Harold Evans, a British born journalist who wrote for The Sunday Times, described the limiting nature of stereotypes perfectly when he said that “Attempting to get a truth means rejecting stereotypes and cliches.” Stereotypes majorly impact every human society in an unparalleled manner, and will always continue to exist along with humanity. Since the founding of the country, the United States (U.S.) maintains a legacy of prejudice; the nation retains a history of racism and copious stereotypes. Several positive effects may emerge from stereotyping, as individuals can accept the stereotypes in order to defend themselves. Yet, a majority of people agree the negative results that emerge out of the prejudices greatly outweigh any possible positives,
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Ascribed statuses such as gender, race, and age define people, despite the effort to dismantle those limiting stereotypes. Modern society offers the opportunity to break through age-old barriers, but the stereotypes that plague humanity imbue each new and old generation thoroughly, as they have since the beginning of time. An article discussing the damage caused by stereotypes explains the broad term: “the word stereotype was used by the French in 1788 to describe a solid metallic plate . . . [they] later used the word stereotype as a metaphor for the mental impressions held by humans that approximate common characteristics of certain social groups” (Allen and Friedman 105). Another article recognizes the multiple interpretations of the expansive word when it states, “there has not been a concrete definition for stereotype, a term used broadly by theorists and researchers” (Kanahara 306). It portrays the issue as “a combination of more than one component, rather than one single component” (Kanahara 307). Determined by these components, adjectives such as incorrect, superficial, cultural, oversimplified, exaggerated, and generalized, represent how people sort others into specific groups with assigned traits (Kanahara
Ascribed statuses such as gender, race, and age define people, despite the effort to dismantle those limiting stereotypes. Modern society offers the opportunity to break through age-old barriers, but the stereotypes that plague humanity imbue each new and old generation thoroughly, as they have since the beginning of time. An article discussing the damage caused by stereotypes explains the broad term: “the word stereotype was used by the French in 1788 to describe a solid metallic plate . . . [they] later used the word stereotype as a metaphor for the mental impressions held by humans that approximate common characteristics of certain social groups” (Allen and Friedman 105). Another article recognizes the multiple interpretations of the expansive word when it states, “there has not been a concrete definition for stereotype, a term used broadly by theorists and researchers” (Kanahara 306). It portrays the issue as “a combination of more than one component, rather than one single component” (Kanahara 307). Determined by these components, adjectives such as incorrect, superficial, cultural, oversimplified, exaggerated, and generalized, represent how people sort others into specific groups with assigned traits (Kanahara