Kara Brown’s article White People Are Rebranding Cornrows as ‘Boxer Braids’ talks about how the cornrow hairstyle has recently been taken and rebranded by Caucasian people and considered to be part of popular culture now. However, the author believes there is a disconnect with that idea.
Brown goes on to explain how Black people have been wearing cornrows for thousands of years and the style has never fallen out of fashion because some people have tried to claim the braids. Cornrows have been worn by many Black musicians and celebrities like Ciara and Tyra Banks. What Brown is offended by, is the New York Post would title an article about an age-old hairstyle rooted in Black history and Black culture as UFC is inspiring the hottest new hair trend.
Even worse, they are not the only ones that give Caucasians credits for cornrows under a different name. Later in the article, Brown posts pictures of Black celebrities with cornrows, which was long before the New York Post gave UFC credit for something they did should not have had any credit for.
The only way a group of people can ‘rebrand,’ lay claim and appropriate something from another’s culture, is they have to hold some form of power. The reason we know this power has shifted is because many people previously would not have considered cornrows part of high fashion when it belonged to the Black community. Cornrows were considered “ghetto” and “from the hood,” these were not styles a person would see on the fashion runway or at award shows.
Now people like the Kardashian’s have taken the braiding style and called it “reverse french braids” and “boxer braids,” and with their influence, they are able to completely ignore the history and the culture, causing a mass ignorance of how important the hairstyle is to a whole culture. This shows the power of influencers. Caucasian people would not go into salons and ask for “Kim Braids” when they actually just want cornrows, which is not something a Kardashian or any influencer can take credit for making popular.
Many people wonder why rebranding or adopting something from another culture is a problem. It is not the act of imitation that is the problem, but by changing the name and having the ability to make others call something by a different name, causing a different cultural maning, makes it the problem. Not a single thing is different.
This is a clear example of another group of people exerting their dominance over a different group of people. This inequality makes it easy for impressionable people to think something that originated thousands of years ago in the Caribbean’s and Africa was created as a new trend by social media influencers and fashion icons.
Cornrows help promote hair growth, keep hair neat for long periods of time and for fashion. Many Black people learn how to do intricate cornrows and braiding styles to look different and stylish. To label a whole hairstyle for years as something that was less desirable and not something that was appropriate in certain social setting, then decide all of a sudden “popular culture” thinks the style is acceptable, shows which group of people have influence.
If this was not the case, then there would have been no confusion as to what the braiding style is called. The only way a person can change the perception of something that comes from another culture is if they have some form of power over that culture.