stereotype

The Leavers, Daniel/Deming faces a lot of racist stereotypes, from eating dog to being good at math (look on note page to see more). Deming makes a point to acknowledge these stereotypes and ignore them in an effort to fit in with the other kids at school. Instead of ignoring these stereotypes, I thought I would research more about them and see where they come from. Stereotypes are not generally sprung out of nowhere; they usually come from a large general assumption about a certain group of people.
The first stereotype that Daniel faced was eating dog meat. Daniel felt insulted when people joked about the “unrecognizable lumps” in Chinese takeout as dog meat, but the truth is, in many Asian countries, it may be true. Eating dogs in the winter was believed to provide warmth in the winter, according to traditional Chinese medicine. Eating dogs occurred during the Great Famine, but peasants would eat any animal they could just to stay alive. In the early days of China, dogs were important sacrificial food to ancestors and gods. However, in recent years, the Chinese have shied away from eating dogs, and a recent dog-meat festival in Yulin has shown that many Chinese citizens think that this festival should be stopped and is running China’s reputation.

Another common stereotype is that Chinese kids are insanely good at math. This results from a traditional Chinese belief that the way to succeed is resulting from hard work. If you aren’t succeeding, you just have to work harder. With this belief in mind, the Chinese public systems focus on memorization and discipline, which makes them excellent at taking standardized tests.

Finally, there’s a stereotype that all Chinese people know kung fu. Kung fu originated from China, so people believe that all Chinese people will learn kung fu. However, kung fu is a very broad genre and is defined as any study, learning, or practice that requires patience, energy, and time to complete.