Enjoy fast, FREE delivery, exclusive deals and award-winning movies & TV shows with Prime
Try Prime and start saving today with Fast, FREE Delivery

List Price: $34.99 Details

Save: $9.17 (26%)

FREE Returns

FREE delivery Saturday, August 12

Or fastest delivery Friday, August 11. Order within 13 hrs 29 mins

Select delivery location

In Stock

$$25.82 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Payment

Secure transaction

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

Details

Payment

Secure transaction

We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more

Ships from

Amazon.com

Sold by

Amazon.com

Returns

Eligible for Return, Refund or Replacement within 30 days of receipt

This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt.

Read full return policy

Add a gift receipt for easy returns

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime

FREE delivery Tuesday, August 15 on orders shipped by Amazon over $25

Or fastest delivery Friday, August 11. Order within 13 hrs 29 mins

Select delivery location

Used: Good | Details

Sold by Batshon Books INC

Fulfilled by Amazon

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Other Sellers on Amazon

Added

Not added

$30.61
+ $3.99 shipping

Sold by: allnewbooks

Flip to back Flip to front

See all 3 images

Follow the Author

Deborah L. Rhode

The Beauty Bias: The Injustice of Appearance in Life and Law 1st Edition

by Deborah L. Rhode (Author)

4.1 30 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Kindle

"Please retry"

$14.74

—

Hardcover, Illustrated

"Please retry"

$50.13

$33.95

$3.59

Paperback

"Please retry"

$25.82

$5.93

Kindle
$14.74 Read with Our Free App
Hardcover
$21.98 - $50.13

19 Used from $3.59 8 New from $33.95 1 Collectible from $35.00
Paperback
$10.35 - $25.82

19 Used from $5.93 10 New from $25.82

{"desktop_buybox_group_1":[{"displayPrice":"$25.82","priceAmount":25.82,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"25","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"82","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"LnQxQ0Na%2FZcgYRIbIgfw%2FA8ph9KcWFGTU%2BAakssuDS%2BfdFfWmBhzYuC3VMn6Ao%2B8DJuVWto%2B8D7trGlS7ibZMw3OTt3wiAcIlxQtxDQ3F2exD6IZjkMKjFpJXUrs%2B0sHLv24u1NvCybq6TitycULyg%3D%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":0}, {"displayPrice":"$10.35","priceAmount":10.35,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"10","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"35","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"LnQxQ0Na%2FZcgYRIbIgfw%2FA8ph9KcWFGTVqTenltodd7U7QiRrMnJjLIQsUOkF19a5QPARmES9o8Q9rUGN9YTaslaVDOxnfqd5zFt6fic7mmpu%2FNDCKc8E4YRU3198DLs9vEodBXj%2BrHbesjrUsd2wvq666BF56DTth1PCCiimkQ1xcI8yiwrszcXYO2Gymb0","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":1}]}

Purchase options and add-ons

"It hurts to be beautiful" has been a cliche for centuries. What has been far less appreciated is how much it hurts not to be beautiful. The Beauty Bias explores our cultural preoccupation with attractiveness, the costs it imposes, and the responses it demands.

Beauty may be only skin deep, but the damages associated with its absence go much deeper. Unattractive individuals are less likely to be hired and promoted, and are assumed less likely to have desirable traits, such as goodness, kindness, and honesty. Three quarters of women consider appearance important to their self image and over a third rank it as the most important factor.

Although appearance can be a significant source of pleasure, its price can also be excessive, not only in time and money, but also in physical and psychological health. Our annual global investment in appearance totals close to $200 billion. Many individuals experience stigma, discrimination, and related difficulties, such as eating disorders, depression, and risky dieting and cosmetic procedures. Women bear a vastly disproportionate share of these costs, in part because they face standards more exacting than those for men, and pay greater penalties for falling short.

The Beauty Bias explores the social, biological, market, and media forces that have contributed to appearance-related problems, as well as feminism's difficulties in confronting them. The book also reviews why it matters. Appearance-related bias infringes fundamental rights, compromises merit principles, reinforces debilitating stereotypes, and compounds the disadvantages of race, class, and gender. Yet only one state and a half dozen localities explicitly prohibit such discrimination. The Beauty Bias provides the first systematic survey of how appearance laws work in practice, and a compelling argument for extending their reach. The book offers case histories of invidious discrimination and a plausible legal and political strategy for addressing them. Our prejudices run deep, but we can do far more to promote realistic and healthy images of attractiveness, and to reduce the price of their pursuit.

ISBN-10

0199767343
ISBN-13

978-0199767342
Edition

1st
Publisher

Oxford University Press
Publication date

July 14, 2011
Language

English
Dimensions

8.2 x 0.74 x 5.64 inches
Print length

272 pages
See all details

Frequently bought together

The Beauty Bias: The Injustice of Appearance in Life and Law

$25.82

Get it as soon as Saturday, Aug 12

In Stock.

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

+

Standoff: How America Became Ungovernable

$34.53

Get it as soon as Monday, Aug 14

Only 1 left in stock - order soon.

Sold by Ceba’s Bookstore and ships from Amazon Fulfillment.

+

$11.59

Get it as soon as Saturday, Aug 12

In Stock.

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your cart.

Try again!

Details

Added to Cart

Some of these items ship sooner than the others.

Show details Hide details

Choose items to buy together.

Ian Haney López
164
Paperback
43 offers from $6.69
Gar Alperovitz
20
Hardcover
24 offers from $2.49
Isabel Wilkerson
43,528
Hardcover
303 offers from $1.99
Bill Schneider
11
Hardcover
30 offers from $2.44
Kwame Anthony Appiah
376
Paperback
67 offers from $1.80
Immanuel Kant
177
Paperback
23 offers from $2.54

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The book is illuminating and important: it explores the often unacknowledged, yet pervasive, discrimination against people, particularly women, who don t conform to mainstream notions of beauty and appearance [Rhode] is the one of the country's leading scholars in legal ethics and gender Rhode is incredibly prolific."--Danielle Citron, Concurring Opinions

"[Rhode] is convincing in her arguments that laws punishing appearance discrimination might be a logical step in exactly the right direction it's hard to deny the validity of the problem that she confronts. And it's even harder to ignore the extent to which concerns about appearance shape our daily lives. Rhode so clearly enumerates the costs to society incurred by appearance discrimination that readers judges and lawmakers included will find themselves unsettled."--Christian Science Monitor

"Provocative Rhode is at her most persuasive when arguing that in the United States, the penchant to discriminate against unattractive women (and also short men) is as pernicious and widespread as bias based on race, sex, age, ethnicity, religion, and disability. She provides overwhelming evidence of bias against the overweight, the unattractive, and the aging. And while some of these cases may be covered under the Americans with Disabilities Act or race discrimination law, most are not."--Dahlia Lithwick, Slate.com

"This book is extremely well written. There are plenty of everyday examples of appearance discrimination and the book is written with a passion and enthusiasm that sweeps the reader along...a call to arms...No doubt it will create a considerable body of literature and much debate."--Legal Studies

"Rhode writes clearly and thinks deeply. I found her case convincing morally and legally."--Dallas Morning News

"This is a well-researched and thoughtful exploration of beauty ideals in legal, professional and other hard-hitting real-life spheres. A serious contribution to the literature of the politics of appearance."--Naomi Wolf, author of The Beauty Myth

"Rhode's insightful analysis and lively writing style brilliantly lays out the ways in which prescriptions about appearance, whether mandated by the law, influenced by the billion dollar cosmetics industry, or the leaders of social movements, affect people's opportunities and their everyday lives."--Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, Past President, American Sociological Association; Professor of Sociology, CUNY Graduate Center

"When the fastest-growing medical specialty is cosmetic surgery, we should all be concerned. Deborah Rhode's analysis offers real insight into what compels our 'beauty behavior,' the economic consequences, and what we can-and must-do about it. This book should be on every woman's bookshelf."--Kim Gandy, Former President, National Organization for Women

"Deborah Rhode uncovers 'beauty bias' as an obstacle for women every bit as disabling as sex or gender discrimination, but more damaging because it is virtually immune to legal challenge. Her discourse and strategies for ending appearance discrimination speak to every woman and should be supported by all people concerned with social justice."--Herma Hill Kay, University of California, Berkeley School of Law

About the Author

Deborah L. Rhode is the Ernest W. McFarland Professor of Law and the Director of the Center on the Legal Profession at Stanford University. She has a Yale BA and JD, and is a former law clerk of Justice Thurgood Marshall, a former president of the Association of American Law Schools, a former chair of the American Bar Association's Commission on Women in the Profession, and a former director of both Stanford's Center on Ethics and its Institute for Research on Women and Gender. She is the author or coauthor of twenty books, including In the Interests of Justice (OUP 2003), Access to Justice (OUP 2004), and Ethics in Practice (OUP 2003), and over 200 articles, and is the nation's most cited scholar on professional responsibility.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0199794448
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Oxford University Press; 1st edition (July 14, 2011)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 272 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0199767343
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0199767342
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 10.3 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 8.2 x 0.74 x 5.64 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,030,212 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #97 in Gender & the Law (Books)
- #109 in Discrimination Constitutional Law (Books)
- #195 in Labor & Employment Law (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.1 30 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

Important information

To report an issue with this product, click here.

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Deborah L. Rhode

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Deborah L. Rhode is the Ernest W. McFarland Professor of Law and the Director of the Center on the Legal Profession at Stanford University. She has a Yale BA and JD, and is a former law clerk of Justice Thurgood Marshall, a former president of the Association of American Law Schools, a former chair of the American Bar Association's Commission on Women in the Profession, and a former director of both Stanford's Center on Ethics and its Institute for Research on Women and Gender. She is the author or coauthor of twenty books and over 200 articles, and is the nation's most cited scholar on professional responsibility.

Author Photo by David Weintraub, photographer.

Customer reviews

4.1 out of 5

30 global ratings

5 star
4 star
3 star
2 star 0% (0%)		0%
1 star

How customer reviews and ratings work

Sort reviews by

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Dan

Some Good and Some Bad

Reviewed in the United States on May 8, 2014

Verified Purchase

Good: This book addresses a very important topic, raises a lot of relevant issues, makes some important points, and is pretty short

Bad: The arguments are often pretty fast - Rhode prefers to skim over a lot of the key issues in feminism by glossing over things and deciding to focus on "refocusing the feminist critique" (pg 88) which is really just code for 'I'm going to ignore a lot of the deeper challenges to my work that come from various strands of feminism and instead make fairly uncontroversial points.' For a topic this interesting it would be good to have a more detailed, strenuously defended argument.

As it stands, sympathetic readers are going to wish there was more substance, and hostile readers are going to find plenty of holes to poke. The book also contains a few factual mistakes and hasty over-generalizations, which it could certainly have done without.

Overall: Worth reading if you're interested in the topic and want to get some of the issues out onto the table, but not so great for digging really deep and figuring stuff out for good.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Amazon Customer

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on May 11, 2017

Verified Purchase

The product was exactly what I needed me it arrived promptly.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

xoxo

Good Ideas Bad Argument

Reviewed in the United States on June 12, 2015

Verified Purchase

This book has a really great idea about how there is a beauty bias and the discrimination between those who are attractive and those who are not. But I wish the author were less repetitive and instead wrote more about the psychological aspects for why this bias exists and what we can do.

The book is basically a long list of various types of biases and repetition. I was really excited when I read the description of the book but was disappointed when I actually read it.

6 people found this helpful

Helpful

...

Beauty in Context

Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2010

Verified Purchase

The book puts alot into perspetive and makes you think about "beauty" in a different context. The legal angle was a new one for me and I really enjoyed the writing.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Amy Chen

Basic overview of issue

Reviewed in the United States on January 25, 2021

Verified Purchase

I thought this would go more in depth but it’s a good overview if you aren’t familiar with the subject.

Reviewed in the United States on July 17, 2012

Verified Purchase

The title notwithstanding, the book isn't really about "the beauty bias" as either a psychological or social phenomenon (Rhode is a lawyer, not a social scientist). It is rather about appearance discrimination in general, focusing mostly on discrimination based on race, disability, and obesity. I have no trouble believing such bias exists; sadly, though, Rhode does very little to prove it.

Rarely have I seen a valid point so poorly argued. Rhode's argument is ill-supported, faulty in logic, frequently off-topic, and repetitious. I'm not sure how one manages to continuously repeat oneself in only 161 pages of text, but Rhode accomplishes it. Overall, the book gives the impression of having been an over-long law review article that the law students at most major universities justifiably declined to publish.

The major problem with the book is that Rhode does not seem capable of formulating a coherent argument starting from a well-supported premise to a logical conclusion. Instead, she starts with some irrelevant personal anecdotes, throws around a number of disorganized facts gathered and claims made by others, impugns appearance-based discrimination with only minimal and unsatisfactory refutation of counterarguments, and makes some mostly arbitrary policy recommendations unsupported by any evidence of their effectiveness. By the end, the impression is that you have been the victim of a peroration rather than a scholarly work, and been made to pay for it in the bargain.

One irony here is that I believe the problem Rhode discusses, identified by psychologists long ago (taking one incarnation as the "Halo Effect"), is perfectly real and deserves serious consideration. Another is that this book is written by a chaired professor of law at Stanford Law School, conventionally ranked among the highest in the country. It is published by one of the most prestigious academic publishers in the world. Both of which prove that reputation ranks among the least reliable indicators of quality. This gives me an idea for another book: "The Unmerited Reputation Bias." I want back my money and the 6 hours of my life spent reading this.

25 people found this helpful

Helpful

Lucia

Just read the introduction

Reviewed in the United States on September 25, 2015

Verified Purchase

The topic of the book is very interesting yet I fell like a paper would have been more appropriate because after chapter 3 it is just too repetitive. The introduction gives a good idea and actually makes you expect a lot from the book, however I feel that it actually gives
The whole book away because after it there are no more surprises, same examples, same arguments with no more depth or data.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Janet Donavan

interesting subject

Reviewed in the United States on June 21, 2013

Verified Purchase

Very interesting, but too technical for "in bed reading". I didn't finish reading it. I usually find that books by journalists are fun and easy to read and books by professors are not.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Amazon Music Stream millions of songs	Amazon Advertising Find, attract, and engage customers	6pm Score deals on fashion brands	AbeBooks Books, art & collectibles	ACX Audiobook Publishing Made Easy	Sell on Amazon Start a Selling Account

Amazon Business Everything For Your Business	Amazon Fresh Groceries & More Right To Your Door	AmazonGlobal Ship Orders Internationally	Home Services Experienced Pros Happiness Guarantee	Amazon Ignite Sell your original Digital Educational Resources	Amazon Web Services Scalable Cloud Computing Services

Audible Listen to Books & Original Audio Performances	Book Depository Books With Free Delivery Worldwide	Box Office Mojo Find Movie Box Office Data	ComiXology Thousands of Digital Comics	DPReview Digital Photography	Fabric Sewing, Quilting & Knitting

Goodreads Book reviews & recommendations	IMDb Movies, TV & Celebrities	IMDbPro Get Info Entertainment Professionals Need	Kindle Direct Publishing Indie Digital & Print Publishing Made Easy	Amazon Photos Unlimited Photo Storage Free With Prime	Prime Video Direct Video Distribution Made Easy

Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands	Amazon Warehouse Great Deals on Quality Used Products	Whole Foods Market America’s Healthiest Grocery Store	Woot! Deals and Shenanigans	Zappos Shoes & Clothing	Ring Smart Home Security Systems

eero WiFi Stream 4K Video in Every Room	Blink Smart Security for Every Home	Neighbors App Real-Time Crime & Safety Alerts	Amazon Subscription Boxes Top subscription boxes – right to your door	PillPack Pharmacy Simplified	Amazon Renewed Like-new products you can trust