White standards of beauty, a penchant of the “blue eyed, blond haired” look, are imposed upon black members of society, who internalize such cultural norms, “accepting rejection as legitimate, and self-evident” (9), and, being unable to meet such standards, are degraded in their own eyes, producing a “powerful self-loathing” (9), and internalized “racial loathing”. One of the major themes that Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye explores is the relationship between race and beauty, or, rather, how the dominant racial group’s perspective about beauty serves to degrade, exclude and marginalize other races, thereby serving the interests of the dominant group by achieving the continuance of its “superiority” over other groups in the eyes of society. Issues in Literary Study Class, Freshman Year, November 2009 The Bluest Eye: The Relationship between “Beauty” and “Race”
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