Stereotypes of South Asians

Stereotypes of South Asians are broadly believed impressions about individuals of South Asian origin that are often inconsistent with reality. While the impressions are wrongly presumed to be universally true for all people of South Asian origin, these stereotypes adversely affect the South Asians as well as the acculturation process.

With 20th century immigration of South Asians around the world, especially to the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States, ethnic stereotyping of South Asians has become common place. These stereotypes have been found by scholars to be dehumanizing, making South Asians more prone to mistreatment and crime, a constraint on their ability to productively contribute, as well as a cause of depression and ill health.

Ethnic stereotypes of South Asians have included Orientalism and Romanticism as well as the scientific racism. These stereotypes are applied in both an unrealistically ideal way and sometimes an unrealistically negative way.

South Asians are stereotyped around the world in ways that are dehumanizing, and in some cases it can lead to depression and mental health issues. These stereotypes include cultural prejudices, belonging to certain professions such as taxi drivers, motel owners, computer geeks, medical doctors, surface learners and rote memorizers, too eager to assimilate or not willing to assimilate, uncaring mothers, among others.

South Asians are stereotyped as belonging to two socioeconomic groups. They are stereotyped either as convenience store or restaurant owners, cab drivers or motel operators who are uneducated, greedy, with large families and live in crowded homes. Alternatively, they are stereotyped as snobbish, upwardly mobile software programmers and doctors, who lack English-speaking fluency and are willing to take a lower salary. These stereotypes are built, claim scholars, by media shows such as the Bangladeshi store owners represented as Sirajul and Mujibur in David Letterman's show, or by the character Apu in The Simpsons, or Babu Bhatt character in the Seinfeld show, or the British TV show The Kumars at No. 42 (though this may be an intentional invoking of the stereotype to call attention to it). This contrasts with the reality that South Asians are active, in various levels of prominence and service, in every profession.

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