Ideal Female Body Structur essays

Ideal Female Body Structur essays Symbolism, the common ground on which both Bordo and Warner chose to base their arguments, is at the center of the question of where do the image of the ideal female body figure comes from. Bordo believes it is from societys pressures of indulgence and control, but does that really create an image? There is definitely an image that we see every day of slender women in commercials and magazines, but how did this come to be the ideal form? This is the question Marina Warner answers in the essay Nuda Veritas. Warner answers this question by discussing art from both Christian and classical culture. She discusses and critiques the idea of the opposition between culture and nature, clothes and nakedness, order and disorder. From these oppositions we derive our idea of beauty versus ugliness. In Christian paintings we are shown pictures of the naked female in many ways. The first, nuditas criminalis, is the vision of lust and evil. It is the naked body portrayed in a lustful or distasteful way. We also see visions of age. In these paintings age is a punishment for sin. We are shown images of the body rotting and being consumed by worms or snakes devouring the subjects genitals. This is supposed to punish lust, and sex. We are supposed to see this nudity as ugly and dirty. Thus, making people fear age and feel ugly with age. The second vision we are shown is nuditas naturalis, this is the image of returning to the original human state. This state is without sin; it is pure but at the same time can be bad. For example Mary Magdalene after her life of sin returned to the original human state by shedding her clothes and wandering the dessert. This wouldnt be to bad if she didnt grow any hair but in order to protect her body she grew hair creating an ugly image. At the same time though we can associate positive images with nuditas naturalis. Jo ...