Black Women’s Transitions to Natural Hair
When I set out to make a documentary about black women who are “transitioning” — cutting off their chemically straightened hair and embracing their natural kinky afro texture — I had no intention of appearing in the film. I felt I was an objective observer and really just wanted to highlight a growing movement. (Of the 50 or so women I struck up conversations with randomly on the street, the vast majority had gone natural within the last three years. According to one industry study, sales of chemical straightening kits, which can be harmful, reportedly dropped by 17 percent between 2006 and 2011.) But including my own story forced me to examine how I felt about my hair with more honesty than ever before.
There are as many “natural hair journeys” as there are transitioning women. What I find remarkable about the movement is the way it is spreading through black women in America. Many are transitioning silently, without much fanfare. Some are inspired by friends and family members who have already made the switch. As Anu Prestonia, the owner of Khamit Kinks, a natural hair salon in Brooklyn, told me, “There’s been an evolutionary process that has turned into a revolution.” It is not an angry movement. Women aren’t saying their motivation is to combat Eurocentric ideals of beauty. Rather, this is a movement characterized by self-discovery and health.
But black hair and the black body generally have long been a site of political contest in American history and in the American imagination. Against this backdrop, the transition movement has a political dimension — whether transitioners themselves believe it or not. Demonstrating this level of self-acceptance represents a powerful evolution in black political expression. If racial politics has led to an internalization of self-loathing, then true transformation will come internally, too. It will not be a performative act. Saying it loud: “I’m black and I’m proud” is one thing. Believing it quietly is another. So the transition movement is much more profound and much more powerful — and I believe it offers lessons in self-acceptance for people of all hues and all genders.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/opinion/black-women-and-natural-hair.html?src=me&ref=general
= new reply since forum marked as read
She looked stunning. Shame Meryl Streep had to ruin her day (Streep won over Davis)
naturally?
White women strighten, perm, curl, cut, color, streak, spray, kink, blow, and otherwise torture their hair on a daily basis. Those advocating "going natural" regarding hair are advocating doing away with the entire beauty salon industry which will adversely affect the employment of mostly women!
Talk about a war on women! 
(Written by a woman who does not more than wash, condition, bursh, and air dry her hair; and who hasn't allowed anyone with scissors, hair color, or any other hair treatment near her since 1985 when the last of a long line of beauticians decided to disregard my instructions on the style of hair cut and impose her own ideas of style on me. (requested: cut my waist length hair to shoulder length -- delivered: my waist length hair cut to chin length.)
(edit: fumble fingers made a bunch of typos)
A Caucasian women in the "old way of thinking" had the ideal hair.
She was held up as the ideal of beauty in America for many years. Caucasian =s Gibson Girl and black equals Aunt Jemima. Those are the AnmericANA images. 
Hmmmm . . . My husband and I just watched the movie Precious which takes place in the late 1980s.
Not only does precious look herself in the mirror and desperately want to see a thin, blonde caucasian girl with blue eyes . . . She later in the movies wished she could be tall, light skinned, with long hair (the house slave ideal)
Me - I went natural in 1997. Buuuuut - it's easier when you are bi-racial with mixed hair texture. I co-poo, oil my scalp at te crown etc etc - and wear it loose wavy/spirals most of the time - and can get it bone straight with a dryer.
I did it because I refuse to try and be 100% something I'm not.
