Third Black Heritage Trail Tea Talk to Focus on the “Myth of the Model Minority”

 The Myth of the Model Minority will be the topic of the third program of the Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire’s Elinor Williams Hooker Winter Tea Talk series on Sunday, February 20, 2022, from 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm.  This is a hybrid program to be held both held in-person at Stokel Commons at the Portsmouth Middle School, and online.  Registration is required.  

Asian Americans are often typecast as studious, successful, and smart. Although the terms are positive, The Myth of the Model Minority exacerbates tension between people of color and ignores the reality of systematic racism experienced by Asian American in the United States. 

Joining the Moderator Delia Konzett, Professor of English and Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of New Hampshire, will be Pawn Nitichan, Executive Director, City-Year New Hampshire; Samuel Hyun, Asian American and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) Advocate, and Public Speaker; and Sandeep Bikram Shah, Senior Program Officer at New Hampshire Charitable Foundation.  This panel will discuss how labeling Asian Americans as a model minority creates a divide between Asian Americans and African Americans, and allows many white Americans to ignore the consequences of racism and racist policies.

These “Courageous Conversations” provide safe spaces for meaningful discussions, grounded in history and lived experience.  All programs are free and open to the public thanks to support from New Hampshire Humanities, in partnership with the National Endowment for the Humanities (learn more at www.nhhumanities.org), and the Exeter Hospital.  For more information on this program and the others in the series, or to register for any of the programs, go to https://blackheritagetrailnh.org/tea-talks-2022/, call (603) 570-8469, or send an email to info@blackheritagetrailnh.org.