She does not know her beauty. She thinks her brown glory, she thinks her body has no glory. If she could dance naked under palm trees and see her image in the river, she would know…Yes! She would know. But there are not palm trees in the street, no palm trees in the street and dishwater gives back no images. (Nina Simone, 1964)

Situated within the global context of corporeal notions, this paper seeks to explore the constructions and importance of body image and beauty (in the Caribbean) and attempts to discuss the extent to which Feminist thinking has affected these constructions and understandings. Additionally, it considers how the body (and beauty) has been traditionally interpreted, through the lenses of race, class and age, and discusses any changes registered with reference to such interpretations.

Using an interdisciplinary approach and drawing on the philosophical, social and scientific, it will examine how personal agency is applied and/or abdicated in determining and creating beauty and how these actions affect the preservation of the concept of integrity of the human being and spirit.

It will also examine the potential of Consumer Eugenics and Germline engineering to add further dimensions to the understandings and constructions of beauty, and the attendant socio-economic and psychic implications for women