Using Film to Teach Cultural Diversity and Identity

Abstract

This study examines how English language ability and skills can be improved by using film to teach, illustrate, and supplement courses on the subject of cultural identity, cultural diversity, and cultural theory. The study uses research conducted by Pyke and Dang (2003) and Kim (2013a) as the basis for how films can be used to demonstrate how Asian Americans exhibit internalized racism toward other coethnics by denigrating them as either “FOB” (Fresh off the boat) or “Whitewashed” in order to situate themselves in the bi-cultural middle of the acculturation continuum. The study examines how Asians and Asian Americans perpetuate the ideology of the dominant class in America that identifies Asian Americans as either perpetual foreigners or as too assimilate by giving up their “Asianness” through the use of “disidentifier” to deflect their stigmatized status. The paper maintains that the attempt by Asian Americans to straddle the bi-cultural middle is a disciplinary practice in the Foucauldian sense to deflect the status of a stigmatized status rather than as an act of acculturation or assimilation into the mainstream society. The study maintains that the plot, scenes, and dialogue in the film can help facilitate understanding of American cultural hegemony and ideology on the creation of an ascribed Asian American identity.