As the twentieth century closes, I believe that Black women have come to better appreciate the array of beauty we portray, despite subtle, and not so subtle, pressure from the media, the workplace and the larger society to conform to their standards of attractiveness.

Yet I am sometimes troubled that too many of us still make snide and cruel comments about the politically, professionally or socially acceptable way to wear our hair. We would be a lot stronger as a people if we used that energy to support each other economically, emotionally and spiritually.
 

A'lelia Perry Bundles, Great-great-granddaughter of
Madam C. J. Walker, Black hair care industry pioneer

A half-dozen Black women vied for space in front of the restroom mirror, retouching their makeup and spraying their hair. One of them, whose hair was short and nappy, inquired of no one in particular, "What is this mass of sheep's wool that sits so prominently atop our heads? What did Black people do to deserve this bad-ass hair from hell?"

A light-skinned woman whose long hair was casually pulled up in a ponytail answered, "Oh, girl, stop taking your hair so damned seriously. It's just hair." And another dark-skinned sister with a short, kinky hairstyle interjected, "Sure, you can say that because you got 'good' hair, and ain't nobody ever called you no bald-headed bitch." During the shouting and name-calling that ensued no one bothered to ask, "Why does it matter so much?" Perhaps the answer is too obvious. As Susan Brownmiller wrote, in Femininity, "Hair indeed may be trivial, but it is central to the feminine definition."

Embodying some Black women's worst fears, a working-class Black man named Darryl describes a far too popular formula for weighing the beauty of Black women in the following words:

The sixties marked a revolution in Blacks' attitudes about their hair; for the first time young women in significant numbers stopped perming and processing, and members of both sexes let their hair grow wild and free in the style known as the Afro. But when the sixties ended, and the 'fro was no longer fashionable, the old attitudes about hair quickly resurfaced. The tradition of calling hair that was straight and wavy "good" and hair that was tightly curled and nappy "bad" had never really gone away. Men like Darryl continued to evaluate Black women according to what was on their heads instead of what was in them, and the self-confidence of many Black women continued to hinge on the freshness of their perms.

In this post-sixties era, hair remains a politically charged subject. To some, how an African American chooses to style his or her hair says everything there is to be said about that individual's Black consciousness, socioeconomic class, and probable life-style, particularly when the individual is a woman.

Clearly, hair is less an issue for men than for women. Beginning in childhood, boys conventionally wear short hair while girls grow their hair long. Adult Black males generally keep their hair cropped short, so its texture is usually not that important to them. But from an early age most Black girls, especially those with fuzzy edges and nappy "kitchens" (the hairline at the back of the neck), are taught to "fix" their hair-as if it were broken. Short hair is unfeminine but for many long hair is unmanageable. Still the hair of Black girls is braided and yanked, rubber-banded and barretted, into a presentable state. And when mothers grow weary of taming their daughters' hair, many opt to treat it with chemical relaxers. As one Black mother tired of fighting the comb declared, "I didn't have time to mess with that child's nappy head any longer, so I went and got it permed. It's been a lot easier on both of us since."

Some Black women come to regret what was done to their hair as children. A woman named Yvette longingly remembers what her hair was like when she was young. She says that many of her earliest memories feature her Afro-puffs (hair that is parted in the middle, rubber-banded, and "picked out" into two small Afros, one on each side) or her thousand braids with bows at the end. She also remembers how fascinated the White children at school were by the natural softness of her hair and how they were always asking to touch it. "For me, my hair was a source of pride and uniqueness," she recalls. But as she neared adolescence her mother declared that she "was turning into a young lady" and it was time for her first permanent relaxer. Today, in her thirties, Yvette yearns for her natural hair, yet she continues to get permanents regularly. "In order to reverse the process now, it would mean a lot of hair breakage and hair loss," she sighs. "At this point in my life, it's a lot less effort just to deal with it the way it is." (The place where permed hair meets virgin hair is often weak and keeping the hair permed may actually prevent further breakage.)

For many other Black women, childhood memories of short, nappy locks bring forth feelings of shame, not sweet nostalgia. A dark skinned woman named Caroline remembers other children's taunts of "Your hair's so short, you can smell yo' brains." Caroline was ecstatic when her mother marched her down to Sister Westbury's Beauty Nook for her first perm.

I had it doubly hard when I was in grade school. Not only was I dark-skinned but I also had short beady hair. I always got teased by the boys and laughed at by the girls because my hair was so nappy and always stuck up in the air. I hated my hair and cried many nights. I was so glad when I got my hair straightened. It changed my whole life.

Many young Black girls view their first perm as a rite of passage, and sometimes it is their parents, particularly those who grew up in the sixties, who are sorry when a daughter stops going natural. In an article entitled "Life with Daughters or The Cakewalk with Shirley Temple," Gerald Early, a professor of English and African-American studies at Washington University, described his intense disappointment the day his two daughters, aged seven and ten, came home with their hair penned.

During that summer the girls abandoned their Afro hairstyles for good. When they burst through the door with their hair newly straightened, beaming, I was so taken aback in a kind of horror that I could only mutter in astonishment when they asked, "How do you like it?"

It was as if my children were no longer mine, as if a culture that had convinced them they were ugly had taken them from me. The look I gave my wife brought this response from her: "They wanted their hair straightened, and they thought they were old enough for it. Besides, there is no virtue in wearing an Afro. I don't believe in politically correct hair. "

Yet for Black women hair is political, and those who are "happy nappy" consider perming "politically incorrect," just as others consider unstraightened hair a disgrace. No matter which choice a Black woman makes, someone may react negatively to it.

On a vacation trip to British Virgin Gorda, the Black poet, essayist, and writer Audre Lorde discovered just how easily her hairstyle could be interpreted politically. Wearing newly fashioned dreadlocks (a style in which the hair is either braided, twisted, or clumped together in separate strands all over the head), Lorde arrived at the Beef Island Airport and was told by the immigration officer-a Black woman with heavily processed hair-that her entry was being denied. Angry at the snag in her travel plans, Lorde demanded to speak to the woman's supervisor and was informed that her dreadlocks marked her as a dope-smoking Rastafarian revolutionary. Fortunately, the officer was eventually able to determine that Lorde was not a "dangerous" Rastafarian, and her passport was stamped "admit.

But unprocessed hair may also elicit political approval. Mary Morten, a former president of the Chicago chapter of the National Organization for Women, who keeps her hair in a short natural style, remembers the time a Black man came running up to her on the street holding a rolled-up poster. He said, "I've been waiting for a sister with natural hair so I can give her this poem. " When Morten unfurled the poster, she found printed on it a Gwendolyn Brooks poem. She was so touched by the message and by the way it came to her that she hung the poster on the wall of the Chicago NOW office. The poem reads:

Nonetheless, Black women who wear their hair unprocessed are often squawked at, teased, and harassed. One sister with long brown dreadlocks says, "When my hair was going through the 'wile chile' stage [the first phase of growing dreadlocks, in which the hair looks completely untamed], a brother actually stopped me on the street demanding to know 'when in the hell' was I going to 'do somethin' with my nappy-headed ass hair.' " The award-winning actress Whoopi Goldberg often has members of her own community tell her that her dreadlocks are disgusting and that she should "take those nappy braids out." A generation earlier, the actress Cicely Tyson was told by members of the Black community that she might be a gifted actress but her short natural hairstyle was detrimental to the image of Black women.

Although political reasons for sporting European-looking hairstyles abound, some Black women relax their hair just because they like it that way. One of them, a woman named Catherine, who owns a small business, says that she loves her hair long and would never consider cutting it.

My long hair is my best feature. I realize it's high maintenance but I'd much rather get up an hour early and do my hair than to have short hair. There's something special about Black women with long hair.

A certain level of Black consciousness would seem to be necessary before a woman dares to go natural. The relationship between hairstyle and politics is far from clear, however. One African-American professional woman from Chicago has said that she could not imagine wearing her hair in any way but dreadlocks, or perhaps cornrows, since everything she does emanates from an Afrocentric perspective. Yet she admits to knowing women as strongly Afrocentric as she who routinely process their hair, and others with no interest at all in fostering Black culture or politics who wear natural styles like cornrows.

Dreadlocking perhaps carries a more radical political connotation than any other hairstyle. Yet all it entails is growing curly hair out to the point where it "locks," the stage at which dreadlocks become permanent and cannot be changed without cutting. Few Whites have hair curly enough to grow into "dreads"; with rare exceptions, the style is uniquely Black. Traditionally, dreadlocks have been associated with the Rastafarians of Jamaica, and American men with dreadlocks are usually musicians or members of the counterculture. However, an increasing number of American Black women are adopting the style. They are writers and performers, like Alice Walker and Whoopi Goldberg, or professors, journalists, and social workers-not exactly corporate types, but not members of a counterculture, either.

Dark-skinned Black women who grow dreadlocks appear to have reached a point in their lives at which they no longer feel the need to compensate for the color of their skin. Breaking free of all their past conditioning about hair may be part of a larger spiritual awakening. After being criticized by a "bro" for wearing her hair in dreads, one brown-skinned woman commented, "It's too bad Black men don't see the beauty and the spirituality of my hair." Sandra B., who manages an urban charity organization in Chicago, also describes her dreadlocks in spiritual terms.

There are many misconceptions about dreadlocks, and those who wear them must answer a lot of questions, many of them from members of their own community. The most common include: "Can you wash your hair that way?" (yes); "Does it smell?" (no more than anyone else's); "If you want to change it, must you shave it off and begin anew?" (most likely); "How do you get your hair to do that?" (it just does it on its own). One woman who got tired of the constant inquiries tells how she turns the tables on the questioner.

When a Black woman comes to Hylton with hair damaged by years of perming, she sometimes has to cut off all the permed growth. If the woman still wants long hair, Hylton will braid extensions onto what remains, to give the hair a rest and help restore it to its natural state.

In the politically charged world of hairstyling, Hylton has even come under fire for weaving these extensions into hair-her own hair as well as that of her clients. Hylton, who wears a Senegalese twist (a style in which the hair is twisted into ringlets, sometimes with African linen intertwined), has this response to such criticism:

Weaving extensions into the hair originated in Africa. Members of different tribes would take plants and weave them into their hair. Weaving or twisting isn't done just to get length. It's an art form and a part of African culture.

Black women with long hair, whether natural or processed, whether achieved by hair weaves or extensions, are acutely sensitive to accusations that they are trying to look White. Like Hylton, they often draw on ancient customs to defend their choices. When asked about the melange of long braids neatly twisted into a hair weave hanging down her back, Pamela, a Black graduate student in psychology, replied without missing a beat.

Hair texture, like skin tone, carries much social and historical baggage for Blacks. All things being equal, a Black woman whose hair grows naturally straight is usually thought to be from a "better" family than a woman whose hair is very nappy. Black women who wear natural styles, like braids, cut across socioeconomic lines, but a politically defiant style like dreadlocks is generally a middle-class expression of Black consciousness. Inner-city girls and women are probably the least likely to wear dreadlocks. Poor Black women with very kinky hair strive instead for straighter-looking hair, but because they cannot afford constant professional relaxation treatments (which can cost up to $85 a session), their hair often looks stiff and overly processed, in what is derisively called a "ghetto 'do. " Still, hair is so important to Black women that, regrettably, some would rather be late paying their rent than miss getting their hair permed.

But the split between Black women who process and those who do not is not as great or malevolent as Spike Lee's School Daze-in which the men debate politics and the women fight about their skin color and hair- might lead one to think. In School Daze women with light skin and straight hair are derisively called "Wannabees," and dark-skinned women are "Jigaboos. " Their big dance number takes place in Madam Re-Re's beauty parlor. There, among the hair dryers and chemical relaxers, the Black coeds sing a lively number called "Straight and Nappy. " It opens with a spate of vicious name-calling between the two groups of women.

    Wannabees: Pick-a-ninny

    Jigaboos: Barbie Doll, High Yella Heffer

    W: Tarbaby

    J: Wanna be White

    W: Jig-a-boo

Chorus: Talkin' 'bout good and bad hair whether you are             dark or fair go on and swear
see if I care good and bad hair. . . .

W: Your hair ain't no longer than (finger snap)
so you'll never fling it all back
and you 'fraid to walk in the rain
oh, what a shame, who's to blame

J: Don't you ever worry 'bout that,
cause I don't mind being BLACK
go on with your mixed-up head
I ain't gonna never be 'fraid

    J: Nappy is all right with me

    W: My hair is straight you see

    J: But your soul's crooked as can be. . . .

Although many thought that School Daze was demeaning to Black women, Lee did inject some humor into the hair issue-doubtless a good thing in the long run.

While African Americans assign the hair issue various degrees of political weight, most Black women, whether they process or not, respect and understand the choices of others. There is, after all, a reality factor to contend with in White-dominated America. For example, a Black teacher from California who had been content with wearing her hair in a natural decided to straighten it when she and her husband began to look for a house to buy.

While more and more Black women today are daring to go natural, they remain a distinct minority. Straightened hair is the standard for "respectable" Black women-those with corporate careers as well as the wives of Black politicians and businessmen. An estimated 75 percent of American Black women continue to perm or relax their hair.

In all fairness, some Black women simply look better with their hair processed, and those who want to wear it that way have as much right to do so as Whites. As one Black sister puts it, "White people don't have a patent on long hair."

Meanwhile, in the nineties short styles are suddenly "in." From the boyish (but processed-looking) haircuts of the "Uh Huh" girls of the Diet Pepsi commercials to the closely cropped natural locks of Black actress Halle Berry (Jungle Fever, Boomerang), the traditional view that long hair is sexier seems to be changing. Berry says that she loves her short hair: "I feel people see me now. I will never grow my hair long again!"

Still, some Black women (and White women, too) say they continue to keep their hair long because that is what they think men prefer. A Black college student named Crystal says that when her

Boyfriend saw her getting her hair cut short, he walked out at the first snip and would not talk to her for two weeks. But it is hard to generalize: another Black man, an electrical engineer from the Chicago area, says that he is partial to Black women who wear their hair short and natural: "There's something so pure and genuine about these women," while another man counters, "Brothers like their women with long hair so they can grab hold of it during sex."

Sometimes the very men who like long hair tell their women not to "wear that arsenal [rollers] to bed," and then in the morning ask, "Why is your hair sticking up all over your head?" Fortunately, in this feminist era, a growing number of Black women are choosing to wear their hair in styles that please themselves first, not their men. At the same time, more African-American men are beginning to experiment with different hairstyles of their own. In the process, they may be becoming more tolerant and perhaps more sensitive to the difficulties of constant hair maintenance.

One currently popular Black men's hairstyle is the "high-top fade," popularized by the rapper Kid of Kid N' Play (who also starred in House Party). Short on the sides, long and flat on top, it goes by other names, including "wedge," "slant," "Philly fade," "gumbie, " "low 'n' tight," or just "big hair." Like other inner-city trends, including ripped jeans and earrings on men, the fade appears to be making its way into mainstream culture. Modified versions of it are even cropping up on the heads of middle-class men, Black and White.

Another male street hairstyle, this one with roots in Africa, entails shaving a pattern through the hair so that the scalp shows through. Some Black youths have even taken to shaving their favorite logos, like Nike, onto the back of their heads. Like the Afro of the sixties, these radical razor designs are an artistic expression of Black culture. But these styles are also faddish and are already losing favor in some urban areas.

While hairstyle has never been a central part of the color complex in perceptions of Black men, certain 'dos' are associated with certain life-styles. In the nineties, Black men who texturize their hair are usually entertainers-musicians, television celebrities, big-name athletes-although a few Black businessmen have experimented with hair relaxers to improve their corporate image. The more radical styles, like razor cuts, dreadlocks, and extreme high-top fades, are avoided by Black businessmen, just as very long hair and punk cuts are avoided by White businessmen who want the establishment to take them seriously.

In general, Black men seem to have a more positive attitude toward their hair than most Black women do. Even when they start to go bald, they can shave it all off, as the Chicago Bulls basketball star Michael Jordan does, and make a fashion statement.

Meanwhile, anguished concerns about hairstyles have hurt and held back Black women, and, as the quotation by A'Lelia Bundles implies, women must, together, begin to move beyond such concerns. Shameful attitudes about hair often begin at home. Within the family, Black parents need to teach their sons and daughters that though hair comes in a variety of textures, there is no such thing as good or bad hair. If you got hair, good!