The person I interview is FDG, a 23 year-old female college student with a Motion Picture/Movie Production at the Academy of Art in San Francisco. FDG was born and raised in Jakarta, Indonesia. Her father is Indonesian and her mother is from Turkmenistan (formerly part of the Soviet Union). Her father comes from a very religious (Moslem) family in Sumatra and it was quite a horror to his family when he decided to marry a foreign Jewish girl (her mother then converted to Islam when FDG was 7 years old). FDG comes from a very comfortable economic background, both her parents are chemical engineers. FDG said that she grew up in a very sheltered environment where almost every she needed were provided for.

As a child of a mixed raced couple, FDG becomes a member of the minority group in the country she was living in where most couples come from similar economic, religious, and ethnic backgrounds. FDG now acknowledges that during her childhood and adolescence she had encountered and experienced stereotyping and prejudice.

Because Russian is her first language, in kindergarten she was teased by her friends for not being able to speak Indonesian fluently and looking different than the others. “I’ve always hated my blonde hair,” says FDG, “one time a friend accused me of being an albino Indonesian… I guess he couldn’t accept the fact that I had a Russian mother with blonde her too!” In the 4th grade she got into a fight and punched a classmate after he yelled, “Go back to where you belong… you Russian terrorist!” FDG remarks that looking back at her experiences she is still surprised that even at an early stage of a child’s life, her peers had already absorbed so many stereotypes and prejudice thought of other people that are not necessarily true. FDG admits that it was a very sad and confusing period of her life because she has always considered herself to be 100% Indonesian. Although she speaks Russian and looks more like a Caucasian rather than an Asian girl, she has never visited the country nor does she know anything about its culture. FDG tells that she made an unconscious decision to separate herself from her mother’s heritage due to the mocking she hears from her friends about her mother’s culture. It is also due to the lack of knowledge and information that leads her to unwillingly buy into all the negative comments. Moreover, FDG mentions that her mother has never made an effort to introduce or familiarize FDG about her Russian ancestry. FDG was very confused and literally did not know where she belonged. She had lived all of her life in Indonesia and was only taught about the traditional Indonesian values only, not Russian. The only culture (Indonesian) she knew about and considered to be a part of turned out to reject her. And on the other hand people expect her to belong to a foreign culture that she did not know anything about. Thus, FDG at first presumed that she is a part of the ingroup whereas others perceived her as an outgroup member. As a result, growing up FDG rarely had close native Indonesian friends at school and instead she made friends with other mixed-race children and children of expatriates in Indonesia.

In the interview FDG talked a lot about the role that her parents have played in her life, especially her mother, in helping her to adjust and cope to the environment that can be harsh sometimes, especially while she was growing up. According to FDG since her father was always away for his work most of the time, her mother has a greater role in her life. Growing up, FDG always had her mother on her side to guide and support her. By listening to FDG, it was obvious that her behavior, attitude and views of life are greatly influenced by her mother’s thoughts and feelings.

FDG agrees with Bruner (1957) that social categorization or stereotyping is an inescapable feature of human existence. Bruner suggested that by assigning individuals based on their similarities and differences, we could deal with them much more efficiently. FDG argues that at times social categorization or stereotyping is helpful, in terms of making social decisions.

FDG parents did not restrict her from choosing her friends nor did they teach her to be prejudiced. However, there are a few exceptions, a set of rules, that she had to obey when it comes to selecting a boyfriend. Ironically, the most important thing that her parents instilled in her is the fact that she is forbidden to date people outside of her race. Moreover, she can only go out with a Moslem boy who is preferably did not come from a broken family (his parents are not separated or divorced). By setting up such rules, FDG feels that her parents are being some kind of hypocrites, especially for restricting her with so many rules while she knows they have also broken by marrying a person with a different religion and from a different race. With this FDG feels that her parents have helped shape her to be a person with a negative attitude or prejudice towards others from different religious, social or ethic background. Almost instantaneously after making this comment, FDG comes into her parents defend by saying that although sometimes her parents may seem to be too overpowering and strict she believes that they only means well.

Funnily enough FDG tells me that she has a special philosophy that some rules are created to be broken. She claims to be a rebel and probably has tried to do what her parents forbid her from doing. When I ask her if she has ever violated the dating rules set up by her parents, FDG replies that she has but often she does it just to spite her parents.

Throughout the interview I sense some hesitation from FDG in terms of giving her views concerning prejudice. As the interview went on, FDG tells me that as a result of the current ethnic disputes (between the native Indonesians and Chinese Indonesians), stereotyping and prejudice are two very sensitive issues in her country now. Also after going through such a horrible abuse of prejudice in her childhood, the issue really hits close to home. FDG argues that most native Indonesians think of themselves as better individuals than the ethnic Chinese people, just because they were born as native Indonesian. FDG concludes that the view of the ethnic Chinese to be greedy, not humble, steal from the native Indonesian’s businesses, and oppressive. By making this comment it can be presumed that FDG has also bought into the general stereotype that Indonesians have regarding Chinese people. When asked why she thinks of them that way, she cannot tell me the reasons why (Ingroup Bias). All she says, “that is just the way they are and what Indonesian kids are told when they are little.”

From all of the traumatic experience that FDG have had to endure, she said that the act of putting people into groups because they share common interests or value as well as prejudice have still somehow manage to enter her mind. Even if she was discriminated against because of her mixed heritage, FDG knows that she is not as unfortunate as being categorized in the Chinese group. FDG knows what it feels like to be prejudiced against, without realizing it she still cannot help from being a prejudiced person herself towards certain members of one group (Chinese Indonesians). Like many of other native Indonesians, she also has adopted some prejudiced views against Chinese Indonesians. When I ask FDG if she realizes that she is treating this particular group with the same stereotypes and prejudices that she was treated with while she was living in Indonesia, she says yes. FDG said that she acknowledges it but later on comments that she cannot help but be influenced by the perception of the majority.

Although FDG may always encounter prejudices and stereotypes in the future, she now know that it is important to get to know a person based on their intelligence and not by their ethnic backgrounds. Now that she is living in a more “international” environment such as San Francisco, I think FDG is now able to broaden her perception towards prejudices and stereotypes and hopefully she will finally come to terms with her own diverse heritage and not have negative perceptions regarding others that are different from herself.