There are many methods with which we
defend our personal zones of space, and one of these is masking. The face we
present to the outer world is rarely our real face. It is considered
exceptional, almost peculiar behaviour to show what we really feel in our
facial expressions or in our actions. Instead we practise a careful discipline
when it comes to the expression of our facies and bodies. Dr Erving Goffman, in
his book, Behavior in Public Places, states that one of the most obvious
evidences of this discipline is the way we manage our personal appearance, the
clothes we select and the hairdos we affect. These carry a body-language
message to our friends and associates. Dr Goffman believes that in public
places the standard man of our society is expected to be neatly dressed and
clean-shaven, with his hair combed and his hands and face clean. His study,
written six years ago, didn't take into account the long hair, unshaven and
careless or freer look of today's young people, a look that is slowly gaining
acceptance. But this look, too, is one that is expected or formalized. It
conforms to a general ideal. Dr Goffman makes the point that there are times,
such as during the subway rush hour, when the careful masks we wear slip a bit,
and 'in a kind of temporary, uncaring, righteous exhaustion', we show ourselves
as we really are. We let the defences down and out of weariness or exasperation
we forget to discipline our faces. Play the game of looking about a crowded
bus, subway, or train during the rush hour after a day's work. See how much of
the bare human being is allowed to show in all the faces. Day after day we
cover up this bare human being. We hold ourselves in careful control lest our
bodies cry out messages our minds are too careless to hide. We smile constantly,
for a smile is a sign not only of humour or pleasure but it is also an apology,
a sign of defence or even an excuse.
I sit down next to you in a crowded
restaurant. A weak smile says, 'I don't mean to intrude, but this is the only vacant
place.' I brush against you in a packed elevator and my smile says, 'I am not
really being aggressive, but forgive me anyway.' I am thrown against someone in
a bus by a sudden stop, and my smile says, 'I did not intend to hurt you. I beg
your pardon.' And so we smile our way through the day, though in fact we may
feel angry and annoyed beneath the smile. In business we smile at customers, at
our bosses, at our employees; we smile at our children, at our neighbours, at
our husbands and wives and relatives, and very few of our smiles have any real
significance. They are simply the masks we wear. The masking process goes
beyond the facial muscles. We mask with our entire body. Women learn to sit in
a certain way to conceal their sexuality, especially when their skirts are
short. Men wear underwear that often binds their sexual organs. Women wear
brassieres to keep their breasts in place and mask too much sexuality. We hold
ourselves upright and button our shirts, zip up our flies, hold in our stomachs
with muscle and girdle, and practice a variety of facial maskings. We have our
party faces, our campus faces, our funeral faces and even in prison we have
particular faces to wear. In a book called Prison Etiquette, Dr B.
Phillips notes that new prisoners learn to 'dogface', to wear an expression that
is apathetic and characterless. When the prisoners are alone, however, in a reaction to the
protective dog facing of the day, they overreact and exaggerate their smiles,
their laughter and the hate they feel towards their guards. With advancing age
the masks we use often become
more difficult to wear. Certain women,
who have relied on facial beauty all their lives, find it hard in the mornings of
their old age to 'get their faces together'. The old man tends to forget
himself and drools or lets his face go lax. With advancing age come tics,
sagging jowls, frowns that won't relax and deep wrinkles that won't go away
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