While you point out Michelle Obama, does a picture like this come to thoughts? Clever, poised, elegant, and swish… Nevertheless, in these cases, Michelle’s elegant and swish hair is just not her pure hair, however relatively a wig or hairpiece.
That is how Michelle’s actual hair appears like. Like Michelle, many black feminine celebrities additionally put on wigs or hairpieces. For instance, the enduring Academy Award-winning actress Halle Berry, the Grammy-winning artist Rihanna, and Beyoncé, who has African heritage. It is more durable than discovering a needle in a haystack to discover a photograph of them with out carrying wigs.
Why are black ladies so eager on carrying wigs? This may be traced again to the historical past of slave commerce and colonialism.
1.Wigs for black ladies: A legacy of colonialism.
Black hair has a advantageous and curly texture that requires particular care. In conventional African cultures, ladies had two important hairstyles: afro (kinky hair) and braids. Each of those hairstyles catered to the traits of black hair.
Hair holds vital cultural and societal which means in any tradition. Within the primordial African continent, ladies’s hairstyles had been typically used to tell apart social standing and sophistication. Meticulously styled hair symbolized a girl’s greater social standing.
Nevertheless, the whole lot modified with the arrival of the Age of Discovery. Western colonizers set foot on the African continent, bringing with them mechanization, trendy manufacturing strategies, and Western aesthetic requirements. Foucault as soon as identified that energy colludes with discourse, main people to robotically adhere to the foundations of dominant discourse when developing their physique picture.
Throughout the Western aesthetic framework, all conventional Black hairstyles have been suppressed. Straight or barely wavy hair, attribute of white people, is thought to be the usual of magnificence, whereas naturally advantageous and curly Black hair is oppressed as “wild” or “promiscuous”.
As colonizers bought numerous Black folks as slaves to the opposite aspect of the ocean, this aesthetic commonplace persevered within the plantations of the American South. Plantation house owners had been happy to have Black slaves with hair extra according to Western aesthetics inside their houses, serving as home employees.
However, Black feminine slaves with comparatively unkempt hairstyles had been engaged in bodily demanding outside duties similar to choosing cotton and tobacco.
Over time, the Western aesthetic requirements have step by step been internalized by Black ladies. As objects of the gaze, they begin adopting the judgment standards of the viewers. They start to understand their pure hair as unattractive and search to hide or alter its pure traits.
With the intention to achieve acceptance and recognition in society, an growing variety of African ladies begin carrying wigs from a younger age. Some students argue that the position of hair in distinguishing class variations inside conventional Black tradition has diminished. Immediately, no matter class, all Black ladies undertake extremely homogenized Western hairstyles.
Even a lady rising up in impoverished African slums will allocate a sure portion of her month-to-month bills in direction of wigs. Nevertheless, the position of hair in signifying class variations has not disappeared; it has merely remodeled into one other type. Wealthier Black ladies spend as a lot as $500 per 30 days on wigs. A number of refined wigs function a show of their financial energy.
2.Embrace Pure Curls and Say No to Wigs!
The bills incurred by Black ladies on wigs usually are not just for aesthetic functions but in addition to keep away from potential bother. Because of the notion that pure Black hairstyles are thought-about “untidy” or “unprofessional,” many firms and colleges have imposed rules that prohibit Black hairstyles.
Even in the USA, the place Black rights are comparatively valued, information about unfair therapy primarily based on hair remains to be all too frequent. In 2010, Chasity Jones was fired from a brand new job as a result of she refused to chop her pure curls.
In 2018, a highschool scholar was expelled for carrying conventional African braids. Mel B from the Spice Women revealed in an interview that her styling staff insisted on straightening her hair. It is very important problem these discriminatory practices and have fun the wonder and variety of pure Black hair.
Embracing pure curls is a strong assertion of self-acceptance and empowerment. With the development of the Black civil rights motion, particularly the surge of the Black Lives Matter motion, increasingly more voices are starting to replicate on the imposed magnificence requirements positioned upon Black people.
“Why ought to we contemplate our pure hair as ugly?” says Mislisuthando Bongela from South Africa.” The underlying logic behind perceiving Black hair as an issue is that they contemplate Blackness itself as an issue.
Within the realm of mass communication, Black hair has taken on new discourse and develop into one of many symbols of Black civil rights. The “Pure Hair Motion” has emerged, with Black people worldwide proudly showcasing their pure hair on social media. On this motion to redefine magnificence, pure Black hairstyles are more and more gaining recognition in mainstream society.
Information from world market analysis firm Mintel reveals that between 2011 and 2016, spending on hair relaxers amongst Black ladies decreased by 30%. All through Obama’s whole tenure, Michelle Obama persistently maintained a chic and dignified wig in public settings.
Nevertheless, after leaving the White Home, Michelle Obama began embracing her pure curls. This long-overdue celebration of pure curls has excited many Black ladies, proclaiming, “Say no to wigs!” As the primary Black “First Girl” with darkish pores and skin in historical past, she has lastly asserted her personal identification by her pure hair.
Earlier than Trump’s inauguration into the White Home, some web customers expressed their hope to see Michelle Obama carrying her pure hair earlier than she left the White Home. They believed that this might encourage different younger black ladies to bravely be themselves.
Sadly, the want of those web customers was not fulfilled. Though Michelle Obama was a trend trendsetter all through her time because the First Girl of the USA, and her actions impressed many ladies, her earlier hairstyles had been both straightened or curled. We’ve by no means seen her carrying her pure afro hair.
Many web customers expressed remorse as a result of Michelle Obama solely appeared together with her pure afro hair after she left the White Home. Some folks mentioned, “If solely I may have seen her carrying her pure hair whereas she was nonetheless the First Girl, it will have been superb… I’d have been comfortable for a lifetime.” Effectively, what we’ve got to say now could be that eliminating discrimination and injustice is a protracted journey forward of us. We hope that increasingly more folks can perceive and respect each single folks round us.
