The face and identity: from Renaissance portraits to modern selfies

For most of human history, we had no idea what we looked like. This was before mirrors and cameras became part of everyday life. We might catch our reflection in a glass window, or, like Narcissus, see ourselves looking back from a pool of water. If we didn’t know what we looked like, who did we think we were? How much of our sense of self is based on our face? How far will we go to improve our appearance?

This week: how our faces became so central to our identity. Our guest is historian Fay Bound-Alberti, founder of the Centre for Technology and the Body at King’s College London and author of a new book, The Face: A Cultural History. She also has face blindness, a neurological condition that makes it difficult for her to recognize familiar faces…even the face of her own child.