Stereotyping In David Hernandez's Pigeons

Stereotyping is one the main ongoing issues in the world of today. Stereotyping is believing unfairly that all people or things with a particular characteristic are the same. The word stereotype itself is defined as a widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing. Common stereotypes present today include racial profiling, the most common one, gender profiling, culture stereotyping, various groups of individuals, and sexual stereotypes. Generally, stereotyping is not socially and personally acceptable. Even with that, it is still very prominent. Stereotyping can have a wide range of mental effects on those of a stereotype. This is seen in the psychological subject of stereotype threat. This arises …show more content…
In Pigeons, David Hernandez presents the pigeons as the less-privileged and stereotyped. The begins with “Pigeons are the spiks of Birdland”. This goes on to be what the concludes the poem with as well. “Spik” is not a word present in the dictionary but a nickname giving to Mexicans by Americans themselves. This is very significant as it identifies the pigeons. It puts them in that category of minorities so from this point the reader has a generally idea of the poem’s topic. The pigeons are described as “survivors of blood, fire, and stone”. The talks about how they have “feathers of a different color” and how their feathers are “too bright to be dull and too dull to be bright” which prevents them being accepted anywhere. It’s pretty clear at this point that they, again, are indeed the targets of the stereotype. The more privileged, non-stereotyped creatures on the other hand are depicted as parakeets, canaries, parrots, and doves. They “have the market sewn up as far as jobs go” unlike the pigeons. These more privileged creatures, or a number of them, are the ones stereotyping. Due to their stereotypes, the pigeons most definitely seem to have it much …show more content…
The pigeons, unlike the more privilege creatures, apparently “can't afford to fly south” and “nobody wants to give them a job”. This shows how restricted and limited they are when it comes to money and job opportunities. From this it can be concluded that more-privileged creatures, of course, have more opportunities usually; hence ‘more-privileged’. Hernandez talks about how they build “wooden cages on rooftops that look like huge pigeon housing projects where they freeze during the winters”. This goes back to the point on money/job restrictions showing that they are also restricted when it comes to their homes and choice of. Hernandez also speaks of how pigeons have to bleach their feathers white trying to pass off as doves just to be accepted. The statement he’s possibly attempting to make is that pigeons are so restricted that they have to pass off as someone else just to be accepted, and most of the time it’s done because they have no alternative. It’s very clear that Hernandez is getting at the point that stereotypes restrict people