Arabs-Americans and Indo American
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Arab-Americans and Indo-Americans
Religious traits are often conflated with racial traits because certain dominant features inherent in religion may trigger an association with a group and are attached to race in popular discourse. The Muslims and Hindus observe their faith socially, typically, and theologically, which seems illegitimate in the eyes of other religions (Khaitan & Norton, 2019). Muslim or Hinduism is not a race, but they are examined through a racial process that is demarcated by physical features and racial underpinnings.
The Imagery of Disney’s Arabian Nights Fantasy film Aladdin characterizes the Arab world as strange, exotic, and alien. The majority of whites view this film as perpetuating the tired stereotype of the Arab world like a desert full of camels, and that the Arabs are full of cruelty and are barbarians. Besides, American TV programs and feature the popular culture of the Arabs and display negative images of Arabs women as belly dancers and less educated. The men are illustrated to be violent, barbaric, and they love violence (McKay & Whitehouse, 2015). .There are also cartoons like Network Batman, which portrays fanatic, dark-complexioned Arabs armed with sabers and rifles as allies of an “alien” plotting to take over the earth.
Structural functionalism concentrates on the relationship between the institutions that make up society. In this case, religion is the institution that creates a conflict and separates majority Christians from minority Islam and Hindus is religion; hence Conflict theory explains that society is in a continual conflict due to competition for limited resources (Meer, 2013). The two groups share some common attributes and resources like water, land, and health facilities. Therefore the existence of an immigrant group is already a threat that informs the conflict for the limited resources. On the other hand, the relationship between the majority of Americans and the minority Arab-Americans and indo-Americans can be understood from a symbolic internationalist standpoint. In this case, the white American population can understand and isolate individuals from the minority population through dialect and create and implement stereotypical ideas about them.
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