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The Managed Hand: Race, Gender, and the Body in Beauty Service Work
Two women, virtual strangers, sit hand-in-hand across a narrow table, both intent on the same thing-achieving the perfect manicure. Encounters like this occur thousands of times across the United States in nail salons increasingly owned and operated by Asian immigrants. This study looks closely for the first time at these intimate encounters, focusing on New York City, where such nail salons have become ubiquitous. Drawing from rich and compelling interviews, Miliann Kang takes us inside the nail industry, asking such questions Why have nail salons become so popular? Why do so many Asian women, and Korean women in particular, provide these services? Kang discovers multiple motivations for the manicure-from the pampering of white middle class women to the artistic self-expression of working class African American women to the mass consumption of body-related services. Contrary to notions of beauty service establishments as spaces for building community among women, The Managed Hand finds that while tentative and fragile solidarities can emerge across the manicure table, they generally give way to even more powerful divisions of race, class, and immigration.
328 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
February 14, 2013
What can you learn about contemporary America by studying nail parlors in New York City? Quite a lot, according to sociologist Miliann Kang. Kang argues persuasively that race, class, gender, and immigration status collide and interact in complex and surprising ways within the walls of the nail parlor. Based on in-depth interviews with owners, nail technicians, and customers, and on her own observations, Kang shows that what women expect in a manicure and in a manicurist varies considerably by race and class, with middle class white women, for example, seeking understated colors and designs that promote a professional image and demanding subservient, "pampering" service, while working class black women are often looking more for bold "nail art" looks and simple, respectful service. Kang also looks at the business from the perspective of owners and technicians, highlighting the family turmoil that results from owners' long, arduous hours, and the toxic dangers and exploitation that immigrant workers face in the parlors.
Kang engages in too much post-structuralist style ironic wordplay for my taste, especially in her otherwise-thorough introduction, and she tries to tackle too many diverse topics in the space of a single book, but what she has to say and share is provocative, moving, and definitely worthy of attention.
Kang engages in too much post-structuralist style ironic wordplay for my taste, especially in her otherwise-thorough introduction, and she tries to tackle too many diverse topics in the space of a single book, but what she has to say and share is provocative, moving, and definitely worthy of attention.
February 25, 2019
Really important research into something very concerning I’ve never seen much discussion of before. loved the parts where she describes her field work and the meaning she made of it was really interesting and insightful. I think this book did suffer a little for being written in the way most university press books are written now. A lot of needlessly complex and repetitive language in her interpretation and a lot of flip flopping and describing every angle instead of picking a firm stance. Not her fault I’m sure I get that’s the expectation but this could have been a pretty much perfect book except for that and i feel like it could have reached a wider audience eventually too, which would be awesome because her research was killer and should be talked about
February 17, 2021
Who knew a qualitative study of nail salons could provide so much insightful commentary on race, gender, and body work in the United States? Kang's efforts reveal how the seemingly basic transaction of a manicure can both dismantle and reinforce divisions across race and class. Moreover, Kang's book is a fantastic template for how to write a well-organized and engaging dissertation.
February 18, 2012
The act of a manicure is perhaps an ideal one with which to trouble any framework of easy global sisterhood. Here two women sit across from each other but are distinguished by class and race markers. The manicurist is engaged in what Kang labels “body labor” which both bodies and emotions to be managed simultaneously. Specifically, Kang defines body labor as “commercialized exchanges in which service workers attend to the physical comfort and appearance of the customers, through direct contact with the body such as touching, massaging, and manicuring) and by attending to the feelings involved with these practices” (20).
Kang focuses her study on Asian immigrants’ role in the New York area beauty services industry. She uses ethnographic techniques to foreground the subjectivity and agency of those who own the nail salons and those who work at them. She looks at the interactions between employees and customers at shops that cater to an upper class white clientele, black working class clientele (specifically around nail art), and the diversity of clients at discount nail salons. In each setting, owners, workers, and customers mobilize racialized and gendered ideologies to understand embodied experiences in distinct and often contradictory ways.
Chapter One explores the growth of nail salons in the context of the contemporary beauty industry. In it Kang answers a number of key questions: “Why Nail Salons?” “Why New York?” and “Why Asian Immigrant Women?”
Chapter Two, “What Other Work Is There?” explores the variety of ways that manicurists enter the industry and their reasons for doing so. Her aim is “critique the ideology of Asian-run nail salons as the ultimate success story by demonstrating the contradictory and uneven gains of Asian women through entrepreneurship and employment in this niche” (58). I particularly appreciated the way she brought in Rhacel Parrenas’s concept of “contradictory class mobility” where “migration leads to higher wages but lower-status jobs in other countries” (83).
Chapter Three focuses on the customers, highlighting the different ways customers understood ideals of feminine beauty. She shows that “women of similar social backgrounds may sport similar nails but ascribe very different meanings to them, while women whose nails appear quite dissimilar may be linked by shared desires” (98).
Chapters Four, Five, and Six each focus on different types of nail salons. Chapter Four focuses on the interactions between manicurists and customers at upscale nail salons. Upscale nail salons often evoke understandings of the model minority and emphasize emotional pampering. This chapter contained excellent in short discussions of the body politics of food and smell, the language of service, and forms of everyday resistance employed by workers. Chapter Five specifically looks at nail salons in the context of popular perceptions (and realities) of tensions between Black and Korean communities and the different expectations for body labor in salons situated in predominantly black working-class neighborhoods compared to salons located in upscale white neighborhoods. There is a shift from pampering to community respect and reciprocity in the interactions.
Chapter Six places critiques of discount nail salons in the context of yellow peril discourse. Kang engages popular culture representations of such salons and commentaries about such salons online. She also interviews the manicurists and customers of these salons. I found this to be the most engaging chapter in the book. Kang explains:
“As I have throughout this book, I use the perspective of gendered work and body labor to illuminate the shifting racializaitons of Asian women within the U.S. service sector and the global service economy. Thus far I have argued that pampering body labor in upscale nail spas enforces the racial privilege of white middle- and upper-class women vis-à-vis their Asian manicurists. In contrast, at nail art salons serving black working-class women, the gendered processes of expressive body labor create an alternative form of identification that disrupts racial differences and inequalities, albeit temporarily. In this chapter I examine the dynamics of routinized body labor in discount nail salons serving a mixed racial and class clientele, arguing that the terms of generic gendered beauty exchanges divert attention from economic factors and onto the racial characteristics of Asians as the cause of unsatisfactory service. The consumer mentality that manicures should be fast and inexpensive drives down prices and services, creating undesirable conditions that then become associated with the Asian women who run the salons” (203-204).
It is in this chapter that Kang most forcefully delves into the poor labor conditions facing manicurists. She discusses the toxin exposures (221-225) and the way yellow peril discourse contributes to the inability of manicurists to wear gloves and masks without dissuading customers. She discusses organizing efforts to redress the lack of breaks and other labor protections for workers. She also addresses one of the major obstacles facing organizing in an industry that is understood through such racialized discourses in our contemporary moment of capitalism. Specifically, “consumer awareness can simply lead to boycotting these salons, as opposed to pushing for better products, conditions, and oversight” (231). The problem is not individual owners and workers but the conditions of labor forced upon owners and workers in an unregulated environment where the products they can purchase are unsafe and consumers’ racialized fears of contamination lead to a lack of concern for worker health and safety.
Kang focuses her study on Asian immigrants’ role in the New York area beauty services industry. She uses ethnographic techniques to foreground the subjectivity and agency of those who own the nail salons and those who work at them. She looks at the interactions between employees and customers at shops that cater to an upper class white clientele, black working class clientele (specifically around nail art), and the diversity of clients at discount nail salons. In each setting, owners, workers, and customers mobilize racialized and gendered ideologies to understand embodied experiences in distinct and often contradictory ways.
Chapter One explores the growth of nail salons in the context of the contemporary beauty industry. In it Kang answers a number of key questions: “Why Nail Salons?” “Why New York?” and “Why Asian Immigrant Women?”
Chapter Two, “What Other Work Is There?” explores the variety of ways that manicurists enter the industry and their reasons for doing so. Her aim is “critique the ideology of Asian-run nail salons as the ultimate success story by demonstrating the contradictory and uneven gains of Asian women through entrepreneurship and employment in this niche” (58). I particularly appreciated the way she brought in Rhacel Parrenas’s concept of “contradictory class mobility” where “migration leads to higher wages but lower-status jobs in other countries” (83).
Chapter Three focuses on the customers, highlighting the different ways customers understood ideals of feminine beauty. She shows that “women of similar social backgrounds may sport similar nails but ascribe very different meanings to them, while women whose nails appear quite dissimilar may be linked by shared desires” (98).
Chapters Four, Five, and Six each focus on different types of nail salons. Chapter Four focuses on the interactions between manicurists and customers at upscale nail salons. Upscale nail salons often evoke understandings of the model minority and emphasize emotional pampering. This chapter contained excellent in short discussions of the body politics of food and smell, the language of service, and forms of everyday resistance employed by workers. Chapter Five specifically looks at nail salons in the context of popular perceptions (and realities) of tensions between Black and Korean communities and the different expectations for body labor in salons situated in predominantly black working-class neighborhoods compared to salons located in upscale white neighborhoods. There is a shift from pampering to community respect and reciprocity in the interactions.
Chapter Six places critiques of discount nail salons in the context of yellow peril discourse. Kang engages popular culture representations of such salons and commentaries about such salons online. She also interviews the manicurists and customers of these salons. I found this to be the most engaging chapter in the book. Kang explains:
“As I have throughout this book, I use the perspective of gendered work and body labor to illuminate the shifting racializaitons of Asian women within the U.S. service sector and the global service economy. Thus far I have argued that pampering body labor in upscale nail spas enforces the racial privilege of white middle- and upper-class women vis-à-vis their Asian manicurists. In contrast, at nail art salons serving black working-class women, the gendered processes of expressive body labor create an alternative form of identification that disrupts racial differences and inequalities, albeit temporarily. In this chapter I examine the dynamics of routinized body labor in discount nail salons serving a mixed racial and class clientele, arguing that the terms of generic gendered beauty exchanges divert attention from economic factors and onto the racial characteristics of Asians as the cause of unsatisfactory service. The consumer mentality that manicures should be fast and inexpensive drives down prices and services, creating undesirable conditions that then become associated with the Asian women who run the salons” (203-204).
It is in this chapter that Kang most forcefully delves into the poor labor conditions facing manicurists. She discusses the toxin exposures (221-225) and the way yellow peril discourse contributes to the inability of manicurists to wear gloves and masks without dissuading customers. She discusses organizing efforts to redress the lack of breaks and other labor protections for workers. She also addresses one of the major obstacles facing organizing in an industry that is understood through such racialized discourses in our contemporary moment of capitalism. Specifically, “consumer awareness can simply lead to boycotting these salons, as opposed to pushing for better products, conditions, and oversight” (231). The problem is not individual owners and workers but the conditions of labor forced upon owners and workers in an unregulated environment where the products they can purchase are unsafe and consumers’ racialized fears of contamination lead to a lack of concern for worker health and safety.
November 4, 2025
Laminated cover
It provides a fascinating look into the Korean nail industry. It covers emotional labor and how social capital-poor women go to nail salons to get social needs met. Due to the cost of the services, the most important clients can feel somewhat emotional draining to the employees and get cycled through different manicurists. The manicure scene used to be dominated by the Russians in the 1970s, but they were taken in by the pan-white ethnic movement, sợ they were able to take on better work. The Koreans feel an affinity with the Jewish people in New York since they are needed and thus tolerated but don’t quite belong. A lot of the Asians struggle with English and speaking to the customers, which they need to do to earn money and tips. The Korean nail salons are often located in black neighborhoods
Thể manicurists tend to deal with health effects from dealing with the toxic trio of nail chemicals.
It provides a fascinating look into the Korean nail industry. It covers emotional labor and how social capital-poor women go to nail salons to get social needs met. Due to the cost of the services, the most important clients can feel somewhat emotional draining to the employees and get cycled through different manicurists. The manicure scene used to be dominated by the Russians in the 1970s, but they were taken in by the pan-white ethnic movement, sợ they were able to take on better work. The Koreans feel an affinity with the Jewish people in New York since they are needed and thus tolerated but don’t quite belong. A lot of the Asians struggle with English and speaking to the customers, which they need to do to earn money and tips. The Korean nail salons are often located in black neighborhoods
Thể manicurists tend to deal with health effects from dealing with the toxic trio of nail chemicals.
April 28, 2013
I enjoyed this book and the author uses interesting conceptual approaches such as body service work and emotional labor. It does open your eyes to the oppressive nature of this kind of work. Also, i think she does a good addressing Korean Black conflict in the mail salon context. However, she gives short shrift to the divisions within the workplace, between owners and workers, especially the new Latina immigrants who work in nail salons. Also many more salons are owned by Latinos.
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November 12, 2010Very thought provoking.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews