In her writing, Judith Ortiz Cofer describes how we see our bodies “through the lens of social values and beliefs” (Ortiz Cofer 433). This statement is still very true today, especially among men and women of color in the United States. As Ortiz Cofer describes, in different social interactions the perception of beauty changes. This is demonstrated in her writing throughout the section in which she discusses how her looks and people’s opinions of them affected her life. She describes her experience in a public high school in New Jersey where the “hierarchy for popularity was as follows: pretty white girl, pretty Jewish girl, pretty Puerto Rican girl, pretty black girl” (Ortiz Cofer 439). This standard was much different than what she experienced as a little girl, in public with her mother. 

In recent years, researchers have found that the standards of beauty have not changed from what Ortiz Cofer described. In many parts of the world, including the U.S., the standard of beauty comes from the features of white women, such as lighter skin and hair type (Harper and Choma 735). This ideal may be an unconscious thought for many people because of how long the media has illustrated white women as the standard of beauty. The author of the article “Normative White Femininity: Race, Gender and the Politics of Beauty” describes her discussion with her mixed daughter where she expresses her desire for blonde hair like the girls on TV. Kathy Deliovsky said “Given that the images on TV are predominantly of Europeans, I realized ‘blonde’ to my nine-year-old daughter signified not just the color of hair but a white aesthetic represented by straight hair” (Deliovsky 49). Women of color are under a lot of pressure from societal norms to conform to what has historically represented the standard of beauty. Social media can be a positive place where people support each other, but it can also have negative consequences. Author Virgie Tovar writes that one’s body is their own business and nobody else can tell you who you are (Tovar). This positivity coaching has been very influential in women’s mental health and body perception.

Works Cited

Black, Elaine Baran. “TOVAR, Virgie. The Self-Love Revolution: Radical Body Positivity for Girls of Color.” School Library Journal, no. 5, 2020, p. 78. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsgbe&AN=edsgcl.622369414&site=eds-live&scope=site.

Deliovsky, Kathy. “Normative White Femininity: Race, Gender, and the Politics of Beauty.” Atlantis, vol. 33, no. 1, 2008 2008, pp. 48–58. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=apn&AN=ALTP758014&site=ehost-live.

Harper, Kathryn, and Becky L. Choma. “Internalised White Ideal, Skin Tone Surveillance, and Hair Surveillance Predict Skin and Hair Dissatisfaction and Skin Bleaching among African American and Indian Women.” Sex Roles, vol. 80, no. 11/12, June 2019, pp. 735–744. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1007/s11199-018-0966-9.

Ortiz Cofer, Judith. “The Story of My Body.” True Women and Real Men.