"By bringing together a provocative selection of essays and images, Only Skin Deep: Changing Visions of the American Self addresses the issues of nation, race, and selfhood and how they are depicted in ways that are challenging and informative, prompting readers to consider the impact of photography on our everyday lives." "If photographs are chiefly responsible for perpetuating myths of American identity, can a different reading of these representations break down distorting stereotypes? This is the central question posed by Only Skin Deep. The authors in this book forcefully argue that race and nation - and, indeed, photography itself - are fictions, cultural constructions that shape our social interactions. Even as symbols, these photographic depictions of ethnic difference and cultural superiority have very real consequences.

This collection of works and essays addresses, for example, the lingering consequences of American colonial expansion; the conflict between public and private visualizations of individuals; the role of commercial imagery in shaping gender roles; the impact of fantasy in ethnic or ethnographic photography; and the uses of science to provide justification for politicized depictions of "race."" "Accompanying a major exhibition of the same name, Only Skin Deep offers a critical rereading of the archive of the history of photography. This applies to the works of famous photographers - such as Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans, Ansel Adams, and Edward Steichen - as well as lesser-known historical figures, including Charles Eisenmann, Frances Benjamin Johnston, Will Soule, and Toyo Miyatake.

A substantial part of the book is devoted to contemporary artists and photographers who have moved beyond the multicultural approach to representations of "race" and have made an investigation of the semiotics of cultural identity a prevalent theme over the past decade. Among the recent photographers included are: Nancy Burson, Nikki S. Lee, Glenn Ligon, Paul Pfeiffer, Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie, Cindy Sherman, Lorna Simpson, and Andres Serrano."--Jacket.