Teaching university students in Shanghai gave me a unique opportunity to explore the opinions of the youth on race issues and the significance of skin color. I once taught a class on racism. One student shot up his hand and said wisely, "We don't have racism in China, because we don't have black people."

My students were shocked on discover that my boyfriend was "black" (as a North American who spent a year studying in South Africa, I'm cautious about using the term "black" to refer to a person of African descent, but I will use the term here for the sake of simplicity). "Black skin is ugly," was a common complaint. My female students said they would never date a black guy because the color of their skin is unattractive. It seemed not so much an issue of racism, but of cultural standards of beauty. White skin is considered beautiful and black just happens to be the opposite of white. When attempting to purchase a moisturizer or skin cleanser in China, it is difficult to find anything that doesn't advertise and contain "skin whitening" ingredients. In Western countries, we are accustomed to see "whitening" on tubes of tooth paste, but not skin care products. I laughed when my boyfriend complained about his mistaken purchase of "whitening" Neutrogena moisturizer. "What? Like I WANT to look like Michael Jackson?" he growled. 

Chinese girls cower under the rays of the sun, like vampires at dawn. The umbrellas are pulled out to shade them and in the absence of an umbrella, they will school books, bags or jackets over their heads to shield themselves from a pleasant sunny day. You might identify umbrella use with rainy days, but in China, come rain or sunshine, the umbrellas are always out. So why the obsession with fish-belly white skin? Well, in Victorian times, white skin was all the rage amongst the European aristocracy. They powdered their faces. White skin was evidence that you could afford a life of leisure, whereas a tan showed you labored in the sun like the peasants. In China, the farmers and migrant workers have deeply tanned skin. Dark skin is indicative of a lower class. 

And while white skin is popular for Chinese, all the expats rush to the solariums to get their tans at 90 RMB for 12 minutes (I am embarrassed to know this). Caucasians feed an equally large industry on skin care products to become brown as Asians have to stay white. Beauty really is in the eye of the beholder and one's culture and upbringing have a lot to do with concepts of beauty. It may take some time before black is considered beautiful in China, but things are changing. Basketball stars are revered in China (most of whom are black). Recently Beyonce, an African American singer came to perform in Shanghai to a sold out audience, many of whom were Chinese. Yesterday my African American friend was visiting. He is a model, dancer, jazz singer and events planner. When he walks down the street, he gets so much attention that sometimes, he just wants to hide. Yesterday, he pulled his hoodie over his head, in an attempt to hide from the stares. At a stop light, he looked down to meet the curious perusal of a six-year old boy. The child pointed up at him and said "monkey" in English. He looked at the child's mother in shock. She just shrugged and grinned back. This was the straw that broke the "monkey's" back. The childlike innocence of the comment made him outraged, hurt and deeply offended at the same time. "You see black man, you see monkey," he groaned. To read more about the experiences of African Americans in China check out the blog: The Black China Hand (go here if you have problems with the other link).