How Natural Hair Empowers Black Island Women
Tamara Lowe walks into her hotel room in Miami in early January 2013. Her eyes swell with tears, she kneels down on the carpet near the base of the bed and she cries “Jesus, thank you.” An hour before she had been offered the position of country manager of Tropical Shipping Dominica, a major shipping company based in the U.S. that services the Caribbean and The Bahamas. Lowe had stood up in the interview with many odds against her. There were other applicants that could have filled those shoes as she had only been in the shipping industry for six years. She had applied for a position in a male-dominated industry and at the time of the interview, she was only 32 years old. Lowe is a Black island woman with natural hair.
“I had decided when they met me at Tropical Shipping Miami, they were going to meet me,” says Lowe. “I’m going to do this with my natural hair.”
Lowe’s choice to wear her natural hair to the interview that could change her life did not come easily. “I remember when they called me for the interview, I was torn,” recounts Lowe. “Everybody said to me ‘this is a big deal, you cannot go with your hair like that, you need to perm.’”
Tamara Lowe walks into her hotel room in Miami in early January 2013. Her eyes swell with tears, she kneels down on the carpet near the base of the bed and she cries “Jesus, thank you.” An hour before she had been offered the position of country manager of Tropical Shipping Dominica, a major shipping company based in the U.S. that services the Caribbean and The Bahamas. Lowe had stood up in the interview with many odds against her. There were other applicants that could have filled those shoes as she had only been in the shipping industry for six years. She had applied for a position in a male-dominated industry and at the time of the interview, she was only 32 years old. Lowe is a Black island woman with natural hair.
“I had decided when they met me at Tropical Shipping Miami, they were going to meet me,” says Lowe. “I’m going to do this with my natural hair.”
Lowe’s choice to wear her natural hair to the interview that could change her life did not come easily. “I remember when they called me for the interview, I was torn,” recounts Lowe. “Everybody said to me ‘this is a big deal, you cannot go with your hair like that, you need to perm.’”
“I started to train my eyes”
Tamara Lowe
Society has for centuries denigrated the features of Black women, particularly their hair. Black women have been encouraged and at times forced to add chemical treatments that straighten their curly hair by breaking down the bonds in the hair shaft. This is called a “perm” or “hair relaxer”. A study in 2018 claims that Black hair has been subject to white social control through a range of formal and informal mechanisms. The study explains that hair is not merely a natural aspect of the body; it has the power to govern how people present and feel about themselves as well as how they interpellate.
A simple Google search of “unprofessional hairstyles for work” will produce photography of mostly Black women. Although the racist results of this search were first written about in 2016, five years later, nothing has changed. Black women’s hair continues to be governed by the standards set by white society.
The first time Lowe went natural, her hair was a Teeny Weeny Afro (TWA). She had just started a new job. At that time, this was not the way most Black women wore their hair especially to work. Preferably, hair would have had to be processed with a relaxer, straightened and pulled back neatly without a strand out of place, or maybe in a weave of silky flowing hair that bounced from side to side across your shoulder. Her boss at the time asked her if she was going to keep coming to work with her hair uncombed.
“I permed my hair soon after, I felt weak,” says Lowe.
Many Black women have been challenged to decide about whether or not to wear their natural hair in the corporate world for fear of discrimination. When the Obamas left the White House in 2016, Michelle Obama’s hair became the topic of discussion when photos of her hair surfaced and broke the internet with headlines like ‘Michelle Obama Sports Her Natural Hair and the Internet Is Losing It’.
For Lowe, appreciating her hair began with arming herself with information. An avid poet and painter, Lowe found out that by educating herself and reading books on appreciating herself, her blackness and her hair that she made significant steps to self-acknowledgement. She had to learn to train her own eyes to see her beauty.
“I started training my eyes, I searched online for women in the corporate world, people that had their hair natural,” says Lowe. “I went up to Miami for the interview with my hair in a twist-out, dressed nicely, looking smart and I represented myself.”
Growing up in the Caribbean surrounded by Black people who look very much like you, you would not expect that Black women would be subject to white hegemony.
Dr. Donna-Maria Maynard, a professor at the University of West Indies in Barbados grew up in the U.K. She remembers once visiting Barbados to attend a family wedding. Her relatives insisted that she got a perm because her natural hair was not acceptable to attend the function.
“I thought I was disadvantaged having been the minority living in England.”
Dr. Donna-Maria Maynard
“They literally took me and I got my hair relaxed. We put curls and stuff, and I went to the wedding … I did not feel like myself,” Dr. Maynard recalls. She had worn her hair natural for most of her life in the U.K. and she assumed that growing up in the Caribbean, one should have a solid Black identity.
“I thought I was disadvantaged having been the minority living in England.”
Dr. Maynard conducted a study with a colleague on Black Caribbean hair identity and "going natural" using social media networks.
In her study, Dr. Maynard confirmed that Black women in the Caribbean continue to face challenges when wearing their natural hair and there are lingering artifacts of the colonial era that are still ingrained in different facets of the Caribbean psyche. The study also uncovered a psychosocial struggle, where the women interviewed reported that society deemed them as not professional enough and their natural hair looked unkempt in some way.
Serina Green, a Black Canadian and second-generation Dominican had her first perm at age eight because her hair was “not manageable”. “I had that kind of hair-between-hair texture, it’s not quite soft or silky and it was very, very thick,” says Green.
While a perm may have made her hair easier to maintain the process left Green traumatized from the burns and scabs that came with getting her hair relaxed. She could not get away from perms fast enough: “It wasn’t fun and at age thirteen I said ‘no more creamy crack’ and went natural.” Green began to practice braiding her dolls' hair to get the styles right before trying it on her hair.
Years later, while attending university in Windsor, Ontario, Green would become a sought-after hair-braider on her school's campus. Black students came from all parts of Ontario to get their hair done and she was making money.
“My mum had no idea what was keeping me afloat while in university, but through word of mouth, everyone was coming to get their hair done,” laughs Green. A daughter of immigrants, Green’s parents had insisted that she complete her four-year degree. She would graduate in 2018 with a degree in Sociology and a new name “Braida Gyal Rin”.
According to Dr. Maynard, many Black women are using social networks to provide support by engaging in interactive relationships, sharing and obtaining information as it relates to wearing natural hair. Green has used social media to connect with her clients. With the help of a friend, she launched into promoting her services on Instagram, while offering advice on how to maintain healthy natural hair. Soon celebrities like the Toronto Raptors, The New York Mets and more would become her regular clients.
Green recently launched her own line of go-to protective style locks called BGR Boho Locs which can be installed in different ways. They are light-weight, versatile and temporary.
“I promote wearing a protective style from time-to-time but particularly in the colder months,” says Green. She recommends protective styling if women want to maintain hair health, retain moisture and increase length. Protective styles are a good option if a Black woman wants to avoid over manipulating her hair.
“I’ve been wearing faux locs for ten years now, it’s my go-to hairstyle and it works,” says Green.
Back in the Caribbean Black women and girls continue to experience discrimination for wearing locs to work or school. The Royal Barbados Police Force in 2015 revised their dress-code policy enforcing a ban on wearing locs and placed restrictions on its policewomen with natural hairstyles. In July 2020, a Jamaican high court ruled, after a two-year court battle, that a school was within its rights to demand that a five-year-old Black girl cut her locs to attend school.
Jodie Dublin-Dangleben, a civil engineer who is employed by the Government of Dominica, has just decided to loc her natural hair. For her, this is a strategic, yet bold move, for her budding hair-care business.
Dublin-Dangleben has gone through a hair journey that began with relaxed hair. Her job, which includes visiting construction sites, exposed her hair to dirt and other elements on a regular basis and she was washing her hair all the time.
“My [relaxed] hair was breaking so I just got up one morning, took scissors and chopped it off,” says Dublin-Dangleben.
She would soon discover that maintaining natural hair came at a cost. Products for Black women’s hair range from leave-in conditioners to creams and oils. These can cost anywhere from fifty dollars or more a bottle.
A Huffington Post article in February 2020 noted that “Black women spend nine times more on ethnic-targeted beauty and grooming products than the average for all consumers”. It also stated that maintaining natural hair comes with a great deal of work and time.
Dublin-Dangleben was determined to have healthy natural hair and began researching and formulating with shea butter and locally made oils like castor oil and coconut oil.
“I would share my home-made products with my friends and they liked it,” says Dublin-Dangleben. She quickly developed her products into a brand that would target consumers who wanted to maintain their natural hair without breaking the bank.
She would launch to-date six hair products and become the face to their success. This for Dublin- Dangleben means maintaining healthy hair and spotting the latest up-do natural styles. Women reach out to her every day for advice, assistance and to purchase her products.
“Most of the questions I get are like, ‘Jodie my hair cannot lie down, how do I make my hair lie down?’” “Sometimes I have to ask, is your hair tired?”
A creative at heart, Dublin-Dangleben plays the flute and sews corsages so having her hair product line was at first another passion project. This was until demand soared for her root shea butter and moisturizing nectar. Black women were asking for shampoo and leave-in conditioners. She began a natural hair movement in Dominica in 2010 which included photoshoots with “naturalistas” with hopes of inspiring other Black girls to rock their natural hair.
“This became a business and I have a good local market,” says Dublin-Dangleben.
Dublin-Dangleben is working on completing an advanced diploma in organic hair and skincare formulation from an accredited institution by July of 2021. Her next move is to produce hair products that are perfect for locs.
Green hopes to travel more frequently to the U.S. as her American clientele is growing. She also hopes to travel to Africa to learn more about how hair is maintained there and eventually establish a shop in North America.
Lowe is the in-coming vice-president of Women In Maritime Association Caribbean (WIMAC), a regional group of female maritime professionals committed to increasing opportunities for women in the shipping industry while raising awareness of the importance of gender equality.
“I feel like I am a revolutionary. I will fight for what I believe in and that is me being a Black woman with my natural hair, being comfortable and fashionable.” - T. Lowe, 2021
