Chapter 11 – Beauty

Chapter Summary

What do you think of as “beautiful” or “attractive” in a person? Our ideas of physical attraction feel deeply personal and have powerful implications for our self-worth and relationship to our bodies. While people often say that beauty is in the “eye of the beholder”, sociology can show us how beauty ideals are not simply individual preferences but are social constructions. In this chapter, we look critically at beauty ideals through the lens of intersectionality—a sociological perspective that examines how various systems of inequality work together. We examine how beauty is both an ideology and an industry. As an ideology, physical appearance ideals can obscure inequalities relating to gender, race, class and body size. As an industry, beauty is implicated in the drive to sell more products, as well as a sense of body dissatisfaction—a culture of “lack”—that motivates us to keep shopping.

Giselinde Kuipers explores the increasing importance of physical appearance in contemporary life. The article argues that since the late 19th century, historical developments including visual and consumer culture, democratization, the service economy, and new media have elevated the social significance of beauty, embedding it into evaluations of personal and moral worth. Kuipers argues that these historical transformations have contributed to a self-reinforcing cycle of rising appearance standards: increasing access to beauty practices continually raises societal expectations and intensifies pressures to meet elusive, ever-evolving ideals. Although beauty products and practices–once reserved for elites–are increasingly accessible, this “democratization” of beauty also generates new inequalities as beauty becomes a resource that disproportionately benefits those with the means to cultivate it.

Discussion questions

How does Kuipers define the “beauty regime,” and how has it evolved over time? What key historical developments have contributed to the increasing importance of beauty in social life?
How has the expansion of the service economy intensified the need to “look good”? What kinds of occupations face the highest demands for appearance?
How do fashion and beauty trends in consumer culture create pressures for individuals to continually invest in their appearance?
In what ways does expanded access to beauty resources simultaneously create new forms of exclusion and inequality?
How has the rise of social media affected the way beauty is defined, practiced, and evaluated in contemporary societies?

Hunter, Margaret. 2021. “Colorism and the Racial Politics of Beauty.” In Maxine L. Craig (ed.), The Routledge Companion to Beauty Politics, 1st ed., 85–93. Routledge.

This short chapter examines the origins of hegemonic beauty standards, which prioritize lighter skin tones, in systems of colorism and racism. It argues that colorism operates as a subsystem of structural racism, conferring unearned privileges to those with lighter skin while embedding inequalities into institutions like education, employment, and the justice system. Drawing on the concept of “racial capital,” the author explains how physical traits associated with whiteness translate into social and economic advantages, often pursued through practices such as skin bleaching and cosmetic surgery. By framing these practices as responses to and negotiations of systemic discrimination rather than acts of self-hate, the text calls for a nuanced understanding of racism as enabled, perpetuated, and potentially contested by everyday beauty practices.

Discussion questions

How do global beauty standards reflect and reinforce inequalities of race? What is the role of colorism in shaping these dynamics?
What is the concept of “racial capital,” and how does it explain the social and economic advantages associated with lighter skin tones?
How do racist beauty standards impact women of color compared to men of color?
What strategies might individuals and communities use to resist colorism and challenge the hegemony of Eurocentric beauty standards?

Kang, Miliann. 2003. “The Managed Hand: The Commercialization of Bodies and Emotions in Korean Immigrant–Owned Nail Salons.” Gender & Society 17(6): 820-839.

Miliann Kang’s ethnographic study explores how gendered, racialized, and classed dynamics shape the provision of body labor—a combination of physical and emotional work–in the context of Korean immigrant-owned nail salons. Through an intersectional lens, the study identifies three patterns of body labor shaped by race, gender, and class: high-service (for white middle-class clients), expressive (for Black working-class clients), and routinized labor (for racially mixed lower-middle-class clients). Kang argues that these practices reflect broader inequalities, as nail salon workers adapt their services to clients’ social locations. Ultimately, the ethnographic analysis highlights how gendered service work both reproduces and provides opportunities to contest existing social hierarchies.

Discussion questions

How does Kang’s concept of “body labor” expand on Hochschild’s idea of emotional labor? In what ways does the maintenance of beauty standards rely on the labor of marginalized others?
What are the defining characteristics of high-service, expressive, and routinized body labor? How do these patterns reflect the socioeconomic and racial composition of the clientele?
How do the differing expectations of clients reflect socially situated (classed and racialized) norms about femininity, beauty, and respect? How do these expectations affect the workers’ experiences at work?
In what ways does the body work performed in nail salons create opportunities to challenge racial, gender, and class inequalities?

Active Learning – Further Online Resources

The darkest shades:

Watch beauty influencers Nyma Tang and Jackie Aina review the “darkest shades” offered by major make-up brands in the US. What do these offerings say about the social construction of beauty ideals? How have influencers like Tang and Aina challenged hegemonic ideas around beauty and blackness? Do influencers reinforce the idea that beauty is (and must be) achieved through consumer goods and services?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOaVDa26bH8

Critiquing White beauty standards:

Watch this short video from the YouTube channel Chaos+Comrades, in which men and women of color discuss the impact that White beauty standards have had on them. What are some specific examples of White beauty standards provided in the video? How does the video define colorism, and why is this concept important for understanding racialized beauty ideals? How did these standards affect the men and women in the video? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wY8W9dvSCTQ

Men and Makeup:

Watch this TikTok skit by Johnny Ross exploring what happens when “straight men shop at Sephora”. https://www.tiktok.com/@mrjohnnyross/video/7148105733136157998 What does this video reveal about the relationship between masculinity, sexuality, and makeup? Do male content creators play a role in challenging or reinforcing hegemonic notions of masculinity?

Beauty and AI:

In 2024, Dove released an advertising campaign calling attention to the ways that AI-generated content may reproduce unattainable beauty standards. One ad, titled “The Code,” simultaneously introduces this issue and positions itself as the solution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD-R2OzcleQ

20 years after the launch of Dove’s campaign for Real Beauty, we are now in a position to evaluate its social and political implications. How does Dove’s emphasis on women’s empowerment commodify resistance into a marketable consumer product?

Fashion’s narrow reach:

Read this New York Times investigation of racial inequality in the fashion industry: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/04/style/Black-representation-fashion.html How does the article explain existing racial and gender inequality in the fashion industry? Where have efforts to diversify the fashion industry been most and least successful (e.g., on runways, magazine covers, or in boardrooms), and why?

Flashcards

Refresh your knowledge of key terms with this chapter’s flashcards.

Social constructionism

A perspective that questions whether many taken-for-granted features of our social world are natural or inherent; suggests that individuals, groups, cultures, and organizations are shaped by social processes that vary over time and across contexts

Stigma

Shame or dishonor brought on a group or individual in a particular social relationship on the basis of real or perceived traits

Body work

The actions people take to manipulate and manage their body, sometimes outsourced to paid workers, to live up to a variety of cultural norms, expectations, and standards. Body work practices and expectations are linked to social inequalities, and are socially and historically variable.

Thomas theorem

The idea, named after sociologists Dorothy and W.I. Thomas, that an individual’s behavior is influenced by their subjective perceptions of reality, and these that perceptions have real consequences regardless of the actual situation.

Social location

An individual’s position within various overlapping social groups, such as gender, age, race, class, sexuality, religion, and language

Sexism

A belief system (backed up by patriarchy) that privileges masculinity (and boys/men) and disadvantages femininity (and girls/women)

Racism

The hierarchical ranking and differential treatment of racialized groups of people; goes beyond individual prejudice and is backed by institutional power and authority.

Ideology

A set of beliefs, opinions, images, and attitudes that form a loose set of related ideas. In Marxist theory, the term is used to describe ideas that are in some sense distorted, false, and disguise an underlying inequality or exploitation (e.g. sexist ideologies)

Hegemony

Antonio Gramsci’s term for ideas that reinforce relationships of domination and exploitation. These ideas are naturalized as they become embedded in common sense.

Intersectionality

A sociological perspective that calls attention to how multiple aspects of our identity and social location simultaneously shape our experience of privilege and disadvantage. An intersectional perspective explores how systems of inequality (like sexism and racism) operate in and through one another, rather than in isolation.

Stereotypes

A narrow, oversimplified portrayal of a particular social group

Heteronormativity

The belief that there are two distinct genders with complementary characteristics, whose members are naturally and exclusively sexually attracted to one another

Culture of (bodily) lack

The idea that the societal focus on how we fall short of appearance ideals results in the need to do more–and buy more–to approximate those ideals (Dworkin and Wachs 2009)

Fashion cycle

The period beginning with the introduction of a new fashion, continuing with the rise and then peak in popularity of the fashion, followed by the decline and disuse of the fashion. Described by Georg Simmel as a "trickle-down" process from elites to the masses.

Lifestyle

An individual or group’s usual way of living/navigating their circumstances, often expressed through attitudes, work, family, leisure behaviours, aesthetic tastes, and consumption choices

"Trickle-down" process (of fashion/taste)

The process in which elites initiate a fashion trend but must find something new to distinguish themselves when the trend is copied by the masses (associated with theorists like Georg Simmel and Thorstein Veblen)

"Trickle-up" process (of fashion/taste)

The process in which lower-status groups and subcultures initiate trends that migrate into the consumption patterns of elites (e.g., hip-hop)

Chapter Summary
Further Reading
Quizzes
- Quiz
Active Learning – Further Online Resources
Flashcards

Chapter 11 – Beauty

Chapter Summary

Further Reading

Quizzes

Quiz

Active Learning – Further Online Resources

Flashcards