The Face Of Lightness Analysis

In her fourth chapter, “The Face of Lightness: Skin Bleaching and the Colored Codes of Racial Aesthetics,” Jemima Pierre composes a compelling argument based on her encounters with and research into the skin-bleaching practice, namely in Accra, Ghana. Supporting her argument with both interviews and published advertisement, Pierre investigates the role that “whiteness” plays in terms of physical beauty and power and the lengths that people with non-White skin will go to get closer to achieving that perfect “whiteness.” In this chapter, it is clear how both the local and global political, economic, and social spheres impact and influence an individual’s choices and create a profile of the supreme type of person. It shows the lengths that people will go to not only gain favor and admiration in society, but also rise up and gain power, wealth and opportunity, despite probable, detrimental health consequences.

In her interviews with Emma, a Ghanaian woman, Pierre found that the main driving force for many women who practice skin-bleaching is the desire to become more beautiful. However, as Pierre notes, the safest treatments are very expensive, and since many of these women are members of the lower socio-economic classes, they choose to use cheaper methods of whitening, such as mercury, that cause significant harm and damage to the skin in their quest to become prettier. Clearly, this raises a significant problem in terms of seemingly-cemented concept of beauty that pressure non-white people, especially women, to do whatever it takes to conform to these