Korean Women, Part 3 (final): A Caucasian Ideal?
( Source: sam samantha)
1. Introduction
Back in the second part of Part Two, I discuss the phenomenon of so many Korean women using whitening make-up, usually to excess and in situations where it is completely inappropriate, like on the treadmill at the gym. It’s easy to sound like I’m exaggerating when I describe how much it is used in Korea, but in fact Korean women’s desire for light skin is so strong that, by the time they reach menopause, they have serious vitamin D deficiencies (actually the worst in the world). Apparently, that’s what three decades of not being able to even cross a sunny street without covering your face does to women.
It sounds inconvenient and unhealthy and, based on what I discuss about the socio-biology of cosmetics in Part Two, anti-instinctive too. Clearly, there must be some strong cultural pressures towards and/or advantages to light skin for Korean women that outweigh these disadvantages. In the comments to that last post, Gord Sellar and Skinny Steve argue that the primary explanation is the historical association of light skins with sedentary, indoor elites, and while I agree that that certainly plays a role, it can’t explain why the practice is so widespread across Northeast Asian countries in particular, nor why the vast majority of the “ideal”, light-skinned Northeast Asian women in those countries’ medias have undergone such a plethora of cosmetic surgery operations also. I’ll respond to their comments in detail in the third section of this post.
( Source: ~Dezz~)
Meanwhile, the most notable of those operations is “double-eyelid” surgery, which I variously hear that 60-80% of Korean women have received by their mid-20s, and both argue that the practice either predates contact with Westerners and/or is not reflective of a Korean desire to look Caucasian. Personally, I think it’s too much of a coincidence that the most sought after cosmetic surgery operation by Korean women is for a bodily feature found naturally in much greater numbers amongst Caucasians. By itself it could be coincidence, certainly, but combined with: the skin-whitening as explained; the decades of articles in Korean women’s magazines extorting readers to turn their “incorrect” and “flawed” Korean bodies into Caucasian ideal shapes and forms (which I’ll explain momentarily); and finally the numbers of Caucasians in Korean advertisements, (which I’ll cover in section four), then naturally I do think that the primary purpose of whitening make-up and cosmetic surgery by Korean women is indeed for the specific purpose of making them look more Caucasian. As least in 2008.
2. Sources
( Source: Scoubi)
To be fair to Gord and Steve, so far I’ve never mentioned on the blog the fact that, say, Korean women’s magazines do explicitly say that the Korean body is flawed and Caucasian bodies the ideal. There’s very little on the subject in English, especially on Korea (in fact the 2006 article I discuss in the fourth section is the first of its kind), and unless you’re fluent in Korean and are an avid reader of women’s magazines yourself then the only real way of knowing this would be to read the journal articles that I have. I’m not saying that having read them makes me smarter than readers, or that the journal articles themselves aren’t open to interpretation, but…well, that’s what they say, and they do appear to fatally undermine arguments against the links I make between cosmetic surgery, skin-whitening, and a desire to look Caucasian.
Let me (belatedly) provide an example:
The article presents what it considers to be particular features of Korean women – short legs, big face, yellow skin – as problem features that can be corrected by certain types of clothing and colours: ‘For Korean women the best look is the formal tailored suit with padded shoulders. This square shaped suit helps make big faces look smaller and puts the entire body in order’ (italics added). [The author] implies that the imperfect Korean body is disordered but can be put back in order through the tricks of fashion. The body is something to be rearranged so its apparent flaws are concealed or eliminated. These flaws themselves stand out as imperfections because they are features peculiar to Koreans and absent in white models.
That was from page 104 of the 2003 journal article “Neo-Confucian Body Techniques: Women’s Bodies in Korea’s Consumer Society” by Taeyeon Kim (details and abstract here), which was the basis for these posts that I started last month. Since finishing those, I’ve read very similar descriptions of articles in Japanese, Taiwanese and Singaporean women’s magazines too, and because women in those countries also desire light skins and share “Eurasian” ideals of women’s bodies, then I think that basing, say, modern ideals of Japanese women’s skin colours and body forms the white-face painting of geisha is useful and necessary, in a parallel of what commentators said about Korea, but neither the Japanese or Korean hostorical specifics can explain why those ideals are so common to the region.
( Korean actor Jeon Ji-hyun (전지현). Source: wongtai231 )
What does link the region then? Let me adapt the remainder of Taeyeon Kim’s paragraph above, by replacing “Korean” with “East Asian”:
All three elements, the Neo-Confucian woman’s subjectlessness, the perception of East Asian bodies as imperfect, and fashion’s function to re-order the disordered East Asian bodies, make East Asian women’s bodies particularly prone to alterations, rearrangements, and re-creations of the body.
In simple terms, these elements provided a base upon which individual countries’ own culture and histories of the use of cosmetics and so forth built upon. They were important, but I do seriously doubt that those East Asian populations with the means to afford cosmetic surgery operations would have done so quite so readily and in such large numbers without a shared philosophical framework that gave such leeway and encouragement for women to do so.
( Source: c0nn0r )
That’s the gist of what my theory, anyway, which I’m in the process of researching and fleshing-out, like I discuss here. But for the remainder of this post, first I’ll address points Gord and Steve raised in much more detail, and after that I’ll discuss the phenomenon of large numbers of Caucasians in Korean advertisements.
3. Response to Comments
Sorry in advance if my chopping and pasting and combining of comments maybe (inadvertently) misrepresents commentators’ arguments; I encourage readers to click on the links to their names and read their comments in full before moving on. Also, much of what I’m quoting below I’ve already responded to earlier (they’re the detritus of many rewrites of this post, sorry), so here I’ll try to concentrate on things I haven’t mentioned already.
Here goes then:
In Part Two, Steve said:
In regards to Korean women trying to whiten their skin in order to look more Caucasian, I used to agree, but as I’ve learned more about Korean history and culture, as well as seeing traditional dance performances, I’ve come to conclude that Korean women have been painting their faces ghostly white for a long, long, time because it makes them look more upper-class in the sense that they’re not out working the fields in the hot sun.
And Gord said:
I also would take issue with the idea that Korean women are (at least consciously) trying to look white. After all, as far as I can tell the double-eyelid obsession was in place BEFORE they met us folk, since some percentage of Koreans are born with it naturally (like my fiancée, for one). Paleness, again, would be a sign of domesticity, and thereby a sign of higher status. (And anyway, there’s lots of anecdotal evidence that even in very remote, non-Westernized societies, there are preferences for paler members of the group…my mom has observed it in many groups living in the bush in Malawi, for example.)
I readily agree that Koreans have historically associated lighter skin with stuck-indoors-all-day elites, and that it may well be a universal phenomenon; I first read of it myself while studying Medieval history when I was fourteen, and if you’re interested you can read a specific chronology here of how tanning in turn became a signifier of the leisured (Caucasian) classes, starting in the early 20th Century. But while it’s difficult to empirically quantify, things like Korean women’s vitamin D deficiencies do point to specifically Koreans (and East Asians) desiring lighter skins to a surprising degree, and I don’t think these historical associations are a sufficient explanation.
I’m very surprised to hear about Koreans being obsessed with double-eyelids before meeting Westerners, especially before modern cosmetic surgery allowed Koreans to get them for themselves (I’ll return to this point in a moment). I’d be the last person to doubt the veracity of anything Gord said, but I’d be very grateful if he or anyone else could point me in the direction of sources on that; after all, if all goes well, I’ll be presenting a paper on it in Fukuoka in September!
(Source: bowtie614)
Steve continued:
Nowadays, though, I think that it may be playing a part (like, 30-40%), but I still don’t think attempting to look Caucasian is the motivation. I think a Korean woman might say “I buy face whitening cream to look more beautiful” but highly doubt she’d say, “I buy face whitening cream to look like a white woman.” You still don’t see that many Korean women with dyed blond hair walking around, after all.
Like Gord mentions earlier, I’ve never said that Korean women consciously want to look Caucasian (although I still think that some surely do). Arguing that they do reminds me of the British stand-up comedian Ben Elton making a joke about women thinking about making their faces resemble their aroused vaginas as they put on lipstick in the morning (God, considering he said that in 1985, no wonder he got the reputation that he did!); that they don’t doesn’t mean that it is not ultimately a factor in the origins of the cultural habit, just like I won’t think about the universal desire for humans to distinguish ourselves from other animals when I shave tomorrow morning, or that my tie is actually a phallic symbol when I get dressed after that. Well, actually I will now, in a pink elephants fashion, but you get the idea.
What do they consciously say are their motivations then? Well, Gord says:
I’d say Korean women, at least younger ones, are trying more to look like Hyori or Jeon Ji Hyun or some other icon of Korean femininity than, say, Julia Roberts.
As this old post of Robert Koehler’s demonstrates, that’s certainly true. Steve also says:
As far as the double-eyelid surgery is concerned though, I think if anything that trend has come about from Koreans’ own desire to conform. I read somewhere (actually, I think it was an MTV documentary by Soojin Pak, but I can’t remember the title) that a certain percentage of Asians naturally have the double eyelid, so it’s not as if the feature is alien to Korea/Asia. What they see, though, is all the rich and famous people in the world sporting the double eyelids, combined with the Koreans that already have it, and now the double eyelid is considered trendy and beautiful. Again, it doesn’t strike me as overtly trying to look like a Caucasian person. It seems like Koreans are fascinated with big eyes as well, a feature that tends to creep me out more than anything, and I suspect the double-eyelid surgery may haveus much to do with giving an appearance of having bigger eyes than anything else.
( Source: PopSeoul! )
But I think the point that average Korean women are whitening their skins and undergoing cosmetic surgery because they want to look like rich and famous Korean women is, to be blunt, irrelevant: it merely changes the focus of our attention, but doesn’t answer the question of why rich and famous Korean women (rather than average Korean women) are doing so. And returning to the point about double-eyelids, I confess that when I first read Gord’s comment that Koreans were obsessed with them before Western contact, personally I doubted it very much. And were it to be true (and for sure, it might be), I still find it too much of a coincidence that that particular body feature, which Caucasians just so happen to naturally have in far greater numbers than East Asians, has become virtually a mandatory requirement for young Korean women.
(Update: Sorry, I just realized that I forgot to respond to Steve’s point about Koreans’ fascination with big eyes. But personally, I don’t think that that fascination is exclusively Korean or even East Asian for that matter. And while I’ll readily admit that big eyes are certainly, say, a prominent feature of manhwa (만화) or manga for instance, that is more to make especially female characters look more youthful rather than a fascination with big eyes per se )
Steve also says:
So, yes, it LOOKS like Korean women are trying to look Caucasian, but that doesn’t mean that’s the real motivation, and I haven’t seen any evidence to really suggest that Korean women are running around trying to meet a beauty standard intended for the whole purpose of appearing like the very Caucasians Korea is continuously trying to keep at arm’s length.
( “Swede Revenge” by cheese bikini)
That last point is very eloquent, and is a good, pithy way to round off a university paper or a newspaper article, let alone a comment in a humble blog. Unfortunately, it’s also completely wrong. It doesn’t take academic study of Korea and/or of Anti-Americanism in Korea and abroad to know that public displays of antipathy towards America and/or Caucasians and/or Foreigners usually go hand in hand with fascination, jealousy, and extensive trade and cultural links, and the stark differences in the way Caucasian and non-Caucasian foreigners in Korea are treated is evidence enough that Koreans don’t want to keep Caucasians “at arm’s length.” When non-Koreans are negatively-portrayed and scapegoated by the Korean media – and I’ll be the first to admit that that happens entirely too often – invariably it’s for domestic political purposes and/or to deflect attention from Korean society’s own flaws.
Finally, Gord says:
There’s no shortage of students who are happy to suggest that contemporary images of Korean femininity are *fueled* by Western icons of “beauty,” but I think it’s worth throwing in a grain of salt, since many of the same students who are talking about this now, were one semester ago regurgitating rather distorted versions of Edward Said’s Orientalism. *shrug*
For sure, and that’s something to bear in mind when reading the next section.
4. Images of Caucasians in Korean Women’s Magazines
Because this post is already rather long, I’ll do little more then outline the conclusions Minjeong Kim and Sharron Lennon come to in their article ”Content Analysis of Diet Advertisements: A Cross-National Comparison of Korean and U.S. Women’s Magazines” (Clothing and Textiles Research Journal, October 2006), and readers can form their own opinions from those.
Because of a lack of prior research (pretty typical for Korean Studies) they write that null hypotheses were developed:
Hypothesis 1: There will be no difference in the percentage of diet advertisements in Korean and U.S. Women’s magazines.
Hypothesis 2: There will be no difference in the percentage of female model’s ethnicity in Korean and U.S. Women’s magazines.
The two Korean magazines they used were Women Sense/우먼센스 and Jubu Life/주부생활, and the two U.S. magazines were Red Book and Good Housekeeping. You can read details of the hypotheses and methods of the samples from pp. 351-353, and details of the results from pp. 353-359.
( Source )
Hypothesis 1 isn’t relevant to this post, but it is to Parts One and Two, and is still very interesting.
In a nutshell, Kim and Lennon found that the hypothesis was false, and the percentage of diet ads in Korean women’s magazines was significantly higher than the percentage in U.S. women’s magazines (11.8% to 3.5%), and also that they tended to promote passive dieting methods, reinforcing the idea that buying their advertised product will solve weight problems with no effort required on the part of the user. Unfortunately, most of those claims are completely false, but because diet products are technically considered supplements in Korea, they are not regulated by the strict guidelines used for pharmaceutical products. Even in the rare cases that companies are prosecuted by the Korean Consumer Protection Board, penalties are minimal and companies often merely close down, reopen under a new name, and go on selling the same product with a different name.
Shocked? Unfortunately asbsent or ineffective regulations are a fact of life here, as things like almost all Korean Vitamin C drinks containing carcinogenic benzene and 88% of Korean organic food is completely fake demonstrate. Not only is little done about this, but I recall that in that benzene case above the KFDA wasn’t allowed to mention the names of the three vitamin C drinks that didn’t have benzene…how ironic that Koreans have to turn to a Chinese news source to find out what they’re drinking.
In such circumstances, it’s no wonder that impressionable young girls take the messages of dieting product companies to heart: as Kim and Lennon report (p. 357), in 2002 half of Korean high school girls were anemic because of dieting-induced malnutrition, and were considered unqualified to give blood.
( Source )
Hypothesis 2 was also found to be false: U.S. magazines had larger percentages of White than non-White models (84.9% vs. 15.1%), whereas Korean magazines had much more equal percentages of White and non-White models (52.3% vs. 47.7%).
In Kim and Lennon’s words:
Instead of having predominantly non-White (Korean) female models in Korean magazines, White female models were as common as non-White models. The number of White models was actually greater than the number of non-White models. The presence of White female models in Korean women’s magazines to this extent suggests that the Western cultural ideal for women is ubiquitous and widely accepted among Korean women. Korean magazines seem to portray and promote Western feminine beauty as ideal and subsequently pressure Korean women to achieve the Western ideal. Subsequently, this indicates that the Western cultural beauty is not limited to Western countries anymore but has gone global. (p. 358)
Naturally I agree: it’s certainly telling that Korean women’s magazines have more Caucasians than Koreans in them. But it’s not unreasonable to argue that Kim and Lennon are making too much of a conceptual leap, without also considering the extent to which having Caucasian models in advertisements is a sign of wealth, class, and of a country having “made it.” Not coincidentally, the first time Caucasian models were even allowed in Korean advertisements was shortly before Korea was admitted to the OECD in 1996. As Taeyeon Kim (referenced earlier) explains:
A casual browser of Korean women’s magazines might observe that many of the models or settings in the advertisments are Euro-American or look Euro-American. This image has become ever more pervasive. In June 1994, changes in laws allowed the Korean advertising industry to use foreign models and celebrities, which quickly led to a sharp increase in the use of foreign models to sell domestic wares. No longer were only foreign products sold to Koreans with a foreign face, now even domestic products were marketed to Koreans by the likes of Cindy Crawford, Meg Ryan, and Claudia Schiffer. (p. 103)
She still comes to much the same conclusions as Kim and Lennon though:
While there does seem to have been a gradual increase in recent years of Korean models in domestic advertisements, these Korean models nearly all have features that have already been reconstructed to meet the prevailing standards of beauty which, if not totally white, are at least a melding of Asian and Western features, the ideal encapsulated by the increasingly popular ‘Eurasian’ look. Many of the articles and beauty tips in these magazines function on the assumption that the Korean body is flawed while the white body is the standard norm.
I don’t read Korean women’s magazines, but I have noticed the virtual absence of Korean women in lingerie advertisements here (it’s difficult not to notice, given the number of ads on subways and cable TV here). Or to be more precise, the fact that Korean models in them will almost invariably be fully clothed (a very rare exception below), but Caucasian (usually Russian) models will more usually be wearing only the lingerie. Sometimes in the same infomercial you’ll have Russian models in their lingerie but the Korean models fully clothed, holding the lingerie in a hanger. Seeing those for the first time years ago, it was difficult not to conclude that they reflected some pretty warped notions of Korean feminine virtue and foreign lasciviousness.
( Source: menacingPanda )
To be sure, many Koreans do indeed have some warped notions of Korean feminine virtue and foreign lasciviousness. But now I think I was mistaken, and realising that the Russian models are signifiers of “developed country status” makes their numbers and their sharp distinctions with Korean models in ads more explicable. So despite what the two journal articles I’ve quoted at length in this post say, the mere presence of Caucasians in Korean advertisements certainly does not necessarily mean that Koreans have embraced and aspire to Western ideals of feminine beauty. But having said that, I do find the overall weight of evidence compelling.
And on that note, because I sense I’m beginning to lose the thread of things at this late stage of a much too long post, I’ll put this subject to rest for now!
Update: Years ago, Robert Koehler mentioned the Korean model Jang Yun-ju (장윤주), one of the few Korean models “that nobody will ever accuse her of cutting up her face to look white”. In a less academic phase of the blog (hey, we’ve all been there), I linked to many pictures of her here.
COMMENTS ARE NOW CLOSED 21/05/2010
Written over 2 years ago, this post was my first ever attempt to look seriously at the subject, and hence naturally many (but by no means all) of the arguments I made were misguided, and/or proved to be wrong as new information came to light. As this post no longer really reflects my views then, and I don’t particularly feel like defending things I may no longer believe, I’ve decided to close this particular post to further comments (many of which are also now outdated anyway!).
For more recent posts which do reflect my current views though, and which I very much welcome and promise to respond to your comments to, please see here and here. ^^
Very interesting stuff. You’ve got me thinking, and I’d like to throw out an idea or two.
What about consumerism? Once you’ve established even the faintest hint that a certain look is more attractive, it becomes a race (no pun intended) not to be the last one to have that look.
I have yet to travel to Korea, and frankly know very little about it (that’s why I’m here), but one thing I keep thinking about is just how fast Koreans have advanced into western modernity and have enthusiastically adopted all the habits of consumerism. In addition to the issues deriving from neo-Confucian selfless womanhood, I’m going to have to add that consumerism itself encourages a diminishing of the value of the self in favor of the value of objects that exist outside the self.
What has happened, therefore, is that according to consumerist ideology, the body now exists outside the self. I notice that there is little discussion here of Korean woman “acting” more “white”. They are not trying to talk the talk or walk the walk, as it were. They’ll probably never even attempt that. Because those kinds of substantive, personal changes actually require a reconnection with the true self. Buying a look however only requires money and a body to carve up or adorn. The consciousness remains entirely absent from the equation. In many ways, isn’t undergoing plastic surgery the truest and most pure (I mean this to sound perverse) form of consumerism a person can undertake? Is it not the apex of the pyramid of self-abandon in favor of external happiness?
Sorry, I guess I should state my hypothesis…
Maybe, for a large number of Korean women undergoing plastic surgery, the choice isn’t so much about looking more white as it is about being a consumer or not being a consumer.
Perhaps that’s the bandwagon their more worried about not being on…
“That last point is very eloquent, and is a good, pithy way to round off a university paper or a newspaper article, let alone a comment in a humble blog. Unfortunately, it’s also completely wrong.”
LOL, awesome. You’re right. I didn’t really think that through enough and used it as much for it’s artistic flair when it came to me. I’m sure there’s a logical fallacy at work somewhere in the way I constructed it as well.
“Arguing that they do reminds me of the British stand-up comedian Ben Elton making a joke about women thinking about making their faces resemble their aroused vaginas as they put on lipstick in the morning.”
Also an excellent point. As was the discussion you led into from there, which I basically agree with now that you’ve put it *that* way. I tend to think Korean culture has simultaneous love/fear relationship with all things foreign and, given their history, I think it’s understandable and I don’t necessarily consider it a fault. More like a defense mechanism. Framing the argument in this way, I would 100% agree that part of Korean culture that has a fascination is probably a major factor, moreso than the degree to which I originally suggested.
I personally think the simultaneous resentment and reverence of all things foreign reflects an endemic self-esteem problem about Korea’s role in the world. I could go ten different directions and probably write a 2,000 word essay myself from there, but it’s already 12:30am and I’ve got to get some sleep. I will add this: I don’t think there is anything uniquely Korean about the propensity to approach all things foreign… [what's the word I'm looking for? dichotomously? The word I'm thinking of means something like holding two opposing viewpoints in mind at the same time, which Richard Nisbett says Asians are much more comfortable with that westerners are to begin with. Hmmm... No, that's not really it. Schizophrenic sounds too negative.... oh well. I hate it when this happens. MOVING ON]
I realize that you never said this WAS uniquely Korean. I just personally find it interesting how so many cultural things can be traced back to basic human psychology that plays itself out in different ways in different settings. I haven’t taken the time to think this out, but it seems like it would be interesting to examine the acceptance/rejection of things foreign by Korean society through the lens of object relations theory. Once I dig out an old psychology textbook and make sure I remember what O-R theory means, I may or may not be able to back up that assertion.
And, finally:
“…almost all Korean Vitamin C drinks containing carcinogenic benzene…”
Holy S#$%@!$#%!$ What? How did that one get by me? Did anything happen with that? Is that situation ongoing?
Though I didn’t really think through my comments as much as I would have had I known they’d be deconstructed so thoroughly, I’m taking it as a major compliment that they were used in this latest post and am supremely satisfied in simply having had a small part in a thoughtful, not-too-contentious, intellectual debate again. It’s a nice break from the pathetically boring curriculum writing that I do all day, every day at my job.
My primary objection was just in the oversimplification about Korean women trying to look white that I’ve heard in various forms for years. Maybe it’s just a personal distaste for oversimplifications. For example, I was against the Iraq War from the very beginning, but I still bristle if I hear someone say something like “The US just wants Iraq’s oil.”
Okay, I’m signing out. Oh wait, did you see this?:
http://seoulsteves.com/2008/04/23/elyse-sewell-joins-the-korea-blogosphere/
Just ever-so-slightly relevant to the topic at hand.
You do make a good argument, James.
As for whether I can demonstrate when the Korean fascination with large eyes came in, I’m not sure I can cite a source, or whether I got it from one or through half-baked logical reasoning (of my own or someone else’s?), based on the fact that some Koreans do have a naturally-occurring so-called “double eyelid.” (My fiancée, for one, ironically, since it’s so idolized and I have no opinion either way on “eye size”. Then again, people sometimes says she “doesn’t look Korean,” or suspect her of having had a nose job, too, things she’s never even considered.) It makes sense that rarer things are valued more, but it doesn’t make sense that that thing was valued only because of its rarity. Perhaps I picked up the idea in conversations, or in some old text where a woman was said to have large, pretty eyes or something. I can’t really remember.
Another think worth noting is that a lot of Korean women I’ve known, when confronted with a real-life Western woman, have been revolted. Western women who don’t look like how Western women look in fashion magazines, that is — imperfect hair, pear-shaped bodies, less-than-pronounced ankles — elicit quite the (often politely muted) reaction, and praise to the gods above and devils below that they don’t look like that.
But that doesn’t really speak to your argument, as much as clarify that Korean women are trying to look like the “distillation of beauty” among Korean women; that this has been modified, remixed with a tincture of Westernized ideas of beauty, is quite (strongly) possible. (With the caveat that most Western women also don’t achieve the Western ideals of beauty, but many more have given up on, or rejected, those ideals. A host of factors, including Neo-Confucianism undoubtedly, seem to make it harder for Korean women to reject those ideals in the same way. Or maybe just that feminism has made less progress?)
For what it’s worth, Lime thinks it is foreign influence, just because double-eyelids are so rarely occurring naturally. I was thinking about where I’d look to disconfirm this idea of mine, and my thought is fashion images from the days before such surgery was possible, though this, again, could betray a Western influence. That requires us to look further back, but since photography, let alone idolizing photography, only goes back so far, and since representational painting offers some potential problems — stylization, as well as perhaps issues of who got painted and why — I’d guess the place to go look would be texts. To which I have limited access, unfortunately.
In my cursory search just now, I only found one Yi Teongmu’s Small Manners of Scholars (1775), as cited in (editors) Ch’oe, Lee, and De Bary’s Sources of Korean Tradition Volume 2: From the Sixteenth to the Twentieth Centuries:
Nothing about eye size, per se, but definitely a Confucian emphasis on women’s appearance, as well as the boundaries for acceptability. It reminded me of certain edicts in the Taiping Tiengguo (75 years later, in Southern China) by Hong Xuquan that women did not need to be ostentatious in their dress, or lovely of face, for God did not mind an unpretty face, but that cleanliness and neat dress were imperative. (Among his harems.) I could find the source of that for you, if you like, though it’s pretty far off. (I have a bunch more resources on the Taipings than on old Korean lit, for fiction-research reasons.)
Anyway, I think if you want to demonstrate change in beauty standards, you’ll probably need to dig into old “media” the way you’re digging into the new stuff. Especially with the mention of “make-up” in that 1775 source — which I’d wager (though I’m not sure) is white-face makeup to lighten the skin. I’ve heard older people say the ideals of beauty have changed. A judicious survey of older advertisements would be one way to go. Old films can get you to the Japanese Colonial era, right? Prior to that, I’m guessing textual sources would be the easiest way to go.
Figure this article might be of interest, if you haven’t seen it already. (Maybe you’ve seen and mentioned it already. The abstract makes me cringe a little, but then, lots of things do.)
Oh, and maybe some of this? (No idea how reliable, but…)
And I found this interesting, if only for the link provided to the Coreana Cosmetics museum. (Click INFORMATION and you’ll see the map and rates.)
that picture is of gemma ward, and she’s australian
Question: have you considered the role multinational corporations/advertising campaigns play in the construction of the beauty ideal? My friend traveled to India, where women traditionally don’t, and see no need to, shave their legs, and there was an ad before a movie from an American cosmetics company that was attempting to create a feeling of shame for women who have hairy legs, in order to create a market for their line of ladies shaving products — it is more efficient and cost-effective if multinational advertisers create a global standard of beauty — it saves the expense of tailoring ad campaigns for each different culture. Of course, if multinational companies like Elizabeth Arden and Chanel have one image of beauty, local companies will follow, won’t they?
Multinationals appeared relatively late on the scene compared to the pale-skin and double-eyelid obsession, but it wouldn’t be a stretch to suggest that they’re probably exacerbating the situation.
Just thought I’d throw that into the mix.
Also… beneze? FUCK! And how nice of them to protect the company instead of the consumer. This is the government, right? Who works for the… oh, yes, the nation, not the people. Korporation uber alles. Too bad the media is too gutless and lazy to go find the information themselves.
A bit late to the punch on this one … Further to what the first commenter said, I agree consumerism and the general desire to keep up with the joneses plays a big part. My wife had the double eyelid procedure and a nose job after she finished school. She dreaded getting the work done, saw no need for it, and begged her (otherwise lovely) mum to call it off, but to no avail. I suspect at least part of the motivation is to show that you have the wealth to get it done, and done well, not badly.
I’m better now, but…Erk, where to begin? Seeing as everyone seems to be responding to the post rather than each other’s comments (naturally) I’ll get started on my replies one by one I guess. I’ll add to this comment over the course of today and tomorrow (lot’s to do after 4 days of wishing I was dead was the only thing keeping you alive!), so if people don’t see their names up here yet, they will be soon enough!
Kevin, and Palapo, have either of you read my series entitled “Women’s Bodies in Korea’s Consumer Society” here, here and here? Your points are quite valid, but I mention similar things there, and you may be interested in commenting and carrying on the discussion in those posts.
My fault. Over the weekend I’m very belatedly going to try and rearrange my sidebar so that posts like those become much easier to find.
SkinnySteve, thanks for being so gracious, seeing as I do criticise much of what you wrote pretty harshly! If it helps, I tend to write atrocious, cringe-worthy comments on other people’s blogs myself (I can give you many examples!), and I really should restrain myself and write them in MS Word or something before pasting them. Yours, in contrast, brought up several reasonable (and readable!) points, which is why I spent so much time on it.
I’ve always felt that bloggers tend to have an unfair advantage in discussions, seeing as we can type and edit long comments to our heart’s content, but once a commentator’s comment is up, then it’s up, warts and all. If and when I move to self-hosted server, I’ll be sure to get a comments program like Dramabeans has (in my blogroll), which gives people 15 mins to edit their comments before they’re “set”.
Gord seems to figured out all the codes and things to get italics and indents and so forth though, so I should really learn to do the same.
Thanks for the link, I’ll be sure to check it out once I’m through all these
damnmuch appreciated comments and emails.Gord, thank you very much for all the links, you’ve given me quite a bit to munch over as I get through my abstract for the conference this weekend.
I especially liked what you said here:
It reminds me of a what a female friend said of her first few weeks in England, there for a year to study English (and pick up an adorable English accent). Before she went, because of movies she thought all Westeners were buff and attractive, so the reality on the streets of Brighton was quite a shock to her…
Sureyya, thanks, and oops! But in my defense the photographer too didn’t know whether she was Asian or Caucasian, and she for a Caucasian she does seem to look remarkably like the “Eurasians” I describe.
Roboseyo, thanks, I haven’t considered the role of corporations and advertising campaigns yet, although obviously it’s to their advantage to get women to associate new looks obtained by using their product with cleanliness and sophistication and so forth. But I think that the huge domestic industry here also promotes Caucasian ideals demonstrates that other factors have more of a role, seeing as it is just as plausible that the domestic industry could have promoted traditional looks and presented non-Korean companies and their beuty ideals as unpatriotic. That sounds simplistic, but as I explained in those links I gave to Kevin and Palapo, most Koreans are highly nationalistic in their consumption choices.
Gord again, yes it was. I’m also curious at what exactly the KFDA thought it would acheive by saying that 30 companies’ drinks were carcinogenic, but not saying which ones. But I was only reading the English language media at the time, and there may well have been plently of information about them made available by Korean netizens.
I know a lot of Koreans, I’ve heard some people getting the double eyelid surgery but never heard about people whitening their skin? I know a lot that go to the tanning bed however!
Gord said:
“… After all, as far as I can tell the double-eyelid obsession was in place BEFORE they met us folk, since some percentage of Koreans are born with it naturally (like my fiancée, for one). ”
JT said:
‘ I’d be the last person to doubt the veracity of anything Gord said…’
Well, I generally trust Gord’s word in both integrity and judgement. If his fiance is Korean, however, I for one doubt the veracity of her word, and so if his/ your line of reasoning is based on her word, I’d say the judgement of taking her word for a sound precept is pretty darn risky.
This both is and is not a cultural judgement. I love Korea and have been here and am enjoying being here still after several years. I am, however, still trying to adjust to the concept that lying is openly accepted as being a cultural norm. Of course lying happens in our original home countries too, but it’s not accepted as being a normal part of an everyday conversation.
I was chatting with a student after class a couple of weeks ago, and otherwise wouldn’t have noticed her sweatshirt, which had a nicely stylised silhouete of that comedian guy from the TV show House, with the words underneath: Everybody lies. Perhaps this is true enough, but the cultural context where such is acceptable or not is vastly different. If we’re looking at the influence of western movie stars for example, they actually tend to be fairly open about when they’ve had cosmetic surgery or not.
Last weekend a friend and I dropped by the local bar where more than 50% of patrons are typically foreigners. The nice waitress there, with a nose the size of tic-tac, was chatting with a foreign woman about cosmetic surgery in a fairly open conversation, so we weren’t really evedropping when the foreigner asked the waitress if she’d had a nose job. With barely an eye batting the waitress simply stated she hadn’t. The other guy and I just rolled our eyes and walked out.
I had a coffee date with a nice young Korean woman once. She was pretty smart: had passed the teacher’s exam first try, but was struggling through settling into teaching and life working full-time while still being a pampered over-protected/sheltered younger daughter. (She wasn’t that smart, as she assumed that I would be impressed by her self-confessed proclamation of being a princess.) She knew enough to be honest as often as she could though. She admitted that she would not tell the truth even if she had had cosmetic surgery.
I won’t bore you with any more anecdotal life stories (not even the ones about my ex-near-fiance). I will, however, say: please keep examining the precepts, presumptions and foundations involved in all your arguments, especially if they pertain to anything stated by Koreans and cosmetic surgery.
The other thing I would like to see examined more closely, though you’ve already started, is the influence (lies…?) of marketing of cosmetics and the spread of its influence.
I was watching late night TV a few years ago (back when I was staying over somewhere that had a TV – it wasn’t actually mine to drop off the balcony as I’d rather do with it) and there was an older Korean drama from about the 1970s, set probably around the start of the last century or soon thereafter. It was about a farmer or country guy and his wife, and how he went to town one day to sell stuff at the market and was impressed by a salesman with a crowd of people listening as he convinced them that a white powder (probably just baking powder) would make women more attractive, so the guys spends his hard-earned money on this tin of powder and takes it home.. and drama unfolds which I don’t remember so well. There’s a fire, at least one person dies, and this tin of powder is left somewhere. My Korean is still basic so I didn’t grasp it all, but it was obviously including a comment on the origins of spending money to attain some concept of ‘beauty’.
Which leads to a final comment:
just as the cosmetic surgeons, product company owners and marketing industry tend to be dominated by males, all the comments here would appear to be by men, too.
Julian, you have some good points, but for someone who claims to love Korea you come across as extremely cynical. And implying that all Koreans routinely lie to each other and especially their non-Korean spouses, partners and/or friends is pretty dammed offensive. Not just to Koreans, but also to people like Gord or myself, who apparently were too stupid to notice and/or didn’t care that our Korean partners lie to us so often.
Sure, while lying in general is viewed differently and is much more acceptable in Korea, seeing as more Koreans than Westerners think that saving face and/or avoiding confrontation is more important, it doesn’t mean that all Koreans lie, all the time. There are indeed some Koreans that do a great deal, especially for the sake of defending Korea against all criticisms from non-Koreans, but very few of us become so much as friends with such people, let alone marry them.
I’m not sure what your point about men is either. I presume, seeing as you are a man, that you’re not saying that the discussion is somehow diminished by us being men. But the lack of female commentators so far would be a reflection of the greater numbers of men than women being interested in Korea more than anything else.
(deleted)
Curious, criticise the post all you like, but useless one-liners get deleted.
I wonder about the “Korean women trying to look Caucasian” theme. I would think that they, rather than try to look Caucasian, just try to look *good*. If their view of what looks good is similar to what Caucasian women think looks good, then… What about it?
Let’s look at another field of human endeavor, music. I, a Caucasian, like to listen to the blues and even jazz (well, not avant-garde jazz). These are “black” – at least originally – kinds of music. Does that mean I want to be black? Of course not. I do like the music, though.
Kathleen Battle likes to sing opera, a “white” kind of music. Does that mean she wants to be white? Of course not (well, I haven’t asked her, but…) That just happens to be the music she wants to do.
Sakari, thanks, and I’ll discuss some of the points your raise in another post soon, which I’ll try to remember to link to here.
But in the meantime, let me say that virtually mandatory double-eyelid surgery, the sometimes more than 50% of Caucasian models in Korean women’s magazines, the critiques of typical Korean body and facial features and praise of those more commonly found amongst Caucasians by authors of articles in those magazines, the whitening creams and avoidance of the sun…I could go on, but all of those are already adding up to a hell of a lot of coincidences.
But there is nothing particularly Caucasian about double eyelids, is there? I mean, do not Africans (and African-Americans) , say, have double eyelids, too?
Sakari, I don’t know, but don’t see the relevance. Koreans as a whole have had very little exposure to Africans and African-Americans and generally retain very racist attitudes towards them. So I very much doubt that the fact that they may also have double eyelids has had any role whatsoever in Korean women’s modern ideals of beauty.
In contrast, when being Caucasian is sufficient to get you a job teaching English in Korea, then being white with double eyelids has definite associations with class and civility here. But you say that Korean women just want to look “good” and that their views of what looks good just happen to include things like double eyelids and white skin that Caucasian women have naturally. At least I think that’s what you meant, because “If their view of what looks good is similar to what Caucasian women think looks good” makes no sense. Well, why does that look good? If you can provide some alternative explanation for that which doesn’t involve being influence by associations with Caucasians, then please be my guest.
In the meantime, all this talk of double-eyelids is getting tiresome. Like I said, they can’t be studied in isolation, and I’d expect alternative explantations of them to also account for all the other aspects of Korean women’s body images I mention, which my post(s) do provide.
And please no more useless and irrelevant points like “Oh, I like jazz, do I want to be Black??”. I was in a generous mood earlier today, because I’ve already deleted about 20 one-liners like that. I’m simply not going to bother reading or responding to any more commentators who think that those qualify as counter-arguments.
If you want to argue that “Korean women want to look Caucasian”, then you should find something uniquely Caucasian that Korean women want. Double eyelids are not uniquely Caucasian, so wanting them doesn’t prove much. And not even all Caucasians have double eyelids. Old Caucasian people often have single eyelids (and may get surgery in order to look younger), as do Caucasian people with Down’s syndrome (a severe handicap).
On the other hand, if Koreans have racist attitudes towards Africans and African-Americans, then they should be expected not to want look like them. Well, double eyelids do make them look more like Africans and African-Americans, don’t they?
“If you want to argue that ‘Korean women want to look Caucasian’, then you should find something uniquely Caucasian that Korean women want.”
No, I don’t. There are no bodily features that are “uniquely Caucasian”, just a combination of some that they tend to have more frequently than other racial groups. By your logic, you could say that Albinos have light skin too, and Koreans don’t want to look like Albinos, so Koreans wanting light skin can’t have anything to do with Caucasians having light skin. Yawn. You could continue with inane examples like that all day.
Yes, double-eyelids would technically make Koreans look more African. Yawn again. Racist attitudes are not known for their hard-headed logic.
And despite my requests, you’re still focusing on only eyelids. If Korean women were only getting double-eyelid surgery, then other, non Caucasian-imitating reasons would possibly have more validity. But as I’ve explained repeatedly, there is sooo much more to Caucasian body ideals than double-eyelid surgery. But you still haven’t offered an alternative explanation of why Koreans get that surgery, let alone of anything else I mention.
If you want me to respond to further comments, then please do me the courtesy of responding to mine first.
I have focused on eyelids because that seems to be the point you bring up first (in favor of your argument “Korean women want to look Caucasian”).
I did offer an alternative explanation for the surgery – that Korean women think double eyelids look better than single ones. To me, this is a perfectly satisfactory explanation.
Do they put on lip gloss because Caucasian women do? No, they do because they think it makes their lips look better .
As regards body ideals, I’m not quite clear on the distinction between Caucasian and Korean ones. Are you saying there are Korean body ideals that are much different from the Caucasian ones? And that Korean women are betraying those ideals by trying to “imitate” the Caucasian ones?
Look, this is getting pretty damn repetitive.
Of course Korean women are getting double eyelid surgery because they “think double eyelids look better than single ones”. That’s your informative explanation that refutes mine??! Pray, do tell me, why do they think that double eyelids look better? Why do the majority of Korean women that don’t have them naturally decide to get the operation to have them? Why are single-eyelids, which most Korean women have naturally, not viewed as equally attractive or desireable, especially as Koreans like to emphasise their distinctiveness from other ethnic groups? Why do Japanese, Chinese, and Taiwanese women generally feel the same way? Why do all of the above groups feel this way about double-eyelids now, but didn’t 200, 100, or even 30 years ago? Why, out of all developed countries’ populations with the finances to afford cosmetic surgery, did Korea embrace the industry to the largest extent?
“Because they think double eyelids look better than single ones”…Jesus, why do I bother? You want the last word on this, go right ahead, but I’m not wasting any more time on this.
Have you ever asked a Korean woman who has had double-eyelid surgery why she had it? Did anyone else, say, somebody doing research, ask that question?
(I know “it looks better” is not very informative. But can you say, of two women (or men), why, exactly and informatively, one looks better than the other?)
The blonde model is Gemma Ward, an Australian white girl; a better example would have been perhaps Devon Aoki.
A year or so ago I would have been offended by a blog entry such as yours, but the sting has been lost from reading thousands of articles, blog entries, etc. written about the same exact thing, always by caucasians and mostly by men.
Thank you for being another person to help categorise asian women such as myself into the role of victimised lemming. This idea is old and hackneyed, and although it rings true for some, it is complete bollocks for many more.
If your hypothesis is true, then I – who grew up as one of perhaps five asian girls within a 25-30 mile radius, and was inundated with ideals of caucasian beauty in the media with a subsequent lack of ANY sort of asian example either in the media or in my immediate surroundings – should have been one of the first to hate my face and my body for lack of looking caucasian. If it is true, then out of my rather extensive network of asian friends I would know several – Korean or otherwise – who have ever undergone or ever seriously considered plastic surgery. Or even eye glue.
Fortunately for me, I’ve been able to leave my hometown, and although I have not lived in Korea since I was a very young child that by no means lessens my understanding of asian women. What, you’ve seen “more” of them? Well, then, you (along with all those other caucasian men writing about this) MUST know.
But by all means, continue to commodify asian women, and women in general. Your “Hot Korean Girls” section speaks for itself.
Gabrielle,
Like Sakari, do you ever actually address any of the points I make? No. Rather, your primary beef with the post seems to be that it’s a Caucasian male that wrote it, and on that basis you not only dismiss everything written by all Caucasian males on the subject, but also take the time to insult not only me but also my wife over at your own blog, which you strangely don’t link to nor allow comments on.
I don’t care myself, but to hard-core Occidentalists like yourself I guess I have to point out that most of the articles I’ve based this post and others on similar topics on (mentioned in my sidebar) were actually written by Koreans. Sorry if that doesn’t fit into your world-view. On the other hand, I suppose that they too could have been brainwashed by the omnipotent “white media” that you mention on your own blog.
It would have taken very little time on your part to figure out that what I say only applies to people brought up in a Korean and/or Northeast Asian environment, and that the reason that I don’t qualify everything I write about Koreans or Northeast Asians by also mentioning the fact that some people can and do rebel against that environment, including…let’s see…my “submissive asian mishega” Korean wife and my female Korean friends, is because it’s already blindingly obvious to everyone who hasn’t already pigeonholed me like you have.
No, spending time actually considering what I’ve written seems to be the last thing on your mind. If you not noticing that I’ve already accounted and apologised for my mistake with Gemma Ward was only one thing you overlooked then I would make nothing of it, but other things like failing to notice the ethnicity of the authors of articles cited, or (erroneously) claiming on your blog that I’m “opposed” to cosmetic surgery, all point to a pigeonholing of me, this post, and of the entire blog that has very little to do with what is actually said on it.
Yes, that I have a “Hot Korean Girls” category means that I have an “Asian fetish” I suppose. Yawn. Please help me understand why my human instinct to find some of the women in the country I live in to be attractive disqualifies me from writing about them. Regardless, that it was only ever there purely to get hits for the blog, and that I’m gradually getting rid of it, is another thing that has entirely escaped your attention. Or was it a case of you noticing that, but refusing to acknowledge it because to do so would detract from your (unproven) point that “The people who most vehemently oppose cosmetic procedures in asian women are usually the ones who have a bit of an asian fetish”?
Before I forget, please pass on some of the “thousands of articles, blog entries, etc. written about the same exact thing, always by caucasians and mostly by men” that you’ve read. Hell, I challenge you to pass on so much as five. And unlike yourself, I’m always up for hearing new thoughts and opinions on the subject, regardless of the author’s gender or ethnicity.
“Like Sakari, do you ever actually address any of the points I make? No.”
The problem I have with your article is that I feel you leave out any other factors determining an asian woman’s desire for cosmetic procedures, etc. I understand for the sake of tighter writing one might have to drop a few points, but to write an argument about human behaviour and have it come down to essentially one point is a bit… lacking.
“ Rather, your primary beef with the post seems to be that it’s a Caucasian male that wrote it, and on that basis you not only dismiss everything written by all Caucasian males on the subject…”
Honestly, I wouldn’t care about your ethnicity or gender if you were one of the first people I’ve heard this argument from (either via article or spoken word). The thing is that I write from the standpoint of living in the States, where asian exoticism/fetishism run rampant and from my experience I’ve observed a very definite thought process among American caucasian males regarding asian women; when many of them attempt to make arguments such as yours, it’s usually coming from a different place than your opinion is. You have experience, the environment, etc. so I apologise a bit late for making assumptions.
“…but also take the time to insult not only me but also my wife over at your own blog…”
This accusation about your wife is not true. “I hope for the sake of his marriage that he does not actually believe all that submissive asian mishegas…” That is the only time I mention your wife, because there is no point in using her as a pawn in an internet argument. If you read carefully I’m actually attempting to give you the benefit of the doubt, saying that I hope for the happiness and equality of both you and your wife that you do not believe all that craziness (mishegas=Yiddish noun) about asian women. (I’m in a relationship with a caucasian male. I know they can work out beautifully.) Not once did I state that I believe her to be that stereotype, because I don’t, and not once did I state that I believe you to be an asian fetishist (excepting my first comment which perhaps hinted at it, although maybe I’m having more of a problem of you being married yet still being able to call girls “hot.” But that’s irrelevant.). That bit near the end about fetishist had no relevance to you, as I’ll explain.
I think most importantly you should understand that the entry on my blog that links over here to yours is not intended as a response for you, i.e. it is not my way of being passive aggressive and attacking someone on the interwebs just because I’m closeminded/racist/PMSing. Rather, your article acts more as a springboard for mine. Little bits like the paragraph about asian fetishists, opposers of plastic surgery, etc. were not meant to be for you, but instead just happened to be thoughts I have that just happened to be included in an entry that happened to be started with an article that happened to be written by you.
My point was not to use an entire blog to respond to every single paragraph of yours. My point was to take the instance of your blog entry as a catalyst for other thoughts.
Why do we write blogs? What makes one different from another? No two writings can ever be the same because there are different experiences, fears, desires, biases, etc. behind them.
I write that your article was written by “yet another caucasian man who thinks that all asian women are helpless and vulnerable and adhere strongly to the ‘I do xyz, therefore I want to be a white woman’ bollocks.” Yes, that is aggressive and caustic and I can understand your offense, but again I apologise and offer up an explanation.
To say that “white media” (which, by the way, I never glorify, and when referenced to is written about in a cynical sort of “does it really exist with all that power like people say?” sort of way) is the reason for the increase in procedures among asian women is, sorry to say, cutting off the argument’s conclusion before it’s even done. As I mention above in this (regrettably, overly-long) comment, to say that women are choosing this because they’re “told” to over and over again by the media is falling short of the complexity of the problem.
Why does anyone – regardless of gender, age, ethnicity, etc. – buy into anything that the media says? Is it just because they’re “told” they need to be a certain way, just because they’re “forced” to “want” something?
No. The reason why the media is so successful is that it taps into individual desires and feelings. Yes, the constant barrage of “beautiful” white women is overwhelming to asians. Yes, the lack of nonwhite models helps foster ethnic insecurity in numerous asian women. But to address this problem one also needs to address the cultural reasons why things like plastic surgery are so relevant to asian women now…
For an anthropologist to understand a people, he must not only understand the contemporary culture, but also the past and how that people came to develop the thought processes, stereotypes, preferences, philosophies that are so important and so pervasive later on.
Sorry I’ve taken so long to reply, busy days at work here.
I accept your apologies, and realise that some of what I took as insults may have been inadvertant. Still, there’s no need to ever refer to my wife, my marriage, my ethnicity or even gender for that matter. As soon as you do, the comments become personal and invariably offensive, let alone detracting from your arguments.
Also, whether you discuss this post in the comments section here or on your own blog is irrelevant as far as I’m concerned. You say:
“Little bits like the paragraph about asian fetishists, opposers of plastic surgery, etc. were not meant to be for you, but instead just happened to be thoughts I have that just happened to be included in an entry that happened to be started with an article that happened to be written by you”
Sure, your post on your blog may well be not a paragraph-by-paragraph response to mine, and I understand that it’s mostly a springboard for other thoughts, but still, it’s pretty short, it refers to me repeatedly, and people have arrived at my blog after (presumably) reading it. Hence if it’s not primarily about me as you claim, it’s still not at all clear where the parts about me stop and others begin, so at the very least it’s very sloppily written.
You wrote: The problem I have with your article is that I feel you leave out any other factors determining an asian woman’s desire for cosmetic procedures, etc. I understand for the sake of tighter writing one might have to drop a few points, but to write an argument about human behaviour and have it come down to essentially one point is a bit… lacking
There are two reasons I don’t mention other factors, particularly Korean and East Asian’s pre-Western contact history of beauty standards that included light skins. The first is that the fact that they had them is correct and easy to prove, and simply doesn’t need saying. Of course they had an influence.
But now, if we take all the manifestations of Korean beauty ideals in 2008, like I’ve outlined in this post and many others, and account for them primarily in terms of a continuation of those earlier ideals? That is retroactive and simplistic at best, and most importantly doesn’t make testable predictions about…well, anything. It’s like saying “God did it” to account for the creation of the Earth: satisfying and neat to some, useless and frustrating to anyone actually wanting to understand. Like I was saying to a friend the other day, of European languages only English makes a sharp division between “hard” sciences like physics and “soft” social sciences, whereas the formulating of hypotheses and testing predictions based on them (ie, the scientific method) is fundamental to all of them really.
So, here’s my hypothesis: Korean women now have largely Caucasian ideals of beauty, for reasons I’ve repeatedly outlined in numerous posts. Okay, on the basis of that hypothesis, I predict:
1) Disproportionately large numbers of Caucasian women in fashion and cosmetic advertisements here – check
2) Beauticians and so forth finding bodily and facial features more readily naturally found amongst East Asians than Caucasians to be ”flawed”, whereas those more readily found naturally among Caucasians to be “superior” – check
3) Instead of a diversity of choice, an overwhelming preference for cosmetic surgery orperations to aquire precisely those features and/or body and/or face shapes found more commonly amongst Caucasians – check
4) Associations of the elite, class, and civility with and deference given to Caucasians but not with or to people of other ethnicities – check
5) Standards and expectations of beauty that require female Korean singers, stars, and actresses to, if not look Caucasian, certainly try to look “Eurasian” if they want to advance their careers – check
6) Korean women being so concerned with having light skins that they cover themselves from sunlight to the extent that they have the lowest Vitamin D levels in the world – check
(I say “check” because I’ve provided evidence for and discussed all of those in my blog)
Okay, let’s account for those instead by saying that Korean women wanting to look white and getting double eyelids and so forth are because of preexisting Korean and East Asian beauty standards that remain today:
1) Ooops, can’t.
2) Ooops, can’t again.
3) Still can’t. And even if half of East Asians naturally have double-eyelids like you say (not even a fifth do in Korea), why would that be the ideal? Strange coincidence.
4) Hmmm…can’t. Seeing a pattern here?
5) As far as I’m concerned, Koreans can argue that their female stars still look identifiably Korean till the cows come home. To everyone else, fifty years ago it was quite easy to tell if a woman was from say Japan, China, or Vietnam, whereas now, it’s becoming impossible to tell if they’re from even Northeast or Southeast Asia, and sometimes even Asia at all. Sure, they’re all linked by Chinese-influenced beauty ideals, but why this melding (so to speak) only after Caucasians, or images of them, arrived on the scene?
6) Sure, that may well have to do something with the aversion to sunlight. Agreed.
In addition to not explaining all the above, it seems just bizarre that traditional notions of beauty, associating light skins with an indoor non-sedentary elite, would remain virtually unchanged despite most Koreans no longer being farmers and the presence of very real, as-white-as-can-be Caucasians in Korean’s and East Asian’s midst.
There’s so much more to say naturally, but I’m beat! That’ll do for now.
(As a forward: nothing in the following comment is meant to be harsh, conceited, passive-aggressive, etc.)
Not everything in life follows a linear pattern.
I’ve been misunderstood, again. I think it is just as silly and tunnelvisioned to account for modern-day beauty ideals solely on earlier cultural ideas, just as it is to base it wholely on the media. Actually if you reread anything that I’ve written, you can see that I’ve been very careful never to suggest that, always eventually mentioning that both factor into the whole argument, with equally vital roles that would be lessened if one of the factors was suddenly gone from the equation. My purpose is more to call attention to the fact that there are other reasons, in order to get away from a one-sided – and yes, logical and able to be tested, but still one-sided – answer.
I appreciate and understand your ideas and your thought process. I hope eventually you’ll understand mine.
I finally hit on one word that describes the odd vibe I get from this blog – juche. That is, the notion of self-sufficiency that (as far as I understand) is one of the basic tenets of North Korean ideology. Yes, juche, as applied to women’s ideals of beauty, would surely mean that only racially pure Korean features are desirable.
Isn’t that just what is argued here? That South Korean women are imitating Caucasian ideals, and are *debasing* themselves while doing so?
Gabrielle,
I don’t think I’m misunderstanding you, quite the opposite actually, and if this wasn’t the 31st comment to this post I’d give you many specific examples of why. But I suspect that we’d never resolve the question of who misunderstood whom the least to each other’s satisfaction, and I’m honestly just a little tired of this thread.
But may I offer some genuine advice? Sometimes I think your comments may be much more provocative than you realize…which is, after all, how our whole heated exchange got started. Take your last comment for instance: most of is perfectly okay, quite nice and polite actually, but then you end it with “I appreciate and understand your ideas and your thought process. I hope eventually you’ll understand mine.” I don’t think it’s an overreaction on my part to think that those last six words completely change the otherwise conciliatory tone of the comment, ultimately placing the blame for any bitterness firmly in my court.
Can you see how a parting comment like that would normally rile someone up, no matter how unintended that reaction was?
Given the prominence of Caucasian models in the beauty and fashion industry and the influence of media images on girls’ and women’s appearance, Korean ideals of beauty have probably been modified by Caucasian ideals. However, there is something of a chicken and egg relationship here. As noted, Asians have long preferred light skin over dark. This is true not only for Northeast Asians but also Southeast Asians, South Asians, Central Asians, and Near Asians. Likewise, evolutionary antropologists have documented a universal preference for large eyes, a sign of youth as our eyes stop growing by the age of ten, but gravity pulls our noses, ears, and eyelids down as we age, giving the appearance of smaller eyes among the elderly.
Early eyelid surgery created a pronounced, puffy upper lid, but today’s preferred look is distinctly Asian. Surgeons suck the fat out of the upper lid to make it trim and less prominent. The eye is opened up but still looks Asian. This is a good place to make clear that it is only among Japanese and Koreans that single lids dominate. China is fairly evenly divided and in the rest of Asia and the world, double lids are the norm. Double lids aren’t a distinguishing Caucasian feature. It is that single lids are a distinguishing Northeast Asian feature.
Silicone implants in the nose seem more of a direct Western influence as cultures tend to prefer smaller noses on women as a sign of youth. Breast implants are also a Western influence, for chest size preferences vary across cultures. It is the .7 waist to hip ratio that is universal. Most Korean women have a high waist to hip ratio, yet thankfully butt implants haven’t caught on.
One must be careful when making presumptions about people changing their physical features. White people risk skin cancer and premature wrinkles by baking themselves in the sun or under lamps, but they are not trying to look Hispanic or black. They are trying to look like white people with suntans. This ideal came about, of course, when affordable air travel made winter and spring vacations to Florida and the Caribbean a middle-class norm. The beauty and tourism industries promoted the look to make money off suntanning lotions, sunburn creams, and hotels and transport. When suntanning was linked to skin cancer, spurring the development of sunscreens, the beauty industry saw an expensive new product to promote. I used to read Glamour for years as a teenager and young adult. In the mid to late 80s, pale-skinned models actually appeared in swimsuit spreads. They had bleached blond or dark hair, ruby red lips, and bright red or blue swimsuits that contrasted with their pale bodies, giving them a very glamorous forties/fifties look. As a naturally pale woman with a classic Irish complexion, I was delighted for the first time to see beautiful, bare, sexy women with skin like mine. Then the beauty industry decided to resurrect the bronze look using naturally brown models more than tanned white women. One almost never sees pale women in swimwear now, but a few Hollywood women like Winona Ryder and Scarlett Johansson continue to buck the trend and proudly display their fair skin.
That’s why I love Jang Yun-ju. She has a classically Korean face, and her appearance on runways and in magazines sends young Korean girls and women a message that heavy single lids and high prominent cheekbones are beautiful.
Well, most white women shave/wax their body hair, does that mean they are trying to look Asian, since a lot more Asian women are hairless or have little body hair? So you can’t use the argument that because double eyelids are rarely found in Asians, they are getting surgery to look like white women. I know plenty of Korean women who are naturally double-lidded. How do you know Koreans are not emulating those in their own society who have the crease naturally? Creases are not what make Caucasian eyes different as not all Caucasians have it. If Koreans wanted to emulate Caucasian eyes, they would have to do a whole lot more than getting a crease like getting a brow implant and changing the shape of their eyes, which is difficult to do surgically. I think you are drawing a convenient conclusion based on selective “evidence”.
Collagen injection in the lips has been a trend for a while in the US. Is it because white women want to look black? There is a heck of a lot more black women with full lips than white women.
A big reason why Koreans who get plastic surgery look for the sharper, pointier look does not have anything to do with wanting to look white or mixed. It has to do with Koreans’ desire to have the “new car smell”. Koreans like things to look “perfect” and new to the extreme. They like those ultra-perky features because they want to look striking and stand out for their beauty. So that is why you will see a lot of beautiful actresses get surgery when there is nothing wrong with their face. They want to be as beautiful as they can.
I can’t really remember another beauty ideal before this plastic surgery maybe caucasian born one, maybe I’m too young. Doesn’t anyone think of how all that crap inserted into the face will look like in fifty years?
And really… Koreans have too much of a mob culture, kids should just rebel like normal kids and stop conforming to all these thousands of social ideals and rules. It’s worse than my mother. Last time I went over to Korea, I was quite terrified to be surrounded by clones and was unimpressed by the lack of occasional eccentricity present in every other country.
Health and not dying over beauty anytime.
that girl with the blue eye shadow is gemma ward. she’s an australian model.
Thanks Takara, but another commentator already mentioned that.
Hi James,
I found your blog through the article that was featured on naver.com and started reading up on your blog. I’m not sure if you stopped writing about the above topic but just wanted to leave my thoughts here.
I was born in Korea but educated in the U.S. since high school and went to college there and just came back here to work post-college. I’ve been trying to understand the cultural issues myself as well so reading your blog totally helped me put things into perspective.
I think the reason Korean women are obsessed with whiter skin is very much due to the long-time preference for indoor-elite look, combined with men preferring women with fair skin (the so-called 청순 look) and nurturing by their mothers that fair skin is highly desirable. Also, the cosmetic industry trying to sell skin-whitening products and sun-block creams (you have to wear sun-block creams indoors because you get tanned by the light bulbs, they say) combined with the Korean’s general fear of not fitting in for not having the general fair skin makes the preference for white-skin as a national syndrome. And you know how korean folks love to follow trends to go with the flow with everyone else and to not miss out.
Hanah–Thanks for adding those. Actually, I am still very interested in the topic, although my opinions have become much more nuanced since I first this post over a year ago, not least because of revelations like this (scroll down to the picture of the models) since I wrote it. So while I do still think Caucasians have a big influence on Korean women’s body ideals, I don’t deny the influence of historical ones and/or more recent ones like you mention above…more, they melded together really.
The cosmetic industry has said that light bulbs cause tanning and so on…really? That’s the first I’ve heard, but I’d readily believe it with all the disinformation and lax laws about false advertising in Korea. Could you please elaborate?
Yeah I remember growing up in Korea till about 7-8 years ago, the whitening products were popular among women. But even then the sun-block cream industry wasn’t so big and people weren’t so aware of the damaging effect of the UV rays. I can’t give you the exact time frame as to the development of the cosmetic industry in Korea but I certainly remember 5-6 years ago my mom told me about the you-have-to-wear-sun-blocks-even-indoors thing; that I have to start using eye-creams from my early 20s to prevent wrinkles and so on. So I actually believed I have to wear the sun block lotion 365 except when I sleep.
I think it was either Loreal Korea or the ELKA Korea (the Estee Lauder group)’s principal who said normal Korean women use about 7 products to complete their beauty routine and such sophisticated regimen makes Korea an ideal testing market for new products and so on.
That’s a few examples of how crazy the entire beauty industry is here.
Yes like you said, I also do think Korean women’s body ideals are influenced by the Caucasian ideals (although not that Korean women want to wholly look like Caucasian).
Why? To make it short, as described above, what is Caucasian is ”a sign of wealth, class and having made it.” And the Caucasian dominant countries (mostly in Europe and the U.S.) are the ones who have the economical and political power now, relatively more than the Asian or African countries, especially when the economic success is extremely desired and sought-after by the majority in Korea. Going to the other extreme, I think if African countries were the ones who colonized the world and prospered to this date, the African beauty ideals could be what is desired by Korean women now.
Then again why this whole plastic surgery phenomenon is so crazy here? (the light-skin preference has much to do with the indoor, high-class thing coupled with things I mentioned above, not with the Caucasian beauty ideals) By having ideals alone doesn’t do it–it’s the Korean desire to conform fueled by the media power that is so strong here.
Geez, I haven’t written something that has to be logical for a long long time, not since I graduated from college. So it took a while for me to write this thing :) But again, I find your blog very well reasoned and I agree with most things, if not all, you write here. Look forward to comment again!
Interesting article on a subject I’m sure all Westerners in Korea must have reflected upon at one point. I myself believe that in some ways, Koreans want to be like Westerners. That they want to be inducted into some discreet, collective western nobility, consisting of classical piano and by-gone days of politeness and refinement. And despite what I just said, I don’t think that the skin-whitening issue need necessarily be indicative of wanting to be western. I say this because:
1. How white are westerners? Both Koreans and Europeans are relatively pale, but in very rough sketches Koreans are more yellow, Europeans more red and more freckled, and on average darker too (possible exception Scandinavia). Whatever else they might think about Westerners, I’m not sure Asians identify them as “the white man”. I think the traditional illustrations of Japanese court life with its arsenic-white population gives credentials to the theory that NE Asians view themselves as quite “white”.
2. Given that Koreans view themselves as a white sort of people, I think they simply want to enhance this defining feature that they have found attractive (for the exact reason it became a defining feature, sexual selection or whatever the term is). Asian women have their distinct look: small round lips, comparatively round faces, “younger” features, yellow skintone, small noses, flat faces, etc. Westerners, by comparison, have bigger noses, bigger eyes, defined cheekbones, freckles, redder skintone…. and the moniker “white”. I’m quite convinced Koreans are happy to remain Korean-looking: small full lips, young features, yellow skin-tone, etc etc.
3. Within a genetic group, women have 3-4% lighter skin tone than their male counterparts. Thus lighter skin is perceived as feminine on a more instinctual level. Yes, I’m really throwing caution to the wind on that one, and I really don’t know how to explain for India.
Thanks for the compliment, and sorry I took so long to reply. Those are all good points, and by coincidence another reader has written me a very long email about this post, which we’ve agreed that I’ll write a post as a response to this weekend or the next at the very latest (and this one was in some serious need of updating anyway). I’ll think about what you wrote and take it into account when I write that, so please stay tuned!
“Both Koreans and Europeans are relatively pale, but in very rough sketches Koreans are more yellow, Europeans more red and more freckled, and on average darker too (possible exception Scandinavia). Whatever else they might think about Westerners, I’m not sure Asians identify them as “the white man”. “
Northeast Asians literally identify people of European heritage as “the white man”: baekin in Korean and bairen. These aren’t just dictionary terms but used in real speech.
During the summer, people of European heritage are, on average, darker owing to a cultural preference for tanned skin. During the winter, people of European heritage are lighter. It’s not only Scandinavians. Eastern Europeans, Danes, the Dutch, and people of the British isles are all very pale. The olive complexions of people of Southern European heritage compare to darker-skinned Koreans. Are some Koreans lighter than some people of European heritage? Yes. Are Koreans on average lighter or as light? No, although the difference is not great.
“Asian women have their distinct look: small round lips, comparatively round faces, “younger” features, yellow skintone, small noses, flat faces, etc. Westerners, by comparison, have bigger noses, bigger eyes, defined cheekbones, freckles, redder skintone…. and the moniker “white”. I’m quite convinced Koreans are happy to remain Korean-looking: small full lips, young features, yellow skin-tone, etc etc.”
You’ve contradicted yourself. Koreans are increasingly getting surgery to enlarge their small noses and shave their distinctly Korean prominent mandibles and add a chin implant to change the shape of their distinctly Korean round faces to obtain that fashionable V-line. There’s nothing Caucasian about a heart-shaped face. In fact the only people I can think of off-hand who tend to possess this feature are East Africans, namely the Ethiopians and Sudanese. The former model Iman is a perfect example. Korean plastic surgery isn’t really about trying to look white, but by altering so many features, Koreans end up looking generically Asian.
bairen in Chinese
( Source: c0nn0r. Anybody know who she is?)
hi, i believe you are looking at gemma ward, an Australian model from Perth. maybe do a google search of her and see if it’s the same girl or if you can find the poster.
That’s been mentioned several times in the comments already…I’ll update the text under the photo once I type this.
But thanks anyway!
Reading this post was quite interesting, and I would say James along with most readers have some good points.
I do not think Koreans totally want to look like caucasians on every aspects of their looking, but I certainly think that consciously or not, some aspects of caucasian looking are definitely looked after, while some are totally not. I don’t know if it has more to be with looking “advanced”, “developped”, and so on, as most Western countries are designated as, to more than simply wanting to “look caucasian”, but anyway.
For example, it can be easily debated that Asians wish for a lighter skin color as to look more caucasian. I do not think this is true. However, for the double eyelid surgical procedures, I would say that consciously or not, it has somewhat to do with imitating a look similar to these of caucasians.
However, many aspects of caucasian bodies are not sought at all by Koreans in general (I’m not talking about supermodels here, just common people). For example, especially European women in general have some very large shoulders, and they are very tall. And I would say a very high percentage of Western women tend to have fat on their bellies, and this is definitely not sought by Koreans. Even Western movie stars tend to be looked as too fat by Koreans. I have also yet seen many Koreans with colored contact lenses (if not at all). Also Koreans have typically very few hairs, whether on their face or their body, which is the opposite for Western women that constantly try to shave off everything. It would be interesting to study where the culture of shaving their whole body came from. But as for me, I do not find caucasian women as attractive are their asian counterparts, by far.
All these facts are important when we want to consider whether one ethinicity wishes to look like another. Asian beauty is also constantly heard in the medias or whatever. We could go on and debate that Western woman also in a certain way desire certain aspects of asian beauty. I don’t know for you, but overly tall women are really not appealing to me, nor those with overly square faces, or large shoulders, or fat bellies, etc.
Anyway, all this to say that I think Koreans still look very Koreans despite any surgical procedures they undergo, but certains ideals of beauty, however far from all, are somewhat reaching to those of caucasians, and are in a certain way done on the purpose of looking similiar to those latter. I’m pretty sure as other pointed out that globalization and multinationals are in part responsable for that. I also agree that Asians tend to look more and more similar, but I still can easily identify a Korean women over a Chinese or a Japanese one.
And I don’t know where I read that, but I don’t think chinese are leading anymore the asian beauty image, I really think Koreans are (I also think, maybe not very objectively, that Korean women are the most beautiful out of any asian countries). What we can see is South-East Asians and East Asians trying more and more to look like the Korean ideal’s image of beauty (in other words: they try to look Korean). The Hallyu wave has to do a lot with that I guess.
hi. This is interesting point though. and pretty long haha and for this posting was done like 2 years ago, I am wondering if you would check my comment.. and I didn’t really go through any comments so this may be duplicating but I wanted to assure something…
As a Korean girl, born in Seoul then moved to Toronto about 10 years ago when I was at the age of 14, I thought the standard of beauty I also had was something that look like caucasians… and I have to agree to some degree that the east asian people (especailly women) do have the fixed standard of course. However, as I analyze the feautures of Korean ‘beauties’ from the classical period, it was not that the standard of beauty was something like having fair skin, enlarged/certain shape of eyes started to posited in Korean society after the contact with the European caucasians. I think partly from the view of European caucasians and the Western society had seen certainly “selected” photographs or arts that fascinated their culture for it had ‘exotic’ differences. so perhaps was exploring the ‘darker’ skin tone and almond shaped eyes flatter and smoother faces as if that IS the asian face and which existing only in Asian society. And seeing all these beautiful girls now is seen as the modern techniques had emerged in Asian societies. but those girls you showed as examples in your blog, are actually on the classic standard of beautiful women. (and also they were naturally looked like that although had some works done if they did, for the purpose of keep looking ‘young’ not necessarily looking ‘caucasian’) Most Asian babies are having fair skin and pretty ‘white’ (sorry for using ‘white’ terms if this is irritating); but as they grow up they loose the complexion and look much duller (not my opinion thou!)
The classical standard was to have beautifully cleaned and kept white by avoiding sun-beams and having healthy foods. It is partly because having white skin looked ‘cleaner’ and smoother texture, and healthier (the Asian medical thought having yellow tone on skin means the organs are not functioning properly or the person had to work all day in the field for their status is peasants). So having white skin is not intended to become like caucasians but caucasians happen to have the complexity! Even the popular pop-stars who look very “Asian-typical” are very popular and called as the beauties too.
And in fact, not all Koreans think all Caucasians are beautiful… the body shape and even facial features and others all included, it depends on individuals but not the whole race.
This is one of the reason why I sometimes get irritated by people very generally using racial terms to describe someone…. what is ‘asian-looking’ vs. ‘white-looking’ vs. ‘arab-looking’ vs. so on… comments made by many Korean parents living in my city. (for example, one of my bf’s mother once said, in fact yesterday, that she was surprised to see a ‘white’ president who happened to be the Mr. President of Afghanistan, talking to Mr. President of USA, who as we know, Mr. Obama. And I got this irritation sadly to say by her ignorant attitude towards ‘nationality’ and ‘race’ that can distinguished by the eye shape, nose shape, and skin tone and fashion style, in her point of view…..For she had what Arab should look like in her mind, that ‘Western’ looking was surprising her!!)
So having this carefully composed article, I am enjoying other people’s view but from someone who spend more than half of my life in Korean society, and having another half talking about these issues (particularly this issue of beauty standard and how we Korean Canadian kids feel pressure on this issue), I had to make my voice heard (though I don’t even know if there was similar point made).
Thanks and sorry if this article had passed already !
sorry for many grammatical mistakes by the way… I was like half-asleep!
Sorry James but one more thing :)
I was studying Fashion Design and Communication and was working for half a year in a High Fashion industry… and I was so sad and stressed out how all these staffs (all Caucasian, including Iranian, too for the history of Caucasian has started out from the Near Middle Eastern region) making great comments on Models’ body and its ideals by which none of Asian girls were fitting in for their dresses. The dress or the fasion items, I think, is the things that make Asian girls looking not-so-idealistic/ desirable/ best-fitting-in because those fashion styles and aesthetics are meant to designed for Caucasians (again, not just Europeans.)
East Asians are quite different. that is why their paintings are different, writings are different, their furnitures are different and dresses used to be different! I never seen any Caucasian girl looks more beautiful than Korean gilrs when wearing Han-bok, the traditional Korean dress. (though only my opinion ha ha ) because Han-bok is designed for Korean body shapes. (Narrow shoulders and smoother faces, not ‘bigger’ head. I can say this cuz I’ve been studying many Caucasian faces too but Caucasians’ are more ejected, in a way longer on side view.)
So Korean women obsession is not just one separate notion but the Social phenomena, as you mentioned and I totally agree, which in order to change is to have more pride in Korean traditions promoted in Korean society as a whole and celebrate the differences with other ethnicity.
Regards,
Jennice
Thank you very much for your comments Jennice, and sorry for taking so long to get back to you.
I hate to say this after you clearly put a lot of time and effort into your comments, and I don’t mean to sound ungrateful for them, but to be quite frank I’m afraid I’m no longer personally very interested in this topic. Partially because with having another daughter since it was written(!) then I have much less time and energy now, but mostly because it is over 2 years old….although not everything I wrote back then was wrong, my views on the subject have changed a great deal since, and so I don’t feel like arguing or even debating things that I no longer actually believe sorry!
If you’re still interested though, please see here and here for my most recent posts on it, the first of which is just 2 months old, and both of which generated quite a big discussion: they will probably answer at least some of the points you raise here!^^ Meanwhile, I’ll close this particular post to comments from now on, for the reasons I mention above. Sorry I didn’t do so earlier, and thanks again!
[...] Women just face way more pressure to look a certain way, Asia could be the worst because sometimes they obsess about Western beauty standards or try to look like exaggerated Anime characters or some model, actress, or singer who has had [...]
[...] Why? What Others Say There is high speculation among everyone whether Koreans change their appearance to become more Westernized or if they do it for some other reason. Some credit it to Korea’s conformist nature: Korean citizens see that the most successful people in the world are thin, have double eyelids, etc. They watch their celebrities go in for cosmetic surgery and come out looking more “beautiful.” So, naturally they want to do it too. 2 [...]