{"id":50543,"date":"2012-08-20T11:20:30","date_gmt":"2012-08-20T16:20:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=50543"},"modified":"2013-11-08T03:26:58","modified_gmt":"2013-11-08T08:26:58","slug":"the-impossibility-of-colorblind-currency-canadas-new-100","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2012\/08\/20\/the-impossibility-of-colorblind-currency-canadas-new-100\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorblind Currency?: Canada’s New $100"},"content":{"rendered":"

An emerging controversy in Canada\u00a0is a good example of just how difficult it is to be racially-neutral when the context is racially-charged. \u00a0The country recently redesigned its money. \u00a0On the back of the $100 dollar bill celebrating medical innovation they sketched an Asian-appearing woman looking into a microscope. \u00a0In a focus group in Quebec, people complained that the bill reproduced the stereotype that Asians pursue careers in science and medicine. \u00a0The Vancouver Sun<\/em><\/a> reports:<\/p>\n

“Some have concerns that the researcher appears to be Asian,” says a 2009 report commissioned by the bank from The Strategic Counsel…\u00a0“Some believe that it presents a stereotype of Asians excelling in technology and\/or the sciences. Others feel that an Asian should not be the only ethnicity represented on the banknotes. Other ethnicities should also be shown.”<\/p>\n

A few even said the yellow-brown colour of the $100 banknote reinforced the perception the woman was Asian, and “racialized” the note.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Canadian government responded that they had never intended the woman to appear “ethnic” and ordered the image re-sketched so it would be more racially “neutral.” \u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

They were then accused of being prejudiced again. Mu-Qing Huang, a Chinese-Canadian interviewed for the story, objected to the deletion of the figure’s Asian features:<\/p>\n

If Canada is truly multicultural and thinks that all cultural groups are equal, then any visible minority should be good enough to represent a country, including (someone with) Asian features.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is a tricky problem. \u00a0By including racial or ethnic minorities on their bills, Canada risks reproducing a stereotype. \u00a0Including all “neutral” figures can be seen as exclusionary because neutral looks suspiciously like White people in a country dominated by White people. \u00a0The third option is to deliberately break stereotypes by putting, say, an Asian woman running the hurdles and a Black woman looking through a microscope, but this can seem overly contrived (as many attempts at diversity do<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The truth is that all of Canada’s options can be read in racially-charged ways. \u00a0This isn’t because people are unfairly reading into the sketches, it’s because life in Canada is, in fact, racially-charged. \u00a0When race matters, it matters, all claims to colorblindness aside.<\/p>\n

Thanks to Craig G., Tom Megginson<\/a>, Jesse, Helen, and Alex, an MLIS from McGill, for the submission!<\/p>\nLisa Wade, PhD<\/a> is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of <\/em>American Hookup<\/a>, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender<\/a>; and a forthcoming introductory text: <\/em>Terrible Magnificent Sociology<\/a>.\u00a0You can follow her on Twitter<\/a> and Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An emerging controversy in Canada\u00a0is a good example of just how difficult it is to be racially-neutral when the context is racially-charged. \u00a0The country recently redesigned its money. \u00a0On the back of the $100 dollar bill celebrating medical innovation they sketched an Asian-appearing woman looking into a microscope. \u00a0In a focus group in Quebec, people […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1770,304,283,285,1759,1757],"class_list":["post-50543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-nation-canada","tag-the-state","tag-prejudicediscrimination","tag-raceethnicity","tag-raceethnicity-asianspacific-islanders","tag-raceethnicity-whiteseuropeans"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50543"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50543\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58254,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50543\/revisions\/58254"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}