Names may escape you over time, but the memories of faces can stay with you forever. We explore the cultural and evolutionary significance of the face.
The human face can cast an intoxicating spell over those who behold them. It has the power to communicate, express and provoke emotion, define our individual identities as well as play a key role in sexuality.
The media knows only too well that putting a human face to a story will automatically stir more of a reaction in an audience. A human face for a story of injustice or tragedy can rally up protest, evoke sympathy or even make us part with our money. While in children’s literature, cartoons and movies, faces are often given to the most everyday inanimate objects to help children identify with them.
Using our faces to express can give away what the mouth doesn’t say; a hurt glance can speak what a thousand words never can, a raise of an eyebrow can convey an in-joke between friends, a familiar face can console us when we feel afraid, and a warm smile from a stranger can be a comfort when you are feeling alone in the world.
The relevance of the face has been noted for centuries. Kings and Queens had their portraits painted (often to be more flattering than the reality) so that their subjects could put a face to their name, and the faces of timeless icons such as Marilyn Monroe, James Dean and Elvis Presley are immortalised on everything from pop-art prints to clock faces across the world.
For centuries the Chinese art of face reading has been practised. Although not a proven science, there are certainly elements of truth to it – above all, faces can tell stories about who we are, where we have been, where we are going and how we see the world.
The eyes
Perhaps the most expressive of all of our facial features are the eyes. Whether they are blue, green, brown, grey, hazel, aqua, black, amber or violet, the eyes can often tell us what is going on inside the mind.
The colour of the eyes is caused by the presence of melanin – a form of colourant. People with very little melanin in their eyes will have blue eyes, people with some melanin will have green eyes and those with a lot of melanin will have brown eyes, while other shades are variations in between these colours.
The eye allows humans conscious light perception, vision and the perception of depth. The human eye has a 200-degree viewing angle and can see up to 10 million different colours.
The skin on the eyelid is just 1mm thick and is slightly translucent so light can pass through it. The blinking of the eyes is an action that prevents them from drying out. This stems from our aquatic origins – when we lived in water our eyes were constantly lubricated, but in air we need to protect them from drying out. Each blink covers the eyeball with tears. These are mildly antiseptic to prevent the eye from getting infected and they also transport oxygen to the cornea of the eye.
The eyebrows and eyelashes
The eyes are surrounded by eyelashes, which offer protection from small objects falling into the eye. These are sensitive to touch, enabling them to feel if an object is near the eye and automatically close as a reflex.
Long eyelashes are seen as a desirable trait, as well as being a sign of femininity in many cultures, which explains the popularity of mascara, new lash growth stimulation products and false eyelashes.
The eyebrows also offer protection for the eye, mainly to prevent perspiration and rain from entering the eyes. The sloped shape of eyebrows ensures water runs down the temples and avoids the eyes.
Eyebrows are a major facial feature which is often overlooked. Without eyebrows, or with different shaped eyebrows, the whole look of the face can change. Often women will tweeze or wax eyebrows to create a refined arch and give a more delicate, feminine look to the face.
They are also vital for communicating without words, or enhancing emotion, to convey surprise, humour or anger.
The skin
As the body’s biggest organ, the skin protects us from the hazards of the world outside. It’s waterproof, bacteria-proof and if skin is dark then it is also sun-proof.
In evolutionary terms, when humans first developed in then eastern and southern parts of Africa, they needed to protect themselves from burning in the hot sun, and black skin, which contains a lot of the colourant melanin, acts as nature’s own sunscreen, stopping UV rays from penetrating skin and burning it.
When humans migrated out of Africa 100,000 years ago to new, colder and wetter places, natural selection over thousands of years gave them genes that altered and lightened the colour of their skin.
This occurred because their black skin prevented the weaker sunlight of northern climates to penetrate. Sunlight, in particular UV light, activates steroids that synthesise Vitamin D and in turn increases bone calcium, essential for strong healthy bones. Therefore, due to the lack of sunlight penetration, the skeleton became weak and prone to several health problems. As our ancestors’ diet would have been limited and may not have contained any Vitamin D, their skin became whiter so more sunlight could be absorbed in order to stay healthy.
But the whiter the skin, the less natural sun protection it contains. This makes it more prone to skin cancer caused by UV damage, which breaks down the walls of cells and causes tumours to develop.
Over the past 60 years, up until the 90s, having a suntan was fashionable – many people baked in the sun and visited solariums. But this has also meant an increase in the incidence of skin cancer in light-skinned people. On a global scale, currently the highest incidences of skin cancer can be found in white Australians, with a significantly lower incidence among indigenous Australians.
The hair
Hair colour is also determined by the presence of melanin. There are two types of melanin: eumelanin and pheomelanin. Black hair has black eumelanin, while brown hair has brown eumelanin and blonde hair also has brown eumelanin but in a much smaller concentration, while people with true red hair produce pheomelanin.
Colours that fall between these hair colours contain a mixture of eumelanin and pheomelanin. For example, strawberry blonde hair has the small amount of brown eumelanin like blonde hair, mixed with pheomelanin, while auburn hair has a larger quantity of brown eumelanin mixed with pheomelanin.
Our ancestors would most likely have had black curly hair, and the curls would have enabled heat to evaporate quickly from the head. Like skin colour, hair colour evolved when humans migrated to colder places.
The nose
The nose is the primary organ for smelling, but it’s also the body’s own air-conditioning system. As the lungs need to be supplied with air that is about 35 degrees centigrade and 95 percent humidity, our noses have to deliver air to the lungs at the right temperature.
In hot, dry countries the air is heated but there is a lack of moisture. Noses in these drier climates have typically evolved to be larger and flatter so that as air travels up the nose it absorbs moisture as it passes. While in Northern Europe the air has more moisture but is colder, so humans here adapted to have long, narrow noses that restrict the air, to give it more time to warm up before it reaches the lungs.
The size and shape of the nose affects the look of the whole face, which is why many rhinoplasty patients can look extremely different after their operation.
The lips
The skin on our lips is so thin that the blood vessels below them are visible, and this is what gives them their red or pink colour.
Lips are the opening of the mouth, as well as a vital tool for eating, drinking and speaking, a sensory organ thanks to their many nerve endings and also an erogenous zone that plays a crucial role in kissing.
They also play a part in human attraction, as a woman’s lip size is said to be determined by her oestrogen levels. So a younger, more fertile woman tends to have plumper lips than an older woman whose oestrogen levels are declining. This makes lips an excellent indicator of a woman’s fertility for a man who is looking to reproduce.
The teeth
The main function of the teeth is to cut down food. The canine teeth are deeply rooted in the upper jaw and are for gripping and ripping food, while the premolars and molars crush food into a pulp so it can be digested easily.
The wisdom teeth at the back of the mouth don’t emerge in everyone, and it is often said that they are an example of a feature being ‘selected out’ by evolution because advances in food mean we don’t need as many teeth to eat any more.
Teeth are often one of the first things many people notice when they meet another person and a straight, white smile is associated with beauty.
This is attributed to clean-looking, perfectly lined up teeth being another signifier of health – as crooked teeth are harder to eat with and can cause headaches, among other health complaints. Clean, white teeth are also associated with health because they look like they have been cared for and have not been subjected to illnesses that may have discoloured them.
It seems good oral health can be a window to overall systemic health. For example, bleeding gums, which is one of the first signs of gum disease, allows bacteria to seep into the blood stream.
Many researchers believe that a number of health problems, such as cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, HIV and diabetes, can show the first signs of presence in the body in the sufferer’s mouth.
The chin
The chin is one of the biggest puzzles for scientists wishing to explain the reasons our facial features look the way they do. There’s no doubt that it’s a prominent facial feature, but it has no obvious function. In fact, it seems to simply be a remnant of our once much larger jaw, which was needed for hunting and eating raw food before fire was discovered. Today people can have a variety of different sized and shaped chins that give them a defined face shape.
The cheekbones
The zygomatic bones, also known as the cheekbones, give structure to the face. High, pronounced cheekbones are seen as an attractive characteristic in both men and women.
There is no certain scientific explanation for why this is, but there are two main theories. The first is that a face with high cheekbones will age better than one without, as the cheekbones almost add extra ‘scaffolding’ to the face when gravity begins to take its toll, and so lessen the chance of developing jowls and saggy facial skin.
The second is that, in terms of evolution, when humans look for a mate they are ‘programmed’ to seek out the healthiest genes with which to procreate and one signifier of health is facial symmetry. When someone has protruding cheekbones it is easier for a possible mate to see if their face is symmetrical or not, so their health and genes are much more on display.
The ears
The ears not only detect sound but also affect balance and body positioning. They are placed on each side of the head to localise sound sources.
In the Western world, protruding ears have been seen as an unattractive quality and corrective surgery for this condition can be traced back as far as 1881.
The ‘ideal’ ear shape is fairly small, with a rounded top and a small earlobe. But strangely there is no scientific evidence showing that this ear shape is beneficial to humans – as with other characteristics that are deemed desirable there is usually a survival benefit to them.
In many cultures the ears can also be used as a decorative tool to make a person look more attractive – particularly women – who have their ears pierced and adorned with eye-catching jewellery.
The tongue
Finally, the most hidden but nonetheless an important facial feature is the tongue. This is formed of a number of muscles, which is what allows it to bend and change shape, width and length.
The tongue has a variety of uses, including forming the shapes we need to speak, registering food tastes in the taste buds and helping the swallowing action, which occurs around once a minute, or nine times a minute when we eat.
