What is “Asian” beauty? Chinese and South Korean racialized appearances in the Mexican and Peruvian makeup industries1

Abstract

This article will try to answer, what is understood by “Asian” beauty in Latin America and how race, history and politics have decanted to the almost opposite reception of Chinese and South Korean aesthetics and corporalities. It is based on my research on beauty and the role of makeup in the negotiated construction of appearances. Firstly, I will explore the concepts of beauty and race brought by colonial imposition to the territories that would become Peru and Mexico. I will then explore how these were employed strategically to reinforce the oppression and discriminatory treatment of indigenous populations. In addition, I will focus on the current cosmetic offer from South Korea to the Mexican market, and the reception its versions of beauty have had within the past decade. Online trends helped to generate local demand of K-beauty makeup, one of the many South Korean industries involved in “soft power” politics.. Convergent definitions about health and youth are symbolic motors of its success; the racial bias applied to slim, light-skinned and traditionally feminine-looking bodies helps sell “Asian” beauty as inspirational. Afterwards, I will explore what informants identified as “Chinese”, whether they were referring to products or aesthetic presentations, and their distance from class and racial desirability. My argument follows the complicated treatment Chinese-descended people still encounter in Peru and in Mexico; including the ways my own body has been addressed and altered with makeup as a Chinese–Peruvian.

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