's really on their minds with regard to race.... "So race is sort of the unspoken thing. A city as diverse as Charlotte is, as progressive as it has been on so many different fronts, I don't think Charlotte has quite figured out how to tackle the issues of race, and how to co-exist in a very diverse environment.

I just think that us, as Latinos, we also need to get educated on the history of the African American struggles... just so we understand.... So you understand what's going on in this community and why there's so much animosity between Caucasians and African Americans.

I've actually had conversations with people who would like to see blacks and whites work their differences out first and then begin to deal with Hispanic, Latinos, or people of Middle Eastern descent, or others, who might choose to make this community their home. My response to them has been, ‘Well, black folk and white folk have been trying to work out their differences for four hundred years now, and we still haven't gotten it right so why should anyone have to wait for us to work that out? Why can't we all work on this together?

It's every individual's mission to speak up and say something. Make a difference in your community. Make a difference and do something that's right.