Accross Cultures: Do People Look Better Tan?
I was born and raised in California, but my family is of Indian origin. My parents came to the United States about a year before I was born, so Indian culture has been extremely influential in almost every 
aspect of my life. Growing up, we had Indian television at home, and my dad read the Times of India on a daily basis. We blasted Indian music in our family cars, and we went to all sorts of Indian concerts and parties. In 2007, while I was in college, I lived and worked in India for two months.
I’ve always been interested in cultural perceptions of beauty, especially how societies approach the idea of skin color. In many parts of India, women make every effort to look lighter with products like skin bleach and lotions. A common compliment that I received was, “Ohh Ritika, your skin is so fair.” I always thought that this compliment was funny – in the United States, people are always complimenting my awesome tan.
This morning, Glamour covered a news study from the American Academy of Dermatology, which revealed that 72% of Americans believe that they look more attractive with a tan. The survey included responses from 7100 men and women across the United States. The majority of respondents (80%) indicated a concern for skin cancer; however, 66% of respondents believed that tanned people look healthier. I’d be interested in seeing the results broken down by gender and age for a more close examination of the data.
I wonder what causes these opposite perspectives in the two different cultures. Naturally-tan Indian women follow trends to become more fair-skinned. Many American women are fair and want to appear more bronzed. Both groups of women will use products and techniques (of varying extremes) to achieve their desired skin color: skin bleach in India and abrasive tanning products in the United States. This observation leads me to ask the following questions:
As humans, are we forever-destined to want traits that we don’t naturally have? Is there a sociological explanation for the desire to be or not to be tan?
When I lived in India, I definitely experimented with a whitening lotion or two. I’ll also admit to having used tanning products while in the United States. Now, I let my skin remain as-is, and it does what it wants. But I wonder – what makes us want to look how we look?
I’m definitely going to take the extra effort to second-guess why I follow certain trends.
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