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Tokenism is the policy or practice of making a perfunctory gesture toward the inclusion of members of minority groups.^[1][2][3] This token effort is usually intended to create a false appearance of inclusiveness and deflect accusations of discrimination.^[3] Typical examples include purposely hiring a non-white person in a mainly white occupation or a woman in a traditionally male occupation. Classically, token characters have some reduced capacity compared to the other characters and may have bland or inoffensive personalities so as to not be accused of stereotypingnegative traits. Alternatively, their differences may be overemphasized or made "exotic" and glamorous.

Contents [hide] 1 Tokenism in the workplace 1.1 Gender 1.2 Race 2 Tokenism in fiction 3 Tokenism in politics 4 References

[edit]Tokenism in the workplace

In tokenism theory, first articulated by Rosabeth Moss Kanter in 1977, a token is a person who is part of a skewed or minority group, making up less than 15% of the total workplace population.^[4]She notes that the minority status of these tokens leads to several issues in the workplace.^[4] Tokens are subject to higher scrutiny from coworkers and superiors, and often have stereotypes attributed to them by the dominant group.^[4] Tokens also find their individuality compromised as they are viewed as representatives of their group.^[4] Kanter breaks these problems down into three terms: heightened visibility, assimilation, and exclusion.^[4]

Due to their numerical rarity and the resulting heightened visibility in the workplace, tokens often