My mother will tell you that I came out of the womb with a full head of hair. A few hours after my birth, she could gather it and tie it into a ponytail tightly held on the top of my head. "You should take special care of her hair," strangers would say on the street, in grocery stores, and in the pews of churches, as though it was sacred. By the time I was five, and my scalp was no longer tender and as sensitive to styling, my mother took me to a driveway in our hometown of Harare, Zimbabwe, where women sat in two lines to get their hair weaved into braids. Their eyebrows were raised, and their foreheads looked plastic from the tension of their hair being tugged. The hair braiders, who always had a story to tell to anybody who would listen, didn’t need to look down to know what they were doing. It was part of our culture to have our hair combed, yanked, divided into sections, braided, and burned with fire at the ends to make sure the plaits didn't come undone.
I came to America in the late '90s. Weaves and chemical relaxers (which we called perms) were the sacrifices black girls made for "good" hair. The girls in my middle school who had their edges smoothly slicked down would taunt me about my textured tresses, which my mother braided the night before. "It is so nappy," they'd say under their breaths. As an Americanized teen, I begged my mother to go to the hair salon for a relaxer. When she finally gave in, my full head of hair, so revered back in Zimbabwe, was straightened and damaged until it was too thin to do anything with except hold down with two bobby pins, one at each side. If I had the extra time in the morning, I would pull my hair back with a tiny band or apply gel for a wash-and-go style that looked like ramen noodles once it dried. There was power in fitting in, even if it was fitting in poorly.
When natural hair came back into style for black women years later, I was 21 and single. I was finally old enough to make decisions that didn’t start with my friends and end with a guy's recommendation. I started growing my afro, wearing it shaved down, in twists, or picked out. Every night, I did exhaustive research on how to take care of my texture. I sat in front of my laptop poring over the many YouTube videos, learning all about black hair. I learned how it grew, how to maintain it, how to keep it soft, and how to make it shine. It became something of a ritual — I reserved the last hours of every day treating my natural hair with the TLC I hadn't given it with all those years of relaxers.
I recently decided to try wearing braids with extensions for the first time since I was a kid. In part, I wanted to find out whether the attitudes had changed over the years towards black women wearing their hair like this. It's a hairstyle that is considered a classic in many black cultures, but I’ve seen white celebrities wear braids to award shows and girls get braids over their tropical vacations. I didn’t expect much of a reaction about my braids except praise and more catcalls.
When I walked into work with my new 'do, there was no hiding the fact that my afro had turned into long braids seemingly overnight. Of course, my coworkers had endless questions. “Is that your hair?”, “How did it get so long?”, “Your hair must grow fast!”, “ I love it! But it’s not yours, right?”. They questioned me, peeping over cubicles during work hours, waiting for the elevator with a crowd of people, in a full bathroom, but oddly, never in private. I answered their queries with a smile lacquered on my face, “No, it’s not my hair." “Oh, this is a weave." “Right, it’s not mine.” I became hyper-conscious about adjusting a braid out of place, paranoid that I would once again have to respond to more questioning. I was forced to publicly announce whether the hair on my head was mine or not to co-workers that I had never discussed my grooming habits with before. I felt stripped of the intrigue that we should all be able to reserve, if we choose to, when it comes to beauty rituals.
As the remarks continued into the second week of my experiment, I began to consider a few things. There is a reason that we don’t openly ask strangers or acquaintances in public areas if they're wearing makeup, if their boobs are real, or whether or not their tan is natural or sprayed on. But such consideration is oddly not extended to black women, who are consistently robbed of this universal respect when it comes to their grooming routines. The reaction to my braids became an indicator of not only who was doing their research about black culture in a mindful way, but whether or not they cared to protect my privacy.
We all have a curiosity about hair. There are online communities and YouTube channels dedicated to sharing techniques, beauty tips, and routines. There is an easily-accessible wealth of knowledge on black hair – it's not up to every random black woman with a hairstyle you're curious about to educate you on it.
By the third week of the experiment, my scalp had blistered from how tight the braids were in my head. Clearly my hairstylists had been overzealous in installing them. My boyfriend urged me to take them out after seeing me cringe from the pain that they were causing on my tender head. In one hour, the braids were gone from my head. I combed out my hair and picked out my 'fro.
When I went back to work on Monday, a co-worker, laughing with all of her teeth exposed, pointed a finger to my head and asked: "Did you get sick of it?"
More braid stories:
- The Trick to Creating Ciara's Stunning Double Crown Braid
- School Threatens to Suspend Black Students for Wearing Braids
- Watch This Vlogger Create a Cute Festival Look for Natural Hair
Zazie Beetz and Dascha Polanco Explain How Cultural Appropriation Superficially Leads to Mainstream Acceptance of Diverse Beauty:
