A Summary Of Hair Story

Byrd, A., & Tharps, L. (2014). Hair story: Untangling the roots of black hair in America. In the early west african societies many of these cultures use hair as a symbol of aestheticism ,pride and Tradition. They would use things such as bead and elaborate braiding styles to show glorification as to who they are as people. Hair was used as a language system that could display if someone is married , age, religion, ethnic identity , and rank within the community . Each tribe and group of people had their own unique style of braiding techniques and patterns . You could easily distinguish a person based upon their hair styles . Hair was also used to represent where a person is from . In Nigeria the Kuramo people would wear a coiffure
Malnutrition, stress,trauma and ignorance of their own hair played a big role into how black people who were enslaved started to treat their own hair . The slave women who were nannies,cooks,seamstresses and maid often had hair styles that mocked their white counterparts . The styles then were bigwigs or a hairstyle that required your hair to be crowned and shaped going back .This wasn’t a natural way fro hair to be worn as a women of color but it was the only style that they know of and the only style that was seen as presentable . Since then enslaved africans were forced to assimilate and be a part of a culture that isn’t their own .With the standard of beauty that isn’t our own being pushed nationally, it puts pressure onto black people to fit the standards of beauty in order to be considered beautiful. Throughout american history black women have been told they have to look a certain way, act a certain way and most of all embrace a way a life that isn’t their own in order to be to be accepted. For a long time black men and women have been taking extreme health risk to make themselves more appealing to the public to satisfy society. The media that was controlled by white people often portrayed black features as inferior to whites and even went as far as calling black hair wool causing the dehumanization of black hair. The media often used black face and cartoons to show black women as unattractive and their behavior as almost animal like . The offspring of interracial relationships would usually have lighter skin and hair with soft curls . Those people were treated better in society and had better treatment than blacks with kinky hair. Mulattos would usually have better treatment, better access to education and a ticket of acceptance in society . Many mixed kids had looser curl patterns but