Beneath the Surface by Lynn M Thomas
Lynn M. Thomas constructs a transnational history of skin lighteners in South Africa and beyond, theorizing skin and skin color as a site for antiracist struggle and lighteners as a technology of visibility that both challenges and entrenches racial and gender hierarchies.-
Necropolitics
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Brutalism
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The Wombs of Women
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The Visual Afterlife of Abdelkader Bennahar
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Architecture of Migration
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The Surrounds
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The Colonizing Self
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Revolution and Disenchantment
- Enacting Decolonization
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Elementary Aspects of the Political
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In the Skin of the City
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Utopia of the Uniform
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The Complete Lives of Camp People
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Experiments with Empire
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Markets of Civilization
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Postcolonial Imperialism
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Senghor: Writings on Politics
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Secularism As Misdirection
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An Unformed Map
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Composing Violence
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The Doctor Who Would Be King
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Psychiatric Contours
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Archaism and Actuality
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Naked Agency
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The Fixer
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Students of the World
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The Briny South
“Beneath the Surface is nothing short of a tour de forceLynn M. Thomas's ‘layered history’ does justice to the immensely difficult subject of skin lighteners. Carefully attending to the complex politics of race and color that are grounded in skin, Thomas at once provides a vibrant history of South Africa and a global history of commodity, beauty, and the body. This landmark study sets a new standard in the field.” -- Julie Livingston, author of * Self-Devouring Growth: A Planetary Parable as Told from Southern Africa *
“Allowing for a comparative analysis over a period of time when the global relationships and meanings of skin color became tied to class, race, and racism, Beneath the Surface helps us understand the intense and long-standing interest whites and blacks have had in lightening the color of their skin despite the potential for severe health risks. There is simply no other book like it.” -- Noliwe M. Rooks, author of * Hair Raising: Beauty, Culture, and African American Women *
"Beneath the Surface makes a necessary contribution to [a] small pool of work on beauty and geography as Thomas' analysis integrates these subjects in considering the (trans)national politics and racial inequalities that uphold skin lightening.… This book would appeal to both undergraduate and graduate students as well as scholars interested in beauty, geopolitics, race, and colonialism." -- Meena Pyatt * Gender, Place & Culture *
“Thomas resourcefully assembles and interweaves sources connecting popular, business, medical and political culture. …. Beneath the Surface would be an engaging key text for students to study a history of race and gender within everyday global beauty cultures.” -- Fabiola Creed * Metascience *
"Beneath the Surface is the most comprehensive book regarding skin lighteners available to date and it is both interesting and innovative.… The book has value as a postgraduate textbook relevant to the fields of history, social science, geopolitics, gender studies, geography, psychology, dermatology, and others. The layered, integrated history presented by Thomas in Beneath the Surface is indeed 'a landmark study' of skin colour and skin lighteners that interrogates every influencing factor from slavery and segregation to consumer capitalism, political protests and reinforced social inequities, and beyond." -- Caradee White * South African Journal of Science *
"Lynn Thomas’s Beneath the Surface constructs a history of skin lighteners that is simultaneously rigorous in its historical evidence base and virtuosic in its lucid articulation of the technologies as they are mobilised in complex contexts in and beyond South Africa. . . . Its biopolitical argument is convincingly made and compelling." -- Vivette Garcia-Deister * BioSocieties *
"This is an impressive book that will surely be a classic for scholars interested in aesthetics, beauty politics, and gender. It is an especially welcome addition to the literature as it centers on African history from a transnational perspective. It also has much to offer those with specialization in the history of science, medicine, and technology." -- Oluwakemi M. Balogun * Journal of African History *
“Allowing for a comparative analysis over a period of time when the global relationships and meanings of skin color became tied to class, race, and racism, Beneath the Surface helps us understand the intense and long-standing interest whites and blacks have had in lightening the color of their skin despite the potential for severe health risks. There is simply no other book like it.” -- Noliwe M. Rooks, author of * Hair Raising: Beauty, Culture, and African American Women *
"Beneath the Surface makes a necessary contribution to [a] small pool of work on beauty and geography as Thomas' analysis integrates these subjects in considering the (trans)national politics and racial inequalities that uphold skin lightening.… This book would appeal to both undergraduate and graduate students as well as scholars interested in beauty, geopolitics, race, and colonialism." -- Meena Pyatt * Gender, Place & Culture *
“Thomas resourcefully assembles and interweaves sources connecting popular, business, medical and political culture. …. Beneath the Surface would be an engaging key text for students to study a history of race and gender within everyday global beauty cultures.” -- Fabiola Creed * Metascience *
"Beneath the Surface is the most comprehensive book regarding skin lighteners available to date and it is both interesting and innovative.… The book has value as a postgraduate textbook relevant to the fields of history, social science, geopolitics, gender studies, geography, psychology, dermatology, and others. The layered, integrated history presented by Thomas in Beneath the Surface is indeed 'a landmark study' of skin colour and skin lighteners that interrogates every influencing factor from slavery and segregation to consumer capitalism, political protests and reinforced social inequities, and beyond." -- Caradee White * South African Journal of Science *
"Lynn Thomas’s Beneath the Surface constructs a history of skin lighteners that is simultaneously rigorous in its historical evidence base and virtuosic in its lucid articulation of the technologies as they are mobilised in complex contexts in and beyond South Africa. . . . Its biopolitical argument is convincingly made and compelling." -- Vivette Garcia-Deister * BioSocieties *
"This is an impressive book that will surely be a classic for scholars interested in aesthetics, beauty politics, and gender. It is an especially welcome addition to the literature as it centers on African history from a transnational perspective. It also has much to offer those with specialization in the history of science, medicine, and technology." -- Oluwakemi M. Balogun * Journal of African History *
Lynn M. Thomas is Professor of History at the University of Washington; coeditor of The Modern Girl Around the World: Consumption, Modernity, and Globalization, also published by Duke University Press; and author of Politics of the Womb: Women, Reproduction, and the State in Kenya.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781478006428 |
| ISBN 10 | 1478006420 |
| Title | Beneath the Surface |
| Author | Lynn M Thomas |
| Series | Theory In Forms |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Duke University Press |
| Year published | 2020-01-10 |
| Number of pages | 368 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |