Structure in A Woman's Beauty by Susan Sontag

As aristocratic women, in an ancient time, Heian women were expected to adhere to many beauty and social standards specific to their time. Also, even though unusual for their time period, aristocratic Heian women contributed majorly not only the culture but literature of their time. Firstly, as women in a largely culturally and ritualistic based society, the women would’ve always had beauty standards. Women from the Heian women aimed to maintain a meek but beautiful look, as too please the men in the court. They were expected to whiten their face, blacken their teeth, grow their hair extremely long, redden their lips and to dress in many layers of beautiful flowing robes. If women reached all these standards they were marked “beautiful”. Secondly,

Jane has gotten used to cruelty and biased behavior towards her average looks, and develops a miserable self-esteem that believes the only possible way to describe her exterior is “plain”. This self-esteem prevents her from even beginning to recognize that anyone could appreciate her or find her beautiful in any manner. The society’s typical reactions and judgments shaped Jane’s self-esteem, and prevented her from receiving equal treatment as that of a beautiful woman.

As of recently, the media has been flooded with positive interpretations of beauty standards all over the world. According to various sources, beauty ideals, in women especially, are socially constructed in order to judge a person’s value based on physical attractiveness; therefore, it is highly encouraged that people pay attention to their looks and take care of themselves, in order for others to create a positive first impression of one’s character. It is no secret that beauty standards vary from one culture to the next and it is difficult to establish a universal principle of what is considered beautiful. Many countries’ ideals contrast one another and, as a result, allow for stereotypes to emerge. This is the case between American

The archetypal approach of Woman is common among literature. There are multiple different archetypal approaches of woman such as; the Good Mother, the Terrible Mother, the Holy Mother, the Innocent, the Hero, the Rebel, the Explorer and much more. The archetypal pattern of woman is one of the most obvious to see in “Everyday Use”.

Next Silko talks about how her grandma was beautiful which introduces the idea of tribal beauty and western beauty. Tribal beauty is that,” each being or thing is unique and therefore incomparably valuable because it is the only one of its kind.” (paragraph 11), they also had old views of beauty that was,” beauty was manifested in behavior an in one’s relationships with other living beings.” (paragraph 13). Another attribute about tribal beauty is that there are no gender role so a man could dress as a woman and work with women and still be considered beautiful. Silko then begins to talk about all the tribal traditions and the social structure where beauty and cultural inheritance are emphasized. Western beauty revolved almost purely around physical appearance and trying to fit into a very specific niche of physical being. In conclusion Silko was able to use the structure though reflection to clearly describe the past and to make her points clear, convincing, and

However, the presenting of bias is fitting and does not affect the overall quality of the essay, seeing that her targeted audience is mostly women, she anticipate them to share similar viewpoints on the topic as her. Irrefutably, she specifically state, “That's one of many reasons why I and other women of my generation grew up believing -as many girls still do- that the most important thing about a female body is not what it does but how it looks. The power lies not within us but in the gaze of the observer” (Steinem 340). The author is trying to explain that women everywhere can relate to the fact that it is not about how good they are at something, it is more about their body display, and if they do not have the right face or figure essentially, they do not stand a chance between others who do. In other words, women understand the predominating ideas that are placed on them regarding how they should look or act.

Pointed out in the book Helen of Troy, Beauty, myth and devastation, it is said that beauty is an important and desirable trait by Ancient Greek women, as it represented the desire to become a wife. (Blondell 2).

Explanation: Sontag discusses the endless battle women face with beauty. By showing that the term beauty “has accumulated certain demeaning overtones” (Sontag 238), she shows the negative connotation beauty has now received and explains

Throughout the paper, it was discussed what self-esteem is and what contributes to it. In the sense of the paper, culture plays a big part on a young woman’s self-esteem. There was also summaries of what some women think about themselves and what is the “perfect” woman.

Sontag uses effective language in order to establish variation in her essay. She begins with the observation on the relation between culture and language, and uses logical appeals to evoke her philosophy of beauty. Beauty is power and she demonstrates this yet again by manipulating another speaker's (Cocteau's) perspective that “the privileges of beauty are immense”(215). The author states that beauty is a power that women and men have naturally and as a result, have the power to attract what they want. Sontag also uses the effects of ethos,

The central message of this work is that society is obsessed with appearances. The point the author is trying to make is beauty should not be the most important trait of a person. In today’s society everything is based on looks, people are more concerned about a person’s outward appearance. People strive to

In his novel, The Six Names of Beauty, Crispin Sartwell describes beauty in the simplest of terms, “beauty is the object of longing” (3). The Greek Goddess Aphrodite has been associated with beauty, love and sexual desire since seemingly the beginning of time, and the pure, Aphrodisiac ideas of beauty will never truly fade; therefore, Aphrodite will never fade away from our culture, “Her stay would be never-ending, her work never complete,” (Paris 13). The connection between the goddess and the ideas of beauty is clear, but is often overlooked in favor of labeling her as the goddess of love and desire. The relation of beauty to every other aspect of life is one that Paris mentions and one I find of particular interest, as without beauty

Since ancient times, women’s beauty has long been a common topic for literature and art. Appreciating women’s charming appearances and behaviors is free to talk about both in privacy and public. However, it should be pointed out that as what the painting Admonitions of the Instructress to Court Ladies reflects to people, due to the effect of old Chinese cultures and traditions, women’s inner self actually plays a more signifiant role than their external appearances, which echoes on a similar idea from Upanishads that attaining self(atman) is a major goal for people while the body is unreliable and not long lasting.

The social sciences became so pervasive in the twentieth century they not only produced new additions to medical discourse, but completely shifted the means of enforcing power. The emergence of individualism and the importance that was placed on one's essential and core identity made it so power that was once externally imposed by physical punishment only, began to enforce itself by way of the individual. The internalization of surveillance, domination, and discipline created a society of self policing individuals. This self policing behavior is most evident among women, and unlike the bodily protest against domestic expectations and other inequalities; it is the internalization of these oppressions, however ultimately manifesting as illness

The concept of femininity is associated with beauty. As sontag explains, “A beautiful woman, we say in English. But a handsome man”. Sontag discusses how beauty used to be a word that described the whole being and addressed both sexes but has morphed into a charged word that focuses only on the outer self and is usually used toward women. This change in language