"In many societies, especially in Asia, skin color was long seen as a sign of social class," said Evelyn Nakano Glenn, a University of California, Berkeley, professor of gender and women's studies and ethnic studies. "With Western colonial incursions during the 18th and 19th century, the light skin of European colonizers became a marker of higher status, while the darker skin of Asians/Filipinos became a marker of colonial subjugation."