No easy labels fit ANY population
I do wonder why it seems so much easier to label the equally diverse Latino/Chicano communities, though.
UMass study details Asian-American diversity
Challenges facing community defy simple fixes, authors say
By Monica Rhor, Globe Staff | May 27, 2004
No easy labels fit the Boston area's Asian-American population.
It is made up of rich and poor, college graduates and high school dropouts, city renters and suburban homeowners, white-collar professionals and manual laborers. They are second- and third-generation Chinese-Americans, well-to-do immigrants from India, recent refugees from Vietnam and Cambodia, and students from Japan and Korea.
Together they make up the fastest-growing -- and one of the most diverse -- populations in the metro area, according to "Asian Americans in Metro Boston: Growth, Diversity and Complexity," a study being released today.
Conducted by the Institute for Asian American Studies at the University of Massachusetts at Boston, the study gives an overview of Asian-Americans in the city and surrounding towns, and seeks to dispel myths that portray the community as either a "model minority" or a "yellow peril."
"Historically, Asians have been stereotyped as a monolithic group, and those stereotypes have had consequences in terms of how they are treated," said Paul Watanabe, director of the Institute for Asian American Studies and the study's lead author. "One way to try to counteract that is to understand the complexity and diversity that exists within the Asian-American community."
That community, fueled largely by immigration, has grown significantly in both numbers and complexity over the past decade, the study says.
