Goguen, Stacey

English

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2018 NEIU Faculty Research/Creative Activities Symposium | Submitted 10/16/18 Title: The Different Kinds, and Effects, of Stereotypes Presenter: Stacey Goguen Abstract: There are a lot of stereotypes in contemporary American culture, some of which are quite harmful. But is every claim about a group a stereotype? And are all stereotypes equally harmful? Surprisingly, researchers still disagree about what a stereotype actually is, and why and when stereotypes are bad. Philosophers are often interested in whether our current concepts and categories are doing a good job of describing the world and the complexities of human experience. When they aren’t, philosophers will sometimes suggest new categories and distinctions to better describe and explain important facets of human life. That is what I do in this talk about stereotypes.  Specifically, I examine three philosophical accounts of stereotypes.  They are, from narrowest to broadest: (1) Stereotypes are misleading, essentializing beliefs about social groups. (Blum 2004) (2) Stereotypes are generalizations that highlight striking, contrasting features of a group. (Leslie 2017) (3) Stereotypes are expectations about individuals based on social group membership.  (Beeghley 2015) I use recent work from philosophy and social psychology to argue that all three accounts provide valuable insights into what (often) makes stereotyping a bad knowledge practice and a bad moral practice. However, on its own, each account is incomplete. So, I present a combined account and distinguish between a “cognitive stereotype,” which is a broad category describing all the many stereotypes that are held by individuals or small groups, and a “cultural stereotype,” which is a narrower category describing only those stereotypes that permeate up through an entire culture. Cultural stereotypes can be “thick” or “thin” (how salient or weighty they are in the culture), as well as “pernicious” or “benign” (how damaging and oppressive they are).  I conclude by discussing the importance of separating the impact that stereotypes have on individuals vs. the impact they can have on a society. All negative (cognitive) stereotypes might have certain detrimental effects on the individual level. But at the social level, some negative (cultural) stereotypes, such as “White people can’t dance” are actually thinner and more benign than certain positive, but thick and pernicious stereotypes, such as “Asians are good at math.” References Blum, Larry. 2004. “Stereotypes and Stereotyping: A Moral Analysis.” Philosophical Papers, 33(3): 251-289. Beeghley, Erin. 2015. “What is a Stereotype? What is Stereotyping?” Hypatia, 30(4): 675-691. Leslie, Sarah-Jane. 2017. “The Original Sin of Cognition: Fear, Prejudice, and Generalization,” The Journal of Philosophy, 114 (8): 393-421.  

The Different Kinds, and Effects, of Stereotypes

https://neiudc.neiu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1049&amp;context=frcas

The Different Kinds, and Effects, of Stereotypes

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