https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/26/nyregion/richard-carranza-nyc-schools.html
According to today’s NY Times article about NYC’s public school system:
“In June 2018, the mayor and chancellor announced a plan to get rid of the selective admissions exam that dictates entry into the city’s elite high schools, including Stuyvesant High School and The Bronx High School of Science."
"Black and Latino students are extremely underrepresented in those schools, and low-income Asian-American children are overrepresented.”
1: highly injurious or destructive : DEADLY; 2 archaic : WICKED (m-w.com)
having a harmful effect, especially in a gradual or subtle way (Google, from Oxford Dictionaries)
“UNDERREPRESENTED”
inadequately represented (m-w.com)
"OVERREPRESENTED"
represented excessively especially : having representatives in proportion higher than the average (m-w.com)
Notice that the words “underrepresented” and “overrepresented” are far from neutral, non-judgmental terms. According to Merriam-Webster, “underrepresented” means “inadequately represented,” as in: THERE OUGHT TO BE MORE OF THEM! AN INJUSTICE HAS BEEN DONE! And “overrepresented” means “represented excessively.” THERE ARE TOO DAMN MANY OF THEM! AN INJUSTICE HAS BEEN DONE!
By using either term, one is implying – whether one wishes to or not – that something somewhere is wrong. The idea built into these words is that representation in any team, group, school, occupation, or set of award-winners ought to reflect percentages in the general population. Otherwise, a group is either underrepresented, i.e., “inadequately represented” or it is overrepresented, i.e., “represented excessively.”
According to one website, 22% of all Nobel Prize winners between 1901 and 2020 were Jews, and 36% of all U.S. recipients were Jews.(http://www.jinfo.org/Nobel_Prizes.html)
Clearly, Jews are OVERREPRESENTED among Nobel Prize winners!
Therefore, we must correct this “inequity”! Or, alternatively, we could investigate why so many Jews have earned these awards, just as we can investigate why there are so many Asian-American children who have earned their entrance into NYC's elite high schools. Perhaps, in the culture or community of Jews and of Asian-Americans, we can identify some rational basis for these groups' success that is transferrable to other ethnic, racial, or religious groups.
It's time to re-think our usage of "over" and "under" represented.