The First Lady of Hair

Our hair symbolically has deep meaning. Our hair relates to characteristics that enabled us to be labeled as property by Europeans. Our skin color and our exterior was used to differentiate ourselves from white people during slavery. We lived a colonial world that labeled anything dark as not beautiful. However, as people of African descent in the Americas we come in all shades and styles. Indeed some may seems the badge of dark skin as not favorable, however in the context of slavery, even our light skin shows how the master owned our female ancestors bodies. Nonetheless, whether you are dark as granite or light as paper, we all most likely have some ancestors of European descent. Remember, black women in America historically were made to breed and we were the sexual objects of the master( black men as well). However, we can all agree that human beings originated from the African continent. Th entire world is indeed children of the motherland. Now whether we keep our hair straight or curly is our own choice.The reasons why though will explain whether we have overcome the self hate brainwashing. If I make my hair straight because I like the style, this is understandable. If I feel my hair is ugly without this straightening process then this is a problem. Nonetheless, now that America is looking at us like never before it may be time we face some issues as people of African descent. I do feel however, that failed to mention that the root of the problem of self hate did not come from African slaves. I can imagine they loved their noses, hair and skin color.



http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1919147,00.html?iid=tsmodule