African, Asian, Latin, and Indigenous cultures have been affected.
Byrdie/Liz deSousa
In This Article
The beauty industry is guilty ofcultural appropriation.
These acts alone are deeply problematic, but this issue also extends to ingredients.
Byrdie/Liz deSousa
Every country has plants and herbs indigenous to their land.
In doing so, they often fail to maintain an ingredient’s cultural integrity and history.
African, Asian, Latin, and Indigenous cultures have all been affected by the colonization of their ingredients.
Byrdie/Liz deSousa
The Eurocentric mindset skincare and beauty brands have operated with creates a two-fold problem.
First, their failure to acknowledge the ingredient’s native origins is a form of erasure.
“I think that is one of the most damaging things that a brand can do.”
Byrdie/Liz deSousa
“Africans were enslaved and taken from all different parts of Africa,” Funke Tegbe says.
“We were made to forget our names and our languages.
We didn’t have the foods we were used to, and we didn’t have our ingredients.
Byrdie/Liz deSousa
Christina Kelmon and Ann Dunning, founders of clean skincare brand Vamigas, share similar frustrations surrounding erasure.
Kelmon is a fourth-generation Mexican-American, and Dunning is Chilean-American.
“But the background of all these ingredients [history] has been essentially erased.
Brands are using these ingredients without any reference to where they come from.
How are you going to take ingredients from our homelands and then exclude us?”
And Ku’s experiences have further illuminated the lack of space given to the storytelling of ingredients.
“I pushed back on that because that disregards the cultural heritage of coconut oil in our community.
This also made me realize [ingredient] storytelling is from a Western point of view.”
“There is a strong exoticism of [Asian ingredients],” she expresses.
That also disregards what that ingredient means for that particular community.”
What Does Cultural Appreciation of Ingredients Look Like?
So, what does true decolonization of ingredients look like?
It starts with cultural attribution.
It’s important to have that discernment."
She also says honoring a culture means ensuring a healthy working environment for the people producing the ingredients.
This is especially critical as many international countries still engage inillegal and dangerous child labor and forced labor practices.
“Ask yourself:Are you supporting local farmer communities?Are there fair trade practices in place?”
“We want to decolonize ingredients by owning part of that market.
But, there is still more work to be done.
