Commentary by BlackKos editor JoanMar
“A woman’s hair is her crown and glory” (or variations of that) is a phrase I’ve been seeing in books since I first started reading. I have no doubt that the authors who wrote the books I read as a child were not using the words “crown” and “glory” to describe Black hair.
Oh, the crosses we have been forced to bear. Malcolm X once wrote that:
“The most disrespected person in America is the Black woman. The most unprotected person in America is the Black woman. The most neglected person in America is the Black woman.”
And if there’s one thing, other than the color of our skin, that is, that makes us stand out and thus even more open to vicious abuse, discrimination, and dehumanization, it is our hair. Our hair and hairstyles are only to be celebrated when appropriated by white women.
tell the black girls
how special powers
are interwoven
in their braids and cornrows.
god gifted
in the tips
of their twists and locs.
This tweet from VP Kamala Harris’s niece brought back memories:
My 5-year-old wanted beads like Venus and Serena. Her mama is not really the best at doing hair, but for her baby girl, she was going to do it herself. She’d not entrust this job of making her baby’s dream come through to anyone else. I went around town searching for just the right beads and the tools I’d need for this assignment. Getting my baby her Venus&Serena-do turned out to be an all-day affair. She was so patient, so well-behaved, and we had tons of fun sorting out beads, singing favorite songs, doing quizzes, she reading out loud to me and me answering a million questions. It was a labor of love and a time for bonding as generations have done before us. At the end of it all, she had a headful of beaded individual braids that she joyfully swung back and forth as she twirled and twirled and twirled and then jumped in her mom’s arms for a long hug. I was a proud mama.
She happily skipped off to her class the following Monday morning, eager to show off her new hairstyle to her friends. I picked her up from school in the afternoon and my baby is in tears. She’s crying as if her little heart is breaking. “What happened?” I asked in alarm. In between hiccups, she managed to tell me that her first grade (white) teacher ordered her to get those beads out of her hair because “you’re not in Africa where they don’t learn. Over here we learn and you can’t learn with beads in your eyes.” This happened in her first class, so can you imagine how traumatized she’d been for the whole school day? I was fit to be tied...but I had a child to calm, to reassure...and to teach about Africa. That night I set about writing letters to the principal, the Board of Education, and to the Connecticut Post (Twitter was just an idea then). I went in with my daughter the Tuesday morning and asked to speak with the offending/offensive teacher. I knew why I had to wait some 17 hours to confront her, and even so, my mindset was like, “Lady, don't push me today 'cause I'm dangerously close to the edge.”
The teacher admitted that she had indeed told my daughter to get the beads out of her hair... the absolute nerve of her. At the end of our not-too-friendly (to put it mildly) chat, she agreed to apologize to my daughter in private and before the entire class and to correct her lie about Africans not learning and to do that also in front of the entire class. Because wouldn’t it be a shame that she’d end up losing everything she’s worked for over her 26 years of teaching? I had those letters ready to go. (Interestingly, one of her excuses was that she was referring to Africans back in biblical times. Apparently, in her tiny racist mind, all the literate characters in the Bible were from Europe. Since she was professing to know so much about the Good Book, I asked if she remembered reading about the Ethiopian eunuch and what was he doing again? She sheepishly acknowledged my point.)
That’s just one of the many examples of hair discrimination I’ve had to deal with over the years — fights involving my daughters, my son (he wanted cornrows), and myself. Somehow, even after all this time, Black hair/hairstyles are still not given the respect due. Black hair in its natural state is not professional enough, is not respectable enough — so says the arbiters of what’s professional and respectable. And that’s why I welcome the latest offering from Dove and the CROWN Coalition.
The video, directed by 2020 BET Award winning music video director Sara Lacombe — who's worked with artists like DJ Khaled, Cardi B, and Migos — follows four generations of Black women who live their truth, share love, and embrace their beauty to the tune of the legendary song we all know and love.
Watching this video brought tears to my eyes. It could have been bitter tears. We should not have been forced to deal with all the crap millions of us have had to endure for generations now...if only racist colonizers and Karens would mind their own damn business and stop trying to impose their sensibilities upon us...yes, the tears could have been bitter, but they weren’t. They were joyful tears. This was a job beautifully done.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
NEWS ROUND UP BY DOPPER0189, BLACK KOS MANAGING EDITOR
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Perhaps you saw this object on display at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History in the past few years—if you did, you won’t have forgotten it. It’s a cotton sack, much mended, with a hundred-year-old stitched notation: “ ‘My great grandmother Rose/ mother of Ashley gave her this sack when/ she was sold at age 9 in South Carolina/ it held a tattered dress 3 handfulls of/ pecans a braid of Roses hair. Told her/ It be filled with my Love always/ She never saw her again/ Ashley is my grandmother’—Ruth Middleton/ 1921.”
This object, known as “Ashley’s Sack,” is the subject of historian Tiya Miles’ new book, All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake. All That She Carried is a master class in the use of context in historical writing. Stymied by a lack of records, Miles thinks around the sack from every available angle: enslaved women’s relationships to their clothes, the meaning of hair in the 19th century, what we know about enslaved children’s reactions to separation, how Ashley might have gotten her name (an unusual one, for an enslaved girl), the natural history of pecan trees in the South. Through her interpretation, the humble things in the sack take on ever-greater meaning, its very survival seems magical, and Rose’s gift starts to feel momentous in scale.
I asked Miles to talk a bit more about her process. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Rebecca Onion: I first read about Ashley’s sack in Heather Williams’ book about slavery and family separation. I don’t think I’ve ever come across a more uniquely powerful object in all of the history of American slavery—maybe in all of American history. You write in an essay on method at the end of this book that you first saw the sack on a screen, in a digital image, and it affected you in a similar way. How do you explain this power? Emotional connection can’t begin to describe it.
Tiya Miles: The power of this object seems to emanate from it, whether a person is seeing it from a distance, on the page of a book or on a screen, or up close and personal in a museum exhibit. And I think the power is anchored in the materiality of it, the fact that it’s a concrete and tangible item, and then the emotionality of what’s expressed on the surface of the sack, through the embroidered story. So the experience of engagement for the viewer or reader is a double or triple whammy—there are all these different modes of connection with the thing itself.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In 1944, William Terry Couch, a “fair-minded, progressive Southerner,” who served as the director of the University of North Carolina Press, along with white “racial liberal” sociologist Guy Johnson, had an idea for a book outlining the concerns of Black America. He enlisted Rayford Logan, a brilliant Howard University history professor, to compile a series of essays called What the Negro Wants. The list of contributors featured the who’s who of Black thinkers, including poet Langston Hughes, W.E.B Du Bois—one of the founders of modern sociology—and labor organizer A. Philip Randolph, who forced the U.S. military to desegregate and later went on to organize a little event called the March on Washington.
When the white liberals saw the initial draft of essays, they thought it was outrageous. The list of demands was insane. They had written about full equality, desegregation and even civil rights! There was no way these were the people who represented Black America.
“I had been hoping that at least two or three of the 15 authors would raise the question of how far the negroes is responsible for his condition and deal with the problem of what negroes can now, regardless of what white people may do,” Couch wrote to Logan. “The things negroes are represented as wanting seem to be far removed from what they ought to want. Most of the things they are represented as wanting can be summarized in the phrase: complete abolition of segregation. If this is what the negro wants, nothing could be clearer than that what he needs, and needs most urgently, is to revise his wants.”
So to balance the book from these radical left-leaning negroes, they sought out a prominent, “conservative, inter-racial cooperation type,” and settled on Mary McLeod Bethune. A reformer who worked with President Franklin Roosevelt for Black economic equality, Bethune was not known for being vocal about segregation or the “separate but equal” policy. She agreed to contribute an essay about the violent protests against police brutality in Detroit and Harlem. She began her essay by calling out the “band of hoodlums” who “challenge law and order to burn and pillage and rob.” Then she explained why this thuggish violence was an American tradition, writing:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Simone Biles is the World’s Greatest. This month, Biles brings her unequivocal joy and grace to Glamour, as the greatest gymnast in history graces the June cover wearing a white embroidered dress and grin that would light up a whole room.
The Olympian stuns in a collection of red, white and blue garments and backdrops, photographed by The Glow Up 50 2020 honoree Kennedi Carter. Biles’ physical and mental strength are evident in this shoot models both flowing and body-skimming silhouettes, showing the juxtaposition between her newly discovered and cherished mental state and the mind-blowing physical strength that has been seen in the four moves named for her.
In the cover story, she discusses the emotional weight of being quarantined, explaining how she “got to go through being angry, sad, upset, happy, annoyed. I got to go through all of it by myself, without anybody telling me what to feel.” The phenom is still not sure if she’ll continue competing past the 2024 Olympics (“I’m just really excited to see what’s out there in the world and to see what else I’m good at,” she says), but as depression descended, she was reminded of why she does what she does—and what would happen if it all went away.
So she trained like the Tokyo Olympics were tomorrow, and all her hard work paid off. She debuted her new leotards on June 6 at the U.S. Gymnastics Championships, each bedazzled in the word GOAT, reminding her fans—and her haters—who really is the world’s best.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In The Heights, the highly anticipated TV adaptation of the hit Broadway musical from Lin Manuel Miranda, directed by Jon M. Chu, dropped its trailer over a year ago and folks had questions.
In sum: Where are all of the leading dark-skinned Afro-Latinx folks?
Granted, the trailer (and film) showcased Black dancers and there were certainly Black women in the hair salon, but where are the dark-skinned Black Latinx folks with a storyline? After all, this film is placed in Washington Heights, N.Y., right?!
I had an opportunity to speak with the film’s director and several of the cast members, like Leslie Grace, Corey Hawkins and Melissa Barrera, who said the following when asked about the light-skinned privilege of In The Heights.
“We are all people of color, and we all struggle for the few spaces that we’re given. And to diminish that, and like hate on something, that is already breaking so many molds...is mean.”
But, I acknowledge that the real conversation should be had with Lin Manuel Miranda.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Transforming the academic study of structural racism into a vague grab bag of villainy has been useful fodder for moral panic while the GOP figures out how to attack Joe Biden. The New Republic: The Specter of Critical Race Theory Is Rotting Republicans’ Brains
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you were to turn on Fox News or right-wing radio right now, you might not find any news at all about President Joe Biden’s first foreign trip: Conservative media has all but stopped covering any policy concerns, whether they be foreign or domestic. But you would hear hours of content about “critical race theory,” the hitherto relatively obscure academic concept that has, over the past few months, emerged as the right’s hot bogeyman of the summer.
Critical race theory has been studied for decades, but it received relatively little attention in the wider cultural sphere until the past year, when conservatives adopted it as a catch-all term to demonize and discredit the anti-racist, anti–police brutality movements that sprang up in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. Its academic context, which is chiefly concerned with the endemic racism in American institutions and power structures, is not actually essential to the current political discourse being promulgated by Republican politicians, conservative institutions, and the right-wing media. The conservative movement is simply wielding the academic jargon as a means to gin up a moral panic.
It’s working. A Media Matters study in May found that Fox News had mentioned “critical race theory” 552 times in the previous 11 months. CNN’s Oliver Darcy reported last week that Fox had shoehorned it into its coverage 125 times in only five days. In Texas, Florida, and a grab bag of other Republican-led states, conservative lawmakers have moved to ban it from being taught in schools.
The “critical race theory” being talked up on Fox and right-wing radio has little in common with the academic discipline that emerged from the Ivy League 40 years ago. It is, instead, a mash-up of a clutch of right-wing tropes. Primarily, however, it is a reaction to students being taught the actual history of America—warts and all—instead of a puffed-up faux-patriotic rendition that passes for the truth in the works of non-historians such as Dinesh D’Souza and Bill O’Reilly. Among these ideamongers, there is a deep insecurity in acknowledging the racism of American institutions or the country’s often brutal past; the attacks on critical race theory are essentially an attempt to sweep the less-than-rosy stuff under the rug, in favor of glossy American exceptionalism.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Bariga, a sprawling northern suburb of Lagos, Nigeria that is home to more than 700,000 people, is infamous for its impoverished housing and gang culture – and for pushing a raw, jarring sound into the Nigerian mainstream. Olamide, long one of Africa’s biggest music stars, was one of the kids responsible for that shift: 13 years ago, he was walking the streets of Bariga, plotting his way out.
“Surviving was hard,” says Olamide, now sitting in a comfortable Lagos home on a sunny Friday afternoon. “Bariga was not far from the other slums you see across the world, from Mumbai to New York and London – life in the ghetto is almost always the same everywhere. There were days when being able to afford three square meals was a big deal for my family. All of that motivated me to hustle hard – I wanted to see the whole world and experience different cultures from what I grew up seeing.”
Olamide Adedeji grew up listening to Yoruba music legends such as King Wasiu Ayinde Marshal and King Sunny Adé, but it was the contrast of DMX’s growling bars and Jay-Z’s ice-cool lyrics that appealed to him when he started making his own music. He is now advertised on the side of London buses and has scored millions of global streams, with a versatile artistry that spans delicate Afropop and harder dance tracks as Yoruba lyrics bleed into English and back again.
His first hit single, Eni Duro, recorded mostly in Yoruba, was released in 2010. Faced with juggling his music career and a university education outside Lagos, he left the latter in his third year, and his single arrived just as Nigerian music was undergoing a subtle rewriting of its pop conventions. Songs recorded in native languages had been relegated to the fringes of the industry, but a class of rappers from mainland Lagos – away from the city’s wealthy islands and peninsulas – then surged to popularity with incisive music that wove tales of street realities into boisterous hits. The positive acceptance of Eni Duro instantly made Olamide one of the wave’s most identifiable faces.
.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
WELCOME TO THE FRIDAY’S PORCH
IF YOU ARE NEW TO THE BLACK KOS COMMUNITY, GRAB A SEAT, SOME CYBER EATS, RELAX, AND INTRODUCE YOURSELF.