I wear my hair in a natural style called Sisterlocks. The style affords me great flexibility with my natural hair. It has also grown to be quite long. For a black woman this garners me a lot of attention. I have been stopped countless times by men and women who were astounded that as a black woman I have been able to grow my natural tresses below my mid back.
Most often I am asked is all of that my real hair. The looks I receive are ones of astonishment and awe. With joy I share a resounding YES! This is all MY hair! Recently I was stopped at the gym by an elderly black woman with the same questions and with the same look of admiration and astonishment. I began to explore within myself her looks of astonishment, awe and admiration along with my own sense of joy. After all, it’s just hair. Or is it?
For many black women the decision to wear our hair natural versus processed has been a real struggle. Our own natural coifs if not of a certain texture deemed to be “good” were not seen as a thing of beauty. For many our hair was a source of shame. The heart of the shame was the belief that we were inferior. Our hair diminished our value. If we couldn’t grow long silky or loosely coiled hair then we were not as valuable as other women, black or otherwise, that could. I as a woman with very tightly coiled kinks would have been labeled and categorized as having nappy or “bad” hair.
For the complete article, visit HuffingtonPost.com/Blog/Voices.
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