I would never get my hair cut if I wanted someone with hair like mine to do it!
I’m quite beigey coloured, but I have an African ancestor somewhere along the line. My Dad has African type hair, even though he is also beigey and my Mum is english and has very very fine hair.
As a result I have very very curly, fine hair (ringlets). It is very unusual. 90% of people I meet say “OMG! Are those curls natural?!”
I think I have seen maybe one person in my life with hair like mine (but then I’m in Australia, could be different elsewhere), and I’m REALLY peeved at the moment because of the hairdresser who last cut my hair.
I always just ask for a trim, and just deal with the different lengths I end up with (it springs up however far it wants to anyway!), but this time I can’t even wear my hair out because the lengths are so different. I have to wear it at least 1/2 up.
I’m talking THREE INCHES difference between two sections right next to each other. Plus, she took heaps of length off. I only asked for a trim . :mad: Do you know how long it takes curly hair to grow so it looks long? Grrrrr…
(rant over, sorry bout that! :D)
So… you can see why I would love to have a hairdresser with hair like mine, and therefore I can see why African hair would be different to cut/style than “normal” hair, and it probably is better to go with the hairdresser with similar hair.
IMHO, it would be mighty stupid to pick a white stylist over a black stylist JUST because you don’t want to assume that black stylists knows a thing or two about black hair.
I’m very sensitive about my hair. When I wore it really really short, I let a white guy cut it. But I’m sporting a curly fro now and I tend to it myself. I don’t want to have to explain to people how I want it to look, because like auntie em, people–black and white–have a tendency to disregard my instructions.
But…if I was in an all-white environment and there was a white salon and a black salon (and I had a dying need to get my hair “did”), I would be a fool not to try the black salon first. They specialize in my kind of hair, first of all. Second of all, even if no one is an expert in monstro-type hair, I’m more likely to find a stylist there who has at least experienced it. If I had my buzz cut a white stylist would work because I have straight hair when it’s really short. But if I stepped into a white salon with my hair as it is now? They’d probably call in the Exorcist and it would be embarrassing.
There are probably many white people who are better at styling black hair than certain black stylists. However, is your average black stylist more experienced with black hair than your average white stylist? Are you more likely to find a stylist who can work with your kind of hair (if you’re black) in a black-run salon than in a white-run salon? Why is stating “yes” to these questions so wrong? When you’re a consumer with limited time and money, you make your decisions based on probablities, not possibilities.
My father has fine, wavy hair. He goes to black barbers (they have their own subculture) but he could very well go to white ones if he ever needed to. My mother, who has dread locks, would not be served by your average white stylist. So it really does depend on the type of hair and hairstyle you have, not just race.
I am ostensibly white, though I claim my heritage is The Great American Mutt. All through my life I have had black folks and white folks alike joke and insinuate that I am of mixed heritage based soley on the extreme curliness of my blond hair. That’s okay by me, I figure I get the best of both worlds: blond & curly.
I’ve had a time of it trying to find a good hairstyle that goes with my low maintenance lifestyle, and it is hard to find hairstylists who understands how to cut hair this curly. For example, a straight cut across leaves me with layers, when it would leave a straight-haired person with a bob. Anyway, to the point of the OP: I have generally found that black hairstylists are better at dealing with my hair than stylists of other ethnicities. My current stylist is black, though to be fair, I’ve learned that once I find a good one, I stick with them as long as I can, black or white.
to adoptamom, my hair grew to my butt and was not that hard to do even with my black hair- my nieces hair and sisters and cousins all have long hair- don’t recall them having a hard time either
That being said, both black and white people make me nervous when they are doing my hair. My black stylist seems to always want to cut my hair and my white stylist…well lets just say she is into macy greys hair do :eek:
I get my hair done at our local beauty school alot because its cheap and they need someone to practice on. Out of everyone who has ever done my hair, these gals seem to do the best, go figure.
This is also relevant. I am in a nearly all white environment, and I have entirely unprocessed hair. (Which isn’t rare everywhere, but in most of the greater Seattle area, it is.) My answer may well have been different in a more racially mixed area.
Just to say, I understand what the black women are saying. I have had my hair done by many people, women with curly hair, with straight hair, thick hair and thin. Male and Female, black and white. My hair always has a better cut when someone with fine straight hair (like mine) styles it. They know the problems I have with it, and they have more experience. It really does make a difference.
Heh, it really isn’t the racial issue some of you are trying to make it out to be . . . it’s just about finding a stylist who appears to have experience with your type of hair. For those of us with difficult hair, we can’t count on every stylist we come across to know how to handle it.
I’m a white female with naturally curly hair, and I have a devil of a time finding someone who can cut my hair properly. Most stylists with straight or permed hair really have no idea what it’s like to deal with hair like mine; it’s unruly and has a mind of it’s own - the less I do to it and the more gentle I am with it, the better it looks (some people think having thick hair means you can be rough with it, but it’s more delicate than it looks!). Stylists with naturally curly hair are more likely to understand what it’s like & generally do a better job because they have to deal with hair like mine on a daily basis.
Were I to walk into a salon in a new area and have to choose a stylist, I would very likely look for someone with naturally curly hair. Barring a referral or evidence that someone knows how to handle your difficult hair, wouldn’t you look for a stylist who has obviously had to deal with hair like yours before?
a slight hijack, but why would/ is it hard for a black person to grow long hair, as Adoptamom_II said?
I also have naturally curly hair, and auntie em, have seen that look of panic in the stylist’s eyes as my hair grows into a fro worthy of Magenta. My hair has been frizzed by both white and black people…though I’m not the target of the OP, finding a good haircut/style is tough, and race/gender/sexual preference/number of appendages would not matter a whit if they can cut my hair well.
aurelian, if you have the tightly curled kind of Black hair that many of us do, it doesn’t really get long, it gets big. (Think of variations on the general theme of the Foxy Brown '70s style shoulder-width afros.) In order to make it straight enough to make it “long” we have to process the hair in some fashion, either with extreme heat or with chemical agents. Both of these straightening methods are pretty unhealthy and they make hair fragile and prone to breakage.
Personally, I noticed that even when I did nothing more than keep my ends trimmed, my hair never really got beyond shoulder length. At that point, the ends would be so split that I’d have to cut it back substantially and the cycle would continue. My hair grows no more than 1/4 - 1/3" a month, so the challenge of getting a lot of length before the damage required a lot of cut back was a no-win proposition.
My mother could sit on her hair when she was a young girl. Her mother was Native American, and it showed (shows) in my mother’s hair texture. I was not blessed to receive the recessive “good” hair gene. Ah well.
Looks like I got here too late. Everyone said what I had to say already, but I’ll chime in anyway. No, I wouldn’t let most white stylists get anywhere near my hair. I’m going with Sionach on this one. It really boils down to experience. If there are two stylists who are unknown to me, one white and one black, I’d choose the black one because she probably knows how to deal with my hair. I’ve never seen a white person in my whole entire life with hair as kinky as mine, so I figure most likely a white person would really have no feckin’ clue what to do with me. I don’t figure that most white stylists are relaxing and flat ironing hair all day. Even if she did have lots of experience with black hair (which is unlikely), she certainly doesn’t have it sitting on top of her head everyday as does the black stylist. I laughed at aurelian’s post because I’ve seen white people panic over frizz. Frizz! This just kills me. Oh boy, what would they do if they had my hair? But then again if they had hair like mine, they’d eventually learn what works with it and what doesn’t, and would have those kinks tamed in no time. So as Sionach says, I feel more comfortable with a stylist whose hair texture is the same as mine.
You may wonder why I assume that a white stylist doesn’t have much experience with black hair. Well I’m sure I’m not the only one who has noticed that there are some salons that are unofficially designated “black.” There are black stylists who cater to a primarily black clientele. I do not see white people working in these salons, and I rarely see black people going into the “non-black” salons. So in conclusion, the point of all that blathering is to say I need someone who I can be sure has had experience with my type of hair. A white stylist may or may not, but a black stylist definitely has experience, and probably a whole lot more of it than a non-black one.
Sorry, but you’re wrong there. :dubious: I’m white and I can definately get major frizz. I have to put product in my hair when it’s wet or else spend 1/2 an hour getting rid of what seems like the start of dreadlocks the next time I wet my hair.
Well, I suppose that I did receive the blessing of “good hair”, but that term just makes me cringe (I realize–or at least I think–that you were saying it in a tongue-in-cheek way, however I know too many people who use the term without a hint of irony).
Also, there are certain “politics” that (still!) tend to come with that “blessing”, for me. No, I’m not talking about Spike Lee song-and-dance numbers, but as a Black person who can grow long hair, I find that cutting it off (a la Halle Berry) is tantamount to committing murder. I’ve lost friends and suitors alike over it. No kidding.
And it’s amazing how many people feel like it’s OK to comment (rather rudely) on your choice of hairstyle when you have Political Hotbed Hair. Or, for that matter, how many people automatically assume that you have a certain personality because of it.
If I was black, I’d choose a black hairperson over a white one, too. I’m white and if I had a white salon and a black salon next to each other, all things being equal, I’d go to the white salon.
When I was in college in NE DC, I didn’t feel like going into DuPont or wherever to fine the nearest Metro-accessible hair place, so I just walked ten minutes up the street to the black salon. My first time there, I had three black hair-dressers confer over my hair and figure out which one would have the best chance of not ruining my hair. The hair came out decent (but I cut my hair pretty simple, 2’s on the sides and back and clip down the top), but not really great. But it was cheaper than anywhere else in the city, so I kept going there. Gradually, the hair cuts became better and better as I was a regular for about two years.
That was my favorite place to get my haircut out here in DC (back home in CA, I had the same hairdresser from the age of 6 until I was 18 and went away to college). The shop was a regular neighborhood hangout place and the conversations were always a lot of fun (and made for some awkward moments occassionally).
But yeah. Given the choice between an unknown white barber and unknown black barber, I’d take the unkown white barber, just because they are more likely to be able to cut my hair properly and deal with my cowlick.
I haven’t cut my hair in over a year and, although it is very tightly curled, I wouldn’t call it nappy (the legacy of my Puerto Rican mother) yet it never, ever grows past my shoulders.
Those of you who are saying that it is racist to assume a black person would have more experience with black hair than a white person-- I personally believe you know how ridiculous you sound. Really-- whoda thunk hair would be a cause of racial tension.
You ain’t never lied, auntie em. When you’re black and you have long hair, you better have it laid nicely or you’ll get an earful from EVERYONE about how it’s all “going to waste”.
I cut my hair because of that (and the fact that I was tired of having to donate an entire day to combing and washing it).
I went to beauty school, and I thought doing black hair was much different that doing white hair. Everything about it is different, and I think it makes sense to assume other black folks are going to know more about how to care for it than a white person.
A friend of mine gave me this great book. It’s called, “Bulletproof Diva: Tales of Race, Sex, and Hair,” by Lisa Jones. I was enlightened by her frank writing on the subject. I think a lot of white people don’t realize what hair symbolizes in black culture. I find it fascinating.
Link to info about Lisa Jones: http://www.greatertalent.com/bios/jones.shtml
I said I’ve seen white people panic over frizz. To be clear, what I meant was when white people I’ve seen white people who don’t usually have to deal with frizz panic over frizz. Just 'cause they don’t really have to deal with it and stuff, you know, so when they see it they freak out. Tis all.
