multiculturalpsychmnc

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

A Reflection

Being totally honest, I wasn’t so sure about this blogging assignment at the beginning of the semester. It seemed like an uphill task that I had no idea how to begin to tackle. As exciting as it is to be able to choose whatever I wanted to write about, I wasn’t sure I would pick the right things, or have the right thoughts. Looking back, I think I was being wary of a hidden curriculum, like we discussed on First-Generation Student Day. But here at the end, I’m a little sad it’s over-- there are so many more things I could write about!

I think the most important thing I learned while working on this project was just how often concepts from multicultural psychology show up in both our media and real world experiences. From parenting styles in Spanglish to implicit bias in Candyman (2021) to gender stereotyping in Modern Family, I’ve noticed these concepts in pretty much everything I’ve watched recently.

This assignment has also caused me to reflect on my own life and experiences, and how often class concepts have led to indelible moments in my upbringing. It’s been a lens for me to explore not only times where I have fallen victim to some of the less positive aspects of the human psyche, but times where I have been unaware of my own biases and acted in ways that I wish I hadn’t. But most importantly, it’s influenced me to do better going forward, both for myself and for others.

I feel like I have a capacity to recognize the way these concepts manifest themselves in my everyday life and experiences, and maybe that will make it easier to understand the media I am consuming and the people around me. Maybe that will make it easier for me to back up and think before I pass judgement on the behavior of others, and maybe it will give me the ability to think more critically about my own behaviors.

In the end, I’ve really enjoyed this assignment and I think I’ve learned a lot while working on it. Here’s to an awesome semester!

Image Credit: Adobe- https://www.adobe.com/creativecloud/photography/discover/reflection-photography.html

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

The Target Toy Aisle and Other Stories from Growing up a “Tomboy”

I thought I’d start this post out with a story. On my 5th birthday, my grandma took me to pick out a toy at the store while my mom got the house ready for a party. Once we got to the store, I made a beeline for the spot where my favorite types of toys were. To my grandma’s horror, I came back to her not with a Barbie or a Polly Pocket, but with a set of superhero action figures. I remember her asking me why I wanted those “scary looking” boy toys instead of a doll, but when I obviously wasn’t budging on my choice, she bought them for me.

I also remember her telling my mom about it when we got home, and her putting them in the freezer until my party, which I don’t think was super related, just weird grandma stuff.

But this was not at all an isolated incident in my childhood. I grew up with a little brother (Jake) who was pretty close in age to me, and it was honestly like having a built-in playmate. We would play action figures together, then we would play stuffed animals, then we would mix our dinosaurs and littlest ponies together and play that. My mom was cool with us playing or choosing whatever toys we wanted so long as we were happy, and my grandma came to be the same way, but I think her being a product of her generation made that difficult for her at first.

I never really thought about going to the “blue” toy isle at Target the same as I never thought about going to the “pink” toy isle, but I didn’t realize that this might not be the same way for Jake. While I could easily go grab a Lego set without as much as a second glance from anyone in the store, Jake and my mom might get weird looks if he wanted to pick out some Littlest Pet Shops.

And this really made me think-- Tomboys were accepted in our culture, maybe even encouraged, but boys who wanted to play with stuffed animals or dress-ups were not. I think this comes down to gender stereotyping and also our expectations of males in Western society. Men are supposed to be strong, and dominating, and wild. They are supposed to be the protectors of their families, the breadwinners, and the providers. Far too often “feminine” traits and softness are diminished in importance in comparison to these male expectations, and when boys show signs of these traits in their play, society freaks out.

This is so problematic for a few reasons. First, we put boys in a box with built in presumptions that they will be tough and unyielding and adventurous. Then we tell them that they can’t possibly be a man if they don’t live up to those expectations. You can imagine what that is doing to the psyches of our young men. But aside from that, this system also refuses to see the value in so-called “femininity”, and what it means to be caring, and empathetic, and to show emotion. These things are good things, and often they are core to being a decent human being, but these expectations that we have for men destroy this.

Even further, I want to talk about how gross it is that we have a pink and a blue toy isle for another reason- we treat gender as a binary, and it’s not. This tactic is so exclusionary and closed-minded when we consider all the people out there who don’t fit into a box of “boy” or “girl”, who know that sex and gender are completely different things, who don’t know which locker room to use at school, because neither of them feel right. The fact that we are pushing this binary in our bathrooms is bad enough, do we really need to push it in our toy isles too?

I could go on about this for forever and a day, so I’m just going to end with this-- let kids be kids. Let kids explore whatever interests they may have without putting a label on it. Allow them to be great in whichever way they want to be great. And for the love of god, stop with the pink and blue toy aisles.

Image Credit: Change.org- https://www.change.org/p/target-remove-gender-coding-pink-and-blue-walls-from-toy-aisles

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

Gender Stereotypes and Modern Family

Over the past few weeks, I have been rewatching Modern Family, and for the most part I’ve been really enjoying it. However, this is not to say that the more glaringly problematic elements of the show have been lost on me, like they largely were when I was watching the show as a preteen. As a proud member of the LGBTQIA+ community, the casting of a straight man to play a flamboyant and stereotypical gay man is more than just bothersome, and the racial jokes that are so often made at Gloria and Manny’s expense often warrant a physical cringe. I would say the show is simply a facet of its time, but 2009 really wasn’t that long ago. Still, I can’t seem to bring myself to stop watching as it’s become kind of a comfort show for me over the years.

However, there is one dynamic in Modern Family that is less talked about as being problematic, but stuck out to me like a sore thumb when thinking about psychological facets of gender that we discussed in this course, and that is the treatment of Haley and Alex in the show.

Alex and Haley are sisters and could not be more different. Haley is popular, fashionable, and dumb as a rock while Alex is nerdy, awkward, and often couldn’t be less concerned with her appearance. For the early seasons of the show, both girls are rather one dimensional and were obviously created to fulfill specific roles, and both are portrayed questionably when thinking of young girls watching the show.

When I first started writing this post, I was more concerned with the portrayal of Alex, a strong, independent girl with constantly aces her classes and achieves remarkable things for her age, yet she is always the butt of the joke that she is never going to get a date, or friends, or be worthy in any social sense. When looking at the list of gender stereotypes and characteristics that we went over in class, Alex checks off many from the masculine side including ambitious, competitive, independent, and self-reliant as well as others, but looking at the feminine side I had a hard time applying any of the traits to her character except in niche instances.

This is problematic for a few reasons. First, though Alex has these traits that we would so often see as positive when applied to men, they are rarely seen as positives for Alex. Her smarts are often praised by her family, but mostly to compare her to her less academic siblings and never to set her apart for herself. Second, this character purports the stereotype that smart girls cannot be feminine.

When thinking about Haley, on the other hand, many of the feminine stereotypes hold up. From the list, I could immediately pick out feminine, cheerful, gullible, and flatterable. In addition to this, Haley represents other female stereotypes such as always making sure her hair and makeup are perfect, dressing in a feminine and fashionable way, and attracting a parade of guys everywhere she goes. She is the popular girl at school and flaunts her femininity as a way to get out of schoolwork and what she would consider to be dorky family social events.

The issues with Haley are almost opposite those of the issues with Alex. She portrays everything that is supposed to be “right” and “good” about women, but she does so in a way that puts women down and reduces us to objects. Further, Haley fits in to the stereotype that pretty girls cannot be smart.

Now, if I remember correctly, as the series goes on all the characters, including Haley and Alex, become more three dimensional, characters that they audience can really relate to and root for, but I’m not sure if this undoes the damage that those first few seasons wrought.

Watching this when I was 11 or 12, I was definitely more of an Alex. I was a tomboy, didn’t have the least idea of how to french braid hair or paint my nails without getting polish absolutely everywhere, and was only just starting to realize that boys (and girls, but that’s another story) existed as anything more than just as friends. I was also whip-smart and excelled in both school and extracurricular academic activities.

But I desperately wanted to be a Haley. I wanted to be the girl that all the girls wanted to be friends with, and all the boys wanted to date. I wanted to have a keen sense of fashion, and get up and learn fun new things to do with my hair every morning. But that so clearly wasn’t me, and sometimes I feel like I sacrificed important parts of myself to try to fit into that box. I’m not saying it was Modern Family alone that caused me to do these things, or even that it was what put that idea in my head in the first place, but it definitely reinforced those ideas. And I can’t help but think I wasn’t the only one.

And I’m sure there were Haley’s that watched and wished they were more like Alex. Again, I never exactly fit into those shoes, but I had friends who were more like Haley who always told me they wished they were as smart as I was, and that they wished they cared as much about school as I did. I can imagine those girls watching this show and having those ideas reinforced to them that if they were pretty and popular and got all the guys, they would never amount to anything more than a pretty little housewife.

Maybe I’m thinking too much into this, and it’s just supposed to be a sitcom that you can turn your brain off for 20 minutes and watch, but I can’t help but think that these things matter. Especially when you’re marketing to a family audience full of young and impressionable girls.

Image Credit: Rouge 18- http://www.rouge18.com/2014/12/22/holiday-gift-guide-teen/

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

Collectivism, Individualism, and Thanksgiving Drama

Ah, Thanksgiving. For many it’s synonymous with time with the family, watching a football game, and eating until you literally have to take a nap. But, for others, the sound “Thanksgiving” makes in your ear sounds a lot like “drama”. Yes, we’re all a little high strung around the holidays (if you’re not, please teach me your secrets), but a recent experience in my own life has taught me that it’s probably much more than just that.

This year, my aunt and uncle decided their family was going to split from the group and have their own dinner. Yeah, okay, whatever. They do this sometimes as my uncle isn’t a big fan of socializing and with four kids who are beginning to start families of their own, they certainly have a big enough crowd to fill their own massive dinner table. In the past this has hurt feelings because it stops the rest of the family from spending time with cousins or nieces and nephews that we don’t often get to see (some live out of state) but my uncle runs a very traditional patriarchy, so to his kids and wife, what he says, goes.

But this year, they took it a step farther-- they stole grandma.

Now my grandma is the rock of this family. She’s 91 years old and often plays the biggest role in getting everyone together for holidays and various family events. She’s also pretty much my favorite person, and I take a lot after her. So for me, getting to hang with grandma on Thanksgiving is one of the best and most important parts of the holiday, and I’m not the only one that feels this way.

At first I was really upset about this, but then I decided to pull back and apply what I knew about multicultural psychology to see if I could put myself in my aunt and uncle’s shoes.

There is a large cultural difference between my aunt and uncle and the rest of the family. Though it’s unusual for Utah, I come from a family of liberals, some Democrats, and some (including myself) even further left than that. In fact, even coming from a pretty large family, I can count the conservatives on one hand, with my aunt and uncle being two of the four in total, their son and daughter-in-law being the other two (note that my grandma is not on this list).

Furthermore, despite growing up the children of the bishop in an LDS household, my mom and her other two siblings aside from my aunt aren’t really religious in any capacity anymore, and neither are their partners or children. We’re pretty much a big group of heathens, again with the exception of my aunt, my uncle, my grandma, and two of my aunt and uncle’s kids. So, they’re kind of in a weird spot.

From this, you can probably gather that there are some differences in collectivism vs individualism as well. I come from a big, close family who really values spending time with one another, and we characterize ourselves in that very interdependent way. It’s very much a space in which we would do anything for each other and we often operate in a collectivist fashion as such. But I wonder if this sometimes doesn’t allow us to account for the feelings of some of our more conservative, individualistic family.

Maybe instead of interpreting this break from the group as being selfish and making pariahs of the rest of the family, my aunt and uncle were just thinking of what was best for their little unit in a more individualistic way. I know my uncle and my conservative cousin don’t always love coming to family events because they‘re bothered by our liberal values and ideas, so maybe this was just an attempt to escape from that. Although, we don’t really discuss political issues around them in the first place as a sign of respect (and because it ends up causing hurt feelings, there’s some homophobia at play), so I don’t know if this is really the case.

And maybe they need grandma more than we do this year. Though I’ve convinced her she simply has to join my cousins (my aunt and uncle’s other three kids) in coming to our Thanksgiving for pie after the one at their mom and dad’s.

I understand this post has probably come out as more backhanded than I had originally intended, but I’m still working through the hurt feelings that this has caused me and many other members of the family. Again, we largely consider togetherness to be more important than our differences, but maybe that comes from being a part of the majority (which again, super ironic for Utah). I think the important thing though, is that I’m trying to work through it.

And hey, this means we won’t have to hide the booze until my aunt and uncle go home!

Image Credit: How Stuff Works- https://people.howstuffworks.com/culture-traditions/holidays-other/thanksgiving.htm

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

Racism and Public Reaction to Candyman (2021)

After concluding watching Candyman (2021), my boyfriend (Chris) decided to look up more content related to the film (i.e. YouTube videos, reviews, interviews with the cast and crew). He does this with most of the films we watch. It seems to me that he isn’t ready for the story to end, but that could just be conjecture on my part. But this time, what we found was really disheartening.

Both of us had thoroughly enjoyed the film, and the social elements related to recent events had only given us more to gush over and talk about, but it seemed much of the general public didn’t feel the same way. Under a YouTube review Chris was watching, one comment read something along the lines of “I didn’t watch a horror movie to have liberal social commentary shoved down my throat”. Upon reading piles upon piles of similar critiques, Chris expressed disappointment that public opinion of the movie didn’t seem to match ours.

I have come across plenty of criticism for Jordan Peele, who produced the film, for using horror movies as vehicles to address important social issues, but I had never really examined where these critiques were coming from. I guess I had always assumed it was angry conservatives who would take any excuse to be negative about the work of BIPOC, or at the attempt to bring modern racism into the public eye. Maybe my original hypothesis is true some of the time, but after some recent searches on the web, the net seems to be cast wider than that.

Despite a surge of social commentary in the horror genre over the last few years (Jordan Peele’s Get Out and Us, Ari Aster’s Midsommer, and James DeMonaco’s The Purge, just to name a few), the use of horror movies to create conversation and social change is nothing new. We can think back to as early as The Last House on the Left or even 1956′s Invasion of the Body Snatchers and see similar calls for a redirection in human behavior. But from what I can see, Peele’s projects have faced a far vaster collection of scathing rebuttal as compared to popular predecessors. So why is this? 

Unfortunately, from a psychological perspective, the answer seems pretty obvious: implicit bias.

One scene in the film shows the main character, Anthony McCoy, who is an artist in Chicago presenting his work in an art show. It is pointed out that despite the diversity of the city, Anthony is one of only a couple of BIPOC artists featured in the show. The majority of the pieces had been created by white artists. We also see that Anthony is met with harsh distaste from the art critic judging the show as she feels that his piece on the gentrification of black neighborhoods in Chicago is overdone, even going as far as to make a racist comment about “his type of people” always presenting on similar topics. When confronted, she says she had meant artists, but it is clear what the true implications of her comment were.

This scene seems eerily close to the barrage of negative YouTube comments and reviews that Candyman received. While someone may make a comment like “I felt like I was watching the news, not being entertained” they may not have even realized their implicit bias was showing, but much like the art critic in the film, they were actually contributing to a much larger and more problematic issue of disparaging black creators in direct correlation to their blackness.

One biproduct of whiteness and systemic racism in America is that we are constantly seeing white stories told in our media, and too often we just accept this as the norm. When BIPOC stories are told, white people get uncomfortable, and they make comments like the ones I saw after watching Candyman. There isn’t a simple solution to this, but that isn’t an excuse not to try to change for the better. To me, I feel like two things need to happen to start that change: first, we need to confront our own biases, and truly listen to the stories BIPOC are telling. Second, we need to encourage more of these stories to be told in our popular media.

If you want to start supporting BIPOC artwork and voices today, I’m sure there are plenty of local initiatives in place that you can share or donate to-- I know there are in my city. I thought I’d post one here that I found for the city of Chicago, in relation to the local of the Candyman movie. http://www.rebuild-foundation.org or https://www.facebook.com/rebuildfoundation/

Image Credit: Monkeypaw Productions, https://www.monkeypawproductions.com/productions/candyman

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

Event: Taboo Talks, Reproductive Justice

For the cultural event portion of this assignment, Maya and I attended the Plan B Taboo Talk on campus 11/9/21. The speakers were Westminster justice studies major Daud Mumin and reproductive activist Ashley Finley. The mission of the night was to explore the interconnection of reproductive issues and the world, especially from the lens of black women in America.

This event really made me think about my whiteness and the privilege that it has given me, even in cases where it seems like I am being oppressed for my gender. One of the moments that really stuck with me was when Finley expressed that the “my body, my choice” campaign is often exclusionary for women of color, and especially black women, in America. Finley made the point that while white women were marching to the capitol in pink pussy hats with signs bearing that slogan, they were doing nothing for the many black women whose body had never meant their choice to begin with. She connected this back to some of the earliest explorations into the female reproductive system which were performed on enslaved black women for the benefit of white women.

These were things that I had learned briefly in the past, but that I had not given myself the opportunity to think about or put action to. I was too young in 2016 to go out and march unattended, so I didn’t walk in that original women’s march, but I’m sure if I had, I would have been willingly blinded by my privilege and whiteness. I would have had a pink pussy hat on and probably wouldn’t have stopped to think any more about that decision and why it may not be supportive of all women. But tonight made me stop and think, and most importantly, it is going to make me change my behavior.

I know that most often the most powerful thing I can do to be an advocate and an ally is to be quite, to listen, and to amply voices of those whose lived experiences need to be heard far more than mine. But I want to help direct others like me who may have put their foot in their mouth a time or two to stop and think critically about who their actions are helping, but more importantly, who they might be hindering, or even hurting. I think the best way to do that is to collect resources to share which highlight the voices we too often don’t hear, and send others their way. I started tonight by following Finley on Instagram, where she posts many great resources and highlights ways to help out on a local level.

I feel awful that I didn’t see past the guise of the pink pussy hat in the past, but all I can do going forward is try to be better.

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

Racism in America and Candyman (2021)

Over the weekend, my boyfriend and I finally got around to renting Candyman (2021). It was a movie both of us had been looking forward to seeing for a long time, but poor college student life, it took us a minute to decide we were feeling rich enough to spend $20 to rent it. The story follows a new cast of characters  terrorized by the supernatural serial killer, Candyman, in the real-life neighborhood of Cabrini Green, Chicago, Illinois. But rather than a straight-forward and mindless slasher film, Candyman explores the very real problems of systemic racism in modern America.

The story follows an aspiring artist, Anthony McCoy (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) who comes across the legend of the Candyman and turns it into his newest artistic project, accidentally summoning the Candyman in the process. Of course, murderous rampage ensues, but more than that we get a look into the racism that Anthony is facing trying to make it in the Chicago art scene, and the racism that fuels the Candyman legend itself.

Early on, Anthony is presenting his new Candyman piece (entitled Say His Name, which in itself is a play on one of the slogans from the Black Lives Matter movement), and is met with snooty disregard by an art critic. She makes a comment something along the lines of it’s always your type that brings around these types of pieces, confronting forms of racism. When Anthony asks what she meant, the critic quickly covers by saying she meant artists. I originally pegged this as a microaggression, but thinking it over this was more of a macroaggression, because she meant for it to be harmful whereas microaggressions are often made with the best intentions. This critic was making a snide and racist comment to Anthony and disguising it as something else entirely to get away with it.

Another thing we notice at the art show is that even though it is taking place in the diverse city of Chicago, most all the featured artists and attendees are white. The characters briefly address this, but it is so briefly mentioned that it is almost something you’d miss if you weren’t paying attention. To me this felt like the film was addressing implicit bias, meaning instances in which BIPOC are treated differently because of their race/ethnicity. In the art scene depicted, white artists are more likely to be featured in the show (or given any opportunity) even though there are plenty of artists of color producing work. This is an all-too-real phenomenon in just about every field you could imagine, working it’s way into even the minds of healthcare professionals who are less likely to prescribe pain killers to BIPOC and educators who make assumptions that their students are less likely to succeed, and are then given less attention in the classroom.

Finally, I wanted to talk about the Candyman legend itself within the film. Anthony meets one of the last residents of the now gentrified Cabrini Green, a laundromat owner named William (Colman Domingo). William tells Anthony all about the legend of Candyman throughout the film, discussing how each time the Candyman has risen, he has been a different black male who was framed for a crime and murdered as a result of their blackness. This could be both an example of implicit bias and of systemic racism depending on the case, or sometimes even both. An example of both implicit bias and systemic racism in law enforcement is given when one Candyman is suspected of giving out candy with razorblades is beaten to death by the police force after a young boy sees him and screams. Another example of implicit bias is shown when a different Candyman (an adolescent) is accused by a white woman of assault, and is murdered because everyone believes her rather than him.

There is so much more to talk about with this film, but I think I’m going to have to save that for another post. In the meantime, the $20 totally ended up being worth it, so if you’ve got the time and the means, I’d highly recommend you cuddle up in a blanket with some popcorn and watch Candyman.

Image Credit: Universal Pictures, https://www.universalpictures.com/movies/candyman

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

What Happens When Cultures Collide: Spanglish (2004)

When I think of media references for multicultural psychology, Spanglish (2004) immediately comes to mind. The story follows a mother (Flor) and daughter (Cristina) who have moved from Mexico to California and what happens to their lives and relationship when Flor takes a job as a maid for a wealthy California family. One of the taglines for the movie is “the ultimate culture clash... family” so there is obviously a lot of content from this film that fits into what we have been talking about in class, but I want to focus on parenting styles.

There is a juxtaposition throughout the film between Flor and Deborah (the mother of the family Flor is working for) and how they parent their respective daughters, Cristina and Bernie. I would argue that neither character fits into just one parenting style, but I could probably pick a primary for each of them.

I would say Flor parents Cristina in an authoritative style most of the time, but Cristina often acts as if her mother is treating her in an authoritarian way. Flor often acts in a warm and nurturing manor towards Cristina, often bringing her cookies on her way home from work (before the pair move in with the Clasky’s). She is very protective of Cristina (she is very upset the first time a boy shows interest in her daughter), and has high expectations for Cristina in terms of education, as we see through the lens of which the story is told: Cristina’s college admissions essay.

Things get a little more complicated after Flor and Cristina move in with the Clasky’s. Flor’s protectiveness of her daughter causes her to become a little more authoritarian, especially when Deborah takes a liking to Cristina and begins stepping across a line, taking Cristina (and not her own daughter, Bernie) to the salon to dye colored streaks in their hair. Flor is very upset when they return and insists that they should leave with little explanation to Cristina. However, she is still emotionally responsive to her daughter. We see this again when Cristina makes hundreds of dollars from collecting sea glass for John Clasky (the dad in the family Flor is working for). When Flor finds the money, she says Cristina cannot accept it and gives it back to John, despite protest from both he and her daughter. The more authoritarian side of Flor comes to a peak when Deborah steps out of line once more, trying to get Cristina into the private school her daughter goes to without asking for Flor’s thoughts about this. Flor then again insists that she and her daughter are leaving, despite Cristina throwing a tantrum, and they head back to their own home. It is important to point out here that the reason Flor parents the way she does is, at least in her eyes, always so that she can give her daughter the best possible life.

I also wanted to quickly touch on Deborah’s parenting style with her own daughter, Bernie. Deborah is very upset about Bernie’s weight (she’s not even really overweight in my opinion, but that’s sort of beside the point). Because of this, Deborah is constantly trying to motivate Bernie to work out and lose a few pounds, but she does this in a way that is almost bullying. It’s obvious that she is more embarrassed of her daughter than she cares about her health. She tries to look like she’s working from a permissive parenting style, acting more like a (bad) friend than a mom to Bernie most of the time, but her actions are more authoritarian-- and not in a positive way at all. She has very high expectations for Bernie to lose weight and is not emotionally responsive to her daughter, often playing the victim when Bernie becomes (rightfully) upset. Things only become worse when Deborah takes a liking to the beautiful and thin Cristina, and tries parenting her rather than her own daughter.

I think this is a really interesting case study in multicultural parenting styles, not just because it’s easy to pinpoint a couple throughout the film, but also because it’s not entirely clear cut. Neither of the mothers in the film can be categorized as just one type of parenting style, and we can see that one parenting style isn’t always superior to the others. I think these are important ideas to apply to real life scenarios, and also to check ourselves when we immediately assume that our Western parenting styles are the “right” ones. It’s also a very entertaining film!

Image Credit: IMDB, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0371246/

[multiculturalpsychmnc]

Ethnocentrism and HBO’s The Sopranos

My mom and I, like most everyone has seemed to during COVID-19 quarantine, began watching (or re-watching in my mom’s case) the popular HBO series, The Sopranos (1999-2007). The show is a goldmine for cultural analysis, and I could honestly probably focus my entire blog around the antics of the fictional New Jersey crime family. However, there is one episode from early in the series that really sticks out to me as having the potential for digging in to important concepts in multicultural psychology.

In episode 2 of season 3, Meadow Soprano (Tony’s daughter) brings a college friend (Noah Tannenbaum) home to the Soprano residence to watch a movie. Tony interrupts the two and Meadow heads off to do something. Noah attempts to make conversation with Tony, and at one point mentions that he is half Black and half Jewish. This sets Tony off, and he begins making racist comments and pressing Noah about his ethnicity. Meadow returns, realizes what is going on, and her and Noah storm out.

Thinking back, this episode is a prime example of the dangers of ethnocentrism. Tony claims throughout the episode (and in a few subsequent episodes) that he is not racist, he just wants “the best” for his little girl. This quite literally gets to the heart of ethnocentrism, a psychological concept in which one believes their culture is superior (or the best) as compared to others. Tony also references his black and Jewish friends and colleagues and points out that Italians used to be discriminated against. Here Tony is trying to dodge allegations of the privilege he holds as a cishet, white male in America. Honestly, if you ask me, Tony’s behavior often even crosses the line from ethnocentrism into straight up racism, though he tries to be subtle/sneaky about his beliefs.

This episode also provides a lens of intersectionality for viewers when it comes Noah’s character. Noah is half black and half Jewish, and Tony picks on him not for just one of these identities, but for the conjunction of the two. While Noah is privileged in being a cishet, male student at Columbia coming from a wealthy background, he is still subject to systemic and social inequality within his intersectional identity.

I think the presence of these two concepts together provides a opportunity for the general public to get a good grasp on these multicultural concepts in a way that is easy to digest and maybe even relatable. Like I mentioned earlier, The Sopranos generally does a good job at tackling intense psychological subject matter, arguably before this was commonly done in popular television. I would definitely recommend giving it a watch, if you haven’t already.

Image Credit: HBO, https://www.hbo.com/the-sopranos