I have quite a few posts on the politics of having kinky hair over at my blog. In the past, people sometimes emailed me to say that they didn’t understand how or why hair is political. After Don Imus and the whole “nappy-headed hos” mess, they got a taste of why it is very political. What the former radio talk show host did was touch upon the third rail of race in a way opened up discussions of matters not usually heard in public conversations.
Most black women know what it’s like to have an arsenal of hair care products, particularly if you choose to wear your hair straightened with chemical relaxers. [Ironically, most of the Rutgers women’s basketball team members had chemically straightened hair, which goes to show you that Imus reduced them to his assumption that black women=nappy hair=unattractive.] I had a cabinet full of “hair product” when I wore processed styles.
And oh, the dreaded hot comb. I am old enough to have experienced the “pleasure” of the thermal hot comb — you rested it over the gas flame of the stove to heat it up. Then the pressing oil was carefully applied to your hair and that comb sizzled through the kinks till it was bone straight, hissing as you prayed the comb didn’t touch your scalp. This is what black women did to emulate straight hair. I say emulate because all it took was water or merely a humid day to revert the hair back to its natural state. But that was the only acceptable style for the working black woman working in the dominant culture.
In 2005 I was interviewed by Heather Barnes, who was working on a documentary project on women and their relationship to their hair from a personal and political perspective. Her blog for the project, Hair Stories, is up and running.
The stories might relate to shaving, first haircuts, having long or short hair, losing their hair, hair and ethnicity, stigma about body hair (either too much or too little), and the cultural and social significance of hair in all its manifestations.Here’s my interview. She’s intercut it with photos from my hair journey web page. When you watch it you’ll see a tortured hair history in the school photos — while I’m the product of two black parents, neither had kinky hair; it took a while for my mom to figure out how to take care of mine, particularly dealing with the humidity in NC.
Full freedom for me finally came when I decided in the 90s to toss out the relaxer and cut the dry damaged hair off. I wore a short natural for several years. I began the process of growing locs in November 2000, a style I wear today. Free from the burning hot comb sizzling my scalp, curling irons, flat irons or other instruments of hair torture.
The status quo is still straightened hair, even though we see more natural styles in vogue now. Black women are unfortunately still chastised by family and significant others not to 1) cut their hair or 2) let it be kinky. It’s one of those “dirty laundry” matters that people don’t want to discuss openly, but when you have such poisonous, enabled self-loathing, it needs sunlight upon it. Look at this ad. It implies that the woman got the job because her hair was chemically straightened. The self-loathing is so culturally ingrained, so pathological — there is nothing wrong with our hair, but nearly every signal received by the dominant culture is that it needs to be “corrected.”
The message is clear — kinky hair is not beautiful — or good for your pocketbook. And yes, it’s still cause to discriminate (Judge Upholds Public School Ban on Cornrows; Dreadlock Lockout: The Dallas Police Department is firing employees based on their hairstyles). We’ve got a long way to go.
Heather is looking for more hair stories, you can leave comments at the blog.
40 Responses to “Documentary on the politics of hair”
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I’m white, but it’s always made me sad that women of color feel like they have to straighten their hair to be “normal”. I’ll admit to having been envious of my black friends’ tight curls in grade school, when we lived in Wisconsin and my school was at least 25% African-American. Now I live in New Hampshire (motto: White as the Mountain Range…
) and it seems like the minority black population would feel even more pressured (since they are even more a minority than elsewhere in the country) but I’ve seen more natural hairstyles here than not, which I think is a step in the right direction 
That ad is truly loathsome
Then again, while the accouterments of hair changing aren’t quite as medieval for white women, they’re just as prevalent. Straighten your hair if it’s wavy; give it a wave if it’s straight; curl it, color it, cut it off… no one’s ever happy with theirs. I fought with my grey hair with henna for years, before realizing that I was going to end up with Ronald McDonald-orange hair if I kept that up, so I’ve cut it off and am starting from scratch… grey and mousey brown and all.
And on the third hand, of course, no matter how much white women might hate their natural hair, it’s rarely leveled at them as a racial slur, which is something, and which of course makes “nappy hair” comments all the more horrible.
It makes no difference to anyone, but I find locs and short curls on black women very attractive, and knowing that it doesn’t take physical torture to achieve the look is so much the better
I saw this on one of the Gawker sites:
Apparently a Glamour editor lets us know that natural hair is a corporate “don’t” at a law firm’s info session
I understand that corporations do try to squelch a lot of individuality other than on the basis of race (including a law firm I heard of that didn’t allow personal items on paralegals’ desks) but despite how normalized locs and untreated african american hair like mine have become in regular life, it’s surprising that the rules haven’t been relaxed, so to speak.
I’m a white woman (with exactly the sort of long, straight, naturally blonde hair that American culture prizes most) who has taught courses in African-American literature and rhetoric, and by far the hardest discussions we had were about hair. Not slavery, not Jim Crow, not lynching or sexual abuse of black women by white men, but hair. It was the one discussion we had where I felt like I had to censor myself, where I felt like the issue divided me from my students. It was explosive.
I remember jokes running around the school and church when I was in middle school and high school about who had, “nappy hair.” Now I’m about as white as it gets, and Iowa (as pointed out by numerous caucus haters) is about the same, but the public schools I went to were pretty heavily integrated . . hence why it was popular to be asking your white friends who had nappy hair.
I knew it was slang for tightly curled hair on African-Americans. But the white kids asking this silliness? WTF? The closest I ever could figure is if my hair was a mess after a nap. Which it almost always was - my hair stands on end in all different directions when I get up in the morning. But who the hell should care?
Now that I look back on it, I think the real question was asking if you were in some proportion black and if you were passing. But ignorant white kids had no clue what they were saying. Or that it was edgy and slightly racist, so it was cool to pass the joke around.
Maybe they wear natural styles because there are so few minorities in that area. There isn’t anyone to do their hair in processed styles. Just a thought.
I live in a fairly integrated community and I have a hard time finding anyone that I truly trust to do my hair.
As a person of pallor with straightish hair, I could never get the hang of using a curling iron or blowdryer every day. It wasn’t for lack of trying on my mother’s part, but I just didn’t care that much. So I can’t imagine frying your hair with a hot comb every day. Isn’t that what caused Tina Turner’s hair to fall out? (Although I have had a couple of perms in my youth, I will never do that again!)
I remember a line from the movie “Crooklyn” where one of the girls on the stoop says, “Oh yeah, she gots the GOOD hair.” WTF? Whoever decided that straight hair=good? That takes a fair bit of self-loathing, no?
If I had Black hair, I’m guessing I’d wear it in tiny dreads, like Pam’s, or tiny braids that come away from the head, like one of my former professors. Either that, or a big ‘fro. I’ve seen women that pull it off their face with a headband, and get this big fluffy cloud on the back of their head. It’s really cute. But yeah, I don’t use a ton of heat and damaging chemicals on my hair, so why should Black women? (Ok, I use hair color, but no one’s going to fire me for not using it. That’s white privilege for you.)
In the Dallas Police Force case, though, I want to hear more facts. As the author says:
“If employers must fire someone for wearing dreadlocks then they should do the same for ponytails, cowlicks or spike-gelled hair.”
If the Police are doing that, I don’t have a problem with banning dreads. I know someone who works in corrections. He’s a metalhead, but he had to cut off his long hair and beard to work in the county jail. The fear is, of course, that an inmate could grab him by the hair in an altercation. If, however, it’s only guys with dreads that are getting fired, it’s quite likely a pretense for discrimination and it must be stopped.
It’s Natty Dread (the origin of dreadlocks): unsettling the occupier / plantation owner with the visual reminder that a captive person’s natural, free state will be socially acceptable (or uncontained; freely flowing or running “wild”..
Natty also means having coolness and style.
That’s an awesome video!
Left of Emma, I live in the biggest city here, and there are a good few little neighborhood salons specifically advertising to black clients, and they do offer straightening according to their signs (the drugstores also carry straighteners in their “ethnic” sections and have for over a decade now), but braiding is just more popular.
A lot of our black citizens, however, are actually from Africa - we were part of a deliberate immigration initiative in recent years - and so don’t have the same cultural baggage as people raised in the US. And white NH, being an isolated backwater by comparison, doesn’t have the same baggage as, say, Boston - not that there isn’t racism here too, but a lot of it comes from MA immigrants looking for a cheap place to live while they commute to Boston/Woburn/Peabody etc; the history isn’t the same.
NH’s homegrown ethnic rivalries break down along linguistic and religious lines, altho’ that’s complicated by the fact that many French immigrant families here are also part Native American and thus shades into covert, unacknowledged ethnic bigotry as well as white-on-white xenophobia (this is also what is going on when you get Massholes like Barnicle going on in the Globe like he did some years back about how “ugly” NH women are with their black hair and sallow skin and craggy features, uh huh) but the history of anti-tribal bigotry in New England, including forced sterilizations in Vermont, is a vast minefield I’ve only barely begun to discern the depth of.
I have wanted an afro my whole life. I’m not sure why, exactly (probably my stringy and listless straight hair), but I’ve always been fascinated with them and if I could have any hairstyle, independent of what my genetically-granted follicles will conform to, it would be an afro.
And Jan Andrea, this really made me think:
no matter how much white women might hate their natural hair, it’s rarely leveled at them as a racial slur.
I’ve previously been one of those white people who just didn’t “get” the whole Politics of Hair thing — if you think straight hair is “good”, man, you are delusional! Not to mention that all women, regardless of race, are taught self-loathing via our hair, and even having a traditionally desirable hair type doesn’t make it any better.
But then you wrote that, and I was suddenly like “OH! Duh!” I may hate my hair. My female relatives may have taught me self-hatred via dismissive remarks about hair. But nobody is EVER going to reduce my white-girl hair into a racial slur. As a white person, I cannot be reduced to a hair texture. If you are a black woman, no matter what kind of hair you have, white society can always brand you “nappy-headed”.
I’m a white woman (with exactly the sort of long, straight, naturally blonde hair that American culture prizes most) who has taught courses in African-American literature and rhetoric, and by far the hardest discussions we had were about hair. Not slavery, not Jim Crow, not lynching or sexual abuse of black women by white men, but hair. It was the one discussion we had where I felt like I had to censor myself, where I felt like the issue divided me from my students. It was explosive.
I am not surprised at all. When I was doing research for one of my early posts on kinky hair, I hung out for a while on a couple of black hair YahooGroups and you should have seen the vitriol between the “processed hair” crowd and the “natural hair” advocates. It got personal fast. This is from an essay at the Black Hair YahooGroup by Ta Ankh, who tried to stop the madness.
The people who decided that straight = good are the same ones who brought us here. As for how you’d wear your hair, I suggest you live with X years of a society that tells you that your hair, hell, your very self is ugly before you can know what it’s like.
I started wearing my hair natural when I was 18 after seeing Nina Simone in concert (years and years ago). I had to hear major bs from all my older female relatives about it too.
There’s been this trend back towards straightened hair and I don’t know exactly where it’s coming from. Maybe it’s because the process of the process is less damaging, maybe it’s assimilation, maybe it’s (to paraphrase Indra.Arie) we are more than our hair. But I am still not confortable with the pressure on black women to have “acceptable” hair.
My niece is biracial and her hair has the really tight, frizzy curls of black hair, but it has the soft texture of white hair. It is absolutely adorable, and I love the baby ‘fro. But my sister always, always braids her hair, or put it into really tight pony tails, or anything but it’s natural state (she’s too young to do relaxers–not quite two–but I’m sure B will try it eventually). It’s a shame, really, and I wonder how she’s going to feel as she grows up and her hair has been tortured into every sort of style but the way it naturally looks.
My best friend growing up (literally, since kindergarten, and we’re still close even though we live in different states) always had cornrows until junior high. Then, in 7th grade, her mom let her decide how to wear her hair. She chose a slightly relaxed (not quite jherri curled, but almost) short ‘fro. It stayed that way forever, and looked really good on her. I didn’t think much about her hair one way or another, except for fascination with its texture because it was so different from mine, growing up. But now, I can’t help but think how brave it was for her wear her hair that way when she was one of the few black kids in my town (rural southern WV) and the only other black girls had relaxed, braided, etc. hair. But, she’s also always had more self confidence than any other 10 people I’ve ever met put together.
My biracial nephew ended up with very strange hair, because the white side has what we always call “Irish hair,” which means that it’s huge and puffy and has a mind of its own. Samuel Beckett and David Lynch have “Irish hair” as we define it. Then it got combined with the African-American hair on the other side, so it’s curly and Irish-puffy, with odd spots where it’s straight and cowlicks going every which way.
His sister only just turned 1, but I’m guessing that her hair is going to be very similar to his. My sister-in-law has been putting it up in little twists, but I don’t know what they’re going to do as she gets older. Straightening products would only make the Irish hair worse.
I’ve observed that educated and professional-class black women favor more natural hairstyles — ranging from entirely natural or dreadlocked to probably relaxed but not quite straightened or, when not natural, at most a simple bob-like do or unfussy extensions. It’s the inner-city denizens that seem most likely to use a ton of chemicals on their hair and, frankly, the convoluted and sculptural do’s they sometimes come up with are awe-inspiring in the same way that a beehive can be awe-inspiring. Also somewhat ridiculous in the exact same way. Although they clearly must torment their hair to produce with the effect, they don’t seem to be emulating any white hairstyle I’ve ever seen.
I infer nothing here, merely offer an easily borne-out observation.
Pam, your best look is the one you’ve got going!
I subbed for a while last spring at a junior high with a mostly black population and my kids did all sorts of interesting things with their hair. I also subbed for a bit at the corresponding high school and they were much the same with the hair. I found the whole thing fascinating, and the kids were really cool about explaining how all the hair stuff works to me. And yeah, some of the do’s are very, very intricate and highly impressive. They got especially creative with it around the time of the spring Afro Ball, sort of a city wide equivalent to prom for the 14-18 set.
It’s the inner-city denizens that seem most likely to use a ton of chemicals on their hair…
I’d guess it’s a class thing, the same way educated/professional white women tend to favor a more minimal look, whereas the working class women stuck in the paralegal/office manager track will go all out with the killer nails, makeup and hair styles that must take hours every morning, pink skirt suits, etc.
The NY law firm Cleary Gottleib invited an editor from Glamour to give a presentation on professional dress to female lawyers. The very first fashion “don’t”? An Afro.
To the firm’s credit, its managing partner immediately sent around an email denouncing the presentation.
http://www.abovethelaw.com/2007/08/glamour_editor_cleary_gottlieb.php
d’oh - somehow missed the earlier comment about Glamour. Sorry. Very, telling, though, that the editor saw natural hairstyles as “political” - and that some of the white women lawyers who’ve commented seem to think that having to blowdry/straighten their own hair is the same thing.
Well, a full-fledged Afro is a thing of beauty and wonder, but you would hardly expect a reputable attorney to sport one. A “short natural,” as Pam called it, yes; not an Afro. Can you see a white lawyer-dude with a mountain-man beard? That entire profession is based on bogus decorum and pomp.
That said, the partner was wise to denounce such an insult. It comes off as “if you’re black, be sure ‘n’ act white.” Not sure if the Glamour consultant meant it that way, but she’s an idiot to say such a thing.
Why is an afro extreme, exactly?
I mean, if it was a seriously crazy 2-foot tall one, maybe.
But what, inherently, is unprofessional about an afro? And either way, yeah, I’m sure there are also attorneys with “full mountain man beards”, too. I mean, certainly there’s no law barring observant Sikhs from practicing law.
This whole thing reeks of the way judges in the 70’s would refuse to allow female attorneys to wear pants in the courtroom. Create as many obstacles as you possibly can, and maybe they’ll just give up and go home.
I’ve observed that educated and professional-class black women favor more natural hairstyles — ranging from entirely natural or dreadlocked to probably relaxed but not quite straightened or, when not natural, at most a simple bob-like do or unfussy extensions. It’s the inner-city denizens that seem most likely to use a ton of chemicals on their hair and, frankly, the convoluted and sculptural do’s they sometimes come up with are awe-inspiring in the same way that a beehive can be awe-inspiring.
I’ll have to disagree here. Having spent a fair amount of time working in various NYC offices with many Black professionals, if I noticed anything about these women’s hairstyles, it was probably that there was no one way to characterize them except perhaps that they probably changed in style with greater frequency than that of their non-Black coworkers. Anyway, they are always putting my generic young-dyke-haircut to shame.
Anyway, the locks are hot, Pam.
I’ve heard a similar story from a really awesome YouTube user called Spokenlife.
I’m white, but my hair is extremely curly and frizzy (most people think I’m Jewish), and a lot of people try to pressure me to straighten it. They even made a petition for me to straighten my hair. I was almost tempted. Almost. And then I decided that they should go fuck themselves. I like my hair the way it is.
The straight=good thing is, I think, really stupid.
Also, Pam, I really like your current style.
Pam, I think your haircut is hot.
wow, your video interview is great. young Pam is the spitting image of grown-up Pam…
except the hair.
on a related note, it’s good to see that we’re keeping track of how hair politics is being used to literally exclude people from work. this isn’t just a “style” thing or a “stigma” thing. it’s funny how an issue that seems to work disproportionately to the disadvantage of women starts to get a little more, uh, buzz, when people realize it also affects men.
This is an interesting issue to look at from an Australian perspective as well. Over here on the west coast of Australia, there’s a large enough emigrant population from South Africa, and consequently there are at least a couple of salons in Perth itself which specialise in “black” hair. We also have the indigenous Australian population (the Nyoongar peoples are the main group in this area of the continent). There’s a definite difference between African hair and indigenous Australian hair - generally it has to do with the size of the curls, with the indigenous Australian curl being a bit looser, from observational evidence.
I suppose I should go into one of those salons, and ask whether they get many indigenous Australian women coming in, and whether there are any differences they notice from experience. Maybe find out whether they get a lot of Anglo women coming in as well.
Oh, and the most popular style for Australian women with African ancestry (whether via South Africa, Britain, the Caribbean or the US) appears to be multiple braids, sometimes added to with extensions. Indigenous Australian styles tend to stick with just a mop of curls, short or long.
“But what, inherently, is unprofessional about an afro? And either way, yeah, I’m sure there are also attorneys with “full mountain man beards”, too. I mean, certainly there’s no law barring observant Sikhs from practicing law.”
I’m told the Kalamazoo County Prosecutor in the late 90s grew a bushy beard and pony tail while in office and got reelected.
He’s currently practicing law that way.
There’s a definite difference between African hair and indigenous Australian hair - generally it has to do with the size of the curls, with the indigenous Australian curl being a bit looser, from observational evidence.
That’s because Africans and Australians are descended from different groups — it’s been shown that indigenous Australians are actually Polynesians, despite what white settlers assumed when they arrived. In fact, indigenous Australians are the group that’s most distantly related to Africans, genetically speaking.
Just another chip in racial assumptions …
My understanding of an Afro is that it is a “crazy, 2-foot-tall one,” more or less. And there’s no law banning it in a court of law, but it makes the Glamour lady — who is probably insufferable and is certainly shallow — bristle. It might make an African American judge bristle, as well, or it might not. Lawyers can’t afford to take that chance. They are expected to present a very conservative appearance, although it’s true they’re not required to by law. It’s one of those jobs, like corporate sales rep, where appearance is very important. I personally could never hold such a job.
The Glamour lady is an oaf, and she may be racist, but I’m not seeing enough evidence to accuse her of that. She has contempt for the natural human form in general, I’d wager. I’m sure she’d cough up her mojito or other trendy cocktail if she caught a glimpse of an unshaven female armpit.
Mnemosyne,
You’re right about the Australians and Africans being from entirely different groups. However, Australians are not related to Polynesians (who are much later arrivals in the Pacific and probably are more Asian in descent as well as appearance). They are more closely related to Melanesians, a more compact group in New Guinea and the Solomon Islands (and spread out probably as far north as the Philippines).
The Australians and Melanesians have been in the area for at least 50,000 years, longer than people have been in the Americas. The tropical skin coloring is the only thing they have more in common with Africans than Europeans.
My understanding of an Afro is that it is a “crazy, 2-foot-tall one,” more or less.
Well, ok, your understanding is incorrect. Unless what you’re really saying is that you call an afro something like this, and a “short natural” something like this.
And if you really can’t see the difference there, and think the one Angela Davis is sporting in the second link is “extreme”, I’m curious about why you think so. We’re not talking about a green mohawk or Crystal Gayle or anything.
Lawyers can’t afford to take that chance. They are expected to present a very conservative appearance
This may be true, but from what I know about the matter, it doesn’t seem like attorneys are all expected to have buzz cuts, or anything. I also think that if the discouraging people from expressing any individuality in their appearance (especially if what is expressed has to do with race, ethnicity, religion, gender, etc.) is a form of gatekeeping — if we make a conservative white male appearance the standard, and decide that anything that deviates from that is “extreme” and should be frowned upon in the courtroom, this will keep out people who are not conservative white males.
A good judge rules based on the testimony, not the lawyers’ haircuts.
Most lawyers I’ve met — and I’ve met quite a few — are considerably left of center. Their appearance, though, is conservative, even anachronistically so. These are simply the rules of the game; you seem to think I’m defending them, when in fact they repulse me. But at my age, I’ve little outrage left for matters of that magnitude. Wanna sell cars, get a loud sportjacket; wanna be a cop, grow a cheesy moustache. These are the least of the world’s cruelties.I think the consultant lady was a tin-eared fool rather than a bona fide racist, though no one here can say for sure. Your contention that the tyranny of appearance comes from white men is well-founded — indisputable, really — but it would hardly matter if the standard of mainstream appearance came from the Mad Hatter, Mae West, Ma Rainey or Martians. In certain professions, you’d simply have to suck it up. Do you honestly believe most white men who wear ties like it?
A good point, and one I agree with, but you left out an important aspect: waffle trees. Wouldn’t that be neat!
These are simply the rules of the game; you seem to think I’m defending them, when in fact they repulse me. But at my age, I’ve little outrage left for matters of that magnitude. Wanna sell cars, get a loud sportjacket; wanna be a cop, grow a cheesy moustache. These are the least of the world’s cruelties.
To be clear, I’m not talking about some dude’s god-given RIGHT to practice law with a neck tattoo.
I’m talking about people being able to accommodate forms of racial, ethnic, gender, sexuality, and religious expression into their everyday professional attire. There’s no real reason someone with an afro can’t practice law. “Thems the breaks” isn’t a reason. 40 years ago, judges routinely wouldn’t allow women to wear pants in “their” courtrooms. Sure, some women said, “well, that’s how it is,” and did the skirt, heels, pantyhose bit. Other women cried bullshit, and now it’s perfectly acceptable for women to wear pants in court.
The idea that beards, “ethnic” hairstyles (can’t think of a better catch-all term), and other differences are verboten, and that’s just the way it’s always gonna be is ridiculous, sorry. And as far as I’m concerned, any use of the existence of the status quo as a justification for why something shouldn’t be allowed is a form of advocating said status quo.
My friend posted this picture on her blog, with a “WTF” heading.
I concurred. WTF.
any use of the existence of the status quo as a justification for why something shouldn’t be allowed is a form of advocating said status quo.
I never said an Afro shouldn’t be allowed — merely that the consultant, while surely a sniffy little so-and-so, was hardly offering malfeasant career advice. You know, opo, I don’t disagree with you, but people simply expect salesmen and legal counsel to fit their idea of what a salesman or a lawyer should look like. That’s the bitch about the status quo: It’s market-driven — so long as it isn’t a violation of civil rights (and as we’ve established, a lawyer could give her closing arguments in bear-claw slippers and a coonskin cap while running afoul of no formal law).
Law isn’t a good profession for those who seek personal expession or even have a discernible soul. Lawyers not only choose the hairstyle that makes them look most lawyerly; they tend to choose the fer-chrissakes spouse that makes them look most lawyerly. Every career choice is ultimately a milieu choice. (In the case of law, a cesspool of blind ambition, unprincipled ego, and grasping mediocrity.)
If I were convinced the lady were racist, I’d be considerably more outraged. Even if she is, insofar as there’s a conspiracy to make the courts bastions of whiteness, I’m not sure it would involve a some low-ranking ditzhead from Glamour magazine.
“Ethnical”?
I suppose that’s perfectly cromulent. As much so as the extremely white girl with the cornrows…
Would it be racist of me to say that white girls just look stupid with cornrows? Probably. Forget I said it.
Law isn’t a good profession for those who seek personal expession
Well, except for the fact that all expression is “personal” expression.
I mean, the bar doesn’t look down on white men who chose to “express themselves” by having short hair and wearing dark suits. Such people aren’t pressured to come to court in mohawks or dashikis.
So by saying that personal expression is looked down upon, what you really mean is that the personal expression of anyone who is not a conservative white male is looked down upon. Obviously some people can easily make choices that will enable them to pass in that regard. But what’s a lawyer to do if, due to their race, their only hair styling options are painful/dangerous/expensive/inconvenient? What’s next? Sorry, you’re just too dark to be in my courtroom. I mean, what if you get lost in the shadows or something?
This is just to say that I just spent a few minutes googling micro-braids and cornrows, and I have to say WOW. The creativity! Some people have the most stunning ideas for hairstyles. Just…gorgeous.
Also, little!Pam is absolutely adorable. But has much better hair now.
Well, I’m starting the too-lengthy process of adopting from the foster care system.
I need to learn about the healthy care of textured hair.
How old do you think a child has to be to successfully manage dreads?
Which is easier on the scalp–braiding or dreading?
Where the heck can I find answeres to these kinds of questions?
Be careful with braiding to often and getting the braids too tight. My aunt wouldn’t listen and she ended up with a nasty infection and a receding hairline! However, if you see someone with braids or locs that you like, ask him/her who does their hair or they know a good loctician. It’s best to start there.