Celtics Ancient One in Dr. Strange. Racist? Hence why I said "it can be though". To look at every choice as character as a decision made purely on race - unless that is the subject matter of the production - seems silly.
As for the casting someone asian as an ancient martial arts master ... well, yeah. Why wouldn't you considering that in asia there is an established and long held tradition in the martial arts? It does seem strange (excuse the pun) that they when for a woman, but it may just have been because she applied for the job, did a good job and so they hired her.
I would be surprised if they only asked white women to attend the casting. It could also have been that they didn't ask anyone else and someone enjoyed her work and had a vision for the movie?
So, no. It is not necessarily racist or sexist to cast someone for a role in a film.
there is no such thing as race — tim wood
Scientifically there isn't. Sadly old ideas have mostly died out but the terminology carried on. 'Race' is effectively a cultural phenomenon. In terms of genetics there are differences between broad groups but such differences go far beyond outward appearances.
Between ethic groups that have some slight genetic distinctions there is little difference compared to within the group - which automatically dismisses the idea of a humans being of scientifically distinct 'races'. This is actually important when it comes to diagnosing diseases and conditions more prevalent in some groups more than others, yet the stigma attached to this whole area makes people feel dread and fear.
Strangely enough on a science forum when I posted about scientists having to take a more proactive role in combatting misconceptions of 'race' due to faulty archaic pseudo science and a lack of spokespersons in this area they practically all announced that 'race' doesn't exist even though I pointed out that they have a boxes on forms where they ask people their race so it does have a place in society outside the scope of the hard sciences.
The social sciences are extremely flimsy and many core scientists (physicists and such) are not exactly sure it should even be called a 'science' (and in universities it isn't classed as a 'Science' it is under the category of 'Humanities and Arts').