Stereotypes Of Asian Women Essay

You could easily name off several leading white men in movies today, however naming off leading men of color is not so easy. Trying to name off leading women yields an even smaller list. Now try to think of leading women who are not white, that becomes even harder; there just are not that many out there. Leading actors and actresses of color are typically playing alongside white lead actors, in fact, I can only think of a few times when the actors of color are the lead actor/actress in any movie. These are examples of the fact that Hollywood is still today stereotyping women and minorities. If they are continually disparaged then their self-worth will be minimized. This will encourage them to rebel against whoever they feel is holding them

To start the conversation about women, minorities and stereotyping, Jessica Hagedorn, a Filipino playwright, writer, poet, and multimedia performance artist, who wrote “Hollywood, Asian Women in Film: No Joy, No Luck” which is about the stereotyping of Asian women. Hagedorn claims that Asian women are typically perceived with “a mixture of fascination, fear and contempt” (344). They could be stereotyped as a Pearl of the Orient fantasy (350) or be trivialized (344), but they are really mothers, wives, lovers, daughters and sisters (343). In the early days of the silver screen, Asian women were played by anyone other than Asian women. In 1960, a movie, The World of Suzie Wong came out; it portrayed an Asian prostitute in a bar trying to win the heart of the American painter who came there looking for inspiration. In typical Asian stereotype, she acts as if she does not matter. The main character Suzie was played by an Asian woman named Nancy Kwan. This was one of the first movies where an Asian woman actually played the part of an Asian woman. Before this, American women and even played the parts of Asian women in films. In 1985, the movie, Year of the Dragon by Michael Cimino and