Is Lighter Better?: Skin-Tone Discrimination among Asian Americans

by Joanne L. Rondilla, Paul Spickard

Colorism is defined as "discriminatory treatment of individuals falling within the same 'racial' group on the basis of skin color." In other words, some people, particularly women, are treated better or worse on account of the color of their skin relative to other people who share their same racial category. Colorism affects Asian Americans from many different backgrounds and who live in different parts of the United States. Is Lighter Better? discusses this often-overlooked topic. Joanne L. Rondilla and Paul Spickard ask important questions such as: What are the colorism issues that operate in Asian American communities? Are they the same issues for all Asian Americans—for women and for men, for immigrants and the American born, for Chinese, Filipinos, Koreans, Vietnamese, and other Asian Americans? Do they reflect a desire to look like White people, or is some other motive at work? Including numerous stories about and by people who have faced discrimination in their own lives, this book is an invaluable resource for people interested in colorism among Asian Americans.

Genres: Race

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[Taylor W. · Rating 3 out of 5]

In their book, Is Lighter Better?: Skin-tone Discrimination Among Asian Americans, Joanne L. Rondilla and Paul Spickard aim to explore colorism and its origins and effects on the Asian American community. Colorism is defined as “discriminatory treatment of individuals falling within the same ‘racial’ group on the basis of skin color” (2). In the Asian American community, colorism is shown through the emphasis on having pale skin and small facial features, whether it be through a parent’s comments or through the personal experiences of an Asian American individual. Drawing upon other academic opinions and published papers, personal narratives, academic essays, oral interviews, a scientific survey and analysis, Rondilla and Spickard do an excellent job of thoroughly establishing that colorism is a tangible, modern issue and exploring the different ways it manifests in the Asian American community. However, though I found that the book is very well written and easily communicable, it failed to provide an in-depth discussion about colorism beyond the qualification of its existence and the examples given of ways in which it is present in the modern world.
Is Lighter Better?: Skin-tone Discrimination Among Asian Americans skillfully places colorism in universal terms that everyone can understand. Rondilla and Spickard utilize other examples of colorism from varying races and social classes in order to really quantify colorism and to banish any doubt of its relevance, lending the book a more widespread relatability. For instance, Rondilla and Spickard state that “African Americans with lighter skin tone earn more money than darker African Americans. Lighter people complete more years of education. They have higher occupational status and so do their spouses” (11). Another aspect of the book that speaks to its accessibility is the style of writing. The prose is both fluid and argumentative without being overly complicated or pretentious. Unlike many other books that are academic in nature, the arguments presented in Is Lighter Better?: Skin-tone Discrimination Among Asian Americans are easy to comprehend and are more memorable. Even the structure and organization of the book speaks to this; the titles of each of the chapters and subchapters have no hidden meanings and allow the reader to follow the arguments without issue (such as chapter three’s title “The Survey,” which hints about the following discussion of the scientific survey completed).
I appreciated that there was an explanation about colorism and why it is important in terms outside of how it affected specific individuals. Rondilla and Spickard placed colorism in economic and historic terms, outside the scope of superficially wanting to improve one’s appearance or to just “look white,” a common misconception often made by others. In addition to the aforementioned quote about African American colorism and its effects on their economic situations, Rondilla and Spickard stressed the historical importance of colorism. It is stated that “Laotianns have a term [that] refers to a dark peasant girl or a girl from the country or farmland. The term is often used to mean a stupid, clumsy, and uncivilized person” (8); thus, it can be seen that the connection between skin tones amongst Laotians as a less desirable quality originates in the past, so much so that it influenced the language. Another technique that Rondilla and Spickard utilized to place colorism outside of the emotional spectrum was the addition of palpable quantitative scientific data (in the form of a study). I felt that this effectively lent the issue of colorism more credibility in the eyes of the reader.
However, although the book’s writing style made it more accessible to those outside the academic sphere, it is almost too shallow in its analysis. It felt as if Rondilla and Spickard took the entire book to reiterate the same main points. For example, the entire sections on the beauty industry (namely lightening products and cosmetic surgery), though interesting, did not add any substance to the claim of colorism’s presence already demonstrated, other than serving as additional examples. And if it did, the meaning was lost on me, perhaps due to poor communication. In addition, even though I liked that the accounts of how individuals personally experienced colorism in chapter 2 stood poignantly and powerfully alone, I would have liked to see them either lengthened or accompanied with short commentaries, for they were very short and I thought that they opened up an avenue for further discussion about the current perpetuation of colorism that was not really touched upon.
Overall, I loved that the book was written in a clear, precise manner that was both argumentative and directional, but not arrogant and one-sided. It was written in such a way that the reader was able to understand colorism and its presence in many different spheres, ranging from societal judgments to individual insecurities to economic and scientific discussion. For me, the positives outweigh the faults I found in this book and I would highly recommend this as a read to anyone, whether it be for academic or recreational purposes, as I believe that colorism is something that should be more widely addressed and understood.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Joanne Rondilla and Paul Spickard’s Is Lighter Better? ambitiously seeks to define a new paradigm in the study of colorism. Unlike previous studies, which have primarily focused on the African American community, Is Lighter Better? explores the implications of colorism among the Asian American community. In doing so, they come upon a set of themes that, no doubt, will serve as a point of origin for further studies pertaining to Asian American colorism.
The issue of colorism is first introduced in Chapter One. In a satisfying nod to nuance, Rondilla and Spickard compare and contrast colorism amongst Asian, Hispanic, and Black communities. Secondly, they also provide a historical backdrop for colorism, noting that Western Imperialism is not the sole cause of the desire for lighter skin. Chapter Two provides a series of personal narratives, each of which serves to underscore the themes laid out in Chapter One. The reader is shown how colorism manifests itself in the daily life of an average Asian American. The reader is also provided with an understanding of the pain and suffering that colorism causes in a highly personal manner. However, a nod is also given to the tendencies of those who have been immersed in Western notions of beauty. These individuals are less discriminatory against darker skin, but still must coexist with others, namely the older generation, who are not as tolerant. Yet quantitative data are not absent from this study. Rather, such data make up the bulk of Chapter Three, which features the results of several interviews aimed at exposing the face of colorism. Colorism products, namely skin lighteners, that were mentioned in passing in previous chapters form the focus of Chapter Five. Again, the attractiveness of lightness amongst traditionalists is reinforced. Unique to this chapter, though, is the emphasis placed on the danger posed by such products. Indeed, these treatments are often little more than noxious slurries of dangerous chemicals that ‘brighten’ the skin by burning it. That women are willing to endure the associated suffering is a poignant indicator of the power of colorism in the Asian community. Chapter Five departs from the strictly colorist theme of the study, instead focusing on elective eye-lid surgery. However, the overarching theme of the societal notion of beauty remains. The authors impress on the reader that such surgeries were in fact ‘necessary’ because the patient saw them as the realization of beauty. This, again, was a strong indicator of just how deeply ingrained collective notions of beauty are in the Asian American community.
Is Lighter Better? triumphantly combines oral histories, interview, theoretical research and empirical fact in order to illustrate colorism and pressures to be ‘beautiful’ within the Asian American community. However, this was less than a perfect victory. The beginning of Chapter Three proudly states that the material it contained was the work of college students, many of whom went on to become graduate students. While a touching flourish, it served more as an explanation for sloppy phrasing and study design rather than an additional claim of legitimacy. At several points, it was acknowledged that the employed methodology was flawed. Yet claims that the students could not come up with a theory for why such flaws would impact the studies outcome, as seen in the portion of the survey utilizing three photographs of women with varying complexions, were provided in order to curb the doubts of a critical reader. Such a reader may have been left wondering if the failure to come up with a theory was the result of inexperience rather than an exhaustive thought process. After all, the study was written by students.
Regardless of flaws in presentation and study design, Is Lighter Better? establishes a new facet to the study of colorism. No doubt, it will be of interest to individuals seeking to understand more about the nuances surrounding Asian American society’s approach to skin tone and beauty.

[Gabrielle David · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was an eye-opener. For what I have always known in the black community, I had no idea and to what extent this phenomena exists in the Asian community, especially among women. Very personal stories are shared, some shocking, all very poignant.

[Jason H · Rating 5 out of 5]

Employing sociologist Cedric Herring’s definition of colorism as “discriminatory treatment of individuals falling within the same racial group on the basis of color” (2), Joanne L. Rondilla and Paul Spickard weave an amalgam of academic writing, personal stories, and interviews into the five chapters of Is Lighter Better?. Inspired by themes that arose in an Asian American Studies class at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Spickard and Rondilla’s discussion on colorism moves from the personal tribulations of Asian Americans pressured by a culture that promotes whiteness to the commercial, implicating the cosmetic industry in the perpetuation of phenotypic hierarchies that conform to Eurocentric standards of beauty. After an introduction to idea of colorism as well as its unique manifestation in the Asian American community, Spickard and Rondilla offer a selection of poignant stories that articulate the difficulties of “living on the color line” (23). Ranging from struggles with interracial identities to coping with skin tone discrimination, each of the six stories is invaluable in illuminating the daily challenges of many Asian American women.
One such story, Karen Jackson’s “What Do You Feel More?”, highlights the difficulty of preserving one’s sense of self in an environment that demands convenient racial titles from those with varied ethnic backgrounds. After struggling to find a place in the Asian community as a youth, Jackson writes that “during my college years, it became cool to be Hapa” (43). This acceptance, however, is tinged with objectification. As Jackson puts it, “They are the White girl you have always wanted to be with but with a touch of soy to give you something in common” (43). Jackson’s compelling articulation of the ways in which men in the Asian American community have reduced her to a desired body lends itself well to Spickard and Rondilla’s larger discussion on stratified power relationships within a racial community. Robin Le, in her essay “Self-Acceptance”, also explores the kind of appearance-based hierarchies that exist within Asian American communities. Writing that a friend of hers “called to tell [her] that his mother disapproved of his girlfriend because she was too dark” (24), Le underscores the value of whiteness in the Asian American community and its role in the discouragement of activities that may cause a Vietnamese girl, for instance, to be mistaken for “ a Filipina, a Pacific Islander, a Latina [...]” (24). As Spickard and Rondilla transition to the interview survey of chapter three, this social distinction between shades of color in the Asian American community is magnified.
Offering an extensive collection of short interviews conducted by researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Spickard and Rondilla illuminate the ways in which colorism manifests itself in perceptions of beauty, marriage, and choice of activities. As a nineteen-year-old Cambodian woman puts it, “They think that the lighter-skinned Asian or Cambodian is prettier than the darker-skinned ones” (49). Spickard and Rondilla’s interviews and analysis are crucial in highlighting that colorism in the Asian and Asian American communities is not limited to discrimination based on skin tone but extends to other features as well. This is apparent as Hiro, a Japanese interviewee, speaks about a particular Asian woman: “if she has surgery widening the eyes then she would be a pretty girl [...] It’s more easy to fall in love with [...] lighter skin, round eye, is more pretty” (49). Exploring the implications of this preference for “lighter skin, round eye” (49), Spickard and Rondilla examine the cosmetic industry that thrives on the insecurities of non-Europeans and the ways in which they perpetuate a culture that conforms to Eurocentric standards of beauty. Making reference to the “Sol-White Brightening System by Esolis” 92, Spickard and Rondilla call attention to the dangers of “skin brightening” (92). Though these products purport to offer gentle assistance in the process of “brightening” (92), they contain harsh chemicals that inhibit important biological processes. In addition to these dangers, the marketing campaigns of these companies echo the perception that beauty is “defined by primarily Anglo bodies and faces” (90). As Spickard and Rondilla bring Is Lighter Better? to a close, they underscore the dangers of involved in pursuing “ethnic correctness” (109). Listing the physical side effects of plastic surgery with “suture reactions, skin reactions, wound separation [...]” (115), they note that such operations may also take another, less visible toll on the patient. As Spickard and Rondilla put it, “there is, however, another side to the danger of cosmetic surgery, and that deals with the psychological and emotional side of the pressure to maintain a specific beauty standard” (115). To believe that one’s features are in need of correcting is to allow an insatiable desire for an unattainable and, more importantly, non-existent ideal.

[Jensen · Rating 3 out of 5]

As an Asian American, I have always agreed more-or-less with the ideas and campaigns presented by my fellow community. Their political and activist works empower me to continue my endeavors into the academia of the Asian American community and identity. However, Is Lighter Better? Skin-Tone Discrimination Among Asian Americans did not strike any chords with me. I hesitate to say that I disagreed with the book. However, there are certain parts of the book where I was puzzled. As I dwelled longer on my feelings about the book, I began to formulate a missing link between the author and me. Those feelings of frustration and actually, loneliness, made me realize that my experiences as an Asian American seemed to have been completely invalidated because of this idea of colorism.

In Chapter Three, starting on page 48, Rondilla begins to list out her themes in the interviews she conducted. These themes would become the basis of her research are arguments throughout the book. Her first theme was “Beauty is Light” (48) which claims, “light-skinned people were more beautiful than dark people” (48). After consulting with both my memory and my sister, I did not see this theme being valid. In fact, from personal experience, I had quite the opposite experience. I attended public schools in the inner city up until college. The White population was tiny. I was one of less than 5% of the non-Hispanic or Black students in the school. In my experience, I wish I were darker. My sister had a similar experience as well. She recalls trying to get darker to fit in with “the other girls” in middle school. I argue that this is just as colorism as the theme Rondilla presents.

“Stay out of the sun” (50) and “Don’t be romantically linked with or married to dark people” (51) are other themes. Rondilla presents the idea that one way become lighter is to stay in the shade. Scientifically, I cannot argue with this. If this is what the majority of the research has concluded, I agree with that. However, I keep asking myself. All those hours I spent outside, pretending I was the mayor of the city, participating in local athletics, going on two-block radius excursions and discovering every little detail in that area with my sister…would we ever give that up just to stay lighter? I wouldn't and my sister wouldn’t. Where’s our story in Rondilla’s research? Did we run into other kids on hot summer days? All the time. In fact, most of them were not Asian American either. (It’s funny how NYC public schools place the students) My sister has heard was more “short” jokes than jokes about her skin tone. I have heard more jokes about my glasses than about my skin tone. If colorism were extended to include beauty, I would argue that I experienced just as much colorism.

“Not exactly trying to be white” (51) was one theme I really could not identify with. I can’t remember a time I was not proud of being Chinese American. Lunar New Year was the day I treasured the most as child. (Even more than Christmas). I remember hating glasses. I never had the thought becoming white and I can’t even imagine, even now, how I would look. At this point, I wonder: are all these themes applicable, or expected to be applicable, to all Asian Americans? How many Asian Americans will actually say, “Yes, this happened to me”? Besides the people interviewed, I wonder how many.

The theme “A link to patriarchy” (57) was quite interesting actually and I wish Rondilla went into it further. As a male reader, I realized this was this huge barrier between colorism and I: the idea that females have to be lighter than their male partners. Perhaps growing up in NYC left me partially blind to skin color. When I thought about it, I never actually thought about skin tone with it came to dating. I would think about my partner’s heritage but not on a black-white scale. Rondilla presents another idea that females have this extra pressure to look lighter because of patriarchy. During discussion, many of the female participants were very empowered by this idea but I couldn't understand it. There does not seem to be an equivalent experience for males anywhere in the book.

I always describe my life and myself as very simple and quiet. I don’t like chaos or entropy. So I was quite shocked to read this book, which seemed to link the Asian American experience with colorism. I would never call myself any less Asian American as I would a New Yorker. Yet, I felt very isolated by Rondilla. There are very few instances where I could actually point to a passage as say, “Yes, that was me. I’m an Asian American and this is relevant”. I didn’t have a very enjoyable experience reading this particular book. However, I do find many of the ideas interesting especially her argument in the first chapter. In fact, I more inclined to call myself an outlier (something I really do not want to do since I rather call myself simple) and accept the ideas she presents.

[Vernice · Rating 5 out of 5]

For Is Lighter Better?, Joanne L. Rondilla and Paul Spickard bring together theory, personal narrative and empirical data to break into a comphrehensive study of colorism within the Asian American community. While the focus of the book is seems to specifically be on Asian American women, Rondilla and Spickard reflect on how these women’s experience shed light on the larger issue discrimination faced by women and people of color in general.

Throughout the whole book, Rondilla and Spickard, in making use of the quantitative and qualitative efforts of a whole team of students and faculty, reflect on how colorism has manifested itself into a two parts - an internalized sense of inferiority specifically within Asian American women and a regularized discrimination that has become the “unspoken” norm for the Asian and Asian American community. As a result of these phenomenon within colorism, skin tone has been projected as an inescapable marker of identity, beauty and destiny, or lack there of. The ability of the women to identify as their ethnicity, whether it be Vietnamese, Korean, or Filipino, or even Asian American is shown to be closely tied to the way they have internalized the opinions of others about their skin, basically to the idea of if they are “light enough”, but not too light of course for others. This fine line between approval or disapproval of others then strongly affects how the women see themselves as acceptable or rather, beautiful. With beauty as an unspoken form of capital, the destiny of these women seem to then be decided for them. This flow through identity, beauty and destiny does not go unquestioned, as the women find themselves constantly fighting to break away from the perceptions they grew up with and come to terms with creating their own beliefs. However, at times, the ways in which the women respond to these trends is to change themselves.

With skin as so closely tied to their perspectives of identity, beauty and destiny, the ability to modify one’s skin because a strong option for the women involved. As perceptions change with the ways their skin “changes”, at times free of whether they did anything to affect their skin tone or not, the women see agency in controlling the way their skin darkens or lightens. This agency can be seen in the way the women handle exposure or more strongly, take to cosmetic products or treatment to lighten their skin. This process also does pass unquestioned as the women present a dichotomy between falling into the external pressure to whiten their skin and the personal preference to make oneself more confident and beautiful through whitening. The implications are ironic, in the sense, that whitening, while viewed as “necessary”, is also looked down upon as last resort. For the Asian and Asian American community as well as that of women and people in color in general, the colorism experienced by Asian American women speaks to the pervasive nature of generalized perception as a given and the norm. The effect of one idea can strongly affect the lives of people, largely depending on the people who support it, such as family and friends.

In view, Rondilla and Spickard can be greatly applauded for their work, of course, however without a hitch or two. With the book, Rondilla and Spickard are able to provide a comprehensive study on colorism within the Asian and Asian American community, making great use of different forms of research and data collection. Similarly, the ways in which the authors connect this focused study to other communities of color and that of women help ground Asian American women’s experiences as being part of larger phenomenon at play, with discrimination and its consequences playing a major role. However, Rondilla and Spickard should have been wary of the comparisons at times drawn between the stories of the women and they ways in which they themselves perceived the women as such can be said to perpetuate the very theme they are trying to present against.

At end, Is Lighter Better? is a strong academic but also personal effort by Joanne L. Rondilla and Paul Spickard as well as their team to bring notice to the often “unspoken” phenomenon of colorism within the Asian American community, a study of which would be attractive to those interested in the perceptions of beauty but also for the Asian American community as a whole.

[gmg86 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Joanne L. Rondilla and Paul Spickard’s “Is Lighter Better?” is a pioneering exploration of the issue of colorism in both Asian and Asian American societies. Crucially, they define 'colorism' as the discrimination of individuals by others within their same racial group not only on the basis of skin color, but also on the basis of hair texture, eye color and size, and nose. Their study is grounded primarily in their interviews of Asian American women, and highlights a troubling and sweeping effort to lighten skin in particular. Their work seeks to identify the root cause of this desire to so drastically change one’s natural features. Their argument is clear, convincing, and explored from a variety of angles, but it is clouded by a compilation style that feels unpolished.
Rondilla and Spickard are clear in their argument that the effort made by women of Asian descent to lighten their skin and reconstruct their features is not an effort to appear more “white.” Instead, they are reacting to standards constructed in their native countries that assign lower-class status to darkened skin, based on the assumption that someone who is tanned has not had the luxury of a comfortable life spent indoors. In modern day, however, this standard has been totally commercialized, as products and medical procedures have been brought into the picture as accessible methods of changing one’s appearance. The commercialization of appearance has created a separate realm of social conformity; these women are no longer complying with solely an Asian norm, but also a norm born in the United States that asks them to look like the idealized Asian female.
At the beginning of the book, the authors mention that they hope their work will be the first in a new field of study on colorism. The text, however, takes on this unfinished tone and reads unpolished. The above stated argument is repeated in every chapter, and each section concludes with several pages of notes. This repetition and the sudden citations serve to disrupt the fluidity of the book. From these notes, nonetheless, it is clear that their study was extensively researched and they have surely paved the way for future work to be done. Placing these references at the end of each chapter, however, has made it difficult to connect the chapters’ meanings to pull out a single and cohesively engaging argument.
That said, “Is Lighter Better” studies colorism from many interesting angles. From the start, we understand the issue on a personal level through transcriptions of testimonies offered by Asian American women about their skin tone. The phenomenon of colorism is then quantified through the inclusion of survey results, which serves to assign numbers to the trends identified in the histories. We are then led through an analysis of colorism in the context of commercial marketing, which allows the reader to understand why a woman would undergo a painful and invasive procedure, without medical necessity, to simply change her appearance. The inclusion of actual advertisements from companies like l'Oreal, for example, is especially effective in demonstrating the influence of social constructions on the women's decisions. Through incorporating different points of study, Rondilla and Spickard allow the reader to consider colorism from the perspectives of the women, their families, their society, and the doctors and skin care lines that benefit from the trend. Their work feels unfinished, but the reader does achieve an understanding of how a standard associated with such pain and negativity could in fact be given so much power.
“Is Lighter Better?” challenges the reader to consider the effects of colorism in Asian American society, but to look beyond the hollow assumption that these women simply desire to be white. Rondilla and Spickard’s argument that the women are responding to social demands from both Asian culture and American commercialization is unique and interesting, and sheds new light on the experiences of Asian American women. Rondilla and Spickard have noted a widespread phenomenon, but identified themselves that more work on this subject needs to be done. I found this point on incompletion to be evident not only in the content of their study, but also in the fragmented and repetitive nature of the book.