If you wanted be beautiful or have a good job, your hair better look as not Black as possible. So straightening our hair with chemicals or a hot comb was the only way a Black woman could look “presentable” for a long time. Daring to be.įor much of the Black American experience, we have been encouraged to look as European as possible. Some take it a little further by not using any chemicals at all or anything that does not occur in nature. Natural: This generally refers to Black hair that has not had its texture altered by chemicals. Depending on the type of extensions, the hair may be added through braiding or even specialty glue. Then the extra hair is woven to those braids with a needle and string made especially for hair weaving.Įxtensions: Extensions are like weaves but they don’t usually require the cornrows as a base. Weave: For a weave, the woman’s real hair is braided into cornrows or other scalp braids.
So when we say “perm,” we are referring to permanently straightening our hair (also known as a relaxing.) Perm: When non-Black women refer to a perm, they are often talking about adding a permanent curl to their hair through a chemical process. 3. Perms, weaves, and extensions are all options for Black women, and sometimes simultaneously.īut what are all of these things? Great question! So we tend to have shorter hair, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t grow. All this means is that it takes a little more TLC to avoid breakage. Each bend in the strand represents a weak point in the hair shaft, which makes it more prone to breakage. Having long hair is really more about how much hair you retain after breakage.īlack hair, because it’s curly, can be weaker than straighter hair. It’s a myth that Black hair doesn’t grow. All human hair grows at about half an inch a month, depending on your health and genetics. This is why it tends to grow up rather than down and can make gravity defying shapes like afros and puffs. (Check out this article’s chart for a more in-depth explanation.) It may come in spirals, coils, loops, zig zags, or other curves. While other races can have straight, wavy, or curly strands, most black people have varying degrees of tightly curled strands. Black hair is literally different than all other hair. But clearing up small misunderstandings - about hair! - can go a long way to clearing up the big misunderstandings - about race! So please allow me to share this primer on Black hair. Yet, something so essential to our identity is often misunderstood by people outside of our culture. It bonds us together in the style successes and struggles. Marketing firms have valued the Black haircare industry at $774 million. That’s a lot of deep conditioner and bobby pins!Īs a Black woman in a family of Black women, with a gaggle of Black women friends, this was entirely unsurprising. Newsflash: Black women spend a lot of time and money to maintain their hair.
For Black women in particular, a hairstyle can often be viewed less as an aesthetic choice than as a political one, and we have many questions. So here to educate on the basics of Black women’s hair is our Black-American Mash-Up Princess Jones, a writer and proud afro-wearer.
It’s important to most women, but for Mash-Ups, hair, and the cultural rules around it, can represent everything that is challenging about straddling two cultures and the competing beauty standards that come with them.
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