Masking our Emotions: An Anthropological Look at a New Abnormal Tracie L. Rose and Fred W. Boelter July 27, 2020
Interaction is a game of reading cues
The comedy and tragedy masks of theatre are recognizable worldwide and these two masks have a history traceable to ancient Greece. The name Melpomene represents the tragedy mask or Muse of Tragedy (sadness) and the name Thalia represents the comedy mask or Muse of Comedy (happiness). Simultaneously simple and complex with a lot of history.
Facial expressions, while visible, just might not be the most reliable emotional indicator. For example, people smile socially although they may not be happy nor even like the person with whom they are conversing. Is the smile a defense intended to protect the person smiling? Is the smile alluring and thus intended to send a message to the other person? Is the smile intended to be respectful of the other person? Is the smile nothing at all beyond being courteous socially?
The human smile may be nothing more than a mask or disguise with complex meaning that could be easily misunderstood.
Respirators, Face Coverings, Masks – What is the Purpose
Something on the face (or not) is for one of three basic reasons: Protect self (while thinking of dependents), protect nothing (without thinking of anyone), protect others (for the sake of society).
Protect self Protect self No protection Protect others Protect others What can be concluded from facial expressions without seeing the mouth?
Respirators, face coverings and masks have been used, misused and abused throughout human history. Each have their purpose, applications, limitations, many require training and fitting, some require medical certifications, many require manufacturing certifications, many require exposure data for selection and efficacy verification. It’s complicated both from a technical aspect as well as from a behavioral/psychological aspect.
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“Mirror, mirror, on the wall, Who is fairest of them all?” (Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm, 1812)
“Don't prac ce 'Germ Warfare'. MASK UP!” ― Anthony T Hincks
Masks can be found in nearly every culture throughout recorded time in one form or another. Masks are objects that cover one’s face for a variety of reasons such as protection, threat, disguise, cloak, entertainment, comedy, satire, celebration, ritual, beauty and identity. One might say applying make‐up and the use of avatars are forms of masking. Masks also provide cover for a wearer to act and behave in ways that may not be not societally or culturally acceptable; or conversely, bring them nearer a mainstream norm or expectation of others.
Death masks, ceremonial masks, tribal masks, religious masks, opera and theatrical masks, Venetian masks, Halloween masks, medical masks, occupational masks, military and police masks, villainous masks, and social masks, allow one to cover their facial expressions, their social rank, their intentions, their emotions, and their flaws.
But do masks, not unlike Batman’s, show a true identity. During COVID‐19, wearing a mask is a demonstrable commitment of caring for our neighbors, local grocery clerk, and coworkers; support of first responders and health care professionals; and collaboration with our community and nation. Now is not a time for playing make‐believe with masks… This is once again a time for public health consequences to be taken seriously.
In the 14th and 16th Centuries, during the black death, masks worn by French doctors looked like birds with long beaks. Artists in Europe during this same time period wore water soaked face‐ coverings to protect from inhalation of toxic chemicals while painting. In the mid 1800s, a gas mask was patented to be worn as protection during mining. In 1905, Alice Hamilton, a Chicago physician and pioneer in the field of occupational and industrial hygiene, recommended masks be worn during surgery to stop the spread of strep bacteria from doctors and nurses. During the Qing Dynasty, a Chinese scientist, Wu Lien‐Teh (1910), invented a two‐layered gauze “Wu’s mask” to protect against airborne transmission of the pneumonic plague. During outbreaks of infectious diseases including the flu and the increase in pollution and smog, mask technology continued to evolve to filter out specific substances. During the Spanish Flu of 1918, USPHS distributed masks and educated others on mask use. In the 1960s air pollution led the public in places like London to wear “smog masks”. Between 2002 and 2003, the SARS epidemic initiated the adoption of face masks as personal anti‐viral protection.
Various cultures long ago adopted the view that wearing a mask in public places was a gesture communicating solidarity, duty and an appreciation for the vulnerability of the community and public. In Asian cultures wearing a nose and mouth covering in public coveys a recognition of intimacy, shared fate, mutual obligation, civil duty and trust in the face of danger.
Western cultures have taken a different approach having at times banned the wearing of masks , disguises, and the veiling of one’s face. Since COVID‐19, the necessity of public health considerations are challenging norms of conventional behavior: wear a mask, physically distance, wash hands frequently.
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In all things, charity. Be careful where you draw the line.
“Empathy is seeing with the eyes of another, listening with the ears of another and feeling with the heart of another.” – Alfred Adler
Why do considerations of public health create such divisions? Is it really such an infringement upon “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” to slow down for a moment and demonstrate a concern about the health and well‐being of others? Maybe it’s just that the virus doesn’t care, so why should I care. Maybe it’s just an egotistical attitude that nobody is going to tell me what to do. Is the resistance to change societal or individual?
In the face of overwhelming data and scientific evidence, how have we achieved such visceral emotional and physical responses to masking up (or not) in public when masking is so easy and effective? Why do masks carry such a robust history of social and cultural meaning and conviction? We accept and celebrate masks for Halloween, Mardi Gras, and New Year’s eve fun, why not for the COVID‐19 that injures and kills people? Why does mask wearing to protect self become a much easier behavior to accept than mask wearing to protect others? There is no easy or perfect solution to the infectious viruses except to adapt and find ways to mitigate exposure in our schools, workplaces, and public life. ”Normal life” has changed us and our daily lives, whether we like it or not. Pretending it hasn’t puts many people’s lives at risk, not just one’s own life.
Rituals, Ceremonies, Weddings, Death – Masks Embody the Human Condition
“People carry their secrets in hidden places, not on their faces.” ‐ Steve Toltz
The Mask of Agamemnon in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens is made of a thick sheet of hammered pure gold. The mask depicts the exaggerated face of a man with details including eyebrows, moustache and beard, but near the ears, two holes implying perhaps it was worn by the decedent. Discovered in 1876, the current belief is Agamemnon’s mask dates to about 1600 BC, predating the Trojan Wars by about 400 years.
By looking at what masks were and are meant to convey, “Those who expect to reap the through time and place, we may glean a clue as to why blessings of freedom, must undergo the wearing a mask (or not) has become a question of civil fatigues of supporting it.” liberties. ― Thomas Paine
The earliest recorded (7000 BC) mask use was during rituals and ceremonies. Historians and anthropologists believe the art of making masks is likely much older; but, due to the materials available for use in mask making, namely, leather and wood, these artifacts would not easily survive to this day. Ritual masks include human‐like faces as well as stylized and figure masks of animals. Some cultures believe that wearing an animal mask makes it possible to communicate with the spirits of savannas, forests, and natural places; and even that the wearer of the mask
Consulting Health Scientists Page 3 of 6 Masking our Emotions: An Anthropological Look at a New Abnormal becomes that animal, inhabiting that place. Some tribes use masks to symbolize different attributes. Closed eyes symbolize tranquility and calm; a small mouth and eyes symbolize humility; a large chin symbolizes power and strength; while a bulging forehead symbolizes wisdom. Another theme of cultural masks depicts the ideal of feminine beauty. War masks with big eyes, painted colors, and features of anger carved in the face were designed to scare an enemy. Masks of Pre‐Columbian and Andean shaman represented devils and gods and were used to communicate with the afterlife; and some Africa tribes believed masks allowed a direct connection with a supernatural ability to move in time and space.
Today masks have many uses from dance performances, celebrations, for protection against evil, to pray for a better tomorrow, and theatrical performances. Theatrical masks and painted faces worn during Chinese opera and theatrical performances provide a color key for audiences to read the role of the characters at one glance: red for loyalty, heroism and courage; purple for sophistication and justice; black for integrity, impartiality and neutrality; blue for wisdom, stubbornness and fierceness; green for lack of self‐control, violence and impulse; yellow and white for cruelty, hypocrisy and evil. Gods, demons and spirits are painted gold or silver to symbolize mystery.
Noh is the oldest style of Japanese theater and dates to the 8th Century Chinese art form of Sangaku. Noh masks are carved from a single piece of wood painted with natural pigment. The masks represent age, gender and social ranking of the human or non‐human, e.g. animal, demon or divine. Japanese masks connected to folk myths and tales represent people, creatures, devil, ghosts, and animals. Kyōgen is a form of traditional Japanese comic performance in the theater during intermission between Noh acts.
In Korea, mask dances are used as entertainment as well as satire and social commentary. Korean soldiers wore masks in battles as did their horses. Jade and bronze masks were used as funerary masks. Korean shamans used masks in cleansing rituals to drive away evils spirits from the ill.
Among the Oceanic peoples of the South Pacific masks have been used in ritual, religious and social ceremonies included funerary customs, fertility rites, and curing of the sick. Oceanic groups in which ancestral worship was very strong depicted ancestors through masks.
Islamic doctrine prohibited figural art representing “No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the human beings or animals. An exception may be the multitudes, without finally getting bewildered niqab or burqa, a veil worn to cover a woman’s face; as to which may be true.” however, these are not considered masks. -Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter
Inuit groups and North American woodland tribes had a custom of “False faces” used during shamanic rituals of healing and warding off spirits. Pacific Northwest coastal groups had skilled woodworkers that made their complex and detailed masks from wood, leather, bones and feathers, with movable parts. These masks represent unity between men, their ancestors and hunted animals, as well as during exorcising of evil spirits.
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The Iroquois wore corn husk masks at harvest rituals to give thanks for and to achieve future abundance of crops. Fertility rites are still performed by the Hopi and Zuni peoples of the American Southwest during which masked dancers representing clouds, rain, spirits, stars, earth mother, sky god, and others, as well as a shaman, take part in elaborate ceremonies designed to ensure crop fertility.
In cultures with burial customs, anthropomorphic masks, were used during ceremonies to associate with the dead and departing spirits. Throughout history cultures have used death masks as a way to ensure safe passage of the dead to the spirit world, to ward off evil spirits, as a celebration of the deceased, and as a final viewing of a loved one. Funerary masks used to cover the face of the deceased were made with the recognizable features of the decedent, both to honor the departed and to establish their relationship with the spirit world.
Some cultures used funerary masks to protect the deceased by frightening away malevolent spirits. In Egypt, from the 11th to the end of the 14th Dynasty, stylized masks – such as the solid gold mask of Tutankhamun depicting facial features of the deceased – were placed on the dead so the soul could recognize the body and return to it, as well as guide the spirit of the deceased to its final resting place. Priests of ancient Egypt, during rituals, wore masks in the likeness of animal heads and heads of gods so they could embody these entities on Earth.
Gold masks also were found placed on the faces of deceased kings of Cambodia and Siam (n/k/a Thailand). Mummies of Inca royalty wore golden masks while the Inca lower personages’ masks were made of wood or clay. Aztec masks were made of silver, copper and gold. Some of ancient Andean masks had movable parts. In the Olmec culture of the Gulf of Mexico, depictions of masks of human faces mixed with those of animals were found carved in stone as early as 1000 BC. The Aztec cultures of Mexico and Peru had a funerary rites skull mask inlaid with mosaics and semi‐precious stones, like turquoise; and the eye sockets were filled with iron pyrite.
The tradition of bridal veils is to protect virgins from evil spirits. Victorian women wore bonnet lace to protect their faces from street dust; and “surgical” masks were adopted to protect the patient from potential infection from the mask wearer. Protective masks are used in many circumstances to prevent injury of the wearer; as with ice hockey goalies, swordplay among fencers, welding with poisonous gases, and SCBAs for fire‐fighting.
During the Republic of Venice, there was a strict class “The irony of life is that those who hierarchy so residents wore stylish masks to hide not just wear masks often tell us more truths their identity but disguise their social standing. Masks are still than those with open faces.” used for disguise, such as during carnival, while protesting, as ― Marie Lu, The Rose Society camouflage, or while perpetrating a crime.
Facing Challenges
“God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.” ‐ William Shakespeare
Human beings establish emotional connections through facial features resembling ourselves and our infants. Infants use faces as tools to learn emotional and social responses, as well as for language connectors. Infants’ ability to detect emotions from faces increases sensitivity to nonlinguistic communicative information such as emotion. It's nearly impossible for us to mark two dots on a sheet of paper without seeing a pair of eyes staring back at us. Ancient astronomers marked the night sky with
Consulting Health Scientists Page 5 of 6 Masking our Emotions: An Anthropological Look at a New Abnormal human‐form and animal shapes. Social communication like all forms of human communication systems, is a dynamic system of the transmission and decoding of information.
Mouth and face “looking and cueing” is vital to the language and speech development in learners with sound disorders such as apraxia of speech. Speech therapy for such learners includes components of following lip, mouth and tongue movements of the therapist or educator. Similarly the face and mouth play important roles in language development among hearing impaired learners, cognitive impaired learners, and those with speech disorders such as stuttering. Will mask wearing require a new process of learning?
Masks hold different spiritual significance and serve different purposes. A mask can frighten, instill panic, provide protection, instill confidence, and give comfort and relief. Masks reveal differences and similarities between cultures and civilizations throughout history, as well as inform about ethics and morality. In this time of COVID‐19, science has shown a clear beneficial response to masks and face‐coverings. By wearing a mask you can recognize a duty and courtesy for the protection of others; not as individuals, but for society as a whole.
‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Tracie L. Rose Fred W Boelter, CIH, PE, BCEE, FAIHA Principal & Cultural Anthropologist Principal, Health Sciences office 773‐867‐6000 office 208‐258‐7478 www.rhprisk.com cell 312‐560‐9113
This essay is the sixth in a series by Principals of RHP regarding the topic of risk and COVID‐19. At RHP Risk Management, we help our clients characterize the uncertainties associated with environmental and occupational hazards and risks to contextualize meaning that can be understood by their decision‐making audiences be they the public, employees, consumers, regulators, or shareholders. For more RHP resources concerning COVID‐19, visit www.rhprisk.com/coronavirus/
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