Comment on "Image, status, mobility, and integration in American society: the Polish experience"
I’m old enough to remember the Barney Miller show—it was one of my favorites. If you are interested in how Det. Stan 'Wojo' Wojciehowicz is portrayed, watch the episodes “The Courtesans” Parts 2 and 3.
http://www.searchforvideo.com/entertainment/tv/barney-miller/
* for you younger folks, that strange device Wojo is using is a typewriter! ;)
The character of “Wojo” was not portrayed as generally stupid, but he was stupid about relationships. And the African-American character, Detective Harris, whom Pula describes as “impeccably dressed” and “articulate”, was also a snob. Yamana, the Japanese-American detective, bet on horses. Deitrick, the German-American, got himself into a couple of scrapes because of his ultra-liberal political views and often alienated himself from “the regular guys” by his constant philosophizing.
My point is that each of the characters had a personal quirk. With Wojo, it was women. He just couldn’t get enough of them. As a young viewer, (this was the seventies and I watched it as a teenager) it never occurred to me to associate that weakness with the fact that he was Polish… to me, he was just a guy with a long name who had a lot girlfriends, some of whom were downright flaky.
But if you are Polish and have had to listen to a lot of insensitive Polish jokes, I can understand why you might take offense at the character. I was a public school teacher for ten years, and I cringe at the stereotypical teacher characters on kids’ shows. Most of them are prissy, clueless, and don’t like kids very much. To me, most of these portrayals aren’t all that funny, but kids find them hilarious.
The mispronunciation of Wojciehowicz's last name was a running gag on the show, but the people who mangled it more than once were portrayed as stupid and insensitive.
Wojo himself was a complex character. He was also honest, hardworking, sincere, and a male chauvinist. In one episode he offers asylum to a Russian immigrant who sought refuge from communism. In another, he deals with the knowledge that he was exposed to Agent Orange during his tour as a soldier in Vietnam.
How we see media characters depends on our past experiences. If your only experience with a certain ethnic group comes from mostly negative portrayals in the media, I think it can impact how you think of that group.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
The article of J. S. Pula made me ask myself if today’s mass-media is enough responsible in a multicultural world and if it accords the proper place to ethnic minorities.
A study I read sometimes ago, presented by Beata Klimkiewicz of Krakow Institute of Journalism and Social Comunication, showed that the existence of newspapers, magazines and broadcasts in the languages of minorities has for the representatives of ethnic communities an important symbolic role, representing not only the warrant of the access to information but especially the recognition from the majority. The same study demonstrates that press materials regarding the ethnic and religious minorities produced by the members of the majority are perceived as reflecting in a smaller measure the diversity than those realized by redactors belonging to the minority ethnic groups. In the same measure, media programs in minority languages realized in a different country have a much smaller relevance for minority ethnics than those produced in the country they live. Ethnic stereotypes that Pula is mentioning in his article can be cultivated through mass media very easily. In this sense, a conclusive example is the one regarding the former Yugoslavia conflict (the ethnic war between Serbians and Albanian Moslems from Kosovo), fueled in a large measure by the way the press reflected the events, serving thus the interests of different ethnic groups in this region.
The Image of Poles in the American World
The article of J. S. Pula presents the time evolution of the image of the Polish Americans in the USA and their current image. In a sense I believe that the portrayal of the immigrant culture was at least superficial in the eyes of the media. What I found interesting is that in the case of the Poles, their image in the American world from the Revolution until about 1880 was good, due probably to the low number of Poles represented on this continent through a few personalities. The massive migration wave after 1880 due to the economical conditions in Eastern Europe led to a widespread contact with the first immigrants of Western European origin who were already settled in America. Why picking on the Poles? What I think it counted in the eyes of the people was the literacy level, the language skills and the number of people that immigrated. The US Immigration Commission (USIC) and the Army issued in 1906 and 1919 biased and undocumented reports that seemed rather a verification of the pre-existing ethnic social stereotypes about new immigrants. In the context of the Darwin’s theory about evolution that took roots that time, one can think that the reports have somewhat supported the superior race theories that in Europe culminated with the ascension of the Nazis to power and the devastating consequences following after that.
The author presents the case of the Polish people but we should not forget that the same derogatory principles have applied in time to Irish and Italian immigrants as nations of European origins, to Chinese or Japanese as nations of Asian origin and more recently to people from Latin America. I think that the negative perception of the Americans over the low human and educational quality of the new wave of immigrants in the USA after 1880 is best exemplified by the triage station on Ellis Island in the New York harbor.
The stereotypes against Polish people presented in television have had a great impact on the self-image and the collective psyche of this nationality in America. The report describes the relative low rank of the Poles in various towns and the conflicts between parents and the children who refused to identify themselves with a damaged ethnic heritage image.
The fact that Poles and the Eastern Europeans in extenso represent a race apart characterized by low intellect and brute force is dismantled by presenting data on socioeconomic mobility and education comparatively with other nationalities. For example Poles median family income ranked above the average in all census data from 1970 to 1990. The 1970 census indicated considerable progress in the field of education; in 1990’s the new Polish American generation showed a higher rate of education than the average Americans of their age. This data in fact shows the contrary of the popular beliefs against the Poles.
While the effect of almost a century of stereotyping was damaging to the self-image of the Polish Americans, I believe that nowadays the general public has started changing its perception, mostly due to the politically correctness principle that must apply equally to people of all ethnic origins. In fact, the “deprecating virtues” of hard work, stoicism and perseverance that were considered characteristic of low-quality Eastern European immigrants a century ago are highly prized today. When combined with increased opportunities for education this proofs that Poles are no more or less in terms of human quality than other ethnic groups. Although the article does not mention it, nowadays the judgment and attention seems to shift on the new wave of immigrants from other corners of the world.
Post a Comment