The Face: A Cultural History by Fay Bound-Albert is a fascinating and recently published cultural anthropological project that explores how human societies have interpreted and valued the face over time. Bound-Alberti analyzes how those interpretations influence identity, power, and social hierarchy in the here and now. The face is also something that contemporary gendered and sexual subjects today are increasingly interested in altering, be it through hormone treatments and surgeries on behalf of gender affirmation, aesthetic improvements, or otherwise. And thus, Bound-Albert draws connections between historical cultural significations of the face and current issues like AI and social media driven beauty standards, selfie culture, and biometric technologies.
We’re linking you to a piece in the Guardian in which Bound-Albert applies her thinking from her book to the landscape of contemporary in-flux masculinities. “Scrutinising the face is not new, but it is women’s faces that historically dominated media attention, usually questioning whether or not they have had cosmetic surgery, and who might look older, younger, fatter or thinner,” she observes. Men’s faces are now under increasing scrutiny, and men themselves are manipulating them not only to revamp looks, but often as tool of dominance maintenance. The newly minted online world of looksmaxxing – the process of maximizing one’s physical attractiveness – bridges the intensification of male beauty standards with some of the gendered sentiments emanating from the manosphere.
