ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at women's talk on hair styling practices and the continuation of the politics and practice of Black anti-racist aesthetics into the 21st century. It not only shows how imbricated hair is with beauty but also to get to grips with the gendered meanings of racialized hair and the politics of stylization. Within the Black Atlantic diasporic generated anti-racist aesthetics the beauty that was valorized and recognized was that of dark skin and natural afro-hair. There is a long-standing tradition in Black anti-racist aesthetics of thinking that straight/processed hair means Black self hatred. A racialized hierarchy is clearly embedded in the language of hair and it must be negotiated by Black women like Lorraine who claim the space of Black beauty. It is Blackness and Black anti-racist aesthetics that are being reframed, renegotiated and re-embodied through hair stylization.
