MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) - Throughout her childhood, Jazmyne Wright and her family moved frequently. She was often the new student at a new school in a new city. When she introduced herself to new classmates, she was often wearing her hair straight.
“I thought natural hair was for little girls,” she said.
Now, at age 18, she wants all girls to know how to wear and care for their own hair. The current Tennessee curriculum is not inclusive enough of ethnic hairstyles, Wright said. She is advocating for that to change in her former Shelby County Schools district, where the majority of students are black.
Current standards for both cosmetology and barbering courses cover all hair textures, according to a statement from the district, the inclusion of standards and skills around natural hair is up to teacher discretion. Most schools that teach the course use Milady Resources textbooks and materials.
When Wright was enrolled in the course at Germantown High School, she did not have an inclusive experience, she said.
“Everything from the textbooks to the instruction to the mannequins, everything was European,” Wright said. “Everything was white.”
Kits for the class are about $170; and while they include two mannequins, in Wright’s case, both were European mannequins. Ethnic hair mannequins were optional and an additional fee of $60, she said.
Wright’s family moved to Memphis for her sophomore year of high school.
She stepped through the doors of Germantown High School and began attending a predominantly black high school for the first time. Wright soon realized how many decisions she’d been making to fit in with mostly white student bodies at other schools, from the way she spoke to the way she wore her hair.
Wright had grown her hair down to the middle of her back, but most of it was damaged from being heated and straightened. A couple months into her freshman year at the University of Memphis, she wanted to learn more about natural hair.
She turned to YouTube, a platform that has been a catalyst for the natural hair movement that began in the early 2000s. Women chronicled their experiences of going natural, sharing and creating their own new hair products, too.
In the 1970s, the hair movement was a political statement, Lisa Tharps, who authored a book on the history of black hair, told WIRED in 2019. At that time and since, black women have needed to outwardly politicize beauty, as opposed to white women, whose hairstyles are rarely interpreted as activism, WIRED reported.
“For black women to have a movement around beauty is revolutionary,” Tharps told WIRED.
One night in her University of Memphis dorm room, Wright found “Our Hair-itage” on YouTube. The 25-minute documentary begins with Black Power activist Kathleen Cleaver talking in the 1960s about why people wear natural hair. It continues to document the natural hair transition for black women today.
Soon after the documentary ended, Wright was still sitting at the desk in her dorm room and a friend, who’d already gone natural, was giving her the first real haircut she’d ever had.
“I ended up having to skip class so that my mom could style my hair right,” Wright said, laughing at the memory. Her mom immediately called her on FaceTime after Wright sent pictures of her new haircut.
“So far, I think I’ve been five months strong without any type of heat,” Wright said. “Just straight water and product.”
Wright wants to be an advocate for women and social justice, and plans to go to law school after obtaining her bachelor’s degree from the University of Memphis.
“I want to be involved with some policy changes in Memphis,” she said, “making environments safer for women and for black kids in school.”
“Make Ethnic Hair a Part of Cosmetology,” an online petition Wright created, has garnered more than 500 signatures. She plans to present the petition to the SCS board at its January business meeting.
Ahead of the meeting, Wright spoke to board member Kevin Woods, whose district includes Germantown High School. Woods is currently researching solutions, he confirmed.
In the past, SCS has offered a summer program focused on the standards for receiving a natural hair license, according to a statement from the district. The 6-week, 300-hour course was paid for by the district, and students were also paid through MPLOY, a city program. The district plans to offer the summer program again.
SCS has made efforts to expand natural hair programming, but a 2018 application to the state focusing on natural hair studies was denied, the district said in a statement.
Many Memphis women who go natural for the first time or want to style natural hair meet Takeisha Berry-Brooks, owner of A Natural Affair Beauty Lounge.
Berry-Brooks specializes in natural hair, and says new clients come in weekly: “They’re going natural, and they don’t know what to do with it.”
Along with the stigma of natural hair being unprofessional, she said, not having ethnic hair-inclusive cosmetology education contributes to women not knowing how to style their own hair.
At A Natural Affair, she focuses on teaching clients how to create styles with their own natural hair, rather than wearing protective styles, like braids.
“When you come into A Natural Affair,” she said, “it’s like home.”
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