KNOTTY GIRL: Straightening My African Roots

Before I “fix” my hair I have to muster up a lot of outer and inner strength. “Fixing” my hair is a process; it is not a wash and go. It’s not even a wash, blow dry and go. It is time consuming, expensive and physically draining. I remember one day I had had it. I no longer had the energy or wanted to waste anymore time and money on my hair. I threw my straightening iron on the bathroom floor and cried. I sobbed. I could not understand why God had given me such rebellious hair. I wanted good hair, straight hair, white women’s hair. Nappy hair is rebellious and unmanageable. Commercials tell me I should not give into the bad hair “because I’m worth it”, and makeover shows promise my issues can be resolved with some make up, new clothes, and a professional cut and dye job.

In North America, hair is extremely important. Hair is an important aspect of how people define themselves and how people define others. Virginia Rutter in her book, Celebrating girls, discusses how hair is a way for mothers to bond with their daughters and a way for us to express our identity. But there was no celebrating when my mother did my hair. The memories I have are that of my mother combing my hair in a dispassionate manner. Nappy hair is kinky and painful to comb. As a child, and even now, my mother holds me down and forces me to silently submit. Her frustration becomes my frustration and visa versa. This only creates an even deeper loathing for my hair and an object for my mother’s disapproval. Why sit and go through the pain in the first place? Why not go bald and forget about it?

Faced with the problem of their hair, many black women choose to be bald or wear their hair very short. In a culture where hair is used to symbolize more than gender and beauty, this is unappealing to many women. For women who involuntarily become bald, it is seen as unhealthy which reinforces the notion that women should be perfect. Shaving the hair of women was, and still is used as punishment for defiance or sin. The choice to be (almost) bald projects an image of resistance.

The truth is, the beauty industry can not profit off baldness, so they portray long hair as desirable and sexy, and sell self confidence in a shampoo bottle. Hair care companies have been profiting off black women for years as part of a colonial project of assimilation and preying upon black women’s need to find acceptance. We have been sold beauty in the image of white women.