Wednesday, January 19, 2011

fewer words than usual wednesday

I am writing this from my phone. Let's see if it works...
The cover of a recent Carter's catalog:

The last page:

So far the pictures don't seem to be posting right. Anyhoo, what is the deal with blond haired/blue eyed people?? This is not a rhetorical question. My husband says part of it is that the protein that makes hair blond that is very rare. My answer to that is...so?
I think there are fewer redheads than there are blondes, and redheads aren't all over the catalog covers. I watched a Bible cartoon once and the people looked swarthy (is that an offensive term?) but the angels were all blond and blue eyed!

Like I said, this is not a rhetorical question so if you have some insight into where this exaltation of fair- haired, light-eyed people comes from...I am all ears (and eyes.) And there is no spell check on my phone, so if there are typos I'm sure you can still figure out what I'm trying to say, because you are smart.
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3 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:42 PM

    I can't answer your question, but I can tell you that my husb and I both have dark hair and eyes, and when our son was born with blond hair people acted like we were the luckiest people on earth. Even the question about whether his eye color will change, it's like it's a social "given" that we would want them to stay blue.

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  2. I read through this a few times and gave it some thought. To be honest I can't figure it out either. I was an extremely blonde haired and blue eyed little girl. I grew into a light brown hair and blue eyed adult.
    A few months after our daughter was born (who is black) one of our friend's had a baby and we went to see her. When we got home my husband said (of their blonde haired blued eyed baby), 'Was she funny looking? She looked really odd to me.' I responded by telling him that it was because she was white. He scoffed at that idea. So when another friend had a baby a few months later he come home and said, 'You are right. I think white babies look funny now.'
    We have come up for many reasons why we feel this way, but what it boils down to is that society tells us so often that straight hair, blonde hair, blue eyes, and so on are beautiful. But when I look at my daughter I see the most beautiful being that I have ever layed eyes on. My idea of beauty have been sharply changed as a result.
    Hopefully this very long response make sense.

    Andrea

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  3. Anonymous9:31 PM

    Okay, this is really old now, but I have been thinking about your question about blonde hair/blue eyes for a while now. So I brought it up to my mom this week and she suggested it may be because of Renaissance art. European artists painted people that looked like them, and a lot of the art was of religious scenes (angels included). Hence over-representation of lighter skinned/haired people (the Dutch masters come to mind). There hasn't been a major period in art that has replaced this classical depiction.

    This also makes me think of some china plates I saw at the State department that had colonial scenes on them--all the patriots had Asian features (the plates were literally made in China).
    JD

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