Amelia Halgren’s Reviews > Twisted: The Tangled History of Black Hair Culture > Status Update

“Now, many white people... conceive of blackness only as an experience defined by racism and unmitigated misery.... people would occasionally (and with a palpable sense of generosity on their behalf), say to me: “I don’t even see you as black” ...as if this was the greatest compliment they could bestow upon me... Don’t tell me you don’t see race, my blackness is something I have no desire to erase....”

Irun Didi

https://englishessaykce.files.wordpre...

The names ‘cornrows’ and ‘canerows’ harken back to crops cultivated by the enslaved:

“Unlike the English names which directly reference an enslaved past, the Yuruba names originate in world that exists prior to one in which slavery became the dominant signifier of black life. The names serve as a powerful reminder that we have identities that existed before, beyond, and outside the legacy of slavery.”

“Generally black people know that our hair takes time and effort to do so they don’t generally try to put their hands up in it. I think there is also more of an awareness of boundaries and personal space as well as the enduring (if these days almost implicit awareness) that our hair has a spiritual significance. Look, but don’t touch. White people, take note.”

“The ordeal eventually ends and my hair has been transformed into a style I can now recognize as Shuku”

https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mPRWBRiZYo...

“In denying black people their humanity, the hair that grows from their heads was —one might argue still is— considered more similar to the wool or fur of an animal than to the straight, human tresses of Europeans.”

🥺