Questioning beauty

For junior Ashley Morton, the list of qualities an ideal partner must have is short and to the point.\n"Personality, smart, funny and attractive," she said counting off the attributes on her fingers.\nWhile Morton's list rings true with most people, one item on it has been the focus of scholars, academics and artists for centuries: attractiveness, also known as beauty.\n"Perfect beauty is an ideal that's unattainable, even though we believe in it passionately," art history professor John Bowles said.\nSocial psychologist and professor Eliot Smith said a possible reason for society's obsession with beauty is simple evolution.\n"When things are attractive, they are thought to be advantageous," Smith said, "with freedom from disease and good genes. We are hard-wired to respond favorably to beauty because it produces better offspring."\nSeventeenth-century Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens painted women large and curvy. Art history professor Sarah Burns said weight was seen as beautiful because it displayed wealth and because a well-fed body was thought to be strong reproductively. In Rubens' painting "Venus in the Mirror," Venus has a beautiful wide face and rolls of flesh that spill over to sit heavily on her thick hips as she gazes in a mirror.\n"Rubens was famous for celebrating super abundant flesh," said Burns. "What would be considered grossly fat today was a representation of what was ideal for feminine beauty."\nStill, seeing women who aren't stick thin as being attractive is not restricted to the 17th century. Psychology professor Ed Hirt points to sexual icon Marilyn Monroe as an example.\n"Marilyn Monroe is very pretty, but kind of chunky by today's standards," Hirt said.\nBurns said art has long given the general public an idea of what was physically beautiful in both men and women. Ancient Greek statues show the ideal male human body, Burns said, complete with sculpted muscles and chiseled features. The Renaissance male nude is also seen as an ideal of male beauty, especially through the art of Michelangelo, such as his "David" sculpture.\nBut beauty in men hasn't always been seen through muscle.\n"In the Romantic period, masculinity was identified with thoughtfulness, dreaminess and melancholy," Burns said. "These are all qualities that distinguish the artist or poet from a muscle-bound type."\nBut while there are many examples of male beauty in art, there is a consensus that more emphasis is placed on female beauty, which Hirt brings back to the evolutionary theory.\n"I think that evolutionarily there has been a selection criteria such that female attractiveness signaled reproductive success and fertility," Hirt said, "and so beauty is selected for more in women than in men."\nIn mythology and fairy tales, much of the emphasis on beauty has been on feminine beauty. Helen of Troy had the face that launched a thousand ships, and Snow White was so beautiful her step-mother tried to kill her. \n"There's definitely more pressure for women," said junior Kate Canepa, as Morton nodded in agreement.\n"Boys just get up and go (to class)," Morton said. "Girls have to get up an hour early to shower."\nEven in art, the emphasis is still more on women than men, Burns said.\n"From the Renaissance on down, beautiful women as represented by men is a concept as fueled by male desires," Burns said. "Male fantasies decide what constitutes alluring women."\nHirt said terms like "beautiful" and "gorgeous" mean something more than words like "pretty" or "cute" because they evoke an extreme reaction in people and are used more sparingly.\nMorton and Canepa agree there are degrees of difference in the words used to describe someone's attractiveness.\n"'Hot' is more sexual," Morton said. "'Beautiful' is more about classic beauty."\nHowever, what actually constitutes classic beauty is up for debate. Bowles said he thinks there aren't any guidelines, at least seen in art, that can define beauty.\n"No, there aren't any timeless characteristics," he said. \nHirt said what makes someone to be considered beautiful differs between cultures and sexes. There are a few characteristics that are thought to be universally beautiful; specifically high cheekbones, big eyes and symmetrical features.\n"Look at how cartoon characters who are supposed to be attractive are illustrated, those are the features you see," he said.\nEven with all the cultural emphasis on beauty, Morton and Canepa agree that without a brain, beauty is meaningless in the end.\n"Appearance is what draws you in first," Canepa said, "but getting to know their personality is what makes someone most attractive"