Definition Essay: The Price Of Beauty

For centuries mankind has unsuccessfully attempted to define beauty. Greek philosophers, including Plato, tried to define beauty as if it were as simple as any other law in nature. However this cannot be so because the idea of what is beautiful has varied throughout cultures and the ages. In the 1800s women who were pale and rather plump were considered objects of desire; but in today’s society, desirable women are slender and tan, among other things. The fact is that today, beauty is as unobtainable as it is indefinable. All of today’s supermodels, as seen in millions of advertisements, have been modified, airbrushed, and photoshopped. Women desiring this beauty have turned to various

Many children in various cultures had to undergo body modifications due to certain cultures and beliefs. “The feet of very young Chinese girls were bound and spliced, intentionally and irreversibly deforming them, because this was seen to guarantee the girls’ eventual amorous and matrimonial success.” (Borel,1994). In Polynesia, unless a girl was tattooed, she would not find a husband. An unornamented hand could not cook, nor dip into the communal food bowl (Borel,1994). It is as to say that “the fact that such motivations and pretexts depend on aesthetic, erotic, hygienic, or even medical considerations has no influence on the result, which is always in the direction of transforming the appearance of the body. Such a transformation is wished for, whether or not it is effective.”

Now a day appearances are everything. People are always striving to look good wherever they go. Many people take a look at them in the mirror and want to change the way they look. This is all caused by the judgement of our society today. This does not only occur in the 21st century it has been happening since the beginning of humankind. This affects men and women equally, because often time’s men judge women and women judge men, but people can get judged by their own gender as well. Every year millions of people do plastic surgery to make themselves more beautiful and appealing. This is done by men and

Different styles go in and out of fashion; the same goes for body types. For a long time there was a clear divide between which body types were seen as fashionable, but recently the divide has been vanishing. Lean bodies used to be seen as being more fashionable than curvy bodies, but that is no longer the case. Glamour laborers are rewriting history, just look to Kim Kardashian and Beyoncé who have become the face for a new age of fashion. This new age, dubbed “post fashion”, claims that individuals can wear their own skin just as much as they can wear fancy clothes.

What is beauty? Who is beautiful? It is very difficult to answer these types of questions. Beauty has different meanings in different people, different cultures and different countries. It also changes throughout time.

Chapter 1 titled Social Bodies: Tightening the Bonds of Beauty provides an overview of social bodies and the nature of masculine and feminine standards society has adopted through changing culture and social norms. It connects the change of cultural ideologies and social institutions to directly changing body standards and customs in order to prove why the ideals of beauty have changed causing higher rates of cosmetic procedures. Partially due to image socialization, tighter bonds of beauty for women than men are reflected in the statistics reported by the ABPS. Lastly, this chapter discusses the definition of cosmetic surgery for the purpose of clarifying what the book is discussing later on.

Throughout history women specifically have felt the need to change their physical appearance in order to be accepted by societies beauty ideal. Social media has influenced women to believe that the word “beauty” defines the outward appearance according to the internets definition — “beauty is a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight.” The definition itself allows anyone to mistakenly interpret the word “beauty” to determine whether or not the physical appearance is attractive enough to be considered beautiful. There are so many emphasis placed on a person’s physical appearance that makes one “beautiful" and “desirable" such the numbers on a scale or measurement, youth, color of skin, etc., but for those who do not meet the media’s ideal expectations are judged or ridiculed. Social media perceives a strong influence on women and what people define beauty to be, but realistically, humans are built to be compelled by enhanced images that are presented in advertisement that create an illusion and fantasy that people admire. The ideal physical appearance that is propagated tends to connect with numerous organizations whose profits promote cosmetics to illuminate facial structures, photoshopped images of famous figures seen in magazines or ads, and cosmetic procedures including liposuction, breast enlargement, and plastic surgery to attain the perfect body ideal. With the continuation of women believing in

Since the beginning of time, humans have found ways to alter their bodies. Mostly due to cultural influences, we adapt to what seems culturally desirable. Currently in Africa, women stretch their necks to bizarre lengths for an increase in social status (Gluckman). In America, anyone doing this to their bodies would be viewed as a nut job. This is due to the different social views around the world. Throughout history, different types of body alteration have been adopted or done away with. Weight lifting, which has been around for centuries, is a very popular form of body alteration.

What is beautiful? How do people define beauty? People view differently. Usually, we judge people, first, from his or her appearance then to their inherence. It is a common fact that appearance has an indirect

Before 1992 women would undergo silicon plastic surgery because that have undergone mastectomy. Perfectly healthy women also undergone silicon surgery to feel beautiful. The author argues that one don’t need to have a bigger bra size or to undergo any type of physical surgery to be successful. People undergo dangerous procedures in multiple country to be beautiful and to fit in. In china the upper-class girls clip their feet to be beautiful and to be feminine to the guys. In Africa they wrapped their head to get a cone-shaped head in order to be considered intelligent. The media has manipulated young the audience. They audience think since a lot of celebrities are doing it then its ok to do it. People persuade the Hollywood image to beautiful.

Body modifications have been practiced by humans for thousands of years. It's a common practice in modern society, mainly to make one's body conform to societal or personal ideals of beauty. There are other motives as well, such as health reasons, religious beliefs, shock value, and to display affiliation or membership to a group. Some of the most common forms of body modification are:

Take the time to examine each individual as they scurry on by, wake up in the wee of hours to catch a glimpse of an array of colors that hit the morning sky, or even reenact the moments that you find most special. In these actions you will find beauty. A pretty face does not complete the definition of beauty, nor does the qualities of being charming and compassionate. People are not the only ones that depict beauty; there is beauty everywhere. Moments, feelings, and characteristics flourish in beauty. Beauty is simply happiness.

Beauty is something that can be interpreted completely different from person to person. A famous quote that goes along with this perfectly is “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” I think a person’s inner beauty should be taken into account when deciding whether or not a person is beautiful. Wikipedia’s definition of beauty is, “a characteristic of a person, animal, place, object, or idea that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure or satisfaction” while Oxford Dictionary states, “beauty is a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially sight.” As you can see, inner beauty could be paired with Wiki’s definition and outer beauty could be paired with Oxfords. Of course, there

The definition of beauty is a characteristic of a person, animal, place, object, or idea that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure, meaning, or satisfaction. Beauty has negative and positive influences on mostly people. Beauty is described by the inside and outside of us. Due to beauty, our self-esteem has been hurt dramatically, especially towards girls. Beauty is not always about our outside looks but it’s about our inside personality also.

What is beauty? How do we decide who is attractive and who is not? Society is full of information telling us what is beautiful, but what fact is that information based on? The topic of beauty has been studied, analyzed and controversial for centuries. We all know the feeling you can have when you hear a beautiful song that brings joy to your heart, stand in a field of flowers that excites your eyes, or admire a face that is visually pleasing. As human beings, we are all drawn to beauty, but what is it that makes something beautiful? The controversial issue that surrounds beauty is that some believe that true beauty is defined by someone’s outer appearance, while others believe it is something that is experienced through a person’s