Book: Michelle Obama and Her Hair
Former FLOTUS’ New Book Joins Black Hairstyles Debate
The recent book published last month by former American First Lady, Michelle Obama, “The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times,” could have been named “The Hair We Carry,” because of the intense interest in what she wrote in the book about her hair, even though there was not much discussion of this topic.
As may be expected, during these years of heavy debate in the U.S. about Black-White relations, which has recently branched into a debate about Black hair, Obama’s writing about her hair became a major issue.
Headlines in major American newspapers and magazines that reviewed the book were mostly about the subject:
The Washington Post: “Michelle Obama says America was not ready for her braids.”
The Hill (In Washington): “Michelle Obama says she had to ease the nation into a first lady with Black hair.”
National Review: “Michelle Obama Says Americans Were ‘Not Ready’ for Her Natural Hair.”
A book that coincided with the publication date of Obama’s book was written by her hair-stylist when she was in the White House, and was titled: “Natural & Curly Hair for Dummies,” which elaborated on Black hair history, texture and care.
In her book, Obama wrote that she considered wearing her hair in African braids while in the White House, but was afraid of being rejected by many Americans with stereotypical views. She said the Americans were “just getting adjusted” to having a Black president and a Black family in the White House. But, “nope, they’re not ready for” African braided hair.
Hair or no hair, she wrote: “For eight years as First Lady, I’d been vigilant and cautious, deeply aware that Barack and I and our two daughters had the eyes of the nation upon us, and that as Black people in a historically white house, we could not afford a single screw-up.”
She added, “I had to make sure I was using my platform to make a meaningful difference, that the issues I worked on were well-executed and also complemented the president’s agenda. I had to protect our kids and help them live with a small level of normalcy, and support Barack as he carried what sometimes felt like the weight of the world.”
Obama related her hair experiences to those of other Black women as they navigated the politics and sensibilities of their workplaces. Although preferring what she described as easier, healthier and safer braids, dreadlocks or Afros, she said she felt the pressure from White beauty standards and workplace norms to chemically straighten her hair for a more professional, “clean-cut” appearance. “We deal with it, the whole thing about, ‘Do you show up with your natural hair?’” Obama said.
Some American commentators criticized this post-George Floyd obsession with Black hair, in reference to the Black man who was killed in Minnesota by a White policeman in 2020 — the killing that ignited the current intense debate about Black-White relations.
This obsession reached the Congress.
Earlier this year the House of Representatives debated Black hairstyles, such as braids and dread, and passed the Crown Act Bill to prohibit discrimination based on someone’s hairstyle, including those “in which hair is tightly coiled or tightly curled, locs, cornrows, twists, braids, Bantu knots, and Afros.”
During the debate a Republican Congressman wondered: “Instead of arguing about sending weapons to Ukraine, here we are arguing about women’s hair styles.” The bill was blocked in the Senate, but now with the Senate controlled by the Democrats, the Senate is expected to pass it.
During the debates in the Congress and during Obama’s own book tour, the subject was engulfed in sensitivities, not only because it involves women’s beauty standards, but also because of the historically difficult relations between Blacks and Whites, and particularly the history of Black women’s relations with Whites — both men and women.
Recently, there have been a few news items about the subject, although most of the time the topic was blown-out of proportion because of the intensity of the debate:
In 2018, a 6-year-old Black boy was blocked from attending school because he wore his locks below his ears. In 2019, a Black TV reporter said her director told her that her natural hair was “unprofessional” and pressured her to change it to “what looks best.” And in 2020, a Black job applicant complained that she was told to have her hair in a “clear-cut” style.
The current book tour by Obama, popular and attended by mostly multi-racial women, sometimes heats up on the subject of Black hair.
During an interview with famous TV personality Ellen DeGeneres, Obama quoted some of her critics saying: “Remember when she wore braids? Those are terrorist braids! Those are revolutionary braids.” Obama, wearing braids during the interview, grabbed her hair and shouted: “Braids, y’all!” to applause from the crowd.
Michelle Obama, more than her husband, former president Barack Obama, has had critical relations with Whites if for no other reason than that the husband is half-White and half-Black. Although the husband, from early on, identified himself as a Black, he has been at ease with Whites, not only because his mother was White, but also, because he was reared by her White parents.
The wife’s tense relations with Whites were documented in her own thesis when she graduated from Princeton University in 1985.
She wrote in the introduction: “My experiences at Princeton have made me far more aware of my ‘blackness’ than ever before … I have found that at Princeton, no matter how liberal and open-minded some of my white professors and classmates try to be toward me, I sometimes feel like a visitor on campus; as if I really don’t belong. Regardless of the circumstances under which I interact with whites at Princeton, it often seems as if, to them, I will always be black first and a student second.”
In the thesis, titled “Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community,” Obama wrote about a future of “further integration and/or assimilation into a white cultural and social structure that will only allow me to remain on the periphery of society; never becoming a full participant.”
Well, Obama now is not “on the periphery” and is a “full participant.”
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Book: “The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times”
Author: Michelle Obama
Publisher: Crown, New York
Paper Pages: 336
Paper: $16.89
Electronic: $16.99
