Not Too Sweet

Not Too Sweet

Certified thought daughters Miranda Park and Scarlette Do bring their training in feminist advocacy and humanities research to unpack everyday Asian Australian experiences.

  1. 5 Mar

    Coda: Bridgerton reactions and the politics of beauty

    We conclude this jam-packed season of Not Too Sweet by reviewing the latest season of Bridgerton ft. Korean-Australian queen Yerin Ha!!! We love seeing fellow Asian women on screen, especially in the notoriously white period romance genre. But does Bridgerton’s depiction of a race-less society and the show’s choice of colourblind casting signal a promising future for racial diversity and inclusion on screen? Or does it unfairly gloss over the socioeconomic and political issues that defined the Regency era and ignore the implicit biases we bring as viewers who live in a racialised world? And how does this all feed into the broader politics of beauty that we’ve been unpacking across NTS season 2? Tune in to hear our hot takes on the Bridgerton universe, our fave moments from this season and more! Support the podcast by following, rating, and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Stephanie L. Hanus, ‘Interracial romances and colourblindness in Shondaland’s Bridgerton’ (2024) Emma Lynn, ‘Quasi-color consciousness: Casting, race, and sexual violence in Netflix's Bridgerton’ (2024) Piia K. Posti, ‘I Get to Exist as a Black Person in the World: Bridgerton as Speculative Romance and Alternate History on Screen’ (2024) William Joseph Sipe, ‘Post-racial politics and the mandate to desire: interracial love as liberation in Bridgerton’ (2023) Patrick Michael Teed, Marcelle-Anne Fletcher & Joshua Falek, ‘The Ruse of Love: Intimacy, Captivity, and Racial Slavery in Netflix's Bridgerton’ (2023) Tre Ventour-Griffiths, ‘The “Whites” Who Loved Me: How Bridgerton Facilitates Digital Lynching’ (2025)  This podcast was produced by Miranda Park and Scarlette Do on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    1hr 10min

  2. 26 Feb

    Bittersweet: beauty and wellbeing with Meg and Alex Lee

    To help expand our understanding of beauty and wellbeing beyond aesthetics standards and practices, we are joined by early career researchers Meg and Alex Lee. In this episode, we discuss issues of access, mobility and belonging shaping the experiences of migrant youth in rural communities and Asian Australian young adults. We explore what wellbeing feels and looks like for those living on the margins and how we can find beauty in everyday life.  Check out Meg’s awesome publications:  Not settlement but movement: Exploring mobility as central to the wellbeing of young people from migrant backgrounds building lives from rural Australia.  Being human and 'hanging out': Mutuality, trust, and 'voice' in youth participatory research.  ‘The little things’: The temporality of young people’s strategies for existential, grounded, and expansive wellbeing in rural Australia.  Meg’s research took place on Wadawurrung and Dja Dja Wurrung Country (Ballarat) and Wotjobaluk, Jaadwa, Jadawadjali, Wergaia, and Jupagalk Country (the Wimmera region).  Support the podcast by following, rating, and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Sara Ahmed, ‘A phenomenology of whiteness’ (2007) Rose Butler, ‘Migration, class and intra-distinctions of whiteness in the making of inland rural Victoria’ (2022)  Kathryn Edgeworth, ‘Black bodies, White rural spaces: Disturbing practices of unbelonging for ‘refugee’ students’ (2015)  DV. Stead, L. Taula and M. Silaga, ‘Making place in a place that doesn't recognise you: Racialised labour and intergenerational belonging in an Australian horticultural region’ (2022) R. Wilding and C. Nunn, ‘Non-metropolitan productions of multiculturalism: Refugee settlement in rural Australia’ (2018) D. Bargallie, N. Fernando, & A. Lentin, ‘Breaking the racial silence: Putting racial literacy to work in Australia’ (2004) Ghassan Hage, White Nation (1998) Aileen Moreton-Robinson, The white possessive: Property, power, and indigenous sovereignty (2015) Helen Ngo, The Habits of Racism: A Phenomenology of Racism and Racialized Embodiment (2017)  J. Wyn, S. Lantz, & A. Harris, ‘Beyond the ‘transitions’ metaphor: Family relations and young people in late modernity’ (2012) This podcast was produced by Miranda Park and Scarlette Do on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    58 min

  3. 12 Feb

    The personal is instructional: beauty vloggers with Tisha Dejmanee

    ‘HIGH MAINTENANCE beauty habits that will make you look LOW MAINTENANCE’. ‘The 6 PROVEN ways to heal your gut health’. ‘POV: A week in the life of a Victoria’s Secret model’. Beauty vlogs play an important role in how young women see themselves and practice their femininity. This episode, with the help of Dr Tisha Dejmanee from the University of Technology Sydney, we unpack vlogs’ role in the neoliberal postfeminist and postrace era. Amongst the deep dive: 🌮 How Tisha’s PhD journey in the United States inspired her research on food blogs 🥐 Fleshing out postrace and postfeminist thinking 🍕 Digital media and how influencers balance being relatable and aspirational 🍝 Vloggers’ display of credibility and why this expertise is so appealing in the age of neoliberalism 🧋 Beauty vlogosphere and Asian Australian racial politics 🍮 Tisha’s advice on mindfully consuming beauty vlogs 🥞 Trad wives in the era of food and time precarity 🍫 Taking long walks in nature, a certain problematic podcast that might or might not have a name synonymous to Journal of an Executive, and traditional Chinese medicine Dr Dejmanee is a Senior Lecturer in Digital and Social Media at the University of Technology Sydney and Co-Chair of the Asian Australian Studies Research Network. Check out Tisha’s awesome publications.  ‘Everyday multiculturalism on Asian Australian food blogs’ ‘Fantasies of food work and digital entrepreneurialism: postfeminist time panic on food blogs’ ‘"An Australian beauty-lover based in Singapore": negotiating Asian Australian identity in the beauty vlogosphere’ Postfeminism, postrace and digital politics in Asian American food blogs Her email address if you are a young Asian Australian wanting to discuss your relationship to social media: Tisha.Dejmanee@uts.edu.au  The Asian Australian Research Network and conference call for paper Support the podcast by following, rating, and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Margaret Henderson and Anthea Taylor, Postfeminism in Context: Women, Australian popular culture, and the unsettling of postfeminism (2019) Kim Dasol, ‘Racialized Beauty, Visibility, and Empowerment: Asian American Women Influencers on YouTube’ (2023) James Palmer, ‘Traditional Chinese medicine needs its own revolution,’ (2013) https://aeon.co/essays/traditional-chinese-medicine-needs-its-own-revolution  This podcast was produced by Scarlette Do and Miranda Park on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    58 min

  4. 29 Jan

    Liberating our libido? Race and desire with Tandee Wang

    Why are there so many white man/Asian woman pairings? Why are Asian men always ranked last in terms of desirability? From University of California Santa Barbara, history PhD candidate Tandee Wang shows Miranda and Scarlette how historical patterns of migration, military occupation, and settler colonial policies in the United States and Australia shape our desires and dating preferences. Amongst the deep dive: 🌹Australian and American history’s role in the stereotypical hypersexualisation of Asian women and negation of Asian men’s desirability 🐯Orientalism, Yellow Peril, Asian Invasion 🙅The dreadful Oxford Study meme and its use to police Asian women’s agency 🍷Finding the fine line between understanding historical impacts and dictating others’ dating preferences 🌶️ABC’s White Fever review, especially its confused approach to strategic essentialism Check out Tandee’s latest publication: ‘At the gate to Australia’s heavenly peace: Asian racialization and Australia’s Tiananmen Chinese’ in Ethnic and Racial Studies.Support the podcast by following, rating, and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Murali Balaji and Tina Worawongs, ‘The New Suzie Wong: Normative Assumptions of White Male and Asian Female Relationships’ (2010) Ruth Balint, ‘Aboriginal women and Asian men: a maritime history of color in white Australia’ (2012) Steffi Cao, ‘Trolls are citing an ‘Oxford study’ to demean Asian women in interracial relationships. But it doesn’t actually exist’ (2024) Ra Chapman, White Fever (2024) Chris Haywood, ‘Exploring Men, Masculinity and Contemporary Dating Practices’ (2020) Anglea Liu, ‘MRAsians: A convergence between Asian American Hypermasculine Ethnonationalism and the Manosphere’ (2021) Helena Liu, ‘Sensuality as Subversion: Doing Masculinity with Chinese Australian Professionals’ (2017) Karen Pyke, ‘An Intersectional Approach to Resistance and Complicity: The Case of Racialised Desire among Asian American Women’ (2010) Arissa H. Oh, ‘From War Waif to Ideal Immigrant: The Cold War Transformation of the Korean Orphan’ (2012) Matthew Raflow, Cynthia Feliciano and Belinda Robnett ‘Racialized Femininity and Masculinity in the Preferences of Online Same-sex Daters’ (2017) Eve Tuck and Wayne Yang, "Decolonization is not a metaphor" (2012) David Walker, Anxious Nation: Australia and the Rise of Asia, 1850-1939 (1999)  The "Mongolian Octopus" cartoon: https://digital-classroom.nma.gov.au/images/anti-chinese-cartoon-titled-mongolian-octopus-published-bulletin-1886  SBS video on Yellow Fever: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcNkbY_kbWU  This podcast was produced by Scarlette Do and Miranda Park on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    1hr 5min

  5. 15 Jan

    The weight of whiteness: unpacking colourism and fatphobia with Devni Vihara

    We’re kicking off 2026 with a fabulous guest Devni Vihara, a lawyer and content creator, who’s internationally recognised for her advocacy regarding gender equality, anti-colourism, and access to justice. In this episode, we tackle issues entrenched in Asian communities’ perception of beauty: colourism and fatphobia. Amongst the deep dive: 🌺 Why fatphobia is so difficult for feminists to unlearn ☀️ The role ‘control’ plays in our relationship with food and our bodies 🦀 Body positivity vs body neutrality: which approach is better? 🥥 The f****d up history and impact of the Body Mass Index (BMI) 🐠 What colourism means and how it shapes our lives 🌻 Devni’s strategic decision to become an advocate for ‘melanin beauty’ You can find Devni on social media platforms using this handle @devnivihara_  Support the podcast by following, rating, and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Susan Bordo, ‘Reading the Slender Body,’ in Unbearable Weight (1993) Carolyn Bronstein, ‘Fat Acceptance Blogging, Female Bodies and the Politics of Emotion,’ (2015) https://feralfeminisms.com/fat-acceptance-blogging/   Bronwyn Carlson, ‘Indigenous Fat Rebellion: Rejecting Settler Fatphobia and Reclaiming Body Sovereignty’ (2025) May Friedman, Fat Studies: The Basics (2025) Margaret Hunter, ‘Colourism and the racial politics of beauty’ (2021) Carla A. Pfeffer, ‘Fat activism and beauty politics’ (2021) K. M. de Silva, ‘Sri Lanka: National Identity and the Impact of Colonialism’ in The Sri Lanka Reader (2011) Jamie Steele, ‘The Weight of Whiteness: Fatphobia and the Psychosocial Disavowal of the Ancestral Body’ (2025) This podcast was produced by Scarlette Do and Miranda Park on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    1hr 12min

  6. 25/12/2025

    (Un)skilled labour: immigrants in the beauty industries with Emma Do

    What’s the connection between the Vietnam War, Dakota Johnson, and Australian KFC taking on the bánh mì? The answer is South Vietnamese refugees working in service industries. Joining us in this episode to parse out this rich history is fashion journalist Emma Do. As a writer and editor from Naarm/Melbourne, whose work covers fashion, arts and culture, Emma helps Scarlette and Miranda rethink the ‘Made in Australia’ label. We scrutinise the history behind Australian manufacturing and labour policies, which left a negative impact on the wellbeing of Vietnamese textile outworkers, whose experiences Emma captured with her book Working from Home (or May o Nha) with illustrator Kim Lam. Scarlette takes us on a wild ride connecting the establishment of Vietnamese nail salons in the United States to the first shop opening in Highpoint Shopping Centre in Melbourne, 1998. We also discuss the racism underlying the reactions (or the lack thereof) to ‘Made in Vietnam’ or ‘Made in China’ label, the uncomfortable conversation around Uniqlo and fast fashion, and how to shop mindfully when brands gamify consumers’ experiences. Special shoutout to the Joe Rogan Experience listener who also listens to Not Too Sweet! Check out Emma Do’s fabulous work: Website: https://emmaqdo.wordpress.com/  With Kim Lam, Working from home (may ở nhà) (2021), https://mayonha.com/ Her infrequent fashion podcast Smart Casual: https://omny.fm/shows/smart-casual/playlists/podcast  Her substack: https://spacesbetween.substack.com/  Her article in the Griffith Review: https://www.griffithreview.com/articles/buyer-beware/  Support the podcast by following, rating, and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Emma Do and Kim Lam, Working from home (may ở nhà) (2021) Susan Eckstein and Thanh-Nghi Nguyen, ‘The making and transnationalization of an ethnic niche: Vietnamese manicurists’ (2011) Milann Kang, ‘The Managed Hand: The Commercialization of Bodies and Emotions in Korean Immigrant-Owned Nail Salons’ (2003) Regan Morris, ‘How Tippi Hedren made Vietnamese refugees into nail salon magnates’ (2015), https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-32544343  Ingrid Piller, ‘The sociolinguistics of nail care’ (2012), https://www.languageonthemove.com/the-sociolinguistics-of-nail-care/  Najma Sambul, ‘How Vietnamese Australians came to dominate the nail salon industry’ (2024), https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-01/how-vietnamese-came-to-dominate-australian-nail-salon-industry/104263066  Jesse Adams Stein, ‘Rethinking “Made in Australia”’ (2022), https://www.uts.edu.au/news/2022/06/rethinking-made-australia  Fiona Tregenna, ‘Characterising deindustrialisation: An analysis of changes in manufacturing employment and output internationally’ (2009) Myf Warhurst, ‘The history of the Vietnamese nail salon’ (2019), https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/myf-warhurst/nails/11161086  Sally Werner and Phillip O’Neill, ‘De-industrialisation, financialisation and Australia’s macro-economic trap’ (2014) This podcast was produced by Scarlette Do and Miranda Park on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    1hr 5min

  7. 11/12/2025

    Material girls

    In this episode, Scarlette and Miranda teach the girly pops about Marxist historical materialism! Just kidding. But really, we go to town on Rini: how the face mask brand’s marketing co-opts the language of self-care and play to integrate beauty regimes into children’s lives. We unpack our changing perceptions of plastic surgery, its manifestation in ‘unproblematic’ and ‘problematic’ Hollywood celebrities. We think through the decision to get beauty procedures via the theories of our old mates Karl Marx and Pierre Bourdieu, who are actually helpful for understanding contemporary conversations around pretty privilege, the pilates body, and clean girl aesthetics. Scarlette traces the roots of the clean girl back to the classical Renaissance body and to the ideal of a virtuous white woman within European colonialism. In response to respectability politics, Miranda fleshes out rationales behind cosmetic surgery in South Korea and how this might be perceived in Australia, all of which helps us tackle the racism underlying responses to the Australian Golden Bachelor. And Das Kapital, baby! Important disclaimer: Miranda and Scarlette are not THAT kind of doctors so any discussion of cosmetic procedures are cultural commentary and should not be taken as medical advice. Support the podcast by rating and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Dana Berkowitz, ‘Botox and Beauty Politics’ (2021) Alexander Edmonds & So Yeon Leem, ‘The racial politics of plastic surgery’ (2021) Joanna Elfving-Hwang, ‘The body, cosmetic surgery and the discourse of “westernization of Korean bodies”’ (2021) Joanna Elfving-Hwang & Jane Park, ‘Deracialising Asian Australia? Cosmetic surgery and the question of race in Australian television’ (2016)  Ruth Holliday and Joanna Elfving-Hwang, ‘Gender, Globilization and Aesthetic Surgery in South Korea’ (2021) Mary Russo, The Female Grotesque: Risk, Excess and Modernity (1995) Helen Wood, ‘Beauty and Class’ (2021) This podcast was produced by Scarlette Do and Miranda Park on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    1hr 6min
  8. Cultural appropriation with Lauren Nilsson-Siu

    27/11/2025

    Cultural appropriation with Lauren Nilsson-Siu

    Beauty practices often involve cultural appropriation: the ‘Scandinavian’ scarf, box braids, the 1990s Asian chic qipao. But what does ‘cultural appropriation’ mean and why is it so difficult to talk about? Helping us flesh out this topic is Dr Lauren Nilsson-Siu, an Anglo-Indian Australian researcher who lives and works on Gadigal and Wangal Land. Drawing from her expertise on gender and cultural studies, as well as critical race and ethnic studies, Lauren leads Miranda and Scarlette through why we have such strong emotions regarding cultural appropriation. Importantly, we discuss how ‘cultural appropriation’ is a Trojan horse for thinking about racism in postracial and multicultural societies like Australia. Support the podcast by rating and reviewing us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music. Sources consulted in the production of this episode: Sara Ahmed, The Cultural Politics of Emotion (2004) Sara Ahmed, ‘Affective Economies’ (2004) D. W. Anselmo, ‘Gender and queer fan labor on Tumblr: the case of BBC's Sherlock’ (2018) Lauren Berlant, ‘Cruel Optimism’ (2006) Rina Deshpande, ‘What’s the Difference Between Cultural Appropriation and Cultural Appreciation?’ (2019) https://www.yogajournal.com/yoga-101/yoga-cultural-appropriation-appreciation/. Nadia Khomami, ‘“Cultural Appropriation”: Discussion Builds over Western Yoga Industry’ (2022), https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/dec/12/cultural-appropriation-discussion-builds-over-western-yoga-industry David Knox, ‘Vale: Swami Sarasvati’ (2023), https://tvtonight.com.au/2023/03/vale-swami-sarasvati.html Lauren Nilsson, ‘Critiquing Cultural Appropriation, Building Community: Desi Online Activism on Tumblr Shame Blogs and #reclaimthebindi’ (2022) Lauren Camilla Nilsson-Siu, ‘“I Don’t Want to Look Too Fresh off the Boat, You Know?” Nationhood and Belonging: The Cruel Optimism of Contemporary Australian Multiculturalism’ (2024) Minh-Ha T. Pham, ‘Racial Plagiarism and Fashion’ (2017) Elspeth Probyn, Blush: Faces of Shame (2005) Elspeth Probyn et al, ‘Productive faces of shame: An interview with Elspeth Probyn’ (2019) James O. Young and Conrad G. Brunk, eds. The Ethics of Cultural Appropriation (2009) This podcast was produced by Scarlette Do and Miranda Park on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nations.

    52 min
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About

Certified thought daughters Miranda Park and Scarlette Do bring their training in feminist advocacy and humanities research to unpack everyday Asian Australian experiences.

Information

  • Creator
    Not Too Sweet
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    19
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Not Too Sweet
  • Show Website
    Not Too Sweet