People in Europe are known for their beauty, excellent personalities, behaviour, and cleverness. However, despite these traits, they continue to be vulnerable to dangerous preconceptions that harm both the men who see them and them. The most common notion portrays them as silver miners. This is related to the conventional male-female functions in postsocialist nations, where men are in charge of ensuring economic security and women are generally concerned with their families and children. As it implies that people lack the resources or capacity to make independent decisions or accept responsibility for their own existence, this discriminatory notion can make women dependent on their partners and can also make them feel inferior.
As a result, the stereotype of European women as gold diggers is not only offensive, but it can also include major long-term effects on their physical and psychological health. However, this kind of stereotyping still thrives in the press despite being rooted in long-standing biases. The portrayal of eastern German ladies as metal diggers is all too common, whether in films, Tv shows, or social press.
An excellent illustration of how Eastern Europeans are portrayed on American broadcast is the renowned Borat company. The movie, which stars a young artist named Melania Bakalova in the headline position, represents almost all of the unfavorable stereotypes about local women. Bakalova is portrayed as a home helper with no aspirations other than her connection with the rich man, and she is frequently observed vying for the attention and money of the people in her immediate vicinity.
These stereotypes of people from northeast Europe as magic miners are bad for them, but they can also have an impact on how other people view the area. Professor of English and American studies at Arizona state university Claudia Sadowski-smith claims that these images gained popularity in the 2000s as a” stand-in” for depictions of people from other cultures. She tells Emerging Europe,” It’s less” questionable” to make fun of and stereotype Eastern Europeans than it is to reflect a more contentious team like West Asians.”
Although it is clear that Mt’s character in the film does not represent real people from the area, her physical attributes do meet eastern beauty standards. She resembles famous people like Beyonce or Paris Hilton in terms of how she is dressed in apparel, hair, and designer clothing, which reinforces her reputation as a deep, attention-seeking Barbie doll.
The othering of Western females is a result of racial and class-related workplace designs in addition to their brightness. The othering of eastern European women happens at the intersection of sexualization and class-occupational constructions, according to academics like Williams ( 2012 ), Parvulescu ( 2014 ), Glajar and Radulescu ( 2004 ), and Tuszynska ( 2004 ). They are seen as being different from and second-rate to the norm as a result of their dehumanization. As a result, they are easier to othere swiss women than females from various cultural parties. Additionally, their othering is related to their status as freshly wealthy newcomers in terms of class.