Beauty Shop Politics

Looking through the lens of black business history, Beauty Shop Politics shows how black beauticians in the Jim Crow era parlayed their economic independence and access to a public community space into platforms for activism. Tiffany M. Gill argues that the beauty industry played a crucial role in the creation of the modern black female identity and that the seemingly frivolous space of a beauty salon actually has stimulated social, political, and economic change. With a broad scope that encompasses the role of gossip in salons, ethnic beauty products, and the social meanings of African American hair textures, Gill shows how African American beauty entrepreneurs built and sustained a vibrant culture of activism in beauty salons and schools.

Looking through the lens of black business history, Beauty Shop Politics shows how black beauticians in the Jim Crow era parlayed their economic independence and access to a public community space into platforms for activism. Tiffany M. Gill argues that the beauty industry played a crucial role in the creation of the modern black female identity and that the seemingly frivolous space of a beauty salon actually has stimulated social, political, and economic change. From the founding of the National Negro Business League in 1900 and onward, African Americans have embraced the entrepreneurial spirit by starting their own businesses, but black women's forays into the business world were overshadowed by those of black men. With a broad scope that encompasses the role of gossip in salons, ethnic beauty products, and the social meanings of African American hair textures, Gill shows how African American beauty entrepreneurs built and sustained a vibrant culture of activism in beauty salons and schools. Enhanced by lucid portrayals of black beauticians and drawing on archival research and oral histories, Beauty Shop Politics conveys the everyday operations and rich culture of black beauty salons as well as their role in building community.

"Black is Beautiful!" The words were the exuberant rallying cry of a generation of black women who threw away their straightening combs and adopted a proud new style they called the Afro. The Afro, as worn most famously by Angela Davis, became a veritable icon of the Sixties. Although the new beauty standards seemed to arise overnight, they actually had deep roots within black communities. Tracing her story to 1891, when a black newspaper launched a contest to find the most beautiful woman of the race, Maxine Leeds Craig documents how black women have negotiated the intersection of race, class, politics, and personal appearance in their lives. Craig takes the reader from beauty parlors in the 1940s to late night political meetings in the 1960s to demonstrate the powerful influence of social movements on the experience of daily life. With sources ranging from oral histories of Civil Rights and Black Power Movement activists and men and women who stood on the sidelines to black popular magazines and the black movement press, Ain't I a Beauty Queen? will fascinate those interested in beauty culture, gender, class, and the dynamics of race and social movements.

First published in 1984, Face Value confronts the pervasive power of beauty through art and literature, as well as interviews with men and women with varying perspectives on the subject. The topics covered range widely: the history of beauty from the Greeks to the present; the pathology of beauty: how women have been willing to harm themselves, mentally and physically, to achieve ‘beauty’; the language we use to speak of beauty, and its implications; our attitudes towards beauty, as examined by psychologists; beauty and ethnic identity; men and beauty. The authors present in fact a redefinition of beauty, enabling both women and men to enjoy it in themselves and in others, while discarding the sex-role stereotypes that have governed the definition of beauty in the past. With a new preface that explores the gaps created by time in the book’s discourse, this book will be of interest to students of linguistics, gender studies, women’s studies, cultural studies, sociology and anthropology.

The growth of the service economy, widespread acceptance of cosmetic technologies, expansion of global media, and the intensification of scrutiny of appearance brought about by the internet have heightened the power of beauty ideals in everyday life. A range of interdisciplinary contributions by an international roster of established and emerging scholars will introduce students to the emergence of debates about beauty, including work in history, sociology, communications, anthropology, gender studies, disability studies, ethnic studies, cultural studies, philosophy, and psychology. The Routledge Companion to Beauty Politics is an essential reference work for students and researchers interested in the politics of appearance. Comprising over 30 chapters by a team of international contributors the Handbook is divided into six parts: Theorizing Beauty Politics Competing Definitions of Beauty Beauty, Activism, and Social Change Body Work Beauty and Labor Beauty and the Lifecourse The Routledge Companion to Beauty Politics is essential reading for students in Women and Gender Studies, Sociology, Media Studies, Communications, Philosophy, and Psychology.

We all know there is a politics of skin color, but is there a politics of hair?In this book, Noliwe Rooks explores the history and politics of hair and beauty culture in African American communities from the nineteenth century to the 1990s. She discusses the ways in which African American women have located themselves in their own families, communities, and national culture through beauty advertisements, treatments, and styles. Bringing the story into today's beauty shop, listening to other women talk about braids, Afros, straighteners, and what they mean today to grandmothers, mothers, sisters, friends, and boyfriends, she also talks about her own family and has fun along the way. Hair Raising is that rare sort of book that manages both to entertain and to illuminate its subject.

Previous work discussing Black beauty has tended to concentrate on Black women's search for white beauty as a consequence of racialization. Without denying either the continuation of such aesthetics or their enduring power, this book uncovers the cracks in this hegemonic Black beauty. Drawing on detailed ethnographic research amongst British women of Caribbean heritage, this volume pursues a broad discussion of beauty within the Black diaspora contexts of the Caribbean, the UK, the United States and Latin America through different historical periods to the present day. With a unique exploration of beauty, race and identity politics, the author reveals how Black women themselves speak about, negotiate, inhabit, work on and perform Black beauty. As such, it will appeal not only to sociologists, but anyone working in the fields of race, ethnicity and post-colonial thought, feminism and the sociology of the body.

From the civil rights and Black Power era of the 1960s through antiapartheid activism in the 1980s and beyond, black women have used their clothing, hair, and style not simply as a fashion statement but as a powerful tool of resistance. Whether using stiletto heels as weapons to protect against police attacks or incorporating African-themed designs into everyday wear, these fashion-forward women celebrated their identities and pushed for equality. In this thought-provoking book, Tanisha C. Ford explores how and why black women in places as far-flung as New York City, Atlanta, London, and Johannesburg incorporated style and beauty culture into their activism. Focusing on the emergence of the "soul style" movement—represented in clothing, jewelry, hairstyles, and more—Liberated Threads shows that black women's fashion choices became galvanizing symbols of gender and political liberation. Drawing from an eclectic archive, Ford offers a new way of studying how black style and Soul Power moved beyond national boundaries, sparking a global fashion phenomenon. Following celebrities, models, college students, and everyday women as they moved through fashion boutiques, beauty salons, and record stores, Ford narrates the fascinating intertwining histories of Black Freedom and fashion.