WMNST 105N Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Ethnocentrism, Intersectionality
Lesson 4: Stereotypes and microaggressions
●Overview
○Define the terms stereotypes
○Define microaggression
○Assess and explain the problems that arise from stereotyping.
○Analyze and debate the controversy surrounding implications for free
speech.
●Stereotype
○reduction of a diverse group of people to a narrow set of adjectives
○Race
○Religion
○Sexuality
○Examples
■women are bad at math
■Asians are good at math
■Asian women?
■Intersectionality
○Comparativism
■evaluate another person against your own circumstances
■boiling down individual characteristics to sweeping generalizations
○Humanization
■how is this person different from myself?
■curiosity about another individual’s circumstances
●What is the problem with stereotyping?
○Stereotypes essentialize
■ monochromatic
■ unchanging portrait
■ ignore history
■Ignore social circumstance
■making any one feature a defining characteristic of a national
personality or a collective psyche
○Stereotypes are ethnocentric
■ implicit negative comparison
■ artificial oppositions or binaries
■ judgmental tone that privileges the United States
