The pervasive obsession with youthfulness and physical attractiveness in contemporary society has resulted in a proliferation of products and services that older adults, particularly women, are increasingly compelled to utilise.
We elucidate the two definitions of ageism that emerged in in-depth interviews with 44 women aged 50 to 70 years : the social obsession with youthfulness and discrimination against older adults.
This behaviour accepts rather than challenges the cultural valuation of youthfulness and the negative representation of old age.
For the ' mask of ageing ', continuity would imply sustaining a youthfulness which stabilises at some point in adulthood.
In texts about 'age-defying consumers', marketing ' experts' and reporters connected consumer purchases to several positive outcomes, such as youthfulness and social inclusion.
The youthfulness of these states and of their apparatus, as well as the traumatising experience of colonialism, are to some degree responsible.
The mask of ageing speaks to the repression and denial of old age and mortality in a society that adulates youthfulness.
For the ' persona ', youthfulness in the context of a maturing self becomes a diversion.
