*Written by Palmira Muniz, UCD Class of 2015
I remember the first conversation I had with my sister-in-law about Blackness and Black politics.
Compared to people who hate their in-laws, Jasmine and I have always been pretty close. Jasmine, a dark-skinned Black and Jamaican woman from the Bronx, is ten years older than me, and has been in my life and family since I was ten years old. Like many Afro-Puerto Ricans, I too was born in the Bronx. However, I mostly grew up in Southern California, as the “dark-skinned Black girl” living in a Mexican American community. While we have both felt outcasted because of our blackness, Jasmine isn’t exactly as lucky as I am in most cases, specifically in situations dealing with colorism. The moment when I first began to self-actualize my identity as an Afro-Latina, and how social institutions affected me, Jasmine and I got into an argument about hair.
Some of you may be thinking, “Hair? Is that what all you women think about?” and if that’s the case, you need to check your sexism at the door, but yes…hair. I made the asinine mistake of making a comment about Jasmine and her husband (my brother Pedro who is obviously Puerto Rican too) that when they decided to have children, their offspring would have “good hair.” My mistake not only lied within just assuming that Jasmine simply wanted to have kids because she was a woman who was married, but implying that my brother’s genes combined with Jasmine’s genes would birth a child who had a hair texture like mine, a 3C curl.
In Black spaces, my hair is considered “good hair.” It did not look like Jasmine’s natural hair, which resembles the soul sistah/Black Panther type of texture comprised of very tight coils and curls. Jasmine’s hair texture and those similar to it are not admired as much as my hair texture, despite the internal issues I had growing up with non-Eurocentric standardized beauty traits. This was nothing in comparison to having to hear “good hair” and not having the compliment being directed towards you for most of your life. This is when I started to realize that my blackness and Jasmine’s blackness are different, but both types of experiences are valid.
In regards to the Black Experience, Black History Month is a cause for the celebration and the appreciation of our forefathers, mothers, and persons who set forth the path that is Black Excellence; and along with this, Black History Month is also a platform of Black Empowerment for this generation. Specifically, Black History Month 2k16 has been solidified by, some would say, Beyonce’s “Formation.” Her music video projects the message, “I love my Blackness, and yours,” showing how multi-dimensional a black female pop artist can be. The video is a necessary political statement about loving your Blackness by expressing and celebrating black culture.
This mix between a Toni Morrison novel and Spike Lee Joint covers many facets of Southern Blackness, and some (outsiders) could say that the music video and song are exclusively Southern, with the exception of police brutality that affects black lives all over the world. Black folks, Blackness, and Black Identity fall under many categories governed by region, gender, class, sexuality, and ability, yet all members of the black community share roots in the African Diaspora, regardless of where they call home. Yet, many Black Folk who don’t reside in the south can agree that there is something every member of the Black community can take away from Beyonce’s “Formation.”
The common ground I am referring to, and which is a huge recurring theme in the music video, and what had been the catalyst in my relationship with my sister-in-law is the concept of Black Hair and the politics that surround it. No, I cannot speak on behalf of all Black folks because that would be impossible and limiting, but what I do know for a fact and no one can tell me otherwise is that hair has been mentioned in one way or another in every Black identified home. In Pan-African Diaspora, Black American Diaspora, Afro-Latinos, Caribbean folks, and all Black identified groups, textured hair has been politicized, policed, capitalized, ridiculed, and criticized. In the song, Beyonce slays-I mean says: “I like my baby hair with baby hairs and afro,” defending her daughter, Blue Ivy, who at barely pre-school age, has been chastised for having her natural hair out. With this simple, yet powerful lyric, Beyonce, similar to my mom who has non-Black, bone straight hair did for me and other cocolas like me, defended her daughter’s existence as a little Black girl who has very Black hair. Along with Blue Ivy flaunting her beautiful curls, we see images of other styles of black hair: locs, weaves, even bigger afros, those beautiful booty-length braids Beyonce was rocking and DANGLING (as a person who has had braids at that length, I do not understand how she was not worried about her edges, but I digress). With the combination of protective styles and natural hair images, the message from this video is: our hair, no matter in what variance it is laid, is valid and beautiful.
This is for you, Blue Ivy. This is for my sister-in-law, Jasmine. This is for me, and this is for every little Black or Brown girl, boy, and child who was told that their hair was too nappy, too ghetto, too textured, too wild. You should have always known that your hair grows up and out because it is reaching for the sun and still you will rise. If it took Beyonce’s “Formation” to give you some validation, then so be it; you were going to realize it sooner or later.