When people think of racism they right away go back in time and think about the time of slavery. They conclude that it is done with and that it is no longer encountered in the world today, (at least not in America). On the contrary, racism is still done today and mostly in America. Even though it is the most diverse country is has the most racism as well. In “YELLOW: Race in America Beyond Black and White,” the author Frank H. Wu writes about all the racism and discrimination done in America towards the minority groups. He brings up three main topics, but I believe there are four, through out the book. They are; the model minority myth, foreigner syndrome, the problems in America, such as immigration and racial profiling, and the last one is a resolution brought on to be a mixed race movement.
In the beginning the author brings up model minority myth with foreigner syndrome. As the book opens up with a story of his childhood and how he was known as the little Asian boy from the show “Johnny Sokko.” The author is brought upon, at such a young age, racism. Little kids were not aware of what they were doing because they were too young to understand. Because of this, some parents didn’t pay care to this problem because they were the ones teaching the kids. At one point in the book Frank Wu was asked by a parent, “What are you? Where do you come from?” Of course he was too young to understand that he asked the same question back but the parents just walked away. This was just an example that I thought was pretty important because adults would discriminate young kids even though the kids didn’t know what was happening. As I continued to read the book I realized that there is such a thing of model minority myth. That today in our time, we look at the Asian Americans and somehow dislike them because they are all successful. They all somehow go into the same career of medicine and overcome every other race. In my opinion this is done, only because we let it happen and get into our heads. If we really wanted to we could have all sorts of doctors and a large majority but right away we just don’t realize that its our fault for not wanting to do so because Asian Americans already beat us to it. It is as if we were referring to them as “they” instead of “us” because they are Americans and are a part of our country.
Furthermore, the author brings up the idea of foreigner syndrome. He brings up an important fact that we need to focus on. Asians have a distinct appearance among the rest of us. They have their appearance of foreigners because of the roots they carry. Like other races, their roots change over the generations, but somehow with Asian decent, they stay looking the same. One point that he brought up was the attack on Pearl Harbor and how right away Americans had no confidence on anyone that looked Japanese. I believe that was an unfair thing to do because Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, and Japanese are all different. It is like saying someone is Caucasian when they are Irish. Just little things like these are what need to change in our world to reduce discrimination and racism.
As the author continues with his main topics, one I thought was interesting was the problems we face with race here in America. I say this because not many people pay much attention to this problem. Not long ago, maybe a couple years ago, he mentions the violence and discrimination he encountered. How, when he lived in a white community he was never accepted. That he viewed too much racial violence as he grew. Especially among blacks with whites, even blacks with Asians. That when the topic of immigration set forth that brought about more tension between the races. As he brings up this topic he does include other minority groups, but doesn’t bring them up as much as I thought he should have in the whole book. It is as if he only brought them up when he didn’t know how to put the Asian Americans into that topic. The author has many facts written in the book and I like how he adds himself and his encounters as examples. How one time at the Canadian border he was stopped and asked questions because of the way he looked. They believed that because of the way he looked, he was a suspect and that he was part of the Japanese group that was sending information to them.
The author adds more and more facts to what he is trying to explain, he finally brings up a point on how to have a resolution. The way he brings up this point is with racial mixed marriages. How many Asians began marrying whites to help themselves out. He even mentions how some Asians women married white men so their children can have a better start, once they are older. I believe this is a bad way to think in life because it seems like we are just fighting with every other race. How we just need to look at the bright side as well as work together to bring up our race and fight discrimination.
I didn’t enjoy reading the book as much as I thought I would have, only because I thought the author was going to focus a bit more on every other minority groups. I was hoping for him to have more examples and details on the problems they faced. Overall the way he brought up examples of Asian Americans was good because somehow it is kind of the same for the other groups. I just believe that by doing so, he could have made the book a lot more interesting and enjoyable to read.
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