Uninformed and Overwhelmed- Recipe for Disaster?

Share

Previously published for MimiMagazine and XclusiveNigeria

 An early childhood memory, is the classic image of a small girl sitting in between an elder’s knees; in my case, I was nestled in between my mother’s.  However, she wasn’t cornrowing my hair or threading it for that matter, instead, she, a model of concentration, was tentatively slathering a cool, creamy mixture to my hair.  In another scene, we are both kneeling at the edge of the bathtub, my head inverted inwards, close to the faucet of fast surging warm water.  It’s curious how our memories can be, because this scene is one of many that I’ve kept buried and thus, untainted, however, within the last few years, when I’ve attempted to recall my earliest relaxer application, this memory is always the one I dust off.  Through adult lenses, I know it was a chemical treatment of some sort, but I don’t fault my mother, who was probably just overwhelmed with the tasks of balancing maintaining my and my sister's dense hair, with providing for her young family, in a new country.  Uniformed and overwhelmed can be a disastrous recipe.

Fast forward to our move to Imo State, Nigeria, and my childhood memories become laced with the sighs, gasps, and affirmations of how lush my thick and tightly coiled hair, regrown natural hair, was.  Perhaps, this could’ve been because we lived right in the heart of Igboland, and that it was possible that a large number people in that region of the country had my same hair type- thick, full, and unapologetic hair.  One might assume, that since this hair type was a common one, there shouldn’t have been so much awe and even, reverence for it.  And yet, whenever I was taken to the market to have my hair done for school, or for a special holiday, or whatever my mother deemed as an occasion of importance, voices of warm approval would consistently envelope me, and I would sink comfortably with indulgence, happy that my hair was the source of so many accolades.  In our corner of the world, having hair, not only on one’s head, but all over their body, is seen as a sign of beauty and good luck, and I frequently, remember passersby who would stop by the hair stall, to run their hands over my legs and arms, cooing over how much hair such a small child had.

Today, I hear varying stories that discuss the perception of natural hair within African countries, and immediately, a sense of detest from African people about African textured hair of any sort, seems to emerge.  I cannot speak on behalf of the entire continent , or on Nigeria for that matter, because my point of reference only accounts for my personal experience; however, I know that while growing up, the texture of my hair was never an issue of contention.  I never grew up feeling inadequate about characteristics of my hair, and the only thing I remember hating so passionately when it came to dealing with my hair, was that I was a child whose last desire was to sit still for any amount of time to have my hair styled.  I was the only girl my age in a compound full of rough and tumble little boys, so I was an interesting mix of tomboyish fearlessness and girlish frills.  Not being able to join my mischievous and carefree cohorts because I had to have my hair braided, was tantamount to torture.

When my family relocated back to the states, my first introduction that all was not right with my hair, was immediate.  I can recall in grade school, a classmate who would always lift up the back of my hair and snicker.  I remember him commenting on how I needed to shave the back of my neck or get a perm.  Needless to say, I was baffled then, but I quickly learned that the mundane curly balls of hair that graced my nape, were unsightly. 

 I find it curious that at both of our young ages, this child had already been taught to dislike the signature characteristic of highly textured hair, the same hair that undoubtedly also sprouted from his own scalp.  He had already internalized negative associations of it, and even felt righteous enough to impose his ideas on to me.  
Soon afterwards, I was relaxed, and maintained one, for the next twenty years of my life, not because I hated my texture, but because I was conditioned to maintain the ritual.  It was what was expected of me, I was unaware of the possibility of ever being without a relaxer.  

Despite the mandatory maintenance that having a relaxer required, if any one ever told me I relaxed my hair because I hated my real texture, and thus, I hated a part of myself, I would have adamantly told them they were hallucinating.  Frankly, I relaxed my hair because I wasn’t exposed to an alternative. My hair still prospered.  It was relatively still healthy and thick, and was always the longest out of my circles of friends.  Apart from the snickers in grade school when I was younger, I believe I grew up in a relatively safe cocoon of self-acceptance.

It wasn’t until after a weave disaster, that the idea of temporarily staying away from relaxers, actually became a conceivable possibility for me.  Ironically, the angst and discomfort that I experienced prior to making the decision to not only forgo relaxers entirely, but to also, chop the chemically straightened ends out of my hair, was exacerbated by the hours I spent researching online accounts about other women’s natural hair journeys.  I braced myself for the onslaught of negativity I feared I would receive after I read and heard about people who had received contempt for their coily textures, and had their hair likened to 'slave hair', 'nigger naps', 'fresh off the boat', or 'Kunta Kinte hair'.  And still worse yet, the ever pervading sentiment that in some African countries, natural hair is generally seen as backwards, unprofessional, or simply just ugly. 

Since, my childhood experience falls outside of that sentiment, logically, it shows that people are not monolithic and that our experiences are diverse.  Perhaps, the expectation and upset that comes along with the notion that all continental Africans must laud afro-textured hair in its natural state is a ridiculously flawed one.  It fails to recognize the mixed bag that people are, and that differences exist across all social and contextual boundaries.  Also, these differences arise through a variety of backgrounds including the legacies of colonialism and the drive to 'modernize' African countries, which a lot of the times, is code for westernization with all of its implications. 

 I don’t doubt the experiences of others, but I feel that highlighting only negative stories tends to create a one-sided view and an oversimplification of the truth.  I can’t comfortably say that some Nigerians chose to chemically straighten their hair in an effort to negate their “blackness”.  I can say that some relax because they feel it is a trapping of social class, and they are happy to be associated with anything that connotes luxury and status.  Others see chemical straighteners as a simple style option.  And still, there are people who don’t know how to care for their natural texture, and relax because they’ve been trained to do so. 

Maybe the assumptions some make about how African people wear their hair is well- intentioned, however, they are uninformed, and a set-up for disappointment. The problem with expectations that romanticize Africa is that they come across as arrogant and misguided because they assume that all African people who are not in the diaspora are in a virtual bubble and have not evolved since slavery. These expectations don’t understand the influences and values that all people are subject to in a global community.

The fact of the matter is that ironically, for me, shunning permanent treatments like the relaxer, opened my eyes to the possibility of choice.  It made me aware of the reasons of why I relaxed my hair, and when I attempted to question my reasons; I realized that my commitment to a relaxer was an unfair one.  I had never allowed myself the opportunity to learn all the nuances of my own tresses in their unaltered state.  

Not relaxing my hair allowed me to understand the revolutionary idea that I actually had the option of whether to relax or to not.  I did not have to live under veiled ignorance or trained conditioning, and instead, I realized that I could control what I did for myself.  In essence, it has become greater than “just hair”, and has manifested into a lifestyle.