Beauty in China

The West and the East (more specifically the United States and China) have very different thoughts on what beauty is in women. One example of this is when Mark, the main character, and a couple of other doctors from the college go to see Tess of the D'Urbervilles, a movie from the West. Mark asked them what they thought about it, and when they said that they did not enjoy it much, Mark asked them why. To this they responded, "Miss Kinski, the star, was not beautiful... her lips were too big... According to Chinese taste, a women's lips should be small and delicate" (74). Part of the reason that the Chinese believe this is because in their culture, people do not kiss, or at least they kiss very rarely. According to Iron and Silk, they only people that the Chinese kiss are babies, less than three years old. If the Chinese kiss their children when they are older, than they will embarrass them immensely. Because they do not kiss, the need for large, or full lips is greatly diminished, and that is why they do not find larger lips beautiful. Talking about kissing and larger lips with the teachers of the college made the teachers feel very uncomfortable, and so when Mark asked about this, they was "an embarrassed spell of throat clearing and teacup refilling" (75).

Today, however the Chinese are more understanding of Western culture and do not object as much to kissing in public. In this article from 2003 (which was 11 years ago) a Chinese teacher in London was alright with being kissed, but only when in the West, not in when in China.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jul/25/gender.uk1

Ruby Nelson