Beauty Bias

ISBN: 9780275990121

出版社: Greenwood Pub Group

出版年: 2007-8

页数: 180

定价: $ 45.14

装帧: HRD

内容简介

Society is fixated on looks and celebrities, but how we look has deep ramifications for ordinary people too. This book explains how social inequality pertains to prejudice and discrimination against people based on their physical appearance. This form of inequality overlaps with other, better-known forms of inequality such as those that result from sexism, racism, ageism, and homophobia. Social inequality regarding looks is notable in a number of settings: work, medical treatment, romance, and marriage, to mention a few. The author discusses the pressures to be attractive and the methods by which we strive to alter our appearance through plastic surgery, cosmetics, and the like. The author also discusses cultural factors, such as the manner in which globalisation of media, advertisements, and movies have trended toward homogenisation, whereby we are all encouraged to appear tall, thin, white, and with Northern European features even if we are none of those things. She also analyses the underlying social forces such as economic incentives that, on the one hand, channel us to be as physically acceptable as possible via the sale of diet pills and skin lighteners, and on the other hand, encourage us to accept ourselves as we are by selling us plus-size clothing. The book concludes with suggestions for equal rights extended to all regardless of appearance, and describes budding social movements and grassroots initiatives toward an acceptance of "looks diversity."