How South Asian Americans came to dominate the Scripps Spelling Bee

• 10 of the 12 finalists in this year's Scripps National Spelling Bee, including winner Harini Logan, are of South Asian descent.
• Many South Asian families emphasize education and a love of learning.

On June 2, a dozen elementary and middle school students from across America stepped on stage in a bid to win the prestigious Scripps National Spelling Bee.

Since the first competition in 1925, the Spelling Bee has become more than just an academic showdown. It has become a national phenomenon, televised the same way a sports broadcast would—for years on ESPN, now, on ION. The Bee has also become a showcase of the country's diversity, reflected in both its words and its winners.

Like many before her, this year's winner, Harini Logan, is of South Asian descent.

From 2008 to 2019, a South Asian American was named a champion at every National Spelling Bee. Seven of the eight co-champions in 2019 were Indian American, bringing the total number of Indian American champions since 1999 to 26. That streak was broken last year when Zaila Avant-Garde became the first Black American to win the title.

In 1985, Balu Natarajan became the first Indian American to win the Spelling Bee. His first competition was actually two years prior, where there were 137 spellers. Six of them, including Natarajan, were Indian American.

This year, ten out of the 12 finalists are South Asian American.

"The diversity seen at Scripps for the last many years has been truly remarkable," Natarajan said.

Many immigrant families place a high value on education.

For many South Asian American children, preparing for and participating in the Spelling Bee begins in early childhood.

"Spelling and grammar were stressed in my home as I grew up, particularly by my mother. She advocated for strong English language skills because of her respect for her uncle, who was a language professor in India," Natarajan told Insider.

Natarajan said the Bee was a "total team effort" and brought his family together. His mother was his main coach, and his father quizzed him and found word lists—a feat that was much more difficult in the pre-Internet era.

Many Bee winners are the children of highly-skilled immigrant parents who put a high value on education and foster a love of words and language, which underlie the significance of academic activities like spelling bees among immigrant communities, according to Shalini Shankar, an associate professor of anthropology and Asian American studies at Northwestern University.

Over the past two decades, there's been a growing ecosystem surrounding spelling bees. There are spelling bees tailored to South Asian children, and spelling bee coaching companies founded by South Asian Americans. The North South Foundation helps Indian American students prepare for academic competitions, including spelling bees.

The proliferation of bees within South Asian communities means more children are naturally exposed to these competitions. Nihar Janga, who became the youngest-ever champion when he won the 2016 National Spelling Bee at 11 years old, first got hooked after he saw his older sister prepare for the school spelling bee.

"Sibling rivalry kicked in," Janga said, adding that studying for the bee opened up a path to learning more about different cultures, including his own.

The model minority myth and the importance of representation.

Beyond personal pride and success, the victories scored by young South Asian spellers is also the victory of the larger community they've come to represent.

"The Bee is a prestige activity, in that it is a highly visible marker of educational achievement and familial accomplishment," Shankar said. "It takes a community effort to get these kids to the Bee, and those who have participated know how difficult and time intensive it is to do so. This knowledge makes their successes especially meaningful."

Young spelling bee champions also said they find pride in having proven themselves in academic success, especially as minorities.

"There's a large, predominantly Asian population in math camps, Olympiads, and I think it's to prove what we're good at to the larger community," Janga said.

Some scholars have pointed to the harmful effects of casting South Asian spelling bee winners as overrepresented and as model minorities—including dangerous narratives that South Asian winners are winning unjustly, and suggesting that they're not actually American.

But spellers like Janga said that they see winning academic competitions—and the visibility that comes with it—as a pathway to greater inclusion.

"We want to be more represented in the workforce, the media, and sports, and this is our way of proving how we can be represented and heard—even if it's stereotypical. That's the way our voices are heard," he said.