I base it on this.
The rule is: no hairstyle extremes.
The exception is: unless it’s cultural.
I attended boarding school complete with school jacket and school tie and all the other trappings of preppiedom and our policy was similar.
As far as banning “street culture,” I say bravo. Sure, in some places street = “stereotypically ‘black,’” but that’s not exclusively the case. And it’s sound policy to ban the trappings of thuggery, regardless of the ethnic group with which it is associated.
Was this handled well? I really don’t know, but I would say that, given the flap, it could have been handled better.
And I’m curious to know why she can’t take it out for two weeks.
What this thread shows me that we as Americans are still trapped in sins of our forefathers. This isn’t about African-Americans, this is the UK, which has people from Africa, and the Caribbean which treats braided hair the way the Scotts treat Kilts. Is it part of their culture…we Americans are bastards of the world and have gone out of our way to boil every bit of the cultural uniqueness of our forebearers into a grey, pasty mush.
Three guesses where the teenager had a vacation at? Perhaps somewhere where Afro-Caribbean culture is dominant? She had her hair braided, lying on the beach or something; happens everyday.
The mistake the school made, was linking the braids to “street” culture. I wouldn’t be surprised if one of the black kids complained about the girls braids. Either because she stepped on their toes, or because they weren’t allowed to have “street culture braids” either, because they weren’t culturally allowed to either, despite their blackness.
If the school only allows those 2 Afro-Caribbean students wear braids and not any other student regardless of the color of their skin, then this is the usual knee-jerk reverse racism crap we always see. A white person appears to be denied a ‘right’, that a non-white person appears to be enjoying…unaware that other non-white people aren’t getting ‘special’ treatment either.
Try this, the school has a dress code and girl’s dresses can’t be above the shin. I walk in wearing my Kilt which is above the knee; being a Scott, I am allowed to wear my cultural garment.
You not a Scott or a Celt and walk in tomorrow wearing a kilt, and are sent home because it’s above the knee. Are you being discriminated against?
Her family went on a beach vacation, probably to the caribbean, and the girl got her hair beaded. What’s the big freakin’ deal. My 12-year-old has gotten it done on a couple vacations. It’s a nice souvenir for as long as it lasts, which is a couple weeks or so.
She’s attending the wrong school, I guess.
What is the school’s policy for hairstyles anyway? It’s definitely neat and tidy.
Looking back, I realize that it’s easy to pass of my deduction as fact.
Allow me to amend to “I’m willing to bet that” the students who are permittied these braids had to be exempted from a no-braid policy.
I’d love to know for sure, though.
Can we get a rulebook from the school?
If someone wanted to show up for school in a Kilt, I wouldn’t care. If they showed up with no underwear, I might. But cornrows are just another hairstyle and not a aprticularly odd one at that. If the school is getting so anal retentive that it starts regulating how students may decorate themselves that chosely, it’s gone way too far.
I just went googling to see if the school had a website, and couldn’t find one…but I did find this unrelated piece, which is about the school in question, and includes this from the head:
I wonder if there’s more to the braids than the news stories are saying?
Yes. The secret is out. It’s the Lady Kung Fu Gang. They whip their heads about until the beads become lethal weapons moving faster than the speed of light.
Or maybe the secret is that the black girls get to be in a high achieving school and a gang and the white girls do not.
Or maybe the headteacher has the biggest stick imaginable stuck up his or her butt and it is poking him/her in the brain and stirring up stupid sentiments. Sentiments like cornrows are an extreme hairdo from the culture of the street.
Okay so assuming that they have more than just the 2 African-Caribbean students, who most likely had to request an ‘pass’ on the extreme hair rules…I don’t see as a ‘pick on the white girl’ issue.
I would imagine the same thing would happen if an African-Caribbean student walked in with a blonde process.
Secondly cornrows aren’t just a hairstyle, they have a history West Africa and are used to confer everything from a social event to social standing. It’s more just a hair style to some people, the same way that side payot are more than long curly sideburns to some Chassidic Jews.
This BBC Article quotes the schools rule as “cannot have their head shaved or wear extreme hair fashions of any sort.” The school spokesman says, “The school has firm and clear rules about what hairstyles are acceptable, which are communicated to all pupils and parents.” I’d like to see the actual wording of the rule – “no extreme hair fashions” is not sufficiently clear and specific.
Because cornrows are NOT “extreme hair fashions”. Unless in England cornrows and mohawks are somehow equivalent in extremness. Are afros allowed or do white people need a dispensation to wear that too?
When I was in high school, my orchestra had a strict dress code. Braids were allowed (would have been damn near impossible to ban, seeing as how many of the students were black). But cornrows were a big no-no, for both black and white students.
I don’t know why. They aren’t that much different than regular braids.
Cornrows are a style of braiding. Instead of long braids coming directly out of the scalp, they’re braided against the scalp, like lots and lots of tiny french braids.
Personally, I think cornrows are a very attractive hairstyle.
But cornrows are just another hairstyle and not a aprticularly odd one at that. If the school is getting so anal retentive that it starts regulating how students may decorate themselves that chosely, it’s gone way too far.