What have face masks meant to people, and how have they changed us?

For many people, they have shown that something that seemed highly implausible before, like wearing a face mask to go down the street, is possible. It has been quite a warning. Now, it is much more difficult to say for certain that even more extreme situations will not happen to us in the future. Face masks have been, so to speak, the visible face of dystopia.

Has wearing a face mask made us lose our identity?

People’s identities are not affected on a deeper level by wearing a face mask. But there is no doubt that an important facet of human nature, such as expressing identity through facial expressions and words, has been changed, and perhaps even hindered. We have had to overcome an obstacle to interpersonal communication that was not there before—at least in our culture. Humans are endowed with great plasticity in terms of our behaviour, and we can reformulate expressions and conventions on how to relate to each other, but it takes considerable effort to do so.

How have face masks affected our relationship with others?

In the back-and-forth between intimacy and distance that has always characterised human relations, face masks have further enhanced pre-existing interpersonal distance. On the metro, for example, our faces tend to be relatively inexpressive, because we don't want to draw the attention of strangers. This means wearing an invisible expressionless mask. Physical masks have provided an extra level to the distance that we sometimes want to put between us and those who belong to other social circles.

Why do you think so many people have decided to keep wearing face masks outside, even though it is no longer mandatory? Is there an explanation that goes beyond the fear of infection?

It seems to me to be typical of an acquired habit, of habitual behaviour. Just as it takes a while to get used to a new style of behaviour, it also takes a while to get used to not doing it. Therefore, we still need some time to get used to this sign of liberation.

Do you think some people feel more comfortable without showing their faces? Why is that?

Body language always involves a certain ambiguity: on the one hand, it allows us to express ourselves and appear before others; on the other hand, it exposes us to their gaze, and makes us vulnerable. Appearance and exposure are two sides of the same coin. That’s why some people may feel less exposed and more protected behind a face mask.

How so?

Continuous exposure to the gaze of others sometimes results in a kind of fatigue, a certain tiredness in having to maintain one's image in a social world where we suffer from an excess of the visual. Perhaps a face mask, despite making communication more difficult, has allowed us to relax a little more when we are not interested in maintaining communication of a certain level of intensity with other people.

And as for social distancing, when the situation has gone back to normal, do you think social distancing will end or people will continue to maintain it?

The situation we have gone through has made us aware of the great level of physical proximity we were used to in our social interactions. Now we take this proximity, which was previously unremarkable, and we have unfortunately learned to see it as a possible threat. There is no doubt that interpersonal distance in interactions and communication is culturally mandated: there are “high-contact cultures” (such as Latin countries, for example) and “low-contact cultures” (such as English-speaking countries). As I mentioned before, it will take us some time to get back to our old habits, but I don't think we will see any significant changes to our usual behaviour if the threat does not persist and our fear of contagion disappears.

Has the pandemic changed us?  Will we learn something as individuals and as a society?

We have been given the chance to learn, to take note of our vulnerability, of our interdependence, of the need to connect and respect all aspects of nature, and also our own bodies. Understandably, we all feel a great desire to go back to living the same way we did before, but before blindly returning to the fast-paced life we used to know, we should take a moment to meditate on everything we have been through. Nothing is irrelevant.